Friday, September 25, 2009

No Graying

People snipped away at my faith in people,

but at 13, the scissors slipped.

My insides ventured out and squinted

in the light.


Stars, enormity, light stomachs, fluttering, me, you.

Every person is a blowfish, and every

morning a validation.

She: paper chains, longer than I thought. You:

clothes made of locked doors and parallels,

and I: out by the river, the only quiet place

I could think of.


A cold blade, the water; my feet,

the renewal of winter, the twist

of a Coke cap, the forgetting of absolved sins,

the slick rocks kicked

gently along the bed.

Voices. A voice.


I confess, I have at times wished for Hell,

if only to be alone for a while.

But a doe on the other bank

reminds me of my need.

The Waiting Room

The TV has a happy ending

again: newborn baby,

glistening mother, father;

no longer to wait

for rescue. Every breath is prayer,

thanksgiving, star-linings, coloring.


Her eyes fall back to the coloring

on the wall: a mural of children, ending

with the serenity prayer

in the corner. The things I cannot change. Her baby

in the room, lungs pried by tubes. Wait

upon the Lord, like Abraham, father


of many babies. Our Father,

who art in heaven, coloring

the air with presence, angels like lilies wait

on you. For thine is the power. Enough ending

for now. The size of her hand, this baby,

this lily, the magnitude of her prayer.


David had been here, too, becoming prayer,

a heap of sackcloth, no father,

no water, interceding, all for his, his baby,

who could pray only with a cough, coloring

everything with gray and stillness, and in days, ending,

weightless, the wait.


What to do in the waiting room, but wait, and wait,

and in waiting, find that waiting is prayer,

and prayer is the beginning and ending

and middle of the unpartitioned Father;

dimensionless light coloring

existences and lives alike. Her pale baby,


eyes closed. Lily-white baby,

flying wherever she will. A hymn too: We wait

for Thee 'midst toil and pain, something-something sighing. Coloring

drains. It shouldn't be like this. Hannah's prayer

answered, and now David's prayer hanging, father-

ing the night. It can be only God's ending.


Another baby cough, fragrant prayer,

to wait more patiently upon the Father

of all photons, coloring, becoming, ending.