Sunday, June 21, 2009

For the Iranian People

On Receiving Word

In its wavy scrim heat becomes visible and things, illusory

like the low-slung strip of buildings where the Sanctuary Church

sidles up to The Dollar Store. Somewhere

miracles are occurring.

The squirrel is not being raped,

small feet not triggering unattended mines.

My friend’s wife is not missing

So much is a search

for the imagined. The purse, shoes and empty

bottle trailing neatly to a door. The plumb line dropped

to center. The self as much a ghost

as language or time or God.

Clouds not shuffling past like penitents.

New leaves not murmuring the wind like mystics beyond speech.

For one blessed moment, the sky—

lucid and free of suffering.


(On Receiving Word, Finishing Line Press, 2008)


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