Thursday, January 19, 2017

Allison Grayhurst writes



  Building Walls of Personal Mercy


It is us without the air - 
leverage, no height, 
clinging to discipline not 
because we fear we will float, but 
to stop ourselves from sinking 
into the immense dead mire dread, boulevards 
of toxic fumes rising 
from wastelands, landfill sites gone 
under water into our heart-space, 
body-space, collapsing.

It is us blind to the fullness of fun, 
proclaiming praise on a settled angel’s shoulders. 
Around a field, running to milk 
the burning lungs of their breath, 
touch duty with presence of mind, to do service 
so curtains don’t close like sealing metal sheets, 
lest moving becomes momentous, then impossible.

Take fruit from the windowsill, 
it is our ripeness cradled in the lonely early morning – 
prayers, a battle against a threatening tide.

Watch the birds with me, 
make peace with the emerging worms. 
We know our place, what can save 
and what is substitute.
 
 Worms -- Wilhelm Neusser



 

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