The Present Tense
THE PRESENT TENSE (please click to watch) You wake up and the room is empty the light is out There’s that high-pitched ringing…
One day three angels came into my back garden and
stared at me through the window
one was red one was black one was yellow
and their voices sounded like bells
They stood as a trio of lights trembling in the air
their gazes were purple beams so fine
they were more like ultraviolet rays
but then their gazes became molecular highways through the normal
and anything might travel on them to my door
The three angels rippled expectantly though didn’t gesture for me to
join them nor refuse that possibility
we simply existed in two spaces separated by a window
that would otherwise be one
me inside the house looking out
they in the backyard garden surround by variegations of green
looking in
And while this wasn’t actually a vision or
visitation it was an inspiration in
words that came unbidden and opened a
viewing perspective in my imaginal mind
bubbles up from the heart animating it
then the mind figuring out or waiting for an explanation of
who they were or what they did which was
faithful to a reality that not only
could have happened there on the grass in the
shadows of the fence under blue sky
but actually did and is still happening in these
written lines as they turn to form a circle of
sparkles almost disappearing as they
rotate hand in hand their long bright
Technicolor peacock-feather wings
whisking through the air making truly exotic flowers
bloom to firework fullness as they turn I didn’t even know were
there until
some of the sky descends and the earth seems to
bend upward as if for a kiss
and the three angels all turn their faces once more to
look at me and now’ve become more
glance than features more eye light than
physical delineation until actually they’ve
disappeared altogether leaving only the
garden scintillating with an unbeforeseen
brightness described now where
before each leaf and tendril-curl existed in its
own light each grass blade trembled in breezes
Now the garden is brought to life by
an ecstatic exhalation of amber-hued breath so vast
each whale in creation inhales it as it surfaces and
circulates it through its huge bulk as it dives back
into sea darkness
thankfully serene
8/8/2002 (from Through Rose Colored Glasses)
Categories: Poems