Looking and Seeing
The hardwood trees knocked to see if He was there and He replied but He was not there And the rainfall straight down sought…
A sandwich at noon is enough to
frighten a field of crows
A telephone ringing in an empty room is
answered by the wind
A road leading upward has a
bicycle on it and two trees
When the blessings were brought in
the sun rolled to a stop
Going past the stables all the black horses
flared their nostrils at once
The month of light was sealed and sent to its
Divine Recipient the year we
lived in trees and
sang at dawn
There’s a stubbornness in refusing to flow
out the gate onto the fresh fields of
clover and recently turned pasturage
The celebration began when the moon
turned into a table set with
silver utensils and Samarkand oranges
Rainbows seemed to fill every window
from multiple light sources
The room spun around while we
remained still but it never went
faster than the earth’s rotation
and the spiralling stars
Young girl acrobats stood on
each other’s shoulders almost reaching
the moon
Daylight fills every corner and awakens
the mouse family
Grandpa told this in story form and it
all cohered
But today is another day and the
dolphins have all departed
back to their pods
Does the earth revolve toward us or
away from us?
Does the sky pass behind us
or ahead of us?
Take a step in any direction
and you’re home
where the celebration continues
until dawn though the
rooster may not crow it open
flopping his red crown
I’ve covered a lot of ground sitting here
and don’t intend to correct it
I try not to be out with my sheep
when God visits my hovel
but the north side of the mountain gets chilled
before a fire can be properly stoked
I hear a buzz of words in the air
mixed with a buzz of insects and the
usual high frequency buzz in my ears
I take as celestial music
Deciphering is all we do and we do it
best in our sleep
I greet anyone intrepid enough to speak
and anyone foolhardy enough to listen
It’s over now
The dawn is up
A new day’s begun
30 Ramadan (2011) (from Ramadan is Burnished Sunlight)
Categories: Poems, Ramadan / 'Eid, Fasting