cry

April 12, 2023

ON THE WING

From watching them in flight
I know that great egrets fly
with their hinge neck folded in
while Sandhill cranes extend theirs.

By listening carefully, I know
the cry of the male limpkin, his lower
than his female partner, while
the cry of the hawk only creates fear
in those who might be its prey, and
the male Cardinal shows
infinite patience calling out
for a mate who never arrives.
I can see and hear all of these
but I cannot begin to tell you why
for when I asked the birds, all
replied with a variation on
“that’s just the way things are,
but why do you want to know?”

February 5, 2023

WORDS, WORDS, WORDS

They can have sharp edges
that wound on contact, some cuts
so deep they leave lasting scars.

They can get stuck in the throat
until you feel you can no longer
breathe, no longer cry out for help.

They can lie there, an
aggregate always acreting
and yet rejecting any meaning.

Or they can, carefully chosen
present great beauty, offer
hope, promise freedom.

They are the currency of poets
and writers, and they chronicle
our history and our lives.

November 22, 2022

WE WANT, AGAIN

We want to cry out,
but we have no words.

We want to scream
but all we give is silence.

We want to curse the invader
but cannot be heard
over the tanks, bombs
and rockets.

We want to mourn
but there are so many
innocents, where
do we begin?

We want to act,
but we are incapable
and can offer
only silent prayer.

November 10, 2022

THE SAINT OF UNCOUNTED NAMES

A desert again,
always a desert
and she the saint
of uncounted names,
her crying eases, no
smile appears for this
Madonna of the coyotes,
her orange-orbed eyes
shuttered against the
slowly retreating sun.
Once her tears watered
the desert sands, mixed
with the blood of a Christ
now long forgotten, trans-
substantiated into a spirit
we formed in our image,
no longer we in his.
The Blessed Mother
watches, holding hope,
holding space, holding
a serenity we cannot
fathom in our search
for divine justification.
She remembers, she mourns,
for what ought to be, and waits
for the windwalkers
to pull the blanket
of stars over her.

First published in Liquid Imagination, Issue 52, October 2022
http://liquidimagination.silverpen.org/

October 18, 2022

UNANSWERED

There are so many questions for which I have never gotten an answer. What, for instance, does one who is lactose intolerant cry over? If the rest is history, can’t we just stop now and read it later? And if every cloud has that silver lining, it has been well seeded, so why isn’t it raining? If you sleep on the left side of the bed, do you always get up on the wrong side? And when I answer your next question, I will start by saying “to be dishonest with you.” What will you do with that, Epimenides?

July 27, 2021

DIFFERENT TODAY

The air we breathe is different today,
and we inhale more deeply
with the energy of our youth.

The tears we cry today are not
solely tears of loss and sorrow,
but also of promise and hope.

The wine that we drink today
will be the same as before, but
now sweeter on the tongue.

The sleep that we sleep tonight
will be deep, nightmares banished,
dreaming of a brighter future.

The songs that we sing today
we have sung a thousand times
but on this day the words have meaning.

February 14, 2018

A DIFFERENT WORLD

In a different world,
I would write you stories, poems,
that would bring a tear to your eye,
that would make you laugh even when
your mood would deny joy,
that would bring freedom to some
and loosen the shackles on many,
that would reflect peace,
that would lighten your burden,
that would heal, if only small wounds,
that would recall a better world
and enable its rebirth.
In a different world
I would write you stories,
but we live in this world
and these are the words I have.