Hopelessness

What was it like when I didn't believe?

How could I live? All that I saw I knew,

all that I knew I saw, but nothing else.

The world was leagues of quantifiable data,

geographies, encyclopedia, and science

forgetting quality. What was it like

when I wallowed in a lowly hopelessness?

A choice to see no future, no magic,

no angel, and no miracle. Was I

impoverished in a deconstructed ethic?

No longer am I shackled by the map

of yesterday's identity, now I rise

free from name and description, believing

in everything that I may never know.

She's the governor, the ruler, the mad designer

She's the governor, the ruler, the mad designer,

the sundial that counts the trembling hours,

my sovereign granting final legitimacy

to the state and station I've established.

She's who I ought to capitalize, her grace

determines my will, she's the awful sin

that draws the trees and flowers from the earth

toward a trembling cloud pregnant with life.

She's the architect of cities, the author

making fruitful choices, dispensing wrath

and justice at her terribly senseless whim,

remaining mysteriously beyond our reason.

Yet I have a faith that I should not have,

and give thanks for my total depravity.

It's the shimmer of an ineffable beam

It's the shimmer of an ineffable beam,
it's the baffling way the measure seems,
it's the difficult textures of the form
that charge me to make daring claims
for the dignity of a dazzling prism.

Red memories deliver the loud alarm,
bitter thoughts render a low doom,
tender visions ornament the vast dome
whirling about us in foolish rhythm.

If slumber brings me a poignant arm
while the creeping luminaries roam
the vault of sky obscured by storms,
I shall choose to hold my faith firm.

It's the glitter of an ephemeral moon,
it's the fleeting rose finally in bloom,
it's the perfect and enduring kingdom
that inspires me to grasp the steam
wandering between tulips who squirm.

To recognize the overwhelming swarm
of paralyzing spirit and the easy slam
of beautiful truth only just proclaimed
between the syllables of a poor poem,

then remember the calm, whimsical hum
of the indescribable and holy freedom
affirmed by a voice across the chasm
of our unspeakably sublime dream.

Tossed in the wind like the oak branches

Tossed in the wind like the oak branches
battering the old window, thinking myself
higher than any teacher, then thrown about
like a tired ship in a merciless tempest.
Cast like a joke into a secular nonsense
ignoring meaning, imagining that I rule
this broad path, that I'm the lawgiver
launching myself toward a good object.
Yet the heave of thunderstorms is beyond
my understanding, the abject absurdity
of a world without god becomes apparent.
The fictions of an individual cannot
be where I place my trust: the hereafter
is the authority that governs my way.

The way she listens to me talk, the light

The way she listens to me talk, the light
across her yielding cheek, the broken
flowers sitting on the desk, the blinds
and how they separate us from each other.
The truth she sings to me, the delicate
sadness of her gaze, the easy loneliness
she feels that's just like mine, how she is
a perfect mirror of my vulnerable self.
The ocean cannot hold her, nor the sky,
the trees can't comprehend her soft breeze,
nor flowers understand her fine sunlight.
No words describe her, no image captures
the mystery of her figure; though I stammer
I yet chant the high things of her love.

It was her yellowed skin, a green morning

It was her yellowed skin, a green morning
between cottonwood trees. I'd never felt
the flavor of the plum, the violet heave
of her insides before the dome awakens.

It was her soured lip, a sweet beginning
to a miserable vanity. I'd never heard
her tongue inside my body, the gold curve
of her brow bringing darkness to the dust.

What could it be? What is the awful sight
of her wearied eye? The neglected person
hidden beyond this anguished identity?

But shall we be released of this smell
of blood? Shall we ever taste the fruit
of our labor despite the dreadful storm?

If the striking brow by which this eye gazes

If the striking brow by which this eye gazes,
from which good judgment proceeds faithfully,
had turned away this spiritless darkness
by proclaiming its love will rightly linger,

my sighs would declare their honest thanks
for this tenderness that has finally expelled
the low ignorance, the seclusion and illness
where I dwelt for many moons desperately.

And once stark obscurity would be removed
by rapture swallowing my basic weaknesses,
staying with me throughout the long night.

The grief in my eyes would be assuaged
by an intense love ultimately expressed
in the serene refuge of this weary person.