4.10.2017

the law is not a sword


WILD GRAPES

A timid April tiptoes toward
her Spring.  Gun-gray sky,
leaf-brown river.  Hobo’s eye
moseys from earth to heaven (&

backward, again).  Raven loops
his knotty diagram,
figures 8 a.m.
some eats (thin scraps he scoops

betwixt instinctual communal hates
of squawky flocks, nations).
Noah’s inflammations
Eli salts – warns, Don’t be late.

Fuming smoke signals just
add to his unease.
Alighieri aims to please –
his bones rest in Franciscan dust,

his narrow beak angles from spark
to spark.  Hearth-embers
flicker out drear winters of
scalding be-ice.  Imperial dark

is splintered by gold threads of light –
lamb-thin graphene ravels
the cave-mouth – mangy hovels
hearken to trompette marine (slight

return).  Apollinaire or Orpheus,
shepherds in New Orleans,
Ravenna... rustic scenes.
Under an overpass (U.S.

               *

or Rus) refugees convene,
lean farmers share
their plows... while everywhere
stones ricochet like bayonets (mean

answers mean, unkind unkind).
The law is not a sword;
it is a binding word
uniting variable humankind

proceeds from love, & so returns –
one warm traveling lamp
from isolated camp to camp
where Roger & Canonicus trade yarns

& Edward Elk defends each Everyone
upon egalitarian
thread-frame (one golden
safety net for all the wobbly children

of sweet Manitou).  Cautantowwit
whispers a Narragansett
name over each hamlet-
nest in Providence.  Let’s eat.

The gathering of crumbs, wild grapes
& hobos has begun.
Mississippi sun
beams west, southwest... Pacific shapes

crest arcs of rainbow (orange, indigo,
azure & rose)... an Ocean
State anchors her span –
Hope’s incarnation (Jonah show).

4.10.17

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