in the gold realm

ASCENSION DAY

My friend Chris in New Zealand

emailed (on Ascension Day)

about that homely display

of bare feet, trampolining to cloud

in the Lorenzetti fresco (or

was it Philip Guston?)

under the superscription

of a proscenium arch.  Flower

of early Renaissance mind

echoing (if necessary)

your mirror-quality

of reality.  Who will so bend

the boarhound from the boar,

Raven from Nevermore?

Is this your last cigar?

Plein air puffs from a planet’s core.

Limestone shreds of the labyrinth

at Chartres were sort of a letdown.

Rough work.  All the gold gone.

The mower set out to mow... absinthe

green, moss green clasping the scent.

The emerald pentagram

shadowed in the sheep’s I AM

quickens the dead husks in a fundament

of everlasting life; & when the Eternal comes

it will be as we remembered

in the gold realm of childhood –

when time swells (the drone lingers, hums).

6.14.19