scribe's tattoo

RIVER WAVES

I miss the mourning doves of Providence

at the end of September

amid these amber

sheaves of wheat (gleaned evidence

of Morning Star).  A new immigrant’s

landed in Minneapolis

light gray, with neckpiece

of black-white bands.  Postulant’s

collar, mayhap?  Or a scribe’s tattoo

ably marked upon the neck

like Isaac or Melchizedek

or some Eurasian collared coo-coo

hums b-flat from the fiery furnace

of her supernatural

affection (international

orange toucan, maybe – or Falcon-Ace)

& so transfigures frozen Everyman

out of his callous armor

into another feathered Amor

winging like an arrow back to Magdalen

& turning to golden almond in her hand

like the sun beheld by Ondine

underwater (bright, serene).

As river waves lap softly overland

her clear tone modulates the earth

back to its mended origin

within your warm all-human

clasp (chastened Columbia’s rebirth).

9.30.19

like a willow bird-basket

DOVE-FLUTE

As Hart’s Admiral of the Ocean Sea

inched toward his New World

or Derry’s Columba (Pearl

Harbor child) anchored his monastery

like a coracle of Ionian gold

in the rêvesonge of an orrery...

So that Prince Hal Harry

leant upon Hobo’s broken shoulder

in order to meld his Camelot tall tale

into a pilot’s river-rumors.

Driftwood-heavy humors,

welded like Jeanne d’Arc in jail

to the high dream of moral freedom –

each bright soul’s laboratory

of liberty (that’s the main story,

from Memphis to Melchizedek-welcome).

O the hollow heart of him Joan lifted!

Like a willow bird-basket

(1132 tons of Itasca

taconite) nailed to Galahad-helmet;

in the clay banks, at the matrix

of four rivers, where

a raven’s bone-flute sauntered

through the air.  Mourning genetrix

for son of Abraham (Jack-in-the-box);

sweet shibboleth of 5-2-9

transmuting sacrificial wine

to shocks of wheat (her arc’s bright locks).

9.21.19

at the end of summa

SURSUM CORDA

These heart-shaped leaves of the cottonwood –

yellow-black memories,

your excavated face

from the dark archive of branded blood.

Leavings from an old mosaic, my Psyche;

yearnings you magnetized

like a Tombs Angel surprised

me from despair – desire molting to fiery

grace.  Loose, unloose these cords,

sister Cordelia –

churnagogue Jonah,

heart’s winepress of happy candle-words.

I hear hands clap together

this little light of mine

I’m gonna let it shine...

through the funhouse mirror

mend you ways, O Minotaur

sacre du printemps

bête pour FIN DU TEMPS

so you may stand with sisters

brothers   in the great congregation

at the end of summa

when the threads draw

taut (1132)   Rabbi, Rab Ravelin

sursum corda   my clay Columbia

as out of the flaming kiln

the milky waters spill

& your glad-sparrow brother sighs   selah

9.18.19

translated to an island

SIMPLE IMMANENCE

Constitution Day.  Coke’s legacy,

translated to an island rose –

mother & nurse of repose

on the throne of Imago Dei – si?

Your lambswool, Giuliana – moss-green

through the red-dust desert.

Alighieri’s tomb, in quiet

(such as lie, smothered in grass, by San

Vitale).  Twin peacocks, maybe –

between two almond trees?

In the Ferrara freeze

(Micòl shivering in her garage)... see?

Your solar emblems not for me,

Ezra.  Marble from Ravenna

swiped for Rimini, & gloria –

the simple immanence of meek Marie

shunned like a ghetto-child.  & so

the merry-go-round of sacrifice

creaks back to 1913, Paris...

Ugo, Parisina, burnt to ash once more

for the war to end all wars (before

the end).  A rust-bronze Penny

blackens backward, in Gehenna –

from dim crossroad will she soar

like diamond Southern Cross.  She is

lips’ ghost dance ring-

around-the-rosy... clear spring

Pax-water (your West Branch Isis).

9.17.19

Rab Ravlin was a weaver bred

SILVER TRACK

Summer’s gliding toward those falls.

The sumac swords are rusted

iron.  Below the nested

locks (St. Anthony), swift sculls

are water-spiders on a dragon’s back.

Hobo Larva... Henry

Woodpecker, monarch (maybe)...

all worm, Noman?  Whose silver track,

mercurial, serpentine?  I was

the wolf in Sheep’s Clothing,

tearing Ariadne’s weaving,

trading lux for lechery (luxurious);

I was the shadow of the waxing moon

purling beneath Pearl Harbor

Day – casting her bitter

part across the bar (Frisco Lagoon).

Now crickets rattle in the looming dusk,

a chorus, waiting in its wings.

1132, the catgut sings –

our heavy grave (in one cicada husk).

Only the lightest antigravity

can spark the dark menorah

in the heart of King Henrah.

Lonely almond of sheer pity

welling forth Father of Waters...

what was Magdala stone

becoming human Union

(steely pontoon, welding 4 quarters).

9.16.19

glare attracts birds

MIGRANT ZONE

      “But,” she added, “a tribute that kills thousands of birds?  Is that really 

                what we want?” – NY Times, 9.11.19

Little Alex was in love with them.

Would run out to the “woody

area” (floored with heavy

twisted vines) & note their thrum

of peregrine wing-calls; run back, report.

He was 20 when the Towers

fell.  Now he’s in the painters’

guild – swings from scaffolds out

in Portland (surfaced a new public school

this summer).  Everyone

knows someone so, dangling on

the perimeter of gravity (lead’s rule).

Edgar Brightman says, each body

is an etching of God’s mind –

that Personage who’s fond

of persons that we are (might be).

It is some Berryman-Osiris dream

of emerald Ireland, or

Mannahatta... out of mire-

bleared violets, one twin-beam

(ineffable, 4 miles up into night).

The glare attracts birds

(like glamorous words

of bright adhesive poem).  Raven, kite...

– bad omens, harnessed by our own

self-heightening memorials.

Yet... all my trials,

Lord.  DOVE LIBERATES LOVE’S MIGRANT ZONE.

9.11.19

New York Times, 9.11.19

narrow waist of driftwood

SPINDLY FENCE

Summer fading into gray skullcap.

Henry with his brass trombone

& Hobo his hypnotic loon

shore up the railroad tracks with sap

of clammy shellfish scree (Rhode Island

sound).  My Providence,

your looming salience;

lines on a brow dwindled by sand

down a narrow waist of driftwood

sundial.  Stentorian

Henry, like a milk train

wreck, bundles through the neighborhood...

but it shall not be so with you.

Glance of dark green

(like black-eyed Susan)

measuring its circuit-wheel of blue

& blazing gold.  Iris of promise

under one lead sentence

(autumn rain).  A spindly

fence holds back the dunes for this,

my gift of dried-up horseshoe crab –

like a seahorse Pegasus

planted on Cain’s verses

(Falcon-Ace, clipped in rehab).

I’m only whispering to you.

From now on, friend,

faithful to the end –

where love is borne (rosemary, rue).

9.9.19