bateaux of old Louisiana

SPEECHLESS GIFT

It was 50 years ago now, Julie.

We were with the sleepers

in a dream, the jumpers

on a fogbound bridge – our odyssey

a sleepwalk of necessity

from day to day.  America

was manifest, a replica

of heaven for the taking – see?

This land was made for you & me.

But you & I sank down

into Pacific depths, my clown,

so young, so sad, so gone.  Ahey

ey yo.  It’s in the bottomland

or on the ocean floor

you’ll find the coral door,

the seashell, Pearl – your eye-in-hand.

Like Joan of A. moored to a smoking pyre

or O. still singing in Leviathan-jaw

bateaux of old Louisiana

meet like rose petals in a western choir.

& the Word-made-light, that sank into the clay

sprang up again, as speechless gift

in the dome where every tongue will lift

& feed upon her painful vine (his dying-day).

Our ghost-dance, Julie – tiptoe in a dream.

JB whispers, Eurydice!

& circuiting the dome with me

hums from Rez graveyard in a Joan A-frame.

12.11.19