SINGLE SPOKE
These quiet late winter days. My mother
lies in her small bed.
The past is not restored
but rows to its island across the water.
I see it in the distance, there –
dark rocks, pines wrapped
in mist. What happened
to those springing years? Vibrant affair
of VISTA volunteers… Rhode Island
skipping in my early heart.
JFK’s Newport.
A tiny sea-casket of azure, sand
in the dawn mirror of a rose lighthouse
casting Roger’s heart’s eye-
beam – his Providential replica
of conscience-liberty (human Cosmopolis).
You elevate my Minnesota grain
toward your red-violet wine
welding human & divine
on the river’s leaping arch – then
paddle further… through green pillars
from Columbia to Gravesend,
Pocahontas Williams (raven-
haired pilot for milky stars).
Where the Wain of Charles is chartered
to an evergreen holm oak –
your Ocean State a single spoke
spinning my reel & sarabande, wholehearted.
3.10.20
