Due to a lot on my plate, the Fortnightly Book will be delayed slightly this weekend, as well; I've just run out of time actually to finish the post, as I am helping with a confirmation retreat and preparing for the start of Fall term.
Crowns
On an early morn I walked a road
past ancient oak trees bent and bowed;
the grass was dewed, the sky was dark
the breezes played with shadows stark.
Afar arose a mountain high
with vastness sheer that touched the sky;
behind, the sun shed glory bright:
a shadow-king with a crown of light.
And then my mind went walking, too.
I thought of me, I thought of you,
and the wishing hopes that never found
a way to grow in thorny ground.
Astute aurora slowly spawned;
melancholy was the golden dawn
like tales I've heard since I was born
of peasant king with crown of thorn.
In life we walk a darkling night,
and peace is rare without a fight.
But faces through the years grown worn
still memories with hopes adorn,
like sunrise red. Our shadowed mind
will someday leave our fears behind
when elders throw their bodies down
before the Throne and cast their crowns.
Laid Low
Every life ends in a loss with lonely grief;
all lovers rise and, rising, softly leave;
the lights upon the high and canvas sky
glimmer off and fade, afraid to die
but dying nonetheless, then endless void;
and we are left to live with loss and lie.
The wind on stormy wave moves unsettled sea
but on the sand-scored stone there will not be
the slightest tremor; Heaven let it be
the stone, not sea, that settles inside me.
Every sun will set to fade to gnawing night,
all faith to fear, and reverence to flight,
all love to loss, as sweetness turns to sigh,
all life to death, for love itself can die
and fall in shallow grave beside the road,
till mind alone is left, and shattered heart, to cry.
The sailor in the storm who is swallowed by the sea
struggles in his pain, but then is free;
first fear from love of life, but soon from life then freed.
Swiftly come the last; the first -- short may it be.
People always leave; that's what people do.
We gain new friends to lose our friends anew;
not knowledge, might, or wealth will surcease buy,
for all will cease, all will fall, all will die,
all will fail, all deeds and works of man,
all laid low that once, but once, was high.
The Space Between My Words
The space between my words is formed of steel;
the silence in the sound is iron-wrought.
As temples formed of stone can only rise
inside an empty space, as written words
will not be writ on any page not blank,
so thought itself, and voice, and deed, and life,
require a frame on which to build and rise,
an empty volume for a soaring spire,
a place to write, a silence framing song,
without which all would fall and crash to dust.
And never need I fear my words will fall:
the space between my words is formed of steel,
supporting all my thoughts as they appear:
a buttress certain holds up rising walls,
a silence, more than void, a soil where sound
can grow a garden fruitful with Amens.
