The heart moans and mourns
Prickly with arrows of doubt.
Restlessness, like a hot, heavy ember
Sits upon a throne of confusion
Hidden under folds of mental shadow
Evading scrutiny and defying reason

Why? Cry you, “Why?”
For what does the heart mourn so?
What is this secret weight
Beneath which I am crushed
Whose name is unknown even to me
And yet calls itself my master?

What answer should I give you?
And what would you understand?
How shall I reply, that you would hear?
What can I reveal, that you would see?
For a pall is upon your understanding,
And what shall I say to you?

Shall I remind you that you are far from home?
Shall I point out that you walk in the midst of wolves?
Will you recognize the sword that has wounded you,
And see that it lies in your own hand?
Why do you remember that the valley is dark,
And forget the brightness of the approaching dawn?

Why do you forget your poverty?
You go about naked, and wonder at the cold.
Why do you forget your frailty?
You approach claws and teeth unarmed,
Bringing no shield to bear against the foe,
And will you complain of many wounds?

Have you forgotten that I have conquered?
You have despaired of my promise.
Is there anything above my command?
But you rather fear wretched princes.
Where is my Name powerless?
You never call upon me in faith.

But these things you will not understand.
You are surrounded by thick darkness.
Too terrible for you, this knowledge,
You will not see, you cannot hear.
Come then, and hearken.
I will speak, and you will know.

You are never alone in your suffering.
The Face of the Lord streams with tears
The Spirit of God groans with pain
The Eternal One cries out in agony
The Heart of Love is grieved
Hope Himself trembles in terror.

Look and see whether there is any solidarity
Like my solidarity; there is not.
Do you think your flesh is a costume to me?
Is your grief for me a mask?
Do you think human tears are a dance I perform?
Do you suppose I mime my wretchedness?

No; your breath fills my lungs
Your blood runs in my veins
Your bones ache beneath my flesh
Your sorrow pierces my soul
Your anguish chokes my heart
Your shame flushes my cheeks.

I howl in misery beside you;
I did not design you for chains;
So I’ll be bound likewise beside you
And moan your secret pains.
I do not know your hurt because I have made it;
I know your hurt because I bear the same scars.

I have drunk and have tasted and had my fill of your thirst;
Come, drink now of my fullness!
Your hunger has burned in the pit of my being;
Come, eat without price!
I have broken my back ‘neath the weight of your guilt;
Come to me, and I shall set you free!

My Bride, look at her!

Beautiful in souls beyond counting
She, in bodies numberless
Has been formed with loving care
By the very hand of God

Elegant in countless minds
And handsome in as many hearts
She is lovely in every way
Loved indeed by Love Himself

My Bride, pity her!

See her wracked with sobs!
In myriad faces her countenance
Is wet with the dew of tears
And her visage downcast with weeping

In the untold number of the oppressed
She is everywhere brought to her knees
A thousand times bound in chains
And constantly despised and scorned

In every sorrowful soul
She groans, awaiting redemption
She sighs to heaven in misery
And mourns in desolation

In every place her spirit is crushed
She is thirsty and forlorn
She bleeds from numberless wounds
Anxious in countless broken hearts

And I, her husband?
What is her Beloved to do?

I will weep for her consolation
And I will suffer for her comfort
I will bend down to embrace her
And I will bind up all her wounds

I will be spent for her renewal
And I will carry her on my back
I will sigh for her salvation
And I will lift her up in prayer

I will always walk beside her
And I will right her when she falls
When she stumbles, I will catch her
In her every peril I shall be near

I will be scourged to ruin for her healing
And I will bleed to see her spared
I will stretch out my arms upon the Cross
And love her even there

Behold the Bride, how loved she is!
In joy, in calm, in strife
Ne’er unlovely in her lover’s eyes
More dear to him than life

Hail to thee, Poets!
For you, like every man, woman, and child who
Has ever smiled or frowned truly from the heart
Have recognized the melody of the familiar song
Which plays in the depths of the mind,
Bringing sweet harmony to human thoughts.

Hail to thee, Poets!
For you have not recognized the song in vain
But, the verse having danced onto the conscious stage,
You met her and matched her step for step,
You drew her close and embraced her
You held her hand and allowed her to kiss you.

Hail to thee, Poets!
For though the song could not be pronounced by human lips
And the love could not be captured in our poor language
You danced the steps because the song was worthy
And with ink you conjured shadows and signs
Which point past the veil to the beauty you have tasted.

Hail to thee, Poets!
For you have exalted the poverty of men’s words,
Elevating them with sweeping style
Giving them new and brighter and deeper hues
Making them swirl and leap and caper gaily
With skillful rhyme and rhythm and tone.

Hail to thee, Poets!
For when structure ceased to liberate
And metre began to confine
And your newlywed wordplay could speak for itself
You cast off fetters and let fly the pen
And your verse became a waterfall of rushing lyrics free.

Hail to thee, Poets!
For you listened intently to the chanting of nature
And contemplated reverently the stone and cloud alike,
With awe you made both fern and frog your brother
And meditated childlike upon the horizon’s lap:
With these songs you painted for us Creation herself.

Hail to thee, Poets!
For you have apprehended a parabolic knowledge,
And grasped a new understanding in allegoric light,
You have made yourselves the masters of the wisdom of riddles,
And laboriously studied a secret language spoken in words divine,
An enigmatic tongue in which no man is fully fluent.

Hail to thee, Poets!
For when you had exhausted all that is outside,
You turned inwards, examining your secret soul,
You sung to us hopes and fantasies and mind’s murmurs,
Giving personality to thoughts once hidden,
You introduced us to the muses who dwell within your heart.

Hail to thee, Poets!
For you did not blush to share your sufferings
But bared to God’s light your inmost wounds,
Wrenching the darkness from your core,
And with the cord yet uncut (for we haven’t yet discovered how to sever it)
You wrote with the viscous ink of man’s sins and pains.

Hail to thee, Poets!
And above all, for this:
You gave us love, charity, amity- O Love!
Love, over all and pervading everything;
Love, misunderstood and no less exhilarating,
Love, good measure, pressed down, and flowing over!

Hail to thee, Poets,
And give me your blessing!
I am not counted amongst your number
But I am your student, your brother, your lover,
Let me sit at your knees and drink of your water,
You honor me with your friendship, I repay it gladly in full.

Eyes of fire set deep in gaunt, sunken face
Sun-burnt skin over bones stretched tight
Wild mane glimmers with holy light
The lonely prophet barefoot runs his race

Sat down on uncarved stone on the salt plains
In wilderness heat off’ring prayer
As arid winds tousle his hair
The sun will set, night falls, yet he remains

Chanting psalms over wastes in desert haze
Fasting, searching, waiting for One
Sighing beneath the beating sun
Searing bruised soles walking sands all ablaze

Heart heavy with the taunts of his brother
Rememb’ring mighty works long past
To the old promise holding fast
Dreaming new hope for Zion his mother

Battered by visions of hail and thunder
Summoned, plague and blight to predict
God’s edict none may contradict
Tyrants to fell and kingdoms to sunder

In threadbare raiment of camel’s tired coat
Commands for rended heart he heeds
A call from empty words to deeds
Found wanting now the blood of lamb and goat

Glancing past the veil, lo! above the dome
The glory of Him on the throne
To whom is worship due alone
Intoning a strain to sing exiles home

When we found the last statue we
Very nearly pitied it, for
The visage with which of old he
Grimaced upon men was no more.

Acid dew had claimed his face, no
Pigeon or gull did spare him shame;
Untitled, unknown, his plaque so
Weathered and worn it bore no name.

But all pity was consumed by gods
Of blood who breathe fire and clamor
To recall that we are at odds,
At war, with Height. Armed with hammer

And chisel, that we may chain, bind,
And throttle Heaven till it know
That if we e’er again should find
Splendor, pomp, loftiness, or show

We’ll trample honor’s arrogance,
Leveling monuments until
No sovereignty save goddess Chance
May interfere with man’s wild will.

Havoc! the swarm ascending cries
Up the pedestal with feral
Baying while something noble dies,
Frowning granite caught in peril

Inescapable. Mossy stone
O’erturned and overthrown by men
Who can rubble and dust alone
Endure in sight to stand and then

The cord now severed, freedom found,
There here remains not one who can
Remember e’er not being bound
To worship that great idol, man.

Who will mourn a rodent’s death?
Who will bend heart-strings to raise a strain,
Commemorating the passage of an unknown mouse
To eternal fields and the dusty rest of disintegration?

I shall sing to mark his heart’s last beating;
I will pluck the ghost of his last breath from the air
And bury it with dignity in a hymn
To acknowledge what was his, now alas! revoked.

Do not despise the meanness of his place,
Nor think to regard him condescension,
Nor dare to suppose his portion of no account,
Nor strip him unfeeling of his minute glory.

His nerves’ last firing is like the dying of a star,
His limbs, grown rigid, mime the world’s decay,
His unsouled eyes dictate the puzzle of life’s end,
His finality recalls the secret questions of mortality.

This rogue once flew on wings of shadows,
Darting adventurous from hiding to hiding,
Erecting a home for his kin in laborious nesting,
Warming sons and son’s daughters and their sons with his love.

This noble rascal lived in breakneck boldness,
Life-risk embraced for morsels of fruit and curds,
Supping on scraps ‘neath the menace of capital danger,
Fear his companion, his bread, and his bed of rest.

The ending of this story is the close of a legend,
The silence of his voice is the dying of a song,
A universal hymn whose harmony depended on his part
Is changed to a dirge marking the end of his verse.

Regret demands that broken be the chains-
A sudden reversal, with eyes fast shut,
Blindly blotting out till nothing remains
All that belongs to the deep, painful cut-
Thus demands guilt, shame, remorse, and fear, but
Healing declares that this shan’t be striven
For: nay, naught forgotten, but forgiven.

Hail, King Arbor, vice-regent of the paradisal garden!
Springing, a wooden fountain clawing up and seizing handfuls of sky,
Towering, dancing in winds that cannot bow him,
With every breeze rattling branches scratch out a shout.

Padded with armor layered in sheaves and shingles,
Constant cloak accented of moss and vine and bubbles of fungus,
Weathered of snows and rains and smokes and fires,
Fitted snug o’er the ageless trunk, ever-young beneath time’s rings.

Steward of life, he cradles birdlings in nested branches,
In chewed divots and caves hiding the squirrel and his kin,
His skin alive with deep burrowing beetles and grubs and thousands of worms,
Beneath his leafy mantle are sheltered the fox and the deer.

While branches sway and leaves fly in stormy havoc,
And beasts and creeping things are shaken and tossed,
His stoic roots, unimpressed, anchor the forest to the world,
Laboring buried and ever unmoved, in dark earthen dignity.

Here he stands, shoulder to shoulder with his brethren,
A sylvan army assembled to keep watch as the centuries drift by,
Council of elders evergreen presiding over the passage of epochs,
Terra’s first tribe bonded inseparable under countless dusks and dawns.

And there he stands, all solitary, vertical spire against a flat horizon,
No less regal for the absence of peers, but still defiant and noble,
Standing in judgement uncontested over an undiscerning globe,
Convicting all, dismissing them as airy flights ephemeral.