Circle of fierce
embers floating to stars
divine spark inside
breathing breathing
I am coming, Mesingw
is coming
I am here
~
Beaver appeared, then otter, muskrat,
toad on a lily-lotus, turtle's
slow search earth rocked
tectonic web, spider's net
Mesingw astride deer
face red black mask
eponym of peace, of
silence, steps, breath
making the forest
opening the path
Thoughts born of words:
You are not myself
nor any other
we are: thoughts
~
Surrounded by water and darkness
immersed in the sound of her heart
If this is blindness what is sight?
Before memory
~
They walked toward me from a great distance
and clothed me in garments of sun
faces so familiar, from a city of bridges
city of stone, city of ring roads
waterway fields
now dust motes in a sunbeam
They rubbed my back
and my feet
whispered sweet words to me
brought me food and drink
So thirsty I stood
alone
as they danced around me
knowledge and acknowledged
Salt flowing down
my body, a
vessel, my
blood my water
misting with earth
Hours not of silence or sun
but of the child
The cries in my arms
~
Stepped into water to wash
by dawn's first light
I carried her
she
carried
my heart un-
sequestered forest
Musing's breath
everything living emotion
motion in stillness
water clear as the air
was clear, the earth, my
thoughts, hers
~
And after many days
of water-silence, naps
and dreams,
her milk feeding my heart, her voice
gentle wind, her face blossoming sky
I returned to the village of nine houses
without a name, uprooted
not-yet-born calling me calling me
Tears of the Father
~
Walked the shore of shells
Walked the dock, the glass
Peninsula, the broken pier
Walked the macadam to
Grassy field, walked the path
Thru the trees towering to sand
Walked the mourning dove's nest
In shade and leaves
Walked the temple
Of elfin gold, of orpiment crystals
Tempered with wine
Walked the birches and outhouse
Walked the water back to where
I began
(tho I could see no semblance of a beginning)
And what the walk revealed
Along the sea's margin
Along the rimrock
Of the island
After so many centuries
Of marsh-tides and moonstones
Of or and ore (before oar)
Was an experience of walking
Irony replaced and transience
The unsaid
Thoughts flowing round my heart
And the rays like a shepherd's fire
Shadowing the vanishing-line
——————————————
Jeffrey Yang
Vanishing-Line
Graywolf 2011
