Serenity

Serenity:

Pink pills for pale people

Who dare not try

The sedative of tired muscles

And a mind at rest.

No Greater Love

No greater love is known than this:

The love to dare the saber's kiss

That man may live--Christ walks again

Where men give life for brother-men.

Candor

Virtue

Her eyes are unsullied and virgin-sweet

As the lilies in fields the Master trod.

A star her light, she scatters the seed

Garnered from God's own beauty-grot.

As pure as the depths of a canyon pool

With crystal bars is her fount of life.

From the gyves of sin she remains aloof

Yet walks with the sinner the "second mile."

Portrait

We are a pale generation

With willow-withe spines

And anemic blood

Needing the transfusion of courage.

We are the "God's in His Heaven" people

Who linger in the miraged oasis

Rather than ride the imperiled

With the black-cowled horseman of doom to ask:

"What has become of the hot,

Red blood of your sires

With the unbending straightness of pines

Who answered to the challenge-call

Of the conquering lion

Rather than to the soft purring

Of the Machiavellian?"

Step Lightly Night

Shine softly, stars, above him where he lies--

My youthful son--somewhere beneath strange ebon skies

Dreaming of home and cricket lullabies--

                       Shine softly.

Blow gently, winds, and give him my embrace,

And let your cooling breath caress his boyish face

As he lies sleeping in some alien place--

                       Blow gently.

Step lightly, night, and mute the strange alarms

Of war, lest he be wakened rudely from the charms

Of dreams. O, hold him close within your arms--

                       Step lightly.

Walk softly, angels, pause beside his bed;

Placing your hands in tenderness upon his head,

Smooth his dark hair, and kiss him in my stead--

                       Walk softly.

Time, I Entreat You

Take not the rainbow's "pot of gold" away,

I could not live with stark reality.

Keep my heart young. Though years bring their decay,

Let virgin-faith companion still with me:

No craggy hill of thought will be too high

For me to climb and sing while doing so.

My forward-looking eyes will see blue sky

Beyond the darkness when the wild winds blow.

Let me, mind-tall, bend not before defeat;

The crest of truth be ever challenging

My will to dare new trailways ... I entreat

That I may ever feel the urge of spring.

Let me grow body-old, inform and spent,

But never let me grow indifferent.

Consider the Pine

Consider the pine, O man:

Century-wise on the mountain

Licked by the red tongue of war,

Seeing patterns in chaos,

Feeling the trembling of Atlas

And reading the prophecy of annihilation,

Waving its banners of immortality--

Constancy through change, its message

To a dying universe.

Consider the pine O man:

Its feet deep in virile loam,

Its forehead touching Heaven,

Its innumerable fingers

Tapping the air for sustenance,

Glorifying the Master-Mind of beauty.

Consider the pine, and let its challenge song

Drown out the siren croon of apathy

That would lull you to sleep

Lounging on its cushions of complacency

Until your ship of days enters the harbor of doom

From which there is no returning.

Bugle Call

O pilot now your ship of days or years

Unerringly to reach a promised goal.

The Master Helmsman will allay your fears

And still the tempests that would scar your soul.

You leave the haven of a citadel

Which greed would now destroy; so let a song

Rise from your heard that you may break the spell

Of avarice that moves a Judas-throng.

Wearing white armor, go and give release;

Brave terror's henchmen on the death-strewn plain;

Bid earth to sing a canticle of peace,

Become a sanctuary--love's domain.

Your shield is youth's clean strength which you have won--

God's arm is long to reach to you, my son.

The Improvement Era

He Had Made Cradles

He bowed in awe, mute with humility--
He had made cradles for many a little one--
Before him in a manger-cradle lay
        A Kingly Son.

Not his, but born of Mary. Not over strange
Was the clean stable with its scent of hay;
He had known mangers and contented cattle
        With their gentle way.

He knew the voice of prophecy, and spoke
With an angel; learned of Mary's promised Son.
While waiting, tenderly he made a cradle
        For the Little One.

They two would roam the fields of Nazareth;
Would both be carpenters until He grew ...
He bowed his head in tender reverence
        For he knew ... He knew!

To Fulfill a Dream

We who have heard the singing of the stars,

The symphony from lilting robin-throats,

The laughter of the hills devoid of scars,

Now hear the laugh of avarice that gloats.

The atavistic mirth that chills the soul

From mouths of grasping men with claws uncurled

To still the pulse of love--make earth unwhole,

Drowns out the Master's lyric in the world.

Yet as we listen to the ruthless tongues

We see ethereal candles brightly gleam,

And strive to climb the higher on the rungs

Reaching to Heaven to fulfill a dream.

We toil to heal the gaping greed-made scars--

We who have heard the singing of the stars.

Smiling He Comes

Sometimes when night's

Ethereal essence fills the silent air

And moonlight softly drapes her silvery cloak

Of gossamer about the sleeping earth,

Concealing all its scars, my mother-soul,

Filled with nostalgic yearning for that boy

Who left us in the pulsing dawn of youth,

Steps from its chrysalis of earthly flesh

And moves across a star-strung bridge of dreams.

Smiling he comes

Through portals hung with golden tapestry.

I take him gently in my hungry arms,

Caress his boyish face, his curling hair.

My first born son! The marks of death are gone:

The twisted foot is straightened, hands made whole;

The bruised flesh is restored ... No mortal wound

Upon his head ... He tells me of his dreams

And of his joy within the Master's kingdom.

There is no war.

This living son of mine! He is not dead!

For death is but the gateway into life

And happiness in God's own Empery.

Slowly the portals close. My lightened feet

Traverse again my star-strung bridge of dreams;

My soul accepts its temple. Comforted,

I walk all unafraid to meet the dawn.

Singing Pens

Sweet Is My Task

Lord, as my offering
Gifts of myself I bring--
           Sweet is my task.

Walking the brambled way
Seeking the lambs who stray;
Teaching a child to pray ...
           Sweet is my task.

Seed time and harvest too
I would be hands for You,
           (Humbly I ask.)
Yours, my Lord, riven through--
           Sweet is my task.

Josephs in World Egypt

When Man returns to leavens of the plow

And walks with joy upon the fruited plain,

There will be no grief-burdened hearts as now

For God is found in singing fields of grain.

The Josephs in the Egypt of the world

Will ever keep the flag of peace unfurled.

His Hands

Cymbals clang and drums beat loud,

Drums that chant of death.

Terror's mighty horsemen ride

With their flaming breath.

On the far Korean shore

Where our sons are dying,

Little children, scarred and thin,

In their need are crying.

Jesus bids us be His hands,

Feed His sheep in war-torn lands.

The Archer

First in Archer Miniature Contest

Barren Woman's Prayer

I who am childless see a hunger there
For more than new-made loaves and cherry pies.
There is a spirit-hunger in his eyes,
A love unfed, a craving for the care
Of one who holds him special. With an air
Of nonchalance he laughs but his heart cries
For childhood's joyous heritage with skies
Rainbowed with deep affection ever fair.

Yet she who feeds his body fails to see
He needs the manna of her arms, her kiss,
Her tender words, her love's sure alchemy
To feed his soul within its chrysalis--
These hungry lads, help me to feed and bless,
Who having mothers still are motherless.

To You Who Wear White Cloaks

Though we were given a darker chrysalis

To cloak our spirits, hide the white within,

No mandate said there need be an abyss

Unbridged between our souls, for our dark skin

Was given us by that same Father who

Cloaked you in white. Though you are fair of face,

Can you not see a brother smiling through

The covering He gave to every race?

Our hearts, with yours can hear Him when He calls;

Can feel the pulse-beat of all brother-men.

Come, let us batter down the blinding walls

Of race and creed and hate, for only then

Can we petition God to bid war cease,

And climb and reach, at last, the Mount of Peace.

Heaven's Alchemy

When in my garden of Gethsemane

The sun was darkened and my song was stilled.

My heart was bleeding, for a part of me--

The boy I birthed and reared with love--was killed.

While spheres were clashing, Heaven's mighty power

Rebuilt my shattered kingdom when I said,

"Thy will be done." The moment--magic hour!

Restoring my torn soul. Upon my head

I felt a crown of peace I had not known.

The veil was thinned ... The Master at the helm

Let me behold my living son, His Own,

And see the beauty of His glorious realm,

Its kingdoms reaching far as thought can look--

Mortality but prefaces God's book.

Singing Pens

To Teach Him How to Love

"I hate all women-folk!" young Danny said
When kept in after school for throwing rocks
At two small girls. Defiant-high his head,
He barked his scorn, "A female always squawks!"
Nor would he write one hundred times, I will
Not throw another rock at girls, "For that
Would be a lie." I failed with him until
I learned his "Mom" had left, and one stray cat
Was all that loved him; his embittered Dad
Fed him on hatred--When I saw him lie
Bruised in the street and heard him say, "I had
To save my cat. Teacher, I didn't try
To hit the girls," I gently smoothed his hair.
To teach this "lost lamb" how to love, my prayer.

In the Eternal Silence

I dug a grave in the depths of my soul

Then straightway forgot the place--

No paths lead to it. With none to condole,

I buried with silent grace

The wrongs I had suffered; then on my road

My companion was Peace, who lightened my load.

Shadowed Years

My joyful song

Is muted

In war-shadowed years.

Even the lyrist

In my willow tree

Sings in minor strain.

With Hands That Are White

"Teacher?" I looked into great haunted eyes--
School was dismissed--Then small Lemuel said,
"Why an I black?" How those shadowed orbs pled--
Set in a face dark as ebony skies
Asking for stars--seeking answers to whys!
Seeing his soul reaching out to be fed
Fair as the lilies where fields knew His tread;
Feeling His presence, I gave these replies:

Heaven is kind; you will have no regrets.
Gently will Jesus, the Master of right,
Tender and loving--Not one He forgets--
Welcome you back to His Home of delight:
Gardens of lilies and frail violets ...
There you shall pick them with hands that are white.

Miracle of the Gulls

Singing, they blazed a highway to the West--

The Mormon pioneers. The desert sod

They conquered, even to the mountain's crest,

To build a great imperium to God.

"Come, come, ye Saints," they sang, "nor labor fear.

We seek the place where God would have us dwell.

Though hard to you this journey may appear,

With joy, gird up your loins, for all is well."

A reverent people asking but to be

Allowed, in peace, to worship Him they loved--

Their right within a kingdom of the free--

Were driven by the lash of slander; shoved

From their ancestral homes with rams of hate:

To coax the dormant life from desert sands;

To keep their shrine of faith inviolate;

Release an Eden in primeval land,

Where high above the ravens of despair

White wings of hope would bid them build their dream;

Where, clarion-clear, through elemental air

Tolerance would echo in the eagle's scream.

Day after day the covered wagons rolled

Across the startled prairies. Light hearts sang

With violins in gladness. Mourning told

Of graves beside the trail ... Yet ever rang

The carillons of truth. A retinue

Of angels listened to their muted song,

"And should we die before our journey's through,

All, all is well." Hearts quailed to hear the long-

Drawn howl of hungry wolves ... A prophet's death,

Mob violence, were left behind; ahead,

Cathedral mountains and the challenging breath

From desert-lungs. When their great leader said,

Viewing the valley-land, "This is the place!"

All eagerly they plowed and sowed and reaped;

Laid plans for Templed cities. The embrace

Of toil was sweet, and life in earth's womb leaped

To greening beauty: Thirsty acres drank

From cool canals and "blossomed as the rose."

 

Then came black wings of doom, and laughter sank

In depths of horror: Hordes of cricket-foes

Came swarming from the mountains till the sun

Was veiled in darkness by them flying, creeping.

And field on field was barrened, overrun

By the marauders. Wives and mothers, weeping,

Fathers and children fought with fire and flail

Unceasingly, while sending fervent prayer,

Pleading for Heaven to save. To no avail

They toiled, then waited: On expectant air,

There came the ominous sound of rushing wind--

Great whirring wings alighted like a cloud.

The gaunt, worn pioneers, grief-disciplined,

Saw death descending swiftly in a shroud:

Rising from waters of the lake came gulls,

Great white-winged birds that brought but added fears.

Could nothing save now but God's miracles?

The cup of joy became a cup of tears.

Then, "All is well!" rang out the victory cry,

"God has delivered us! The crops are saved!

Great joyful wings!" Their paeans reached the sky--

"Praise God for mercy prodigally laved!"

The gulls would gorge, cast up, then gorge again.

Exhausted toilers stood in awe to see

The feasting birds eject the crickets, then

Refill their craws ... Their dark Gethsemane

Was lily-beautified.

                             As strong men knelt

And wept like children, with new tenderness,

Mothers held babies to their breasts, and felt

Anointing hands of angels in caress.

Within God's shadow, weary hearts (grown old)

Leaped with the pulse of April. Pioneers,

Young as tomorrow, in a rescued wold

Sang, "All is well! Dispersed are all our fears.

Why should we mourn or think our lot is hard?"

For God's sure fingers held His world in place.

Their hearts retuned unto love's harpsichord,

They joyed within the peace of His embrace.

Today, beside a timeless monument--

Great silent wings--their children's children tell

The sacred tale of how the gulls were sent,

And sing the stirring anthem, "All is well!"

Upon Whose Altar

Love builds a heart-shrine

Upon whose altar candles

Of forgiveness glow.

Montana Poetry Quarterly

Love-Wrought Miracle

Ebon faced
Lena envied Mary, fair
As the lilies blooming where
Jesus walked. Then Mary smiled
As she placed
Lena's hand within her own:
"Black and white,"--How sweet her tone!
"Each one is the Master's child."
Beauty graced
Phrases wrought a miracle:
Lena's soul felt beautiful.
Sun and shadow--primrose aisled--
Interlaced.

With Never a Backward Glance

When Adam and Eve

Stood outside of Eden's closed gates,

The gold of sunrise flecked the barren sands,

Gilded the great Joshua-arms of the desert

And glorified the far horizon.

In the distance--backward to Eden--

Came the singing of seraphim,

While from the waste land came the scream of the lion,

A challenge-call to conquer.

Eve spoke, "It is better thus:

We are not fallen mortals but rising gods

Knowing good from evil.

The Father smiled approval as He said, 'Depart.'

I am not afraid."

Adam answered her challenge,

"Wisely we disobeyed. In our innocence

We knew not we were naked until awakened

By the alchemy of the forbidden fruit.

Now we will multiply and have dominion over the earth

Even as God commanded.

In deserts of despair there will be oases of hope.

Guided by the torches of avatars from other spheres,

We shall make all earth an Eden."

Not guilelessness with pale, passionless joy was beckoning

But virile, purposeful toil holding a banner emblazoned "Eternal Godship."

The glory of Eden paled to insignificance.

Hand in hand, Adam and Eve walked away from the closed gates

With never a backward glance.

No Idle Playing on a Harp

The alluring

Grandeur of death

Bids me live gloriously-unafraid

In the now of the cycle.

Once, near the door

Death opened to admit a soul,

I glimpsed beauty unconceived before;

The burgeoning acres of immortality--

Every seed planted here, blossoming there;

The dream being builded;

A temple with carilloned towers arising,

The living builders singing the retrain,

"Nothing is lost, nothing is ever lost."

I shall welcome the silent restorer.

Unafraid, pass through the shadowed valley

To the blinding radiance awaiting

And accept the challenge--

No idle playing on a harp.

Different

Who Visions a Great Oak

My problem boy, now six-foot-two, full grown,
Is a man crowned with content, eyes wonder bright,
Who stops his toil to watch a lark in flight
Or listen to its silver flute intone
The wild, sweet breath of spring, for on his own
Green acres--no soul-need to prove his might--
He plants and reaps, with love his acolyte,
Yet spares the pheasant's nest till young have flown.

Once as we watched the land's awaking soul
Gently he mused: "Recall your problem lad?...
Who visions a great oak will plant the seed."--
His hand reached out, caressed the new-born foal;
His eyes sought mine with tenderness--"I had
A teacher, one who saw and filled my need."

Let Us Keep Faith

The peace of sculptured silence rests tonight

Where men gave life for man. On hallowed strands

Beauty conceals the countenance of death.

In love let us keep faith. Ours are the hands

To give the loaves and fishes and to ring

The Temple bells; our feet to walk the sea

All unafraid; our voice in ruth return

The prodigal to Him of Galilee.

Ours be the task to light the moving Star

Till man beholding, cries, "My Lord, You Are!"

Gypsy Fortune Teller

A toothless hag in a darkened tent

Cackles her wares as she casts her spell,

"Come lady there with the handsome gent!

For I move Heaven and I move Hell!"

She tests the coin for a ringing sound,

Then reads their palms by a candle's glow;

With evil creeping upon the ground

She tells the things they should never know.

They hang in air! With a crafty eye

She stops, refuses to cast her spell;

Another coin and she reads the sky,

For she moves Heaven and she moves Hell.

The flap is closed, for she knows full well

The witching power of her ancient guile,

That crowds will gather beneath her spell;

She hears each pause with a crafty smile.

She knows man's urge to the secret world;

She knows its power as she casts her spell,

Then grasps the coin with her claws uncurled,

For she moved Heaven and she moves Hell.

So all day long in her eerie tent

She plies her trade and her purse grows fat.

She fills the mind with dark wonderment

Then sits back wise as a grinning cat.

A toothless hag in a musty tent

Cackles her wares as she casts her spell,

"Come lady there with the handsome gent,

For I move Heaven and I move Hell!"

My fire has died to an embered glow,

My youth has vanished and I am old,

Yet still I dream of the long ago

And hear again what the gypsy told.

The Archer

Fifth in Ballad Contest

Where Maples Flame

"I will return in autumn," so I said,
"To see these greening maples crown this hill
With a flaming lei." But always when the chill
Fall days returned as time too swiftly sped,
I was not free so I could not fulfill
The vow I made. My heart in mute lament
Longed for wind-music, wild and eloquent,
While echelons of geese displayed their skill.

I could not be denied the joy-ascent
To my bright hilltop when the autumn came.
My spirit, country-bred, I could not tame
To city confines yet I know content;
For though the autumn calls me still the same,
My heart has built a hill where maples flame.