Hiding In The World

 

Those greedy ears
that only hear the music of the till,
they fold their doors
across the sudden singing in the yard.
Their silver mirrors
reflect the senseless striving of the will
and what it's for
is never learned because it seems too hard.

The people leer
at whatever scenes attract their shaded gaze.
They see the light
reflected off the objects in their road.
The path is clear
that leads directly to the living blaze,
but its delight
is shattered in the shadows of their code.

The dreadful world,
its burdens and its battles and its blight,
is swallowed whole
and passes through the artist's swollen throat.
He speaks his pearls,
he sings the mighty beauties of the night.
His tattered soul
collects the random winds around his boat.

I cannot tell,
my wosdom's like pale ribbons under glass.
I'm still too young
to let my frail inversions be exposed.
Must I expel
the demons and the angels of the past,
or hold my tongue
til all the futile rivers are composed?

I search for eyes
with sculptor's hands and a painter's steady grip
to sieze my wheel
and turn my life around a few degrees.
My motors rise
to haul their weight the whole entire trip,
but my appeal
seems to shut their tender windows to the breeze.

My windy heart
will embrace the graceful purpose of my craft–-
the words in stone,
the music in the grass and strumming rain.
She knows her part,
to recite the simple phrases of her laugh.
My love alone
cannot control the soul's creative pain.

Still, underneath
my pride, my old frustrations all remain.
The surface calm
conceals conductive currents I must feel.
Afragile sheath
encloses these sharp feelings I explain
with written psalms
in letters never sent, but firmly sealed.

I keep my wings
in storage in a closet in my mind.
My freedom spills
from dresser drawers and boxes on the shelf.
I've kept some things
that long ago I should have left behind
and thrown or willed
away some things I need to mend myself.