Her Song (2003)

With these words
I carve a well
inside and down
a bare white shore
of foam, this poem
a motion of the
day which is my
tide and gift
and prayer,
tidied in short
rhythms and
spiralled out to
You whose
center is everywhere
and whose
circumference
is the next isle
or the next.
A unicorn rests
in a clean white
corral - that's
the shape and
tone, a beehive
cell with words
for post and
stone, shapes
both tower a
nd well and
chalice and
bell. In it
you'll find both
name and numen,
wife asleep
upstairs and Mary
Magdalene in
her cave, her
long perfect hair
in waves about
my feet: Cat
and dragon
in the window
looking out
on suburb
and barrow
fanning the
waking lanes
of dawn. There's
a screech-owl
in the scratch
of this pen,
an angel tolling
a blue sanctus
in this
narwhal's horn.
This pen holds
it all together,
having risen
from below
where I sit each
morning with my
ears open every
way, on this
beach between
two oceans, this
chapel the two
worlds attend.
Here's Moby with
Ahab in his
pulpit five
miles down from
life. Here's
climbing back in
bed with my wife
to pray the heavens
round. Here's my
aging father
walking in
his woods
amongst a
colloquy of stones,
and here's my
mother dozing
in the sun,
singing all
God's psalms.
Palms and oaks,
soles and sugar
jones - all of
it here, narrow
as my arms
yet round
enough to rise
descend -
a throat of
surfside praises
all ages
moat and mend.
Mary in your
cave of rue,
your hair's now
drifting in
the savage blue
I ride. I sing
of it in every
line I write.