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Pilgrim Clay

III

After rain the robin prances, a prince
Among trout lilies; the garden aflame
With red-breasted dignity; in a sunken

Wheel-track of trapped rain another bathes, wing
Clapping his delight; we are shy with them
When we come upon them from our moments

Of solitude; a fear of intrusion:
For each snap of stick that scares them to flight,
Or each unquiet, unheeded movement

Shatters a fragile attunement. Could there
Be a time when we might sit with them -
A sort of consonance among creatures ?



IV

This landscape: farm houses, barns, harvest towers
Tree clumps, islands in a sea of harrowed
Fields; a mile is what your eye can decide

Between one horizon and another.
And on stilly, cloud-washed evenings, the coo
-ing of the mourning dove from nearby woods

Is an unfulfilled echo from the past,
Resonating with my haunted inner
Landscape: a clump of anger is tracing

Itself backwards to a clutching regret
Which echoes from beyond horizons where
Woods are islands, forever out of reach.

This is simply, and complexly, just beautiful, Jimmy. Very satisfying. I'm appreciative that you've broken up its presentation as you have. You know your subjects well.

Your last three verses of part III are so exactly and perfectly desriptive of such encounters. Your writing is so rich .



~ Lizzy

Hi Jimmy,

I like the way time slows down in a lot of your work.

I also especially like:

...Could there
Be a time when we might sit with them -
A sort of consonance among creatures ?

Consonance means 'agreement' and also 'repetition' doesn't it. In my mind that alludes both to a sought actual connection with these birds, and to the repetition of the genetic code, which could be the only place where we can "sit with them". We share the same ecosystem too, and they stir a sense of beauty and poetry in us. But they are oblivious to us and we cannot reach them, or the flowers or woods. It's a one-way longing. That's what occurs to me, reading your pome.

an unfulfilled echo from the past

Perhaps they were the promise and we were what happened, and now we are separated, and stranded.

Thanks,

Diane

You are right about what I was trying to explore. The fact that so much of nature is oblivious of us. So who are the lonely ones??

That's a great line: ...they are the promise and we are what happened...

Who promised... and how did what happened to us happen???

Thanks again
Jimmy

It seems it all started to go wrong about 50,000 years ago when we developed self-consciousness.

Woodstock lyrics run through my mind...

We are stardust, we are golden
We are ten billion year old carbon
And we got to get ourselves back to the garden

Diane

Diane Quoted:

We are ten billion year old carbon

What kind of carbon?

Graphites Which being so soft make a wonderful lubricant.
Diamonds : Being so hard that it is called the ultimate abrasive
Fullerines: which being a better lubricant than graphite pushed to a certain point can be harder than diamonds without being abrasive.

I reckon we are the diamonds, Jack. The ones that shine on, crazily. .

Blimey Jimmy you've got loads more parts to your epic and I'm still on this one. Anyway I just nipped back here to post this:

The raspy-voiced crow
perched on a pine pole
preached the Winged Dharma;
wayward birds trembled, fearing
rebirth as human beings.

- Michael P. Garofalo

Looks like the bird prefers to be in the bird world, Diane.
Maybe we can be so arrogant to think that maybe we have the best of it!!!