To Paint a Water Lily

A green level of lily leaves
Roofs the pond's chamber and paves

The flies' furious arena: study
These, the two minds of this lady.

First observe the air's dragonfly
That eats meat, that bullets by

Or stands in space to take aim;
Others as dangerous comb the hum

Under the trees.  There are battle-shouts
And death-cries everywhere hereabouts

But inaudible, so the eyes praise
To see the colours of these flies

Rainbow their arcs, spark, or settle
Cooling like beads of molten metal

Through the spectrum.  Think what worse
is the pond-bed's matter of course;

Prehistoric bedragoned times
Crawl that darkness with Latin names,

Have evolved no improvements there,
Jaws for heads, the set stare,

Ignorant of age as of hour—
Now paint the long-necked lily-flower

Which, deep in both worlds, can be still
As a painting, trembling hardly at all

Though the dragonfly alight,
Whatever horror nudge her root.

Traveling beyond your borders,
  freedom scents the trail

Traveling beyond your borders,
  destiny in the mail

Traveling beyond your borders,
   memory in the wind

Traveling beyond your borders,
—without becomes within

(Villanova Pennsylvania: April, 2013)

It matters to the family
If not to God or the new lake
They go there to pray on Sunday
Even if they're not really there anymore

We look at auburn streaked skies
And see his welcome beauty
But the door to heaven
Is not to the attic but instead the cellar

We wonder how everything will turn out
The current changes speed and direction
Gospel songs float on top
And the rising waters take us home

The howlers and the wailers are natures friend
Grace comes from its unmerciful ways
Their roots are bent sideways and twisted
But the way of the land is all that faith knows

Panic attacks are like the wind.
You can't see the wind but you can surely feel it.
Panic attacks are like a boomerang.
You throw it away thinking you're fine.  But it comes right back to you.
Panic attacks are like setting off a firework.
You know it's going to go off.  But when it does it scares you.

My feet may be stuck on earth,
but my mind is a realm of Eden:
the heavens’ wonder.

The sky is round,
fits around the earth,
with the sun swims
in the dew on the rose.
Still the giant earth falls short
to hold onto a man for good!

Not the sky nor the mundane
can encompass a man,
only fits within a man.

Jesus, I need the light
of your face to shine
on all the places that I
cannot see my hand
right in front of me.