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Photo by Ben Schumin. Courtesy
Wilipedia Commons.
CAN YOU SEE
THE
FUTURE…?
Can you see the
future, as I just have?
There is a tired
corner where the old ones live,
Plain and simple
people, but the shops are closed,
Only one or two
remain, the empty rows
Along the mall-way
disregarded, dark and shut,
The commerce of the
former age a jaded slut;
Curved of back and
minimized the businessmen,
Still can tell a
joke or two, brave specimens
Of confidence long
lost, bravado of the old,
Who once knew how
the world was spun on looms of gold
Elsewhere born
invisible a dispensation
Of the bright
successors of a world yet hidden;
They may not be
seen, we feel vibrating steps
Unsearchable and
noiseless as the decade leaps
WOLVES OF THE
FOREST
In that wood where we
were used to wander,
Camouflaged beneath
the autumn forest litter
Of rough grey bark
and tawny leaves I saw
Two brutal forms
entwined by hairy belly and by paw
Rising and emerging,
shaking off the earth’s disguise
To see who had
observed them through outlandish eyes;
They saw me and
gazed down the wooded hill I’d climbed—-
It was for them an
interruption of their mating time
The male chimerical
stood up, assumed a human form,
Coolly studied me
unfazed, feigned to mean no harm,
But the female of
the couple, submerged in some dark lens
Of water showed her
rounded face, inhuman as the moon’s,
And I an interloper
from the past remained stock still
For just a moment,
then retreated backwards down the hill—
One wolf to the
other said: He will not recognize
The future when he
sees it through our innocent disguise
SPIDERS SPIN…
Spiders spin
Cities fall
Wolf in the woods
It sees us all
Long the snout
Broad the head
Strong in the jaw
To crush us dead
Yellow eye
Brown and grizzled
Hungry, sly
Fang and muzzle
Now it sees us
Now moves forward
Imperious
It is no coward
But then held out
A brandished rod
It feels some doubt
Or fear of God
Into the pond
It swims away
Looks to the right
For other prey
Spiders spin
And cities fall
The web of time
Will cover all
Wolf and woman
Man and child
The city fallen
And the wild
WHAT IS THIS
SLUM…?
What is this slum?
An alley crammed
with old defective parts,
It is your life
The wretched
failures and the paltry arts
Inside, the ancient
exiles
And the silent
mournful young,
Decrepit furnishings
But no sweep-out
provision for the donkey dung
A kind of human
stable
But no sign of any
infant king,
No kings, no
shepherds’ praise,
No angels from the
stratosphere proclaiming
No one bears, is
born here
And no promise given
to the bitter end,
Time exhausted
Bankrupt, fails and
has no other years to spend
Only one condition,
Hope, commences when
the daylight burns
The feeble winter
sunlight—
And the winter
solstice turns
Listen
to Pavel read "Autumn Come" (MP3 format)
AUTUMN COME
The land is like a buried
pharaoh
Mummified, long live the
king
Forever if it should be
so,
Whatever might the autumn
bring
The land is like a buried
pharaoh
Mummified within three
coffins
Always till the wild
geese go,
Autumn come there will be
orphans
Gold and wood and paste
of glass
The mummy king within
made fast,
But when he rises, as he
must,
The pharaoh shatters into
dust
AUTUMN
IS A HOLY TOWN
The
mitten leaves of sassafras
Golden
blades of hickory
Maple
scarred with autumn casts,
Acid yellow
psalmody
Design,
desire all of this
Turn the
clockwise sun around,
The
towers of basilicas—
Autumn
is a holy town
Who
lives here? Awnings gone,
Deserted
boulevards of oak
Except
the bronze and scarlet tones,
The
bells of leaves that autumn spoke
Out of
center grows a dream
Spotted
with the scars of leaves,
Tiles
across the slanted beams,
Masses
of the holy trees
Ending
prayer, descending now
Spelled
the tongueless world to pray,
And
those who go upon it walk
Soundlessly
away
THE
RELICS OF SAINT FRANCIS
Not him
but his pathetic robe
The true
flag of Assisi
Laundered
and preserved, but not filled up
Inside
the empty socket of Subasio
The
pines, the wrens, the sliding sun
The
yellow curving wall of Francis’ cell
But not
the fragile bones and skull
The
melting muscle and the insubstantial blood—
The
imitative whistle lives
Or did
you know he whistled with the birds?
He sang
with them, and they with him
Some
echoes now to last forever
In this
dying world there is a wave
Attenuated
yet alive
And his
was strong and rises still
It was
not sound, for that requires air
It was
the wordless run and trill of prayer
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