Rare

Rare

Discipline is a gateway

from the barker’s coaxing 

and hawking

romance, and pleasure, and alabaster skin,

Suburbans on verdant byways,

stuff we deserve,

and interviews:

“Your take on life’s meaning, in two words or less…”. 

Heads bow,

pondering beyond feet and floor.

This biding of time is

the mortification of pews,

a faith that suffering settles debt. 

It is solitude in assembly,

a safety for the surrounded, 

a solid use of space. 

The quiet is frightening. 

We do not choose to hide our selves—

it is learned disposition.

Nakedness is confession; 

derision prowls in search of her.

Even mothers wound.

The quiet, we know, have so much to say.

“The quiet are frightening;

let us gather apart from them.

(“They do so lack decorum.”)

“Let us together consider the weather.”

“What could be grander?”

“What could be blander?”

and 

“Isn’t it good that we’re having it?”

Light.

Dark…

Light/dark…

Like dust in a beam,

ethereal:

a certainty, doubtfully seen.

Eyes are windows.

We peer in vain into panes

that lock in night. 

But when the lights of eyes linger, 

they wonder 

about shells, and souls.  

(“Are you a soul?”)

Like toes that tread on chill, dewed grass 

and warm earth;

the smell of living things,

vivid as taste:

it is the exit of entering. 

…and isn’t it rare!

Still as faith we wait.

We wait, 

certain

that longing is promise 

of a sort that is true.