was the gate
of the Lady of Heaven;
her warm
Madonna smile was bread leaven
to all who
loved her son’s essential vein.
There was no
forged crucible with blood stained
hands,
without being pierced by his brethren,
for he was
one of us; we were forgiv’n
by his very
heart despised, sapphire reign.
There—a ring
of unending gold as fire,
a melodious
sound came from the wood
of
relinquished cross, now crucified stone
played on the
third morn as a fragrant lyre
of old, the
pages were turned as we would
in the valley
of a prophet’s dead bones.
What word
would speak and raise the spire to sky;
what hope
would glisten as the morning dew?
There was a
church that blazed its colours true,
linen
crevices were indigo dyed
and hailing
from Europe, the prayer would rise
that from a
deity drew kingdoms new,
to rest upon
the heads of saints glass-blue,
quiet
patience and perseverance tried.
I would
repeal the curse that rests bereft
beneath my
hand, for I the ink and quill
that wrote
each word of the scriptures was one
that stood in
souls of time with my request.
I would not
break or violate your will
lest you
asking lack something, come undone.
The organ
thundered out, we lift our chant
within Our
Lady’s alabaster stone,
with rushing
river by the island’s moan;
the true
living remnant would not recant.
Brilliant
prairie grasses of Miscanthus,
Pennisetum,
Stipa, with flowers grown
as Echinacea
and Achilleas’ throne.
The iron of this
sanctuary rusts
its bounty in
the hearts of those who sing,
their low
carol carried o’er the threshold
where other
flowers tarry due nearby
and their
waxen perfume unyielded stings.
But the
brocaded ceilings were of gold,
and song's
sound mingled with the tears and cries.
A flame
towered in the dark, its blood spurts
with a vice
of midnight, now dying blade
that from a
steel sword swiftly did away
with all mild
dissidence and fear of hurt.
We were no
more, we leaned and grandly cursed
the ground we
had once walked upon, in sways
of lowly
field, and revelled lovely-made
from
vestments of the air that saline pursed
the tide upon
the beach of Paris’s front.
She was wont
to be wearing red, silence
brought
tidings of her reputation forth;
she was a
queen of the night, took the brunt
of their insults
to death. Knights took violence
from
strangers of other realms to gain worth.
There was a
hint of burning cinder there,
beyond
cathedral’s levelled paradigm;
there was the
sound of sun and moon resigned
where pigeons
roost in alcoves of star air.
What were
their last words as these silver stairs
filled with
smoke from some guilty humankind;
a glass of
lemon water with the rind
sat on the
old wood table with no care.
There was no
fault, no blame in stone was set,
no blinding
flame has seared our coral minds—
their deep
porous thoughts, staid with minerals.
But now our
hearts, reduced to ash, are met
with dark
realities of other kinds,
the Gothic
spire was once ethereal.
Not one pale
stone was left upon the next,
and so no
crucified corpse remained there,
there was no
evidence in dragon’s lair,
only an ashen
kind remembers text
from a burned
down Bible’s vast lexicon.
If I was to
pour pure oil in my hair,
the fruit of
virgin olive break and tear;
the black circle from its branch, comely vexed,
would be on coming out with pearl drop glass.
The poorest
girl would now hit the high notes
and circle as
a falcon, bird of prey,
for you
thought to make them victims of class,
you hoped
they would try calling you, emote,
and fiery
burned them to the ground that day.
To raise the
dead from every ladened curse,
the
gargoyles, covered with soot from the fire,
return to the
oak of youth’s golden spire,
remember the
covenant you made first:
to love no
other but me, lest you thirst
and drink of
another cistern, you tire—
the level of
purity I require,
too difficult
for anyone but Christ.
So he will be
your prize, your figurehead,
he will be
set on high, and in the rocks
of hellish
night, where burns your soulish branch.
There entered
not one tree to this blood-red
rose, just a
child came by with blond dreadlocks,
swung under a
Maritime Pine, then blanched.
