Weeping of the Cells We noted the litres of ascites drained Affording the swollen abdomen relief So little of her energy remained, From weeping of the cells, the body's grief. How softly slips the soul through tenuous sheaths, No sound is heard of any laboured breath Its blessing on all visitants bequeaths And silence fills the calm abode of death. I watched the life-force in her slowly go As I've observed it many times before, In other's lives and other lands I know When souls have stood upon that distant shore And looked with love on earth then slowly turned Towards a golden light whose radiant sphere Encompassed all for

For Mary Helen 2/17/02 One Who Was All-Beautiful One who was all-beautiful in life Was no less so when death called out her name, The candle as it yields its final flame Grows brighter still and she, both friend and wife Illumined all my days by her delight And never shall a shadow come between A love that rarely on this earth is seen, Disciple on the shining paths of light.

Loss – Prayer of Longing for the Divine One hundred days adrift in seas of night While clouds of darkness hover over me, Have I a pilgrim stumbling towards the light Through loss descended into entropy? All round me seems unreal, illusion's mask, The centre is estranged, a hollow place, And effort towards the goal a hopeless task For one who can no longer feel the Grace Or see the smile that broke the nether grip Of forces that could work with one their will, Awaiting their chance, the inner guard might slip, Then on the soil of nescience cruelly spill The sacramental wine of offering, Or cast the spirit do

To Build the Bridge - To Mother, Remembering Mary Helen Ever I shall remember when Ipray Abiding at Thy lotus feet one day We two might meet, for I would recognize The blue and luminous beauty of those eyes Through which her spirit's gentle light had shown. What seed divine in us has slowly grown That even in our pain no deep despair Can swamp the soul with stultifying air. Thy Presence lifts the spirit's wings to soar, The flame-touched heart to open and adore, Where once desire trampled on our prayers Now peace descends and Love in us prepares The temple of the living Word's abode And lifts

In Our Profoundest Sleep 6/27/02 He sits awake in our profoundest sleep, Guardian and guide of all our dreams, Spurs lethargic self to dare and leap Across the gulfs of ignorance where gleams Eternal verity, transforming power, A love divine, immutable, unstained, Whose formidable force can seize the hour And all that lies within us unattained Make blossom forth as flowers to the sun. A newer man shall overleap mankind, A vessel of the multitudinous One, And we who in a half-light seek shall find The harmony that now

DNA of Death We cannot wait on some epiphany That shall effect the change our nature's need Or found on the earth a human harmony And in our killing-fields plant Godhead's seed. The spirit sleeps its drugged lethargic sleep As blood is poured and Death victorious Bestrides the hills and decimates the sheep. The Lamb of God in silence weeps for us. Immortal lost within our mortal dress, Shall yet another cataclysmic hour Descend on man before he will confess His spirit's truth and the transforming power Admit within acknowledging that love Must one day penetrate this god-touched brute Whose standard is the laurel and the dove, Th

Sing On Poet Now in my 64th year The blossoms of poets drop on me, As in the shaping of a tear Or rain from leaf-hung canopy. Their chant upon my hearing falls, Never have I heard such song, Such music as my spirit calls, To what height do they belong? I feel their rhythms, hear their cries Of beauty born from death's grey tide, The voice of Truth mid all our lies, Though darkness reign and light denied. Sing on poet 'til night is done, Morning in our lives renew, The wedding of the bride begun, Earth anointed honours you.

The Lotus Seed Now I drink the solitary wine Embittered with tears, the taste of acid rain, And on the scraps of sorrow weeping dine, Such Beauty shall not pass this way again. We are allotted time then we are called When spirit tires of the progress made In human flesh , the epic journey stalled, Leaves the form-bound shell, the birth delayed, The birth of knowledge borne from fiery heights, The union of the fountain with its source; We cannot neglect the gift of God's delights For mundane goals ephemeral and coarse. Yet there is One within who waiting smiles Expecting not subservience or need, With fluting calls the errant heart

We Have Shared a Grace - For Mary Helen O emptiness – where once a heart had stood Young and glowing in the joy of youth, Of one who lived within, deep within And heroically faced the demons of the night, Who found, leaving all the world behind, This world of satisfaction and of ease, At the far end of our spinning earth One whom her longing soul would recognize, The Mother of all sorrow and all joy Whose holocaust still shall save the world. Her soul led, the body acquiesced And all the deep refinement of her birth Was cast into the poverty and filth Of suffering too deep to comprehend And hopelessness the West had never seen.

A Strong Wind at Coppermine - For Mary Helen "There must be a strong wind at Coppermine, Many trees are down." And with these words her spirit crossed the line That borders the unknown. She spoke as she lay dying, miles away From forest haunts we knew, The drugs now held her mind within their sway In moments brief and few. She asked me often where her blessings were, The flowers Mother gave In packets filled with force that entered her, To help protect and save The souls of those who believe that love divine Shall triumph over death, Their lives of solemn offering the sign Beyond the final breath.