Swan of climbing wings,
Below
Slips by
The hour of the rhyme of time unraveling.
Raindrops.
Where now will the footsteps of the ancient ones tread?
On the moon – the dark side?
On the mountain height?
The unbecoming,
Unarranging,
Unimagining.
Aloft, Hamsa – you who ride
On the mist, undeterred
Through the red
Pillars of the sunset
Through the cliffs of darkened flight,
Do you see –
Or have you heard
Such a string of mis-imaginings?
And yet
The old one saw the donkeys
On the winding streets of Egypt
Among the catacombs and the crypt.
For a long time,
She rescued them.
Fly now to join the birds in the clouds,
Only the clouds,
Gray over the medieval rooftops
Of the crags above the lost towns.
Crowds
In dusted cities,
The mind gone
Astray,
In disarray,
Betrays
The darkness
And the quiet,
Until only the mighty wings of the sparrow
Understand
The patterns of the falling snow
And go on to a newer, older land,
Found by grace.
Become then the white-crowned sparrow,
Only the sparrow who flies
Toward the face
Of the dawn,
Only the gull who rises, who cries
In gladness,
Over the wintry bay,
Free,
Beyond the misted, ethereal rooftops
Crowned in pointed hats of snow.
© Sharon St Joan, 2021
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