sky

The sky might go on opening 

forever, up and up, blue shining

into white light, Heaven itself

open and sitting on blue sky,

God's throne in the center of the sun,

and we beneath run, scattering, like ants, 

grasping our crumbs in mindless

jaws. We walk about with grief.

What little sorrows do we carry,

wearing them smooth like pebbles

in our palms, worrying over them

again and again. We turn around

our griefs until our hearts 

knot up like little lumps, nuts that

are hard to crack, until they crack

and show how soft they are, how damp

and black with rot.

What heavy little stones, what sins

beneath such ceaseless sky.

 

What seems like blue and ceaseless sky

is such a little layer, on a globe,

a nut, of such a smallness, in a vast

space, flung out, freckled 

with worlds--

And all this, curled

in love's palm, stirred

by love's breath, tended

until its epochs all are ended,

every soul ingathered, every thread

of fungus inspooled, every bond

dissolved and recombined, every turn

turned in at last:

 

what we wanted, what we worked for, what we earned

what we built, what we lost, and what we burned

these years beneath this little sky--

infolded now by boundless, bluest

Love