30

With mother’s milk the hushaby

All will be well no need to cry—

O promise me she didn’t lie.

Although we know of death’s goodbye,

We swear a love that will not die—

O promise me that we don’t lie.

Eternities of joy deny

Time’s ruthless arrow on the fly—

O promise that they do not lie.

We laugh and laughing you’re nearby

All fun is reaching for your sky—

O promise that it doesn’t lie

Here under your eternal eye,

I want to trust your lullaby—

O promise that you do not lie.

67

The morning’s heavy sky is closed and fraught

With snow that won’t allow the dawn to flush

A gloom that in my youth I’d often fought.

Almighty, I’ve no knock-down proof of you—

You’re far beyond the reach of any thought,

All logic fails, no argument will do,

No image can contain you, no similitude.

Beyond our being, words now falter too—

Superlatives compare, infinitude

Here stands apart from all we can define

And every name I give you still elude;

No matter how I try you hold the line.

I know no one can see your face and live,

Allow me to hear your voice, give me a sign!

Although you’re never argumentative

Whatever you desire you will disclose

In words; insisting on the figurative,

You’re poet-God who will not speak in prose

But sends allusive lines from high-command

With metaphors refusing to foreclose

The mystery of how you show your hand.

But now the sun has dared a kindled blush—

I listen for your voice as here I stand

Unsandalled still before your burning bush.