Snapshots
looking at a photograph of a family reunion, summer 2001. notable is my grandfather, who had passed away last year. everyone looks
happy.
tell me what we know
is written somewhere, in stone. tell me
that we don't need to hide
from the things we've done, or
shy away from the dying
days of winter.
mondays and wednesdays I sing
with a choir, young and brash.
the music stands resolute
like Achilles, triumphant
on the shores of Troy - the way he feels
accomplishment gleaming at his sword tip,
skin-bronzed standing on Trojan sand.
I know somewhere, I can hear
the notes hang triumphantly in the air,
immortal.
tell me we're making something ancient -
that we are scraping against a moment,
carving out like gem stones the very
things that are worthwhile. those things that
make standing there -
this moment, with the sun in my hair -
make this the most important thing I do in a lifetime.
-------------------------
looking at a photograph of any Saturday, July 2007 - me and my brother standing on the beach looking at the moonlight dragged over the bay, recklessly taking candids with a digital camera. both of us smile -
we look happy.
tell me that these
are those whispers I want to tell you,
softly on your ear and
shy like fingers of fog that tease the streetlights -
those moments when I'm alone,
and I remember man is not an island.
I relive afternoons, lazy hours after school
sharing the forbidden knowledge,
glad to die with the fruit of the Tree. I've made
my skeleton out of moments that brag
with the boldness of the sun,
all the paths of your life laid out clear
in sidewalk paths and auditorium rows, pews
and stages familiar through months and years.
these are the secrets, a sadness
I wonder if you share - living out the days
of my dwindling adolescence - I'm nothing
if I'm not alive.
if I cannot at least once a day
savour a hard-boiled egg
or savour the nonsense of being
then it's not the life that I can hear humming
from flourescant tubes down hallways,
in the concrete edifices of our street corners, or
in our hearts.
I wonder if it's written in stone -
the throbbing pulse of I'm trying to say,
that sits in my gut like too much whiskey
tell me it's carved deep enough to run
my fingers through the edges
so I can understand it,
know that my love is the right balance
of unbearable lightness,
why I'm terrified to die.
I wonder if you can look at the lines,
if they just as deadly
miserable it feels.
-------------------------
looking at a photograph, dated March 16, 2006. The Fairfield University choir is performing a concert in the San Lorenzo chapel in Florence, Italy on their spring break tour. the sixty students line the steps of the altar, the white and black tuxedos and dresses silhouettes against the pure white stone. they are frozen, mid-note - they
look happy.
tell me this is how I imagine dying -
I imagined music, a hymn that I heard
one March evening, sung by an italian choir.
the notes hung like fingers of light, caressing your face -
I was there, sitting on a wood pew and
wringing my hands in the cathedral -
something ethereal in me lifted up,
gently -
because it's whisper quiet, these days - grey
and lonely, listless. not how
I imagined this happening,
or what I want it to be.
tell me the feeling doesn't die, too
and that I can visit it sometimes, sitting
surrounded by picture frames and love letters -
memories welling up like hymns lifting
glory glory hallelujah,
lux, lux callida gravisque into the night -
because I hear it every day
the warmth and certainty of being lost
into an essence larger than yourself,
knowing that the answers dance in your mind in the twilight hours of your sleep.
tell me you hear those whispers, too -
maddeningly too soft to understand, but
the heart of it rings true,
hanging immortal, and somehow
you know.
happy.
tell me what we know
is written somewhere, in stone. tell me
that we don't need to hide
from the things we've done, or
shy away from the dying
days of winter.
mondays and wednesdays I sing
with a choir, young and brash.
the music stands resolute
like Achilles, triumphant
on the shores of Troy - the way he feels
accomplishment gleaming at his sword tip,
skin-bronzed standing on Trojan sand.
I know somewhere, I can hear
the notes hang triumphantly in the air,
immortal.
tell me we're making something ancient -
that we are scraping against a moment,
carving out like gem stones the very
things that are worthwhile. those things that
make standing there -
this moment, with the sun in my hair -
make this the most important thing I do in a lifetime.
-------------------------
looking at a photograph of any Saturday, July 2007 - me and my brother standing on the beach looking at the moonlight dragged over the bay, recklessly taking candids with a digital camera. both of us smile -
we look happy.
tell me that these
are those whispers I want to tell you,
softly on your ear and
shy like fingers of fog that tease the streetlights -
those moments when I'm alone,
and I remember man is not an island.
I relive afternoons, lazy hours after school
sharing the forbidden knowledge,
glad to die with the fruit of the Tree. I've made
my skeleton out of moments that brag
with the boldness of the sun,
all the paths of your life laid out clear
in sidewalk paths and auditorium rows, pews
and stages familiar through months and years.
these are the secrets, a sadness
I wonder if you share - living out the days
of my dwindling adolescence - I'm nothing
if I'm not alive.
if I cannot at least once a day
savour a hard-boiled egg
or savour the nonsense of being
then it's not the life that I can hear humming
from flourescant tubes down hallways,
in the concrete edifices of our street corners, or
in our hearts.
I wonder if it's written in stone -
the throbbing pulse of I'm trying to say,
that sits in my gut like too much whiskey
tell me it's carved deep enough to run
my fingers through the edges
so I can understand it,
know that my love is the right balance
of unbearable lightness,
why I'm terrified to die.
I wonder if you can look at the lines,
if they just as deadly
miserable it feels.
-------------------------
looking at a photograph, dated March 16, 2006. The Fairfield University choir is performing a concert in the San Lorenzo chapel in Florence, Italy on their spring break tour. the sixty students line the steps of the altar, the white and black tuxedos and dresses silhouettes against the pure white stone. they are frozen, mid-note - they
look happy.
tell me this is how I imagine dying -
I imagined music, a hymn that I heard
one March evening, sung by an italian choir.
the notes hung like fingers of light, caressing your face -
I was there, sitting on a wood pew and
wringing my hands in the cathedral -
something ethereal in me lifted up,
gently -
because it's whisper quiet, these days - grey
and lonely, listless. not how
I imagined this happening,
or what I want it to be.
tell me the feeling doesn't die, too
and that I can visit it sometimes, sitting
surrounded by picture frames and love letters -
memories welling up like hymns lifting
glory glory hallelujah,
lux, lux callida gravisque into the night -
because I hear it every day
the warmth and certainty of being lost
into an essence larger than yourself,
knowing that the answers dance in your mind in the twilight hours of your sleep.
tell me you hear those whispers, too -
maddeningly too soft to understand, but
the heart of it rings true,
hanging immortal, and somehow
you know.