On the Waters

by Steve King

©  2012 

All rights reserved

The surface had been broken sudden,

ripples shake the sky to muddled gray,

mixing clouds with infinite azure—

clouds that seemed so bright before,

floating high upon a sea of light—

but not now in reflection,

not now, writhing on the fractured sheen;

The sun, bent to funhouse shapes,

a wandering balloon

set loose upon the world,

unencumbered child’s play

making light of all the day.

The certain picture gone,

hostage to the least of winds

that touch and go and leave no trace

or any true pathway.

The face upon the waters

puzzles now a dawning mystery:

eyes flash across each gathered wave,

changing with new currents,

now hiding in roiled shadow,

then glinting in that funhouse glare;

lips, fickling with each rise and fall,

first smile, then frown to bottom out the depths;

no Narcissus charm to beckon

from the spirit floating there,

countenance remote, delicate,

hanging just beyond an easy reach,

trapped within an ever-changing tide.

Watching for a certainty to settle of its own,

to hold a master vision once again,

an image, an idea that might stay,

knowing sure that all things seen

linger on their own thin edge,

ceding fragile form and gravity

to random ripples of unthought design

that shatter calm reflection,

spin still contemplation and regard

out of their sometime world.

These beauties that the image now betrays

are drifting peaceful on the deeper reservoir,

reflecting for an instant only on the broken shoal.

Such shadows may not be embraced,

nor should they even slip to light so much,

for all that gathers on the edge

is scattered as I stoop to see,

ruined on the muddled shore

as I do reach to lay a heavy touch.

From the Balcony

©  Steve King

All rights reserved

i.

Through all seasons,

peering outward from the high window,

he would watch the boats.

On they came

through clinging fog,

curtains of rain,

breaking through the crowning sun,

and out of deepest night,

with horns, lights

and strange dancing nautic grace,

gliding beneath sheltering stars

emerging to his view

as if the stirrings of dream.

Familiar constellations shown upon them all.

Only the moon would change its face,

although he knew it dragged the stubborn tides

in some promise of larger constancy.

Unchanging stars alone made perfect sense.

ii.

The manservant brought wines

appropriate for every season.

They drank to the hours,

and to the stars,

and for fair seas and warming winds

to usher every pilgrim home;

and to the dreams of coming ships,

and to great beauty as it once had been.

iii.

‘She’ll know me, even now,’ he said.

I have the pictures yet.’

‘And you have the letters.’

‘Yes, musn’t forget.’

‘The letters.’

‘You have them safe…’

‘I have them.’

‘Yes, most; but there are still a few…’

iv.

The sea changed every night,

the color and the call,

the mass of harbored boats

strung with lights

that traced a captive swell.

‘Shall I turn on the light?’

‘Easier to look out through the dark. 

I can see the farthest reach that way.

I will know her when she comes…’

He paused to dispel a nearing cloud.

‘…and she will need no beacon.’

v.

And so the many seasons went,

and many servants in their turns,

and endless boats and sheltering stars

reflected in the slipping tides.

And staring far through forgiving dark

to feel good seas and take fair wind,

he waited on a gentle dream

now grown ever close at hand.

And in the measure of his dream

he held a gaze so patiently,

to linger long on beauty lost,

someday to find his shore again.

Abiding without place or end,

great beauty as it once had been.

Springtime at the Olduvai

© Steve King

All rights reserved

where brown earth

and green bush meet

unrolling to empty azure all around

the cats picnic in moving shade

painting red the sands with random feasts

while

spiraling above

great birds follow where ripe scent blooms

across revealed ages

The brown guide says

‘here is where they saw it first’

the older tourist in fresh khaki nods

(gravely)

‘they were more like monkeys yes

not so much like us’

‘oh not so much like you sir’

‘no, you will have an easy resting place

and a crowd to please you at the last

not a pack set running

at the sight of you

torn

‘or puzzling as your eyes lose their light

wondering how this all had come to pass,

wondering that you must have so displeased

the angry spirits of the grass

‘dying quick

belly pain the last sensation

birds nearer

nearer as you watch

‘no, you will have kind grasses and cool earth

and there will be no mystery of you

and no seeking after

for it will all be known

plain as may be said

between the corners

of your polished stone

‘even now for you

the birds are distant curiosities

just artifacts like all these other things

even now

seeing how it all began

seeing how it goes’

‘no sir not at all like you’

and breaching earth

the ancient rift

a piece of countenance revealed

hollow eyes

broken brow polished

from long confinement

in grinding sand

and heaving gravel bed

come again to sun

outlasting flies

and all the carrion feasts

waiting for the sands again

the shifting grave

without memory or expectation

no mercy dreams

to soften long night

or another day

another season

as much a cousin now

to all rough stones

as to the monkeys

even less to you sir

yet sir

no sir not at all

The Sacred Groves

© by Steve King

All rights reserved

The sacred groves have all been hewn to render fences, dwellings, and their neat décor,

and rafts of other transitory things that will not shimmer nor bend with the air.

Not so much for temples and their ilk; not sanctuaries nor remote retreats

to shelter mendicant reflections, or to echo with those quaint old prayers.

Gone, the children’s hiding place in sheltered fairy-bowers;

gone the shamans and their daylight charms; gone the wise birds and seers.

I’ve read that in old days, those times gone by when gods were still with us,

with powers fit to fill the ready air, their large presence would inhabit the woods;

and for the gift of hospitality they would endow the golden boughs

with full song of spirit to hymn the notes of the enlivened leaves,

bidding winds to sing; granting grace to those who dreamed as kings,

if only over those small shaded realms, if only for a moment.

And now the sacred groves are gone, and gods don’t live by ready air alone.

Vacant are those airs, and stilled the voice that echoed all around;

and scattered on the open ground, the ashes of what once were golden boughs.