Who Is The Spirit
Robert Vivian Who waits with me before dawn listening for words in hush of winter and northern woods aloft and reaching out in falling snow with tiny hands like so many trembling brushes, and who is it dear breather, dear listener, dear inmost that takes the pen and moves it across the page making a soft, scratching sound so gentle and full of questions pausing before going on like someone who has just heard a beautiful echo and who is the candle and the flame it bears so brightly burning down to wisp of smoke that rises only to disappear, and who is the window that watches and waits so clearly with a reverence that does not end, and who is first cusp of sun breaking the horizon with bright of day and who is the fading full moon whose vigil gives way to daylight and who is the call of a single bird ringing the cold empty air in clarion sweetness and who are the deer tracks leading into woods and what kind of seeker is drawn to them in the marrow of pursuit toward the heart of a great mystery and who is the woodpile in the neighbor’s backyard stacked for burning and who is it that wants to fly, to soar, to fashion his wings out of balsa wood and aluminum siding and memories of a first kiss and what is this early morning hope that renews itself each day so quietly, so shyly as if almost afraid to open its eyes and who among us is shadow dissolving and shadow giving way to glowing and who is the doer and the baker and the candle stick maker and who is the babe and the wayward cousin down to his last crumpled dollar and who is the king and the beggar and the barefoot daughter and the lowly prince crouched beneath underpasses in the huddle of homelessness and who cries uncle or sister or alas and did my savior bleed, and who is the spirit that animates this body and these teeming cells and every body that lives and breathes and moves this day and what should I call it, and when does a prayer turn into flower and when does a flower turn into nuptials and reed bed and how long have I been given to ask these things though I will not grope after answers only reach out in wonder, and who will take me back to where I belong in the many splendored land of word before deed was born and everything was sung or spoken, everything was poem and how can I thank spirit for planting this ache inside me and nourishing it every morning and all of them one morning and one spirit of earnest play, eager to awake and to commence this fiddling with words that is like so much grateful sighing after a night full of dancing and laughter. |
Robert Vivian is the author of The Tall Grass Trilogy, Water And Abandon, and two collections of meditative essays, Cold Snap As Yearning and The Least Cricket Of Evening. He's currently at work on a collection of dervish essays.
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