Plumbline

The depths of the heart:
deep, dark water
no line could reach
no plumb, no measure of
depth, no ruler that long

to part, the father
I like the beach
I had a shawl,
once when I was young

Daughter where are you
where did you beach
treasure of gold in the
heart, the human song

of good, of good deeds
of a true road, the reach
of good intention is long
singing, trying, forever young

with starting again, anew,
each day clean, trying.
Twenty fifteen no time
for speech, for the part

that did not last, gone
in a second and then the
mourning, long, a neverending
wrong that affronts us

and we go down
to the street in a quiet
night in September and
breathe-in all our lives

as if the moment mattered
and, always,
we could begin.

previous poem

next poem