SOON
I saw no Way-the Heavens were stitched-
I felt the Columns close-
The Earth reversed her hemispheres-
I touched the Universe-
-Emily Dickinson, Number 512.
There is no first and last here;
all is forever, the feeling near,
noon and centre and a tear,
more than one, for all that’s
gone before and what is to come.
There is a taste of immortality
on these tall marble columns,
the beginnings of a touch of gold
that one senses deep down will
be forever. Many will be the words
that try to describe the trip, but wordless
the conception, tenacious my feeble grip.
When this brief drama in the flesh
shifts beyond our mortal coil,
I hope that I can hover here
in my sub-atomic soul so fresh
where I can juxtapose this time
and immortality in some eternal rhyme.
Meanwhile I’ll take the angles on this place
as they accost my open eye,
‘tis more than walls and gardens green,
more than land and sky.
One beauteous line that I espy
a spider sewed at night,
an arc of light, an arc of white,
such precision in his sight.
Sometimes a bird will walk along
and drink a dew from grass;
with rapid eyes he’ll hurry ‘round
and stir in his sweet song, alas:
he divides this silver world with wings
as he goes splashing past.
So do the butterflies float by
among these banks of noon;
their wings dance through this ocean
and gently they sing of soon!
Ron Price
15 June 1995