In The Gathering Darkness

In the gathering darkness
be light.

but be the shine of the moon
that ripening white
intimate with the Egyptian blue
of night

and star –
fires dead, here, and yet to come.

In the midst of worlds coming apart
like eviscerated flesh,

be the love

that can enfold the burning earth
and the harvest of death.

be the whisper of the lover
breathed

Into the seashell of the waiting ear.

be the letter sent out across distances,
from ancestors,
hand to hand,
making generations.

In the gathering darkness
be hope,

indomitable bird,
sent flying through the burning forest.
the ecstasy of survival,
improbable life.

be the vessel soft and pregnant with
radiance.

be the clay channel

through which the new might flow

onto the parched fields
of the still burning earth.

In this time
where disaster touches disaster
In dread multiplication,

be the light

that no shadow of the powerful
can extinguish.