Lovely Bones

White, bone white,
Dry, bone dry,
Here they lie
Amidst the mold
Autumn’s ruby red and gold
All gone by.

Gather them then,
Collect them all
Make of them a pile
A bundle pitiful and small
A girl child’s tibia and femur
A woman’s pelvic saddle
Skull entwined with
Hanks of yet red-gold hair still.

What husband left her there,
Or lover, brother, friend – murderer?
Why should she lie so cold
Upon her bed of old old
Maple tree appendages, mingled
With the sharp needles of pines
Dun dull and brindled brown.

So I will lay my head upon
An empty breast, sprung
Casket of the heart,
Pure enameled cage of hopes
Love now abandoned
Upon a wind of fall
Drifting like descending leaves
Dry and whispering.

I will wonder what children
Might have been
What tanglings amid the
Warm drifts among the trees
Would tint white cheeks
And cause dark eyes
To smolder, lips bruised with
Kisses fierce or nibbles tender.

Oh, yes, and I might dream
Why bones must lie here
Unloved, ungathered as dreams
Of love in autumn
Only, only, for a time and times.
Love will one day
Gather these and knit them
As in their mother’s
Womb first they were knitted
Down below in
Deep to depths unknown unknowable.

Ad majorem Dei gloriam,

Wendell Geary Jr.
Fall, 2001

Seeking Arran

Clyde’s coast
Brunei’s shore
To walk them
Again or anon
Though one exists
Only in the heart’s imagination
The other only in memory’s aging eye.

To walk in block booted feet
Arran’s sea belt macadam,
View with my own white orbs
Lockranza’s iron tower,
Staring black socketed toward
The bay, girt round with her
Sward of rain damp green.

And on beyond to the
Twelve Apostle’s solid
White domesticity, deep set glaze
Catching the sun setting
Toward Erin’s Isle
Below the green gray curve
Of Kyntyre’s horizon line.

And on again to where the soughing
Breeze from the Firth echoes
In the arched confines of the cavern
Where lay the Celtic hero
Bruce’s royal head an exile,
As are those who dream of
Thick salt air flowing warm as mother milk
O’er frothy foam on sand beneath
Ecstatically arched palms sighing
In the heat of the tropic night.

And above the cold washed shingle,
Climbing up and up into the highlands
Of this little Scotland, following
A clattering, dun scree track
To where the rills over goarse and heather
Collect in a cold clear lake
Among the mounds of weathered gray rock hills.

And to the end, in the south
Among the scrub pines where
The red deer run,
When exhausted feet find wool warm
Comfort beneath an inn’s eiderdown.

How my feet do fly
Cold and wet, or warm and dry
In my mind’s far seeing eye
Along an island’s shore,
Pan’s land of nevermore,
Arran’s ilse east of Erin
Seeking Eve and love
Among sea palms and singing pines.

Wendell Geary Jr. – February 15, 2001 - III

Between the Worlds

Hot green haze
Fading to bluing gray in
Onrushing tropic dusk
All edged with burning orange in the utter west.

Above these towers now, over
Old Batavia, tier on tier
Clad with the emblem of the verdigris
Mermaid Arabica and her twin tails.

Java, garden of the east all
Jade, Adamite, Chrysoberyl, Chalcedony, Amazonite,
Emerald archipelago between
Never the twain to meet, East and West.

Crossroad of ancient empire
Qin and Brahmin, Dutch and Britannic
Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie
Shell and Exxon Mobile
Lapped by muddy waters
Off mangrove coasts
And orient religions all
Jesuit, Nestorian, mullahs, monks
In saffron robes and red.

But the waves that wash our
Hearts, brothers, sisters, soul fishers
Are azure and sea.

We then, carry his love,
Floating flame burning within the breast
Sailing in light of brilliant blue
Though to shore-bound view
These vessels drift in the foggy gray
Between the worlds.

July 2007 - OC, Singapore

Lost West of Boon Lay

Listening to Dido
And easily, my life is for rent
In sticky heat on hard seats
In smoothly running electric trains
And air conditioned diesel busses
Yellow sunlight, old with afternoon
Black hair, dark almond eyes
Christian cemetery, Islamic, Chinese
Military camps. Air Force. Army. Academy.
Late but not stressed,
Lost, but confident.
Hot, but there is a drying breeze
Alone but complete.
Truly loved and full of peace
Heart full and still
Because you do, Father, you do.

On the bridge between
Choa Chu Kang west and Choa Chu Kang east,
Following a woman over
To discover I’d gotten off too early
By two stops.
And a mosque just down the end of the block,
And carefully cut green grass in the field across,
And I have peace.
What joy, to be lost and late
And not repeating to myself
A litany of the level of personal inadequacy.

Late but whole.
Lost, and still a man,
Listening to love songs
By a woman I’ll never meet.

August, 2007

Alabaster Vial

You are going.
You are not mine,
Gone, and I had no chance.

To tell you
To show you how
I love you,
How I long for you.

Unrequited in my aloneness,
Touched by your grace
Touched by your love and gifts
How can I show you
What you mean to me?
The love inside me is
Strong, full, and fecund
The rivers of longing
A silent and mighty flood within.

I would have scented myself
With this, for your delight,
My delight to soar in yours
As I gave myself to you
Lover, companion, wife, mother
To the progeny of kings.

I only wanted what was the nature of
My creation and my stature fair.

But you are not mine,
You belong to Another,
And to a nameless purpose I cannot
Sound, a vagueness that stifles
My breath, and my heart pounds in
Unknown fear, my lungs burn
Beneath my breast.

So I give you but this portion
The scent, and pour out the vial
Of my longing, that you not forget
The delight I have in loving you.

I will not, cannot be silent.
Know then this, my love, for all of time.