H
e a r t S o n s & H e a r t D a u g h t e r s of A l l e n G i n s
b e r g
N
a p a l m H e a l t h S p a : R e p o r t 2 0 1 4 : A r c h i
v e s E d i t i o n
DAVID COPE
Tender Petals For Calm Crossing
along this silent path among cliffs thru
terraced green you’ll
sing beneath your breath where the poet once
dreamed
of his escape thru the clouds, where whole
populations fled
to rebuild shattered dreams, hands in the
moist earth—
stone masons who shaped the rock attentively,
that it might
interlock & honor earth that gave both seed
& harvest
in the sweep of seasons—ghosts today, they
wander with you,
picking your pockets, to know what dreams you
bring
to this place, what breath you leave among
these rocks,
what song you gather in your backpack &
basket of silence:
here, the lost mother weeping for her child
borne to minutes
of love before its last breath, the father
pouring a lifetime’s
devotion thru his hands, his face red with
defeated love yet
shining in all the brilliance of that loss—here,
the lovers moving
together, their short gasps echoing in a great
sigh thru which
another child comes—here, the lost father who
could not face
the wreck of his love in his own child’s
eyes, his sorrow like
a hermit lost in the passes of his own
valleys, his heart bursting
with roses he could not bring to his own
table—here, warriors
cut down like corn on a day as crisp as
this, eyes turning skyward
one last time, up to the light as their
blood gushes out on fertile
ground, shining path where arms & legs of
the dead clutch
& kick at
heaven, vanishing dreams of hungry ghosts. so
you come, bringing blessings & eyes to
flush the tears that
still pool in the world’s grief thru all the
rages of lost centuries,
all the weeping sisters crying for lovers
that never appeared,
all the lost brothers marched thru barbed
wire to death’s
final anonymity in the last bursts they’d ever
hear, minds
turned inward to their mother’s cries on the
day they forced
their way into this light, compassion now for
them all:
that your dream be clear when you come to
this pass, I send you
this wish where tender petals turn, open in
both darkness and light.
[Originally
published in NHS 2001, http://www.poetspath.com/napalm/nhs01/cope.html.]