I saw creation, nothing less.
Closing my eyes in hospital
for solace, denied egress
from one small spot, a bed,
not so much of pain as rough
discomfort, where battleground
nausea raked my consciousness.
You cannot will a vision.
It must come, unearned or earned.
I do not moralise, merely conclude
the universe is given, hence, a gift.
Mine was the reddest rose
I ever saw. I left it to grow richer,
deeper, unable to think of velvet
or the ruby glass of Chartres
(which came after), but sank
into the redness, into rose
grown from the inner eye, from soul.
Wondering, I knew
even such redness isn’t all:
from the petals, from the throat
came dancing endlessly
the finest, spitting rain of gold,
as fireworks or welders
shower sparks
that fall and fall,
astonishing the eye.
I understood:
surfaces that seem static
burst with life
of we knew but the frequency.
Stones hum, bricks shimmer,
the very leaves drip silver.
Air is charged with moving motes.
Life happens every moment:
creation’s never done.
The rose of the world
does not sleep: She
burns on.
