Of Memoranda

Handmade quality of parchment’s texture

draws the hand across its silent texts;

many written in elegant prose,

some in verse.

Noted passages recorded,

read against candlelight

by those with a devotion to knowledge,

vellum modes for the hungry to learn from the cooks.

Important first rubrics of:

ceremonies and rituals,

canons for mourning,

chants of priests petitioned by both king and vagabonds,

prayers of the living,

the wants of the dead

handed down to those most in need of gifts.

Languages from the ancient past,

doctrines to be absorbed in the future,

personal messages reflecting sweet talk,

colorful dialogue, extravagant promises,

main points inked as

barren rhetoric in a high-flown style.

All these,

evidence of the continuing attraction

of sheepskin and papyrus.

 

 

 

                        

                                                            Drawing by Linda Imbler

Insensate

A distracted, harried woman on her way to work,

collided with a truck,

now an ersatz depiction of a sleeping woman,

amid tubes and drips she lies.

She concentrates on the doctor’s light, 

she knows it is important.

On the outside, appearance is insensate, 

“Brain-dead,” the diagnosis. 

An autistic Navajo child, 

he has never laughed, spoken nor cried. 

Present at the tribe’s nightly dance, 

“Poor kid doesn't even know his own name.” 

He concentrates on the firelight, 

he knows it is important. 

On the outside, appearance is insensate, 

His eyes lock with an image at the center of the flame. 

An orchid in a greenhouse tucked amid blooms of gladiolas, 

full of color and fragrance, useful for formal events, 

giving pleasure when viewed, 

but it won't interact or are we just confused? 

It concentrates on the sunlight, 

it knows it is important. 

It shows a smiling countenance, lifts, grows strong. 

On the outside, appearance is insensate, 

“You can't carry on a conversation with a flower.” 

How little regard some have, 

for that which they judge unfeeling. 

How fragile the connection, the understanding, 

for that which they feel is incognizant.

Judgement from such disregarding minds and hearts,

surely, from God’s point of view, is insensate.   

 

 Thank you to editor Sand Pilarski of Piker Press for publishing my poem in July.