Paradox Poem by Gregory Wm. Gunn

Despair nipped at our hearts,
we the blue children
of the growing season, long green stalks rising
in savoury fields.

Vitality has deserted us,
polished gems of the first water
swallowed by the Sun
and surface smiles.

Along the edge of Summer
we chewed on the softest sprigs
of sleep, myths gathered us
in on the brow of Night's
primeval forest.

Our tiredness grew restless,
it fashioned velvet shrouds,
double-breasted jackets
of weariness and ragged
woollen caps for our slumberless sojourns
in the wake of the dawn.

Lustrous after life
these short strides
from long-suffering
and extended habits.

In salt coated palms
(Fate's plans are blueprinted
in frost) we cup weighty heads
of past lovers. They perish
upon our guiltless fingertips.

The distant grey dove's
voice, beyond his heart and wings,
somewhere else in salvation
with bleak outlook, searches
memory's skylight
to sustain yet more shortened
gasps of Time.




01/24/08