A poem for a friend

I would have written a poem for you

But the long, grey leagues of the sea between us

Swallowed my words,

And blew my songs away.

(Seagull and albatross,

Wings that rise and fall,

And beat across my mind

An alien rhythm,

And the sea and the spray, and the wind and the waves

Seem one,

Just one,

I turn and try again.)

There is no rest here

Until the winds are spent

And the storm has moved away

(Wherever it is storms go)

And the words fall back in place,

And cadence rules again.

Will I offer such a poem?

A trumpery of syllables?

But there are more than poems

In the warp and weft of breathing,

In the sacramental reaching

Of the hearts that He would join,

Music without notation

But a pilgrimage of joy.

Therefore I would send you

Not the stale words of my typing

But the breath of my heart’s leaning

From the weariness of life

To the resting place we find

When the heart says, “yes, YOU see!”

Following kind whispers

To the music of the spheres,

Tracing a moment’s giving

To the grace that binds us close.

And where we reach, we touch

Despite this world’s wide winds.