Waiting....

-
Sometimes,
walking for hours through the woods,
I don't know what I'm looking for,
maybe for something
shy and beautiful to come
frisking out of the undergrowth.

Once a fawn did just that.
My dog didn't know
what dogs usually do.
And the fawn didn't know.

As for the doe...
dreaming that everything was fine...

The way I'd like to go on living in this world
wouldn't hurt anything, I'd just go on
walking uphill and downhill, looking around,
and so what if half the time I don't know
what for-

so what if it doesn't' come
to a hill of beans...

In the films of Dachau and Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen
the dead rise from the earth...
while the rest of the world
did nothing...

My dog and the fawn
did a little dance...

Oh, you never saw such a garden...
A many sits there...
He is finishing lunch...
A bottle of wine...
He fills a glass...
He lifts it to his mouth and drinks peacefully.

It is the face of Mengele.

Late the doe came wandering back into he twilight.
She stepped through the leaves. She hesitated,
sniffing the air.
Then she knew everything.
The forest grew dark.

She nuzzled her child wildly.


Mary Oliver...

Comments

Jan said…
Beautiful. I know you are waiting and waiting; I hope you find the peace of God in this tension of now and not yet.
10/14/2010 12:20 PM
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