Olly Olly Oxen Free

 while I'm being (perhaps unnecessarily) self-revelatory on the internet, here's one of the poems i wrote last fall

Olly olly oxen free

I am listening for silence,

tired after

a long hour of seeking.

Prayer:

the simplest, most complicated thing.

The Christo negro hangs on the wall,

souvenir of long-ago pilgrimage.

Crutches and eye patches littered the pathways

up to the cross.

If I but touch the hem of his garment

No tattered edges of cloth here.

Only the hum of the boiler,

ticking of slow radiators,

growling stomach.

Noisy critics pour water on the embers

of my desire—

you’ll never get anything done.

What is it that you want,

I ask myself.

Remember the sweet Buddhists:

be gentle on

yourself, on others.

It’s good advice.

Why should it be so difficult?

I write my poems in labyrinthine

circles.

Coming closer to the center, but no—

only to find myself again on the outside.

Not lost, exactly,

neither to end at a new beginning

I once would have said

that hunger is a gift;

the peril  of that old

self-sufficient lie more dangerous

than starvation.
I even wrote a poem about it.

From the bottom of the well it looks different.

Silence only magnifies the echoes.

Come, come and climb down with me—

we will be lonely together.

It will be an adventure,

giggling children in the dark—

hiding from our mother’s call.

Count to ten!

Ready or not, here I come.

Mother Mary sends her son

to share in our cruel games

The sleek winners cry foul

as he changes the rules.

We will all be released

but will we follow?

The ladder hangs down the well

just within reach.