Alms for the Spirit by Candice James - HTML preview

The Understanding

© Candice James, Poet Laureate Emerita

New Westminster, BC CANADA

We wade knee-deep

In our own patterns of eternity:

Weaving the destiny we wear;

Mapping the world we create;

Stumbling through dreams;

Tripping on nightmares;

Cutting our teeth on the knife of life.

Visible and invisible,

Peeling hours like oranges,

Sharing slices of time,

We are ghosts

Filtering in and out of sky and soil.

Dreaming…

We’re lying awake.

Awake…

We’re inside the dream.

We are vapid expectations

Of our own personal poetry

Filling page upon page

With sunsets and moon-glow,

Snowflakes and stardust.

Waist deep,

We begin the understanding.