Praying Mantis

Imagine my surprise,
finding you on
the arm of my chair!
I suppose you chose it
not for comfort,
but for its color
compatibility,
crouched as you were,
permanently
bent for the spring.

What was your intention?
How did you find your way
into my house, and when?
But these were not
my first questions.
Inhospitably,
I wondered how
I might remove you -
without touching you,
of course.

So we stood, both
in our places,
uncertain,
mistrustful,
until I realized
it isn't death, but life
we fear, with its
unpredictable
capacity for
rendering death.

And watching you,
with little brain,
I knew you
knew it too.

BFS

Boredom

I was bored, Lord,
and so you gave me
a little worry to
remind me
bored is better.

BFS

Tonguetied

There are many
things I cannot say,
because I might be
misunderstood -
might do injury
to some layer of
comprehension
beneath elaborate
coats of culture -
wound some ancient spirit,
restless underneath
its new decor.


It isn't my intent.
I do not want
to waken sleeping
tigers, feel
their claws imbedded
in my soul. So,
I am silent,
caging my responses
till they sleep
anxiously
beneath my
painted smile.

BFS

The Victor

The quiet log
permits the flame to touch and hone
its sturdy frame.
Impetuous,
frantic fingers
smooth the wrinkled bark,
probe callously the wooden heart to
find a sister spark.
The vibrant fire clutches
at its life-sustaining prey - and dies.
The passive log endures -
as ash, worn soft and grey.

BFS

Getting and Spending

I long to capture Wisdom in my net,
let petty thoughts escape without regret
and feed upon the riches that I find
add lustre, opalescent, to my mind;
then fill my heart's deep pool up to the brim
with Wisdom's offspring, Joy and Strength, to swim
about serene and safe within my care
until some soul in need asks me to share.

BFS

Being

There is always a corner that
harbors dust.
No need to search; it will collect
And make itself a force
to reckon with.

It doesn't happen slowly.
Dust rushes
to accumulate,
materialize,
like wispy smoke that holds
itself together, apart
from common air,
insisting.

BFS
1976

Low Stone Walls

Low stone walls
will listen well to silence
or to words that wrap pain
in thin tissue for presentation,
accept all gifts of confidence
without rebuke.

Though they run beside the road
and mount the hill, low stone walls
will carve no riverbeds, won't seek the sea.
They stop beside the traveller to stand
between a weary spirit and the wind,
let themselves be leapt
or sat upon
if that's the need,
offer easy climbing and
a meagre height for longer views.

Age and use don't polish
low stone walls to glossy eminence.
Have you noticed?
Uniformly gray, they sometimes weep.
Have you seen them weep,
the low stone walls?

BFS

Questions,Answers

Who, you asked, made God?
wanting an answer
to descend like rain upon
the curled question
to fill the empty circle
so the matter would be closed.

Let's look and see, I said, so
together we peered
through the question and saw
infinity: a limitless range
of mights and maybes,
a flood of ifs,
a sky pellucid, blue,
no rain.

Perhaps, you said, He isn't yet all made.

BFS

In Season

Putting
on youth so timidly
the awkward hickory limbs bud and burst,
tremble to uncertain geen;
eclipsed by brazen daffodils, the tender leaves
take heart from dogwood branches filled with stars,
sure of their place on the bough,
and shyly wait for sun and moon
to shape new truths
from
old
and
tangled roots.

BFS

Hope

Too cold for too long,
Brittle winter cracked
at last, and through
the ragged fissure,
a misty light
revealed pale remnants
of a Summer past,
the mother of a
Spring to come.


BFS

Sleeping Child

I intrude upon my sleeping child
And find her will is gone.
Her innocence and trust remain
Protecting all the dreams
She has not learned are vain:

To pay tenpence and sit beside the queen
upon a throne,
To dig a hole to China with a spoon, and in between
to chance upon a pot of gold,
And once grown old
To be reborn a child again.

BFS

Poimandres

Sheep,
Where rests the Shepherdman
Who coaxed you to this greeny feast
Spread thick o'er England's ample breast?
Where lies the woolen cloak
That warms the Shepherd's fleeceless back,
The crook that rescues lambs from crooked paths?
Is there no Shepherd's pipe
To softly bend the blades of grass,
No yipping dog to nip the heels
Of errant sheep?
Tranquility arrests the gentle breed,
The ram, the ewe, the lamb, who feed
By waters still and deep.
Dear flock, where hides the wolf?

BFS

On Meeting Charles Dickens

A face so rare - I knew him instantly,
The gentleman with balding fur-fringed pate,
The paunch, the strut, his blinking blue-eyed glee,
At once the pauper and the potentate.
And while I watched Micawber twirl his cane
Why, "Oh, my liver and my lungs," a Shade,
Cadaverously thin and gaunt, did stain
The wall beside me. Woefully afraid
To meet the leer of 'umble Heep, I sneaked
Beneath a passing parasol. 'Twas damp,
Its owner, too, was sodden and she reeked
Of gin. The refuge found was Sarah Gamp.
I did not go to Doughty Street to stare
Because I met you, Dickens, everywhere!

BFS

1976

Envy

It's hard to pity the peach,
blessed as she is
with the blushing cheek
and a skin as soft
as the nose of a mare.
It's hard to believe that the peach
has a pit
and probably envies the pear.

BFS
(sometime)

Western Poppies

The Tintinnabulation of the Bell

The older he gets
the younger he looks,
this runner of races,
this writer of books--

And the younger he looks,
the more he belies
the fact that he's fifty
and wears no disguise.

No toupee, no goatee,
not a contact lens,
he survives, yea he thrives
on his strict regimen

Of grit and granola,
gargantuan goals,
that he sets for himself
and his Reebok soles.

Oh Jerry, dear Jerry,
you're so gentle and kind,
and though you are fifty
we really don't mind

As long as you vibrate,
you jingle and peal,
you're loved from your head
to your truly Tar Heel.

BFS

A Villanelle for Tina Bell

A dainty thing is Christine Bell,
A shining jewel set in gold,
At fifty now, femme nonpareil.

So fair of face, this demoiselle
Whose youthful smile has wisdom's hold,
A dainty thing is Christine Bell.

With charm and grace she doth excel
In acts of kindness manifold,
At fifty now, femme nonpareil.

And like the yellow asphodel
All friendships bloom within her fold,
A dainty thing is Christine Bell.

The subject of this doggerel,
The queen of fun, her wit extolled,
At fifty now, femme nonpareil.

Tres elegant, tres chic as well,
In spirit and in gifts bestowed,
A dainty thing is Christine Bell
At fifty now, femme nonpareil.

BFS
July 12, 1991

Poppies on Jura

If Wishes were Fishes

In former life, I was a fish.
That's why it's my Piscean wish
To situate beside the sea
And contemplate life's mystery.

To sift detritus on the shore,
Or frame the stars in heaven's door,
Then shift my view from sky to sand,
And name the seashells in my hand.

I'm getting closer; I was born
Amid midwestern waves of corn;
Though east I came, to Chapel Hill,
I'm still removed from fin and gill.

My hopes depend on fate at last
To reinstate my fishy past;
To recognize my scaly kin,
Give back my salty origin

And make a home beside the sea
That's adequate for John and me
To muse our final days away
In sight of whitecaps and seaspray.

BFS
1987

Will There be a Breeze in Heaven?

Will there be a breeze in heaven?
And if there is, will skinless souls still
Feel the zephyr’s gentle touch?

Will raindrops gather into pools
Where goldfish dart and the goldfinch
Comes to wet its wings?

Will angels sing Beethoven’s Ninth
While trumpets greet the dawn
of new and everlasting life?

Will all the fruits of Eden hang on trees
In easy reach? Will tongueless souls
Appreciate the plum, the peach?

Will sunlight cast its glorious beam
On heaven’s hills? And will its counterpart,
soft shadow, be allowed?

Will thunder rumble up from earth
To interrupt eternal peace,
Eternal calm, complacency?

Will we remember what we left behind
If heaven proves a stranger, and
Life’s small joys are life’s alone?

BFS
August 2005

Dunvegan Poppy

Today

I am so busy doing
that I lose being.

BFS

Hebridean Poppies