A Land Like Silver Dust Motes Dancing

The notes rose from the Irish flute and fiddle,
Each and every note alone,
Single and solitary among the crowd of others,
And rose into the middle air,
Rose to its perfect place,
And burst -
With a clean and awful clarity -
Burst and then dispersed,
Into some unknown time and less known space.

“Ireland”, I said, “must be a lonely place,
Or else must have a lot of lonely places.”

“Ireland”, she said, “has lots of lonely places…”

God save me from this awful place

My eldest has gone crazy and,
My youngest has passed on,
Amid these dark and greasy trees,
Amidst these slimy leaves,
That rot before they hit the ground,
To feed the crawly things.

And yes, my love is ever here,
Sunk in this muck and mire,
So wasted by my vanities,
And buried by my fears,
Down deep beneath this worm filled peat,
Down deep beneath my tears.

But there, a shaft of golden light,
And two of argent blue,
They are named Hope and Love and Christ,
Birthed just to see me through,
The dreadful horrors, terrors of,
This deep dark shade-made night.

To save me from this world of strife,
To save my worthless life,
To free me to a better place,
And ease my Spirit's pain,
Forgiveness given free of charge,
For prayers prayed not in vain.

It is a smile from God's own face,
It is a thing that He calls Grace.

Sometimes you have to take a chance

What is this jeopardy I undertake?
A futile try to turn death's blind and solemn eye?
No, just a chance,
thrown on the hard green felt of life,
Sometimes we have ought else,
So thrust it forth and let it ride on red.

Charge and shock,
Infuse the drugs.
It will or won't,
Depending on the fates,
Bring life, or leave it lie on death.

And o'er and o'er, to no avail,
And then we try the thing,
That is not in our book,
But has long been within our head.

And there, a beat,
Another.
Prometheus hath found fire,
Of which he must not speak.

We write it up to fit,
The concepts of physicians,
Long insulated from the field,
Wherein we do this thing.

And Lo, it works – and no one knows,
But us,

And we have won the roll,
And no one ever knows,
But we go home,
And hide the chips within our heads...

And always know they're there.