Hear Now the Gates

Hear now the gates slowly opening as the night

invades our questioning ears, weaving in the flood

of our fluid dreams the syllables of unuttered hopes.

Evening into evening we pray for wakefulness,

with needs to be paid for patience, love rewarded,

life to receive the broken bread of homage.

But always, always life dissolves; objects become thought;

words to fix time fade; memory quavers asleep

even as hurrying trains hurtle us homeward

with glimpses of the moon, even as forgotten faces

move in the grace of greeting, or retreat in whispers.

Lips, substanceless as words, move without context,

fitfully; fingers weave meaningless gestures, resolve

into the motion of trains, reach into time.

Then it is love, love, we call, as we wade

through deep air, up steep stairs. Love, love:

once more hammer the failing vision into shape.

Form into full coherence table, eye, and mind.

Give us a flowering world, but let it be rock.