Luke Grecki
Spring river flowing,
each petal floating down the way.
The trees are green now,
the last blossoms swept away.
How can a moment be
as brief as this,
a season turning while I sleep.
I hold up my cup
in the cool rains,
to fill my heart again with sorrow.
At night my days
decrease by one,
another spring dies
as summer rises again.
Time falls like rain
on the ground of being.
Sometimes it whispers
with the wind,
speaking of spring flowers.
Yet when it is silent
the greatest blossoms appear
in the forest of mind,
a growth in this eternal season.
Walk between these flowering trees
as sun kisses your eyelids,
hear the sound of the heart
as it flows down this old mountain
like a river.
Watch this fist open
like a flower,
the world ten thousand
miles away.
Drunk with pain you
tied knots in the dark,
trying to hold earth.
Yet this quilt knows
no borders,
your life winding through
its aimless symmetries
as you sit still,
the waters of being
as silent as a mirror.
I was on my back as you came
into that dark room.
Crying that you were far
I held to you in that cave,
my voice foreign to my ears.
I stood up under the eaves,
rain falling as I watched
each second dying in the
light of silence.
A life of sleep burning in
the fire of this truth,
my library of dreams becoming
a ruin in my old hands.
Yet I still don’t understand
this strange movement
of night and day,
the hollow sound of clocks
as I try to stay awake.
My ignorance is an ocean,
the tides pull on my sinking boat
as I cast my net in the waves,
waiting for a song in the dark.
Black branches cradle
this flickering mind,
sorrow’s shadow follows
these points of light
shining in the void.
Kneel before the dark,
trace your fingers
along its walls
and read the cold words
in its faces of stone.
Be alone in
the fire of winter,
understand nature’s edge
as it cuts through your
worn truths.
At ocean’s end
I hold my breath,
waiting for the current
to carry me back to light and air,
as I carry my eyes of night
to the break of day.
Travel to the
river’s edge,
find these water worn
rocks as smooth as clay.
In this rich soil
trees take root
among a sea of weeds.
Follow the river’s
flow, keep your eyes
fixed on its currents
that wind through the
forest at dusk.
These shimmering waters
are as silent as the
sun sinking at
horizon’s edge.
It is dark when
you reach the river’s mouth,
your feet wet and caked
with mud.
The sound of water
disappears into the
night, the river emptying
itself into this black ocean,
as you too fade like a candle
going out in the dark.
Let us swim in
this sea of impermanence,
the waves crashing over
our gaping mouths as
we cry out for air.
There is no land
in sight, all doors lead
to empty hands.
The moon flickers on
the face of this sea
as our hair turns white,
as our years flash like hours
in the pull of the tide.
We have time to
give a few things names,
to paint some colors
on this skull as
we tread water.
In a thousand years
some soul may receive
our letter, our words
finding breath in young eyes,
as our silences die with us
in the grave of the sea.
Witness the soul as it moves
through the cage of time,
as it paints itself
with the colors of
the finite,
as it matures in
the passing light
of the seasons.
It is the movement
of a living question
that feeds us,
a pulse in the music
that surrounds us,
a whisper in the waves
breaking on the sands
of this forgotten shore.
Pulling at the thread
of this maze I unravel,
my body becoming earth
as my heart burns
in the sky like a
red sun.
Forget this tunnel,
the light now filters through
this window of sky.
When my head lies
tangled in knots
I am a desert.
Now my sight is
as green as grass,
sleep falling from
my eyes.
When I go under again
whisper to me of
rivers and trees,
call me back to
the mind of nature.
The vine wanders
across vast fields
and up these old
walls.
Its tendrils kiss
both soil and stone,
spreading as it advances
with the seasons.
It grows along
the current of life,
ripe with fruit
hidden in the twists
of this ruin.
Soon it will reach
the borders,
this growth touching
the shore as it drinks
ocean water, moving into
the music of the waves.
Breathe deep of
this wilting world,
watch as death
becomes ripe in
the eyes of the living.
The corners pulse with change
as our months disappear
into seasons,
as we forget our truths
in the ocean waves.
To repeat ourselves
is our curse and
our joy,
to grow wheat again
where wheat has died,
to cry where
tears have fallen,
to open doors heavy
with memory.
Start again,
kiss your shadow
as the sun rises
like grass.
Wake at night
to the howling wind,
listen to the music
under the ground.
Watch the city sleep
like the dead,
as you alone
drink the silence
and the dark.
Soon the moon
will go under
the clouds,
as day is born
to those leaves
dying in autumn sun.
Still, the night
holds me with
its whisper,
it calls shadows
that I cannot reach.
I sit like a mountain,
only a candle’s flame
separating me from
midnight.
A black train rides
through the night rain,
a prisoner to the
silver rails.
The ocean in the window
is just a mirage,
the tracks leading from
land to land.
Put your hand in mine,
feel my pulse in
the beating of these
steel wheels of time.
Soon the sea will rise
above these old tracks,
the sun will swallow
this island of night.
A guest in this
house of days,
my season passing
in an ocean of time.
Some guests leave early,
their voices ringing
like chimes in the
winds of experience.
My mind is passing
through this open window,
the moon as full
as my old heart.
What can words say
in these waves
as my hands
wrinkle with age.
I sit in silence
to listen closely as
the minutes unravel
like thread,
as the hours flicker
in this sea of night.
Reach out to
the heart of days,
cradle this blue fire
that withers leaves
and makes the moon
full.
With time’s breath
on your neck
this road has no forks,
it winds through a wild country
in a storm as dark as night.
The sun sits
glowing in the void
as we wait for
an eclipse of the heart,
as we wait for the moon
with our waking eyes.
Watch the days sink
like shadows,
breath rising and falling
in the hollow of this wind.
Watch as the lights
go on and off
like fireflies,
as soft grass grows
on old graves,
as a yellow moon
sits above this black forest.
Watch the eyes of love,
the mouth of hate,
the faces of time that
flicker and wane.
Watch each leaf
as it burns with life,
and falls back to the
cool ground of silence.
Into the cold night,
wide eyed and wild fire
flickering like light
from the constellations
of this ruin.
To not know when
one might circle home,
to feel something in
the old eyes of a stranger
as the mystery holds taut
as a tightrope over
the pitch black abyss.
These acrobats of day and night
may interlace fingers,
floating in pockets of time
as wind turns to breath,
as this dance grows
out of muddy water
toward some strange light.
Your half shadow
covered in moss,
draws me in to
your wilds.
What I don’t know
is your face at sunset,
your eyes wide
as night swallows day.
Beginnings have the charm
of the dark,
the little that is seen
illuminated by fire,
a portrait that moves
like a river hidden
by great trees.
Will sunrise bring the sight
of roots or flowers?
As I move in the
mirror of your mind
can you feel the wet earth,
can you feel the grass growing
under our soft feet?
Ride the wild horse
of the mind,
see these dark lands
empty and silent.
It was all fool’s gold,
the questions and conclusions,
the plates and the food,
this earth and ocean water too
are shadows of a searching
dream, the many masks
of a being weaving existence
into the clothes of mystery.
My tears fall in this
shifting river,
salt mixing with water
moving to a distant shore.
Longing is folly against
the music flowing in the winds,
this eternal theme sounding
in my body,
despair a crime against
the light present in darkness,
this star that slowly burns
in the heart of night.
The days shift like sand
over these old dunes.
I stand as a flag
in this timeless desert,
dancing with the winds
that have travelled to meet me,
reading their designs like
gold letters in strange words
that hold as much as they hide.
If I move with the signs of time
it is not to arrive at some richer land,
it is only to untangle
this braid of birth and death,
to sound the drum whose rhythms
will reveal this silence
like flowers unfolding
under the full moon,
in bloom for weary travelers
seeking waters of home.