An Arm’s Length Away
A poem where the divine feels distant, and the human does not.
I’ve been out with notebook and pen again. I do this often when the page seems to want to stay blank. Often I drive just a few miles down the road to the Derwent Reservoir. This place seems to put ink back in my pen - even in winter. And if it doesn’t, it’s a wonderful place anyway. Just to sit and watch the world wander by.
Anyway
I’ve been reading Ryokan’s poetry again. I also stumbled across the poetry of Ovid and his The Art of Love. I then began to compare Eros to Agape. We live balanced between the two. The world needs both and so do we. Apparently Dante’s Divine Comedy is seen as the ultimate synthesis of the two. I’m going to have to read that epic poem.
Here’s the poem I wrote today.
Unreachable
God is unreachable.
Your body
is an arm’s length away.
You are my empty church
your flesh has life, warming
the cold stone sermons
we speak.
The hut’s roof lets in rain,
the bamboo door whistles
and the chimney is demanding a brush.
Our bones creak in winter.
But not to love
would be
unforgivable,
a sin.
So, let’s light the fire,
now,
and make the unreachable
smile again.