Shape and Substance

To the star-flecked Darkness
he said for no apparent reason:
I have nothing of any use
to say.

The night went on
around him, solar winds
chasing constellations through
the corridors of shadow
to obscure destinations.

Aware of his irrelevance,
he remembered fervent days
when he prayed for things
that mattered, moved the world.

But these night-winged words
are just balloons inflated
with helium-colored hopes,
full of squeaky certainties;
when they burst, as they will
if ever they rise high enough,
the Darkness laughs.

He thought,
maybe I make the Darkness
laugh. At least that’s something,
isn’t it?

Our lady of the mournful mien
cloaked and draped in feathered shawl
asks her question, true and keen
that echoes from the trees as tall

as any medieval spire
it furrows heaven if it pass
this way, and should that not transpire,
it settles softly in the grass

beyond the glade, at last to bear
its muted witness, dying soft
between cathedral walls of air,
of peat below and cloud aloft.

At evening’s hour I passed along
the path before the woodland door
and there heard it, clear and strong
and thought it was intended for

another, but listened nonetheless,
reflected on its fear and thrall,
and wondered why in what distress
we must draw lines; we must build walls.

But soon enough the thought occurred
that walls do not discriminate
among the ears that hear the word
to gather or to separate

but beg the question in the air
of difference between the two:
the one is here, the other there
but deserving of the birthright, who?