Colonoscopy

“And so from day to day we ripe and ripe,
And then from day to day we rot and rot.”
From Shakespeare -- A Winter's Tale

This is how it happens, here:

small things lead to great things,
things inside tell of things outside;
the quick speak of the dead
inside us, stalked and silent.

Cells decay and grow
in their own cycle, but decay
and growth have the frail sound
of voices that fail at sunset,
softly carrying over lakes
until only ripples remain.

Beyond our knowing; roseate,
scoured, our bodies are traitors,
filled with the substance of
corruption. Bravely we stand it,
we stand it bravely, until the day
of reckoning, when all things
shall be brought to light..

Tears are not enough,
prayers are silent as water at evening.
pleading is as dark as the sun
in storm, whose spots mar its energy,

What have I done, what have I
said, where have I been silent that
I should be so? God’s bowels move
on the firmament while lakes ripple
quietly as wings of bats, but say nothing,
do nothing.

Space is space, time is always time,
matter is singly and simply matter,
but I, who are not of them,
corrupt from day to day
and hour to hour.




Copyright 2003 by David King.
All rights reserved.
Reproduced by Poetry 360 with permission of the author.