Worn, I long for the simplicity of desert,
for Abba Poemen’s knee to rest my sleeping head.
I call to heart the peace of silent communion,
of neighbour and myself in essential speech.
But mind is Baroque in its impulse.
Chiaroscuro in substance, it curlicues toward ceilings,
rhizomatic and elaborate,
frantic in its downward and upward questing.
The finger outstretched, God to man,
is lost in my musing. Does it reach, nonetheless?
I seize this moment; possibility yawns.
At the foot of the morning’s cave, I listen.
The Consolations of Writing 