Long ago two young men drew a map of the sky
Laying on their backs, perhaps,
Like children in tents with holes in the tops
They counted and connected the stars.
Order from chaos was formed in their eyes
Squinting into darkness
Blinded not by light but by enormity
And mysteries invisibly connected.
They traced routes with their fingers, point A to B,
Like homemade kites pursuing the way
With windy anticipation and
Lines to find what was or was not connected.
As the men grew beards, their love of the sky
Fell to the earth and to pieces.
Shatters of themselves were given away
To money, ambition, and work: disconnected.
One of the two held hands with success
Palms sweaty together and traveling
With compass pointed away from the heavens
And down to notifications and contacts: connected?
The other man poured his life slowly
Like a cup spilling over his family—a wife and two kids—
He drained all he had, a deluge of hope
And then gurgled and gasped as the woman fled: disconnected.
Alone—surprised by aloneness—
The un-wifed man lifted the tips of his naked fingers to the sky.
Suspended in air his hand wished to feel
To touch, to reach, to caress, to connect.
No alien hand reached with fingers to intertwine
So the man looked down, instead.
A tear dripped from his eye and onto his future:
Two children—looking up from the ground—
Counting and connecting the stars.
© Jill Szoo Wilson, 2015
Tag: Poet
Poem: God of the Street
What if God was as close as
The domed ceiling of an antiquated church—
Walls lines with stained glass
Depictions of before and after
Christ invaded the story
The history of man
A broader narration
An epic
A comedy
A tragedy
A lineage of life and death
And birth and
Resurrection.
The grandiose nature of
The Alpha and Omega—
The beginning and the end—
Could not be contained
The stained glass rattles
The musty, dusty wood
That used to be trees stretching
Tall in majestic places
Now bowing to parishioners
Waiting for
Waiting for
The release of weight
When men and women
Stand to their feet
Applaud and proclaim
Praise to the One that lives
Beyond the dome—
Outside the temple erected
His focus directed on each one
Who walks the streets
Umbrellas and tissue
And glasses and backpacks
Catering to their earthly needs
All the while moving inside
An invisible song
Pervasive notes swirling
In the air
The breath of God in the wind
His playfulness in
The wings of fluttering birds
His rejuvenation in colorful promises
Of spring
His love in the eyes of those
Who hold hands
His peace in the frogs croaking
Their midnight serenades.
He whose visage
Hangs in the churches
Broke through the walls to
Walk side by side
No dome
No tomb
No misunderstanding
No doubt
No running
No running
Can hold the God of
Everywhere
Prostrate
To our wood and plaster and
Ornately
Drawn windows:
It is we whose frames are weak
It is we whose knees
Must bend
Whose heads must bow—
It is our shatters
Our shards that the
Incense picks up and carries
Into the atmosphere
Palpable with life
And into the nostrils of He
Who broke through the dome.
© Jill Szoo Wilson, 2016
Poem: Of Melody and of Moan
The sky is hot like leather
Brown and coating our skin
With beads surging into streams
Of sweat
In the distance
A lonely guitar throbs
Crooning refrains of love
And regret
We toil long and
Hum the oscillating songs
One by one to forget
The hour
Bugs sway back and forth
On blades of green
Tired and scorched by fever and
By life
Women tell stories
Laugh with heads thrown back
Simple versions of disaster pulsate in
Their smiles
Men with sinewy arms
Pull from the lazy earth
Swollen roots of sustenance and
Of dreams
Children thump the ground
Like ragtime drummers
Beating rhythms of play and
Far away
The musician strums andante
Caressing silvery strings releasing
Vibrations of melody and
Of moan.
© Jill Szoo Wilson, 2023
Jill Szoo Wilson 