Growing Down to Grow Up

"One may not reach the Dawn, save by the path of Night"

Kahlil Gibran

 Growing Down To Grow Up

(Written for my children: Carise, Micael and Jason)

Each is a seed of boundless probabilities,

Skin encircling soul, holding all necessities,

Gifts and possibilities, nascent budding rose,

A tint of patterned petals, anxious to unfold.

Unique and wondrous flower, embryonic pod,

Drawn out by Gaia's power, fertile womb of God.

Beneath the crushing clay we wait then break apart,

Alone in seamless silence, enigmatic start.

Each seed must burst asunder, shed its fragile skin,

Lose its perfect circle, then begin again.

A skein of tangled roots exploding into birth,

 Fantasies expanding on a tapestry of earth.

Sown and sewed by Daemons within and out of sight,

Likeness cloaked in darkness, emerging into light,

Pushing through the soil as the Plantsman works above,

Dispensing rain and weeding, each an act of love.

Delicate newborn sprout pierces the emerald lawn,

Finally rising upward after months of growing down.

A shoot, a stalk, a blossom…then the sated bloom,

Symphony of brilliance, supple budding plume.

end/Michael Bogar

Something New (written after Jason's death)

"I" prayed, and nothing happened –

Jesus did not appear, there was
no "peace that passeth understanding,"
not even a numinous chill…

I watched a Guru on TV,
telling me all the religions were the same,
that the truth would set me free,
and on and ona ndon ananda ndon and on
until his droll chant ceased - and
                            he a$ked for money -
there was no truth, no peace,
and he blamed the nirvanic absence on ego.

Then "I" felt…

My mind extended into my chest, a cavity, a cavern
filled with a thousand swirling wraiths, angry
nondescript, terrifying in their discordant flurry,
not asking me to pray, but to enter…

"I" breached the mood, through my throat,
down a windpipe raw with grief
into a claustrophobic corridor, met by
a monstrous yelping dog
nearly chasing me back to my prayers
and the chanting Guru. I moved past,
and there,

Across the dark cavern I saw
a single shimmering wraith
rising from an urn held aloft by a
five fingered song, and two soft glowing eyes emerged,
brownish-black, somehow familiar…

There were no words,
but by his luminous glance the cavern, or my mind,
lengthened, and a million fathers stood around me,
and a million mothers, wives, children and
others too…

And that brown-eyed specter nodded at the horde,
saying nothing, making it clear that my hollowness
was not from his absence,
but from the presence of the empty multitude
as lost, as sad, as confused as me.

I turned back to the wraith, a wry smile,
also very familiar, had replaced the dark eyes,
and slowly he faded from my sight.

I returned back through the dim passageway
crowded with groans. 

I felt no sweet resolution, no truth,
none of the peace I had hoped for.

But there was a slight comfort,
a solace in the necessity of my ignorance,
the brilliance of hopelessness
in order that love
might crack the angry chrysalis of a lost race,
giving birth to something…new.

end/Michael Bogar  9/20/2008

GENTLY TUCKED US IN

Yes, my eyes lit up, coal bright

like an enigma about to disclose it’s riddle.

And my imminent silhouette

spread like an orange-red wraith

under a wisp of sun,

turning solid in your embrace.

I like the way you became familiar with my skin,

found the faint scent of perspiration

to which you returned again and again,

and the way you traced the rise

up the back of my thigh, cupped my bottom

on the way, continued your voyage

along my spine. We both watched the exploration

in the mirror, spectators of our own recital.

Leisurely, the evening wrote itself

in lines of verse made of sighs

and irrational sounds. Before sleep

gathered her kin, three soft words

and a final kiss gently tucked us in.

end/Michael

CONCERT OF THE GODS

One hundred thousand suns burst their rinds,

dispense pools of  swirling light -

before names, before time, spontaneous tendrils

hemorrhage passionately. Celestial white

splinters like porcelain. Without remorse each

stabs the fertile soil of night.

Atlas groans under the mass, fingers claw

toward stability, bending, shrugging, shifting,

hoisting each outburst into position.

Picking up my guitar, eyes closed,

empathic fist clenched as an in-breath tightens

each muscle before the down-stroke.

Poised, without plan, silver strings

cower beneath my hovering hand,

chords slammed through a Sunn Amp.

I mimic the concert of God –

Agni ejaculates red streams of semen

one rogue ember penetrates a crack in the egg,

congealing softly. Denizens of Eternity

stand to admire, “Fire! Fire! Fire!”

and Infinity bursts into bloom.

Notes like ash drift from the eager womb,

seeds burrow, sprout songs. Incessant pulsing

moves the rapt onlookers to applause.

One whispers, “Hush”, and then conception,

gestation, birth.

A spiral of milk piques full nipples.

Sorcerers and scientists explain how

continents were knit together, how stray notes

strung randomly are subject to no magic.

The full belly grows warm with spawn,

igneous arms lift the dawn, infant fingers rise

into cerulean skies, wiggling cloud-ward.

The child is laid under a crescent cradle,

golden bough gently tilting

spills pearl white milk to young Earth;

first breath, the infant suckles…

there has been a birth.

end/michael

COME TO ME, SLOWLY

Ecstasy of union is in separation,

depth of longing is born from length of desire,

most do not know that sun and roses spring from

winter's tedious garden. Romance is sown

in the soil of frustration. Troubadours

and modern lovers languish in self imposed bliss,

sensual postponement grooms two passionate seekers,

delaying carnal disappointment.

Miserable separation, so deliciously

keeps the illusion alive. Enforced distance

is wisdom, locking the gems of immanence

in the temple of transcendence.

Enjoy the gradual disinterment,

unearthing your lover through ritual imagination

and a thousand sacrifices, one kiss.

Love and death always work together,

a knife in one hand a tourniquet in the other.

Healing is in wounds, and for slow lovers

there is mutual blindness to inevitable discontent;

causing them to pretend that it is possible to be

always arriving while praying

that the journey never ends.

end/michael