Woven with needles of light

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I r o n i n g   T h i n g s   I n

Circular Congregational Church Graveyard

Charleston, South Carolina

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Time and place, time and place,

how dull you make them sound:

I'll take a happier ground.

A history and a mystery

of absurd but bewitching secrets

in the May sky tra la in the bloodstream too

in the gay heart and the merry mind

in the dream that sings on the borders of sleep

of worlds lost and worlds to come

all of it woven with needles of light

blossoming and vanishing

flashing and gone. Time and place

but with a difference. Everything

to be touched and loved at once

each fiery item intrinsic and tangible

as the round red moon of the calendar

or the seconds jumping like crickets

on the stupid face of the clock.

The senses are mischievous but also

there's magic in them, and love

lives through the senses only.

Isn't it there that the soul lies?

O yes and lies and lies if you like,

for the soul too is a chameleon,

where and for how long can it stand still?

Over the steeple and under the hill.

Yet volatile and incorporeal howsoever

-- see where it flies! --

it too feeds only through the senses

summoning thus the very quiver of light

to be by this translated

and quickened to an ecstasy.

Now that is gone

and love undone.

From Love's Grammarians

= Conrad Aiken =

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Happy Friday