CAMP CEDAR GLEN

CAMP CEDAR GLEN

The children find me here on the rock—
four girls and one boy, they climb up,
and spread out their towels to sunbathe.
Jenny, April, Autumn, Holly, and Sean.
April says everyone else has gone to chapel.
I tell them Indians used to sit here…
that this is a sacred place.

O Great Rock, balanced here
between setting moon and rising sun,
tell me your name!

I am Grandfather Rock,
grandfather to modern poets too,
young bards who come to dream their dream
in the woods…you hear that jazzbird?
He’s tapping out the base pattern.
jazzbeat on wood
bird chorus swells up
bless you my children
I bequeath you my stone savings
base pattern bones earth bones
marrow of the mother Mother Marrow Mother Mary
Great Goddess come dance on the bones of our good mother
O mother love how can we dance on your bones?
Make us know that we are free
in the trees in the greening

Youngbird flutters joyous wings to waning moon
achieves air and sails into birdsong
turns on homing wind and calls, Jazzbird!
finds his throat liquid warbling riverhood
manheart splits through throatcry, Prometheus!
You old fire lover man lover,
earth water fire earth water fire,
you brought air too, didn’t you
Prometheus?

Wind blow gently on liquid heartfire,
Motherbones dance to the base pattern,
Jazzbird, God, blow gently on heartfire.

The children have left, having found and taken
what they needed from this place
quickly and surely as children do.
I am alone on the rock in the trees
in the blue circle of Time,
Grandfather Rock, Open Sky,
Golden Sun, Silver Moon, Myriad Birdcall.
I bow. I offer thanks, and promise to come here again.
--Barbara Smith Stoff

O HENRY’S LAST LEAF

O HENRY’S LAST LEAF

In this classroom.
I wish to compete!
I wish to compete
with what is going on
out there!
Last night…
In color
and in black and white,
you watched
and you listened
as television reassembled
beatings and rapes and…
and murders.

This morning
I want to read to you
a simple story. O Henry,
O! teach us to listen.
Teach us to hear
this small quiet voice.

In this room
there are no guns.
There are no cries
of pain and horror
to snare your attention…
only this small quiet voice
that says, look,
there is this much good
…in one old man…
who is drunk…
most of the time.
(So the teacher said
one last leaf for O Henry)
And I believe…
the students…
Listened.

--Barbara Smith Stoff

TRANSFORMATION

TRANSFORMATION

At birthing time

one is asked to be a bearer of life—

seeing beyond the shrouds

which cloud clear vision—

carrying seed and symbol

toward and toward…

the birth of the Dayrose

whose power knows

and distills golden fragrance

from mudsludge and dungeon breath—

rendering the pure essence

of all seeing

now then here being

now then here being…

made to live

as long as God lives.

--Barbara Smith Stoff

ELIJAH'S CUP

ELIJAH'S CUP

Dear ‘Elijah Rising’…I was just going to post this poem today, and as I come to the blog, I see your comment…so this is for you...what beautiful synchronicity! I wrote the poem several years ago as my night time reflection after being invited to a large Seder service at a temple. The Haggadah explained the fifth cup and how only the children in the room notice that indeed Elijah has come and sipped the wine. There was a small ‘post script’ which said it’s now okay to drink from that fifth cup during the service. I raised my glass with deliberate thought and real joy.
--bss

ELIJAH’S CUP

That fifth cup is Elijah’s cup.
Be reverent
with the shards
that remain
of that perfection
which was childness.
Turn them carefully
against your callouses,
or listen, as with a shell
to the ear, for secrets saved
toward wholeness.
All these years…
kept in the keep of the heart,
the secret stirs, and Elijah
begins again to whisper.
--Barbara Smith Stoff

FOR WORDSWORTH: DAFFODILS

FOR WORDSWORTH: DAFFODILS

Through a long winter
my feet have traced a new path
through unpatterned shadows
from ice-laden limbs of bare trees.
Bare trees cannot shelter,
even sparrows,
yet they do offer themselves
as cold crystal prisms,
as pale sun warms the waiting
for some sound of spring. There!
Yellow chalice-faces,
green-stemmed hope,
daffodils breaking through—offering—
There!
--Barbara Smith Stoff

THE HEART

THE HEART

Having inquired too much

of too many lessons and too many books

now I lay me down on this good earth

to mound the leaves like words--

piles and piles of yarrow words.

Silent and dark, I stir and stir

until the question bows,

until the question stirs.

Where does "I want" arise?

In the mind.

Where does "I need" arise?

In the body.

Where does "I have" arise?

In the heart.

The heart can never be cut down.

The heart can never be used up.

--Barbara Smith Stoff