She searches the radio
for a night song
a blend of Texas and new age
her room lit up by holographic bingo lights
she plays dice
emptying her woe out the window
singing along:
“Be kind to your disguises
Be kind to your sins
Be kind to each other...Amen.”
-Nancy Pontius
It may be smoke from a wood stove
inside the house across the road
on the other side of the pasture
lingering in the air like prayer
incense not certain how high it
wants to rise, as if there are some
prayers only the earth can answer.
I like the way smoke or fog or mist
gets caught in the tops of trees
like Eros grasping after Psyche,
clutching the edges of the cloak
saying, “Stay. Please stay.”
So I think of the prayers I have
wasted offering them to heaven
when they wanted to be earthbound,
the answers before my eyes, under
my feet, already in my heart.
-Byron Hoot
https://www.facebook.com/hootnhowlpoetry/
My body knows the lullaby of eight hours.
Less or more shows in the waking,
the tone and tenor of the day,
the accord or discord.
Which brings me to how does the body
know what the mind can’t seem
to grasp? This quickly replacing
any other koans I know.
Which draws out the question
of spirit. That place of other
sense, of where logic lies
gasping for breath. Where words
dissolve into laughter.
I don’t even know the words
to the lullaby. My mind asks,
“What are you doing?”
I reply. “What are you doing?”
No reply. And that tells me something.
Hootism: you can’t deny where you’re from and still be who you are.
-Byron Hoot
