The RetroLounge Daily Poem Thread (Sun 1/28/07)

[RetroLounge]

Crossing Over

So the words come to us,
over the wall embedded with broken glass,
like doves from a dumbwaiter,
inauspicious kin of the seared page
lifted by fires in the alley.

We cannot read them
fast enough, burnt gospel of the poor
and kindling can, discarded tourist pamphlets
keen on wings of gas, copies of the New Testament
born like the bodies of saints by the river,
ashing the acts of our hands.

But the words come anyway,
and the ghost, holy or not,
he comes too, on tongues of makeshift fire
like a boy scrambling over a wall, tearing his body
on the sharp vowels of the one side,
on the long vowels of the other.

Thomas Bates

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RL

If you have a request for a certain Poet, post their name in the thread and I will find a poem by them and post it...

if you want to see some of my poetry, see the blog at:
http://www.myspace.com/retropaul

[wildhorses]

1. ---

:hi:

[RetroLounge]

2. ===

:hi:

RL