Old Women among the Stars

Some of you will not doubt be happy to hear that there are only three more Star Sequence poems after this.

One night after a storm
has begun the long passage
towards the maritimes,
you may go out under the harvest
moon. There with the scent
of lightning still clinging to the blades
of drenched autumn grass
you may look up and discover
among the golden clothed
tatters of some straggling rain
clouds a ghostly chorus.

Probably you will tell yourself
the moonlight or the passing storms
have sparked your fancy,
or simply go looking for another glass
of wine, whiskey, or scotch but if you can
make yourself tarry under the stars
a while, hold your breath,
listen closely and look
not so closely, you may see
flowing gray robes and silver hair,
glistening eyes and arms that reach
for you to listen. And just perhaps
you will hear them reciting their doubts
and lamentations to the stars.

What did all his strivings
bring him? Did they endear him
to some nameless god
of bulls or return to his heart
the daughter he lost, or the exhausted wife
with nothing left to spend
on him? No, not even one worn out
muddy sock he lost by the river
one foolish evening. He was as hollow
as a honey tree into which we poured
our lives but found inside
no sweetness left for us.

Perhaps, if your ears
are very keen, you can just discern
the reply in a distant clatter
of lightning and thunder
over the sallow hills.

There is no peace under the moon,
only riddles that have no answer,
scorching heat and killing frost,
striving, clawing, dying–
so maybe you will have to miss the sweet
flavor of honey for a season–
but the season of loss will pass
and the season of forgetfulness
will come. The shadow of time
out of mind will come to cool
the fevered lips, salve the wounds
of a desert lifetime.

Perhaps you will look up
just as the last beads
of silver rain are shaken
from the tatters and the vision
dissolves from your eyes as honey melts
from a comb in August,
but you cannot be among
the sleepwalkers anymore
nor wander drunken
along the muddy river banks
nor very likely find forgetfulness
in dreams.