Three Poems

Communication

1
The hieratic gestures of the priest
in temple are clean functional and modest.
With a few flowers, in silence, one
circles a prearranged pattern
around a deity, whose immemorial hand
absolves a mysterious, compulsive debt.
It's done. One understands, accepts. The bells
intone to release another day.

2
In a park, an old couple, the woman
gently massaging the man's feet on her lap listen
-ing with a rapt face turned up to his.
Eager, nodding, comforting, prompting details.
A simple image of linear tradition whose
magnificence is alive on plain grass.
I pass this quiet bridge between two worlds.
...