I wonder what our families
would have been
had the older brother
taken the younger
into his heart,
protecting him,
helping him?
Had the older sister
loved the younger.
taking the difficult choices
with her?
What would the products
of these families,
the children—us—
have been to each other?
Would we have wanted
To destroy each other?
Filed under Ethel Mortenson Davis, Poetry
She stands inside the garden’s blooming, still
As long green stalks that reach toward the sun.
Above her head the Arcosanti bell,
A gift brought to her by her lovely son,
Waits wind to stir its deep, pure voice to song.
Her graying hair shines in the early morning light:
A silent testament to births and how
Her son died in a place she did not understand
And how her daughters have a boundless grace
And how granddaughters gleam and grandsons spark,
One caught inside autism’s draining clinch—
A binding to the yellows, blues, and pinks
Of blooms she planted in the early spring
Then, whirring, one bold calliope bees
Up to the bright red feeder near her eyes
And slips its slender beak into the hole
Where nectar made inside her kitchen sink
Transmutes into an iridescent energy.
A moment more and clouds of hummingbirds
Kaleidoscope around her head; her eyes
And spirit swirled into a halo born
Of flowers, bell, the hummingbirds, the light
Of early morning, all the life she’s lived.
Filed under Poetry, Thomas Davis
a love poem to Ethel by Thomas Davis
Our fathers died, and then your mother left
And took a train ride to her resting place.
There are no words for senses left bereft
The moment living left our son’s kind face.
Our love was glory when it first began to bloom.
We walked brown hills and felt the sky breathe light—
You took your hesitant, unlikely groom
And gave him more of life than was his right.
The days of work and turmoil, gladness, stress,
Have slowed us down and made us feel our years
As separateness has ground against the press
Of love through joyous days and bitter tears.
From gnarling roots of memories and time,
Love forges symphonies of changing rhyme.
Filed under Poetry, Thomas Davis
a love poem for Ethel Mortenson Davis by Thomas Davis
In the stone fields
The roots of the pinyon
Interweave with stone.
In the barest silence
Song is worn like a cloak
Of the brightest colors.
May my lips be as a brook
Bubbling forth songs
In praise of my love.
May my heart be as a pinyon,
Drawing forth music
From the barest stones
Filed under Poetry, Thomas Davis
a children’s poem by Thomas Davis
Way down in Caf∞a∞ghan∞a∞stan,
Down by the restless, wave-tossed seas,
I met my true love walking home
Through sands, past forest trees.
The flowers, lemon-blossomed yellow
Spread out beneath the sun
And blossomed spring-time on the earth
And put cold winter on the run.
The pearl gray oysters fell to flocks
Of kiwi birds with prying beaks,
And long-eared owls laughed at the moon
And fished from moonless creeks.
Way down in Caf∞a∞ghan∞a∞stan,
Down by the restless, wave-tossed seas,
I met my true love walking home
Through sands, past forest trees.
My love wore golden earrings bright
And a gown of misty, sea-morn blue.
My love turned day into the night
And said to give this poem to you.
Filed under Poetry, Thomas Davis
a love poem to Ethel by Thomas Davis
I love the woman whom I love,
And in the morning’s world of blue
I wake to bellow hearty songs
That say so simply, “I love you.”
Love is the light of human black.
The tone that brings man up to gray,
And though the world is lost and doomed,
I say it makes today a day.
So, blacken out the joyous sun
And ink away the solemn moon.
I love woman whom I love.
She’ll lighten up a tar-black room.
Filed under Poetry, Thomas Davis
a love poem to Ethel by Thomas Davis
Like a snowflake in August is my love,
Like an August sun on a winter day,
Like the small thunder of a shining raindrop
Striking on a roof of stone.
O lobster colored sunfire,
How can the heavens be strewn with stars
When the sun has not felt the coolness
Of the gently silvered moon?
I have felt snowflakes in August
And been warmed by an August sun in winter.
I have heard small thunder ringing,
Brought by the drumming of raindrops,
Upon the stone roof of my soul.
O lobster colored sunfire,
Do you not know the differences made by love?
Filed under Poetry, Thomas Davis
on Ethel’s birthday
Bring to me water
Taken from the well of the moon.
Bring to me bread
Baked into brown, round loaves.
This is my water and bread:
My woman with hands as white as the moon
And eyes as dark as the brown loaves
Bringing me the food and drink of life.
Filed under Poetry, Thomas Davis
a children’s poem by Thomas Davis written for Sonja and Mary when they were young
There was a song that I once heard
When I was very, very young.
I heard the songs of bright night stars
Cold singing in a silent tongue.
There’s no one else within the world
Who heard their silver lullabye,
But now I’m telling you, my loves:
Go out and listen to the sky!
Filed under Poetry, Thomas Davis
fourwindowspress 