January 23, 2007 : The Double Helix of Splendor



It is as if there were this bracketed dispensation of grace, a short period of time anointed with receptive guilelessness, a time of wholeness when word and touch whisked up a double helix of splendor. I wonder what would happen if cynicism died, of course: a pretend. So they went out and proclaimed that all should repent. They cast out many demons, and anointed with oil many who were sick and cured them. Then a snake parting the grass by Emily Dickinson: But never met this Fellow / Attended, or alone / Without a tighter breathing / And Zero at the Bone—

Both of these are luminous things. Both are a parting of the grass where a spotted shaft is seen, and then a closing that opens further on. Both a Zero at the Bone though one a more profound Zero than the other, one a dispensation of wonder in sanctified history, the other a marvel in a sanctified backyard.

To address the world as Thou, the ethic of dignity, redeeming the serpent, re-sanctifying touch.

I rise in search of that opening further on, that bracketed dispensation of grace to come, when hands and words form the tender of the realm in which we abide along with the song of the pine warbler in the predawn dark, the dark shimmer of aubade that too tightens the breath.