heard in April 2002
Your voice on tape, rasping meld of ancient
Southern preacher (only honest) holding
vowels an extra beat with sly penchant
for drama, and withered bullfrog scolding
us children on swamp’s edge not to enter
that dark mystery of slime and swarm lest
we fall, lost in the unholy center
of ourselves, guideless, gasping, with no rest
until the mud floor grasps us, releasing
then our new lives to rise and somehow find
within your lyric lines love so pleasing
we lose sight of all but falling snow, wind
chimes of you recalling your old friend Kay,
and embracing life as you walk away.
Your voice swirling me back to Little Rock
in the Seventies, shaken by power
of holding your prize: awe of Willie Stark,
but more of Jack Burden alone with her
in the huge house, and me, a poet young
in the work, stunned by the bolts of your art
striking page after page, leaving my tongue
dumb, caught up in beats of my aching heart
as I hear the once loving Muse whisper,
“No sense for you to ever write again.
I’ve given him all. You see? Let despair
hurl you away from me.” Bleary, tear-stained,
my eyes can’t focus on next week’s synod
when I’ll drink with friends and call you a god.
Roger Armbrust
April 19, 2002
