PATIENCE (Dickinson J712/Fr479)

Because I could not wait for Words –
They daily wait on me –
Their Message comes in Figured rimes –
And sometimes Poetry.

They softly speak – They have no price –
And I can yield for free
My stresses and my pressured times
To Their Tranquility –

We bless the Stage where Mortals play
At Business – in the Plan –
We bless the Woods of Tender Trees –
We bless the Meekest Man

Because – He first blessed Us – with tongues –
My thoughts are shivering –
The holy Gospel tunes, the Gifts
My Hands delivering –

We pray within a Home that seeks
A Silence for the Sound –
The Answer – nearly audible –
The Spirit – is Profound

So that – it’s Paradise – but still
Seems humbler than the Dust –
And I’m surprised that Wisdom’s Words
Would lend me lyric Trust –

(18 October 2008, Pleasant Grove, Utah)

EXHIBIT: Education in Zion

The daybreak shines –
The shadow reclines –
New beauty’s mountain light reveals –
The calming of another sea –
The caring for another sheep –
Pacific now – the valley kneels.

(9 September 2008, JFSB, BYU, Provo, Utah)

THE SECRET OF LUND (To Arthur Henry King, 1910-2000)

Our mentor, who wast our teacher,

Rememberéd be thy face.

Thy studies here; thy wisdom there

In shadow as it was in morn.

Behind the Grand Hotel,

Beyond the Dome-Church bell,

Past the rune-stoned college,

Down the boot-stained cobbles,

Dusk led to etymology,

A plot for philology:

The botanical tree garden

Honoring Linné’s biology.

Exhale feeds birch, beech, pine, and vine,

Open-air orchids, greenhouse cactus,

Parabolic orchards, paradisaical fruit,

Leaf, trunk, and bloom in God’s Växthus.

The Branch that gave us this day

Our daily breath, deprives us of fear

As we release those who dread us,

And rescues us from death,

And brings us not into pollution.

For Lund is a kingdom,

And a tower, and a grove,

For ever, for Arthur, amen, again.

(Lund, Sweden; Sunday, 17 August 2003)