November 2010 - Vol. 44


in this atlas of headland 
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poem by Sean O'Neill


in this atlas of headland
the hills
manlike
fold like a brain
under the white cranial sky

today
like a missing memory
in the clay of sick fields
there was a hunchback crow
below the cherubim of hilltop sheep
turning inside out
a double-breasted robin
sifting these portents 
for answers

yesterday
stupified by the hill’s rocking
a stallion mourned the going before 
of his jelly-eyed bay
and stooped into the twilight of the ruined shell
to sniff the volcanic silence of her nostrils 
for molecules of life
for reasons

tomorrow time will turn or run
groping in the mean seasons
for the green meaning
of dead dirt 
and
miraculous with numbers
call up a full head of leaves
from the flotsam of this copse again

then like the runt of time
when the wind turns down the sky
I will fetch
from my own deep pocked rubble
a seraphim of bursting buds to tell
of the rising of the sudden Spring
who goes before us to Galilee 

Sean O'Neill is originally from Glasgow, Scotland, and currently lives in St. Paul, Minnesota, USA. 
His poems range from the sacred to the mundane and sometimes, inadvertently, both at the same time. 

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(c) copyright 2010  The Sword of the Spirit
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