THIS MOMENT


the green light under the trees is aslant with holiness:
holiness raining down and blooming on the young man
the young man half-kneeling
with his infant on his knees
his hands holding the world and hope

the child is stable as a buddha: quiet and full
resting surely in all containment
in all being contained and held

the man's white shirt (open at the neck)
calls to mind nothing so much
as the light of a Dutch interior
the straw hat (a summer Panama
of the kind fashionable fifty years ago)
shades a face sweet as any madonna's

the man was found whole in this moment
in the dappled light of the summer afternoon
when he held his child on his knees:
this moment that shimmers as a sepia memory

in the yard under the trees
when the summer light was awash with joy:
this moment stops the sun with a steady hand
and holds the man and the child as gently
as the man then held the child

and the woman is there too:
it is she who is holding the camera
it is her eye and heart
that held and framed
this moment

it is hers forever
and the man's and the child's:
that moment when the green light under the trees
was aslant with holiness

--Lynn Park

THIS MOMENT


the green light under the trees is aslant with holiness:
holiness raining down and blooming on the young man
the young man half-kneeling
with his infant on his knees
his hands holding the world and hope

the child is stable as a buddha: quiet and full
resting surely in all containment
in all being contained and held

the man's white shirt (open at the neck)
calls to mind nothing so much
as the light of a Dutch interior
the straw hat (a summer Panama
of the kind fashionable fifty years ago)
shades a face sweet as any madonna's

the man was found whole in this moment
in the dappled light of the summer afternoon
when he held his child on his knees:
this moment that shimmers as a sepia memory

in the yard under the trees
when the summer light was awash with joy:
this moment stops the sun with a steady hand
and holds the man and the child as gently
as the man then held the child

and the woman is there too:
it is she who is holding the camera
it is her eye and heart
that held and framed
this moment

it is hers forever
and the man's and the child's:
that moment when the green light under the trees
was aslant with holiness

KHAT'S PANTOUM

I don't sleep well or long, wake up at three.
She breathed out last Thursday just past midnight,
piddled then on the stainless steel counter.
Right after that I held her rag-doll limp.

She breathed out last Thursday just past midnight,
and now somehow Monday slips up on me.
Not long after I held her rag-doll limp,
at home again she slept beneath my arm.

Now somehow Monday has slipped up on me.
Time flies they say but what of little souls?
At home again sleeping beneath my arm,
did she rush away or did she dawdle?

Time flies they say but what of little souls?
After piddling on the stainless steel,
did she rush away or did she dawdle?
I don't sleep well or long, wake up at three.