Sonnet XIV

O France! That distant does my lone heart raid –

How far from home my thoughts have been this hour.

A gold Provençal sunset bluing, fade

The tawny southern fields of sun and flower.

I long to walk on grassy Norman heights

Along the ashen lengths of wind-swept sand

Climb high in silent towers of Michael’s might

And raise my heart in domes of king’s command.

Yet here the southern fields break my heart

And there the northern hills bring near

My darkest hurt.  I yearn to rise and part

This godless town to find him there --

My God whom I may never know at home

Without whom here I'll always be alone.

I Am

I am white

White as the driven snow

White as the Whale

White as your brother’s face

that time he drank the H₂O₂

We laughed

I am American

American as apple pie

American as Eliot

American as your brother blown

bit to bit screaming for his god

We cried

I am a student

Studious as privilege

Studious as Caulfield

Studious as those college boys

being peaceful patriots

We thought

I am human

Human as reason

Human as the Christ

Human as Prometheus bound

bowels bread for birds

We died. 

Apathy

Turgid brine, crashing itself against the shore,

A million drops sprayed to the skies, like

Angry words sputtered from feverish lips. Gulls

Scream, the rumble of distant thunder

Sending shivers through every living thing.

Even lonely rocks cower from the black, shaken by the break

Of crooked seas heaving endlessly,

Black breaker, white crest, at war with earth and sky.

A man, among the rocks

Standing, feels their trembling, tastes blood and salt.

Life, they say, is full and passionate, and free,

But here the taste of blood on bitten lip

Only tightens the crushing emptiness within.

He sees all, is all, bright blue eyes now

Black and dull with ache.

Yet all is silence -- violence deafened by a vacuum

Frustration.