Words in Solstice Time

i

Orange light on the back gate.

The longest day dawns, zeros out the night

retreating to shade on the other side.

In the beginning there was no time.

In the middle there’s only one escape:

You must sit still forever.

Mama sits still. She is well into it.

She is impossible to see.

The shortest distance between—

a pencil might define it, or a command:

Write tinier lines. Inscribe the Torah

on the head of a nail. Drive it,

syllable by syllable, into mind.

Read it out as Qur’an.

ii

The light stops here.

There’s a pile-up at the gate.

I am curious, though I have no desire

to go through just yet.

I hear water over there: Concerto

with moments and stones.

I’ve caught glimpses of lilies too,

licking up the orange.

A line goes on forever.

But even forever fails

in the face of the real thing.

Orange fails as well, sheds its skin,

hitches a ride on the flesh

of the lily—almost forever flower.

iii

I hear my granddaughter.

My wife has her on speaker.

She makes a sound like a bird

from the Jurassic. She is prehistoric.

She is full of motion and life.

She runs out of view. Stillness

proves nothing but itself. Still,

it builds, like water’s lust for rest.

Mama crossed over years ago.

Daddy, too. There’s a pile-up.

A bird makes a sound like a daughter,

or a daughter’s daughter

laughing, crying, laughing.

This mother tongue.

Published in The Journal of Bahá’í Studies, Sprint-Summer 2023