LIKE A WORLD Little island in the endless sea Flicker in the endless night No more constant than a tidal pool Yet to me it’s like a world See the universe in your own hand Dissolve into a shimmering field Yet you have a solid place to stand Your feet believe the rock is real How dependable the common sense Steady as the solid ground An illusion of the cosmic dance What a joy to dance the circle round Little island in the endless sea Flicker in the endless night No more constant than a tidal pool Yet to me it’s like a world What a wonder for the earth to grow Flower of the human mind Like a crocus thrusting through the snow Like an orchard in the summertime Fire flickers on the cavern walls As we paint the great sustaining herds Heavens part, a torn and flaming scroll As we reach beyond the grasp of words Little island in the endless sea Flicker in the endless night No more constant than a tidal pool Yet to me it’s like a world When the atoms of an inner space Seem as far as star from star And we look upon the human face How we wonder what we are Little island in the endless sea Flicker in the endless night No more constant than a tidal pool Yet to me it’s like a world

I SAW YOU FROM AFAR I saw you from afar, walking light upon the earth I was dying of hunger, my friend I saw you from afar, walking light upon the earth I was dying of thirst, you are rain, I am alive again I was dying within these walls Locked away from the moon and sun Where I could not join in the dance Where I could not join in the hunt I had food but it had no heart And my work did not make me strong Voices of talkers, buzzing of lies Took the joy from my song I saw you from afar, walking light upon the earth I was dying of hunger, my friend, I am alive again I saw you from afar, walking light upon the earth I was dying of thirst, you are rain, I am alive again In this desert I sought you out Like the water you sip from the sand To ask you to teach me to draw it out From the breast of my own desert land What I found at the water hole Cattle come and the Bushman gone Men without joy leaning on the corral And the words of your lost son “I left the desert because of thirst. There is no place to go, so I stay. No, I don’t remember my father’s song. Why should I?” On a rock where painted animals live I place my hand on the print of a hand And you speak from the painted rock “This is how I hunted the eland” There you pass in a single line A mirage in the shimmering heat First people, come to the last place on earth Shallow the print of your feet Walking light upon the earth I was dying of hunger, my friend, I am alive again I saw you from afar, walking light upon the earth I was dying of thirst, you are rain, I am alive again

THE WAY THINGS ARE Rising up in the morning Day that could be the last Tangled up in the future or the past Shake it off and the morning will be The way things are All the world is a wide open door All you have to remember All you have to forgive All the mornings remind you where you live Let me open the window and see The way things are See the world as a wide open door Walking home from the graveyard One spring night long ago I felt absolutely present Every hair to every toe Same time, felt I was flying Seemed some kind of cosmic joke Right there, and ten feet behind me Felt every muscle as I hovered there And watched my body walk One foot in the future One lagging behind All a balance in motion, every stride Got to laugh or go crazy sometimes The way things are All the world is a wide open door Half that night the aurora Played out streaks and streams of light Smoke blown inside a bubble Silk scarf waved across the night Heavens hooded like a cobra Racing lights like mackerel shoals Bright ring traced by the aurora Framed a window in the dome Formed a crown inside my skull Some of these mornings When I walk through the door I can laugh about after and before Let me open the window and see The way things are See the world as a wide open door

BEARSKIN Nothing waiting for him when he went home from the war He met with silence at the table after silence at the door In town he felt a vagabond, a tramp without a trade At home he felt himself a stranger A walking accusation and a mouth to feed Bearskin No one spoke unkindly, they just didn’t speak at all And no one gave him any hard looks, but he saw their faces fall One day he kept walking, past the churches, shops, and fields He took the trail into the mountains And he knocked the mud of that life from his boot heels Bearskin Empty as a penitent, he laid his musket down Below him buzzards spiraled upward Wisps of woodsmoke marked the town “I know just what you need,” crowed the first voice heard in days The soldier turned and faced the devil He rose slowly to his feet and held his gaze Bearskin The devil summoned up an angry bear The soldier took its life without a thought Made a bargain and put on the devil’s coat And over that he pulled the hide of the bear Four long years he wandered, and as they had agreed His pockets always brimmed with money More than he could ever need All that time he never bathed and never cut his hair And though the money opened doors for him Few could see the man inside the bear Bearskin Once he followed sobbing down the hallway of an inn At first the troubled man was frightened, but he let the soldier in All his ills were want of money, they were swiftly healed A grateful debtor with three daughters The old fellow offered marriage, but the eldest would not yield Father, said the youngest daughter, go will I I will wed this bearskin if he’ll have me Surely there is more to him than meets the eye I’ll repay this stranger’s generosity Three more years he wandered over strange and hostile lands Asking all he helped to pray he might slip through the devil’s hands Thinking of the lion-hearted bride that he had found And often touching half a broken ring That one day with its mate would bring the world round Bearskin Could have bought a kingdom, or shipping, mines, and mills He could have savored every luxury or mastered others’ wills Gave where it was needed, letting go of every thing And through repentance and detachment and compassion He grew richer than a king Bearskin The morning after seven years were done Bearskin called the devil to account Settled up and took the trail down from the mountain Feeling that was a battle he’d won Fine as any general and mounted on a steed There went the shunned and tempted man Who’d conquered loneliness and greed Father get your jacket on, the elder sisters cried Here comes the finest man we’ve ever seen A mare without a rider by his side Three sat drinking cider while the elder sisters preened It was the bearskin’s bride, the father, and the soldier in between The woman reached and took his hand, not even looking up She’d spied the half-ring, like a crescent moon Shining through the cider at the bottom of her cup First she teased he looked more handsome as a bear Then she fit the broken ring together Soon she rode beside him on a jaunty mare To a simple life they both found better than treasure Some say one sister hung herself And one leaped down a well Grandma says it’s just a tale her grandma used to tell

LOOK, NOW, OR THE CHILDREN ARE GONE Time flies is what all of them said to me Parents whose children had grown Those first nights with the nest full of babies Felt like an eternity 'til they had flown Days inched like a worm in an apple tree While they were learning to crawl Look, now, and they’re not what they used to be What you expect to see, not that at all Like desperate sleepers who cling to their dreams Though morning has come We need to be shaken, and often it seems Look, now, or the children are gone No page from the book of your memory Ever can bring back a day Hear, now, it’s a hymn not an elegy Life in a major key, children at play If time is a wind, find a place in the lee Each moment is one A sheltering presence, a moment to see Look, now, or the children are gone

RECKONING After Gibraltar, the fleet headed northward Into fog that had blinded us a dozen nights and days One of our number approached our commander With a plea that he turn the ships 'til we could see our way Jack was a sailor, a scholar of water By his own secret reckoning, we’d strike the Scilly Isles High naval treason, that use of his reason And the law said that Jack had earned the wages of a spy Warring on foreign kings, none may keep a reckoning Only the few would know where our ships were bound One seaman beckoning, many met their reckoning Jack was hanged, the old man murdered Thousands more were drowned No worse than others was Admiral Shovell No more cruel than his officers, and not alone in pride Home sailed his gentry with fair claim to victory For we’d stung our old enemy and saved our skins beside Harsh was their justice on one plain and honest It condemned them as sure as him they’d hang before they’d hear Thousands of others as blameless as he was Were to die on the rocks beneath a fog that never cleared Law came down thundering, none may keep a reckoning Only the few would know where our ships were bound One seaman beckoning, many met their reckoning Jack was hanged, the old man murdered Thousands more were drowned Just two survivors were cast on the island I imagine the admiral was sorry he was one Soon came a woman to save or to doom him Took his life with her hard hands For a ring with sea-green stone Law came down thundering, none may keep a reckoning Only the few would know where our ships were bound One seaman beckoning, many met their reckoning Jack was hanged, the old man murdered Thousands more were drowned

THE POOR ARE WITH YOU FOREVER Halfway across a bridge in Paris, high above the Seine Hold him in your mind, for he will never rise again Someone said he had no papers, no identity Someone said there was no refuge for the refugee Frozen in the lights of Paris, leaping in the Seine Was it fear he'd be sent home or despair of ever seeing home again I recalled the words of Jesus when I heard the news Never have I heard it questioned why it must be true He said the poor are with you forever, but not I Did no one ask why? Did no one ask why? Must there always be these children too hungry to cry? Must the refugees find haven only when they die? Give a pack of wolves dominion forty thousand years Would there now be countless millions of poor wolves here? Now suppose that refugee was the creator's son Ask yourself, whoever he was, whose will's being done He said the poor are with you forever, but not I Did no one ask why? Did no one ask why? Must there always be these children too hungry to cry? Must the refugees find haven only when they die?

AND YOU’RE NOT ALONE Oh the choice is clear when the tanks roll in But the challenge comes in a thousand ways Always in the air in the calmest days And if you should hear, you are not alone Empire’s days are gone, so the tailor said As he dressed the lie in the cloak of peace Still you see the head of the same old beast Through the children’s eyes, and you’re not alone See it overgrown and still reaching out To the fields of oil and the diamond mines To the factories south of the borderline See how victory spoils, and you’re not alone With a kinder face it’s still slavery With your dearest name it’s still genocide Empire’s just the same when it thrusts inside Your most private place Friends and neighbors turn, cheer the winning side There’s no middle ground in this make-believe Though you fear you’ll drown, go against the tide For the tide may turn, and you’re not alone Oh the challenge comes in so many ways On the path you take through the everyday Let it pass, or stand though you’re only one You’re the one who can, and you’re not alone Dare to take a stand, though you’re only one You’re the one who can, and you’re not alone

UNDER THE CLOUD Under the cloud, we gather wood To build a fire, sing it loud, life is good At the end of the working day Cloud forming like a bird of prey You’re like an actor Lost his place in a modern play Act it out, or turn the page In the end you’ll have to act your age Wings beating in your ears As they sweep the stage Under the cloud, we gather wood To build a fire, sing it loud, life is good He’s your cat, he’s all your rage Rogue tiger in a bamboo cage Pure fury burning gold in a gelded age Nothing new but the rising sun Beware of following anyone Put your back into the work to be done Under the cloud, we gather wood To build a fire, sing it loud, life is good

TWO BIRDS Two birds with golden feathers In the branches of the same tree They perch together One tastes the fruits, both sweet and bitter One tastes of neither, but calmly observes On a peaceful Yankee Sunday Not a sign of the war up above Someone stood to pray for the enemy Whom Jesus dared him to love In that same white church sat the leader Not a sign of blood on his hands At the well to draw life's water While death rained down at his command And the good folk drowned out the prayer They sang a hymn to the state And when the singing was over They dragged that man out the gate Two birds with golden feathers In the branches of the same tree They perch together One tastes the fruits, both sweet and bitter One tastes of neither, but calmly observes Every day at work it gets harder To put my heart in the game In my mind I see mass murder Committed in my name Can you stand untouched by the fires That rage through the world in your day Disengaged from contentment and desires Could I still take part and play? There's a yes I know in the riddle They say Martin loved a good meal Takes a still point down in the middle And a movement round to make a wheel Two birds with golden feathers In the branches of the same tree They perch together One tastes the fruits, both sweet and bitter One tastes of neither

GATHER ROUND ME Gather round me once again Song and story now you will spin You are the circle that's always been Who am I? The space within In a vessel made of clay Shaped by hands and fire-born What you see but cannot say What's within that earthen form Gather round me once again Song and story now you will spin You are the circle that's always been Who am I? The space within Where the night is a deeper black There the stars confound the eye Desert stone beneath your back Til you fall into the sky Gather round me once again Song and story now you will spin You are the circle that's always been Who am I? The space within Unknown hands laid stone on stone In the middle of nowhere Where the sun goes to be alone Empty circles in empty squares Gather round me once again Song and story now you will spin You are the circle that's always been Who am I? The space within Follow music where it goes When there's no one there to play There is so much that no one knows Even more no one can say Gather round me once again Song and story now you will spin You are the circle that's always been Who am I? The space within

TRIAL BY WONDERS What do you make of it? How much can you take of it? Trial by wonders Is it a trial by wonders? Did it start with a dream? She led you to a river Through a fallen city where you'd lost your way City blocks broken to shivers Put you back together and you swam away What do you make of it? How much can you take of it? Trial by wonders Is it a trial by wonders? Was it something you saw As you shivered on a hillside Above a darkened valley and a shining lake As the sun slid behind Clouds and mountains on the far side? Does the memory throw light on every step you take? What do you make of it? How much can you take of it? Trial by wonders Is it a trial by wonders? Did it take you away To the pleasures and the dangers Beside yourself in deserts or beside your love? Did it carry you home From the company of strangers To the quiet joy of moments you are dying of? What do you make of it? How much can you take of it? Trial by wonders Is it a trial by wonders?