Michael Angelo Poetry


Author: Michael Angelo

  • Bird-Cry

    Bird-Cry

    As a breath of air fills my lungs,
    I hear a bird-cry.

    I do not recognize it and think to myself
    how good.

    Most of my thoughts
    spend themselves on people,
    on internalizing their rigid delineations,
    so that I can say
    “this is I”
    and believe it.

    But this bird I cannot see,
    only hear,
    is far greater than I could ever be,
    as its song is much deeper, much humbler,
    than any poem I struggle to write.

    I say this because its song is not for me,
    its breath not mine,
    and no effort is wasted
    on my delight.

    Its song asks nothing and says nothing,
    avoiding the greatest of all follies,
    and speaking truth.

    For what is truer than a bird being a bird,
    and air being air,
    and a foolish child misunderstanding both—
    calling their combination
    “song”.

  • Cassandra

    Cassandra

    I have inherited a worthless gift:
    the gift of words,
    an impotent wind
    that cannot shake the feeblest branches of this world,
    cannot support a nest, cannot roll a stone,
    cannot even feed the poet who gives his blood, and burns
    upon its crucible
    his soul.

    It is a worthless practice, yet I am committed to it
    for reasons hard to distill,
    like trying to discern the features of a mountain through a maze of trees.

    I am compelled to poetry
    like a moth is compelled to confuse
    a lantern flame for starlight.

    To ash, to salt
    to the dust that comprises the firmament of dreams,

    a bird given the gift of wings under the sea. 

  • Ponderings in the Rain

    Ponderings in the Rain

    I.
    There is only The Way
    The exhaustion of the body through hard training
    The winter air that meets hot skin
    The stream that rises into space
    The spirit
    is of body, mind, and nature
    Here, the Self is again

    II.
    A warm hermitage
    The musty sweat of one’s life
    The pure air of winter
    Heat and cold meeting and dancing
    One is the offspring of a cyclone
    Pure, flawed, and innocent

    III.
    It is easy to remain still while submerged in peace
    It is harder to be a stone in a coursing river
    But one must learn

    IV.
    There is the quiet of one’s life
    In it one may find the riches of dreams
    The garden of one’s mind is abundant
    Flowers are in bloom at every moment
    A single moment’s realization is all it takes
    The source of all treasures is oneself

  • Litany of Snow

    Litany of Snow

    A litany
    like snow falls
    upon my heart in place of sleep.

    A litany for the lost,
    for the fading memories.
    A winter’s mist, white descending sky,
    how it pools and blinds childhood’s dreaming eyes.

    Simple joys
    bright along a field, once here,
    then lost within a veil.
    North winds raging, freezing tears to jaw.
    Once a child, now a private weeping
    winter.

    A litany
    like heart reels
    from toils, from time’s spinning wheel.

    A litany for the lost,
    for people known, people unknown,
    buried beneath mounds of mounting snow.

    A broken home,
    a father’s noose, love’s betrayal, a world obtuse.
    Stars, perfect in their celestial beds, shine,
    unmoved.

    A litany
    like weather weeping
    ash.

    A litany for the lost,
    the smothered child, the leaves
    on graves,
    dead.

    The flowers lie buried,
    the mourners sleep forgotten,
    all has sunk
    under falling,

    falling,

    falling, snow.

    But I will never sleep,
    and I will always sing
    for you

    a litany,

    a litany,

    a litany…