The Poetry Of...
Kenneth P. Gurney.....................
Sunlit Through the Rose Window
In the sanctuary
the cross sprouts branches,
extends roots to the floor.
Two women weep
on the anniversary
of lost husbands.
Christ grows a skin of bark,
his arms pull nails from stiff wood,
bend toward the sun;
leaves bud at his extending fingernails.
The slow river of feminine tears
from a handful of sorrows
guide the tree roots into the earth.
The mouth of Christ speaks of heaven
and a sparrow nests upon his tongue
and lay her eggs.
On Sunday the faithful return,
like salmon, to their favorite pews,
witness nature, call it a miracle.
Something happens every day
when people close their eyes
and water the seeds of their prayers.
We Paid for Bullets, Helicopters, Daisycutters
America, my face is the face of war
and all the sleepless nights
that follow the homecoming.
It was my brother who did not say that
when he returned from Iraq,
but I read it in his darting eyes.
I guess at the scars he covers with bluster and bravado,
how the church bells fall unheard from his ears,
and the vengeance of his wounds
terrifies his girlfriend when pretending love.
Brother. You are history
standing in the living room—
a cigarette’s smoke
too reminiscent of Fallujah
for you to light the tobacco
you crave.
I fear you’ll be your own death squad,
that your disappearance is only a matter
of a night too black with thunder
when the dark hollow of your eyes caves in.
On the day you returned, I hugged you,
embraced the crease of skin created
where the bullet slid around your rib,
cracking, but not breaking it.
I want to see that scar, to run my finger
where that bullet pushed a lethal fear
through bone and inside your heart.
Bradford Beach
In the car behind me, a dashboard Jesus
preaches to the back window,
baseball bobble-heads—
benedictus home team
always wins.
The woman, Ruth,
who, at an early age,
begat Lydia, who begat Anna,
who begat Hannah
sits on the beach
in a one piece
watches her
great grand daughter.
A car radio blares snippets
of erectile dysfunction
to its revved up occupants
who need no chemical encouragement.
What would the Taliban do
if they happened upon this beach?
I see them regularly hanging out at McDonalds,
their innocence fooled by the marketing machine.
They debate the purity of supersized fries
unable to stop now that they’ve begun,
now that they salivate whenever they see
a golden arch or crescent moon.
Ruth is asleep and will burn in those spots
where the fifty-four SPF lotion missed.
Hannah, thirteen, so impatient,
flirts with the boys and feels the power
of her developing curves, the pressure of fabric
as her nipples rise; in a moment realizes
she is as headless to the boys
as if the Taliban carried out
a religious execution.
Kenneth P. Gurney is the editor and creator
of the wonderfully rich Tamapyhr Mountain Poetry~ a resort for the mind and a true gift to writers.
