What's in a Word
What is in a word? What do the people say? A vexing afterthought, cast by faith in naught? Or a bending bow which hits a mark, With fitting ring it binds a thorn, yet “Does that mind perceive it?” With weeping falls do wishes rend down off a place of misplaced fend, and ripples fade from shallow view; A word! If only a word with you… Do not mine eyes hold more than tongue? Has not my past a thousand pictures, worth a thousand some? A box-like hex the foolish cast, with mind to take a word as last, but wisdom seeks the seeking thresh; With words it seeks, the spirits to test. Not can words in that mind stay, For depth is reached in every day… It poses, for a time, what seems to be sublime, and later sees the words foregone like river rushed, for here, at last, have new words time, to heal with lightning if they not be hushed. Or even throws out nettle spears, a sour tonic, yea incautious fears, or weary gasp from much unspoken, reveals a gash of hope soon broken. With prickling fault it speaks unjust, if only for a moment… to feel what must… Learn ye this from master Job, That a wrongful word, yet honest phrase, if in hope of novel growing, Is better loved by Heaven above than many words from fragile knowing, That proper words with goodly views do shroud a world of private hues, Yet brazen craft of genius spirit seems poor taught for ears too dull to hear it. That with intent does stretch an eye in folly closer to that Starry Keep, than clenching teeth by beck and plead to stop the mind a sin to creep. That there's a Spirit deep in man which teaches new perception. In words it sees a person's seeing, not simple missed correction. Indeed that Love of God, and others, dear, means not to polish blameless sights, but to live your mind and set it right. What’s more, to see the other as a world within, with words to shine a light so thin. Be thine eye greater still, that you might find a lamp wherewith to fill thine heart with warmth alight to venture up that dire hill— a seeking peace, with ears to hear the glimmers royal, beneath veneer. The sea that is the heart of man needs more than words to be brought near, and yet by question's answer dare we play, a game in which we must relay so great a depth, in just one day… Most of all should we eschew the shallow, which takes for granted what is by their generation chanted, and makes the group its leader hallow: The hope is not to dodge all sins, but to understand the God within. See you not that elders' phrase contains a lie? Hidden still from wise and learned... That he was once a Father's want decried! And as Son discovered lessons earned. That beneath the words awaits a warming ocean, by trust a process can embrace an image broken, For 'silver has a place from whence it comes,' but wisdom hides between the lines, not on 'beaten path' arrayed with stones, but out in fields away from busy eyes and lunges forth from clouds asunder, as 'Satan falls like lightning' under, when braver hearts might share the walking feat of making living parts in whole complete and splitting careful down great clearer branches make a garden in shared glances. Learn this then from the Word’s First Fable, that the Word is not the cherished fruit— but the growth that grows the root.