schooled in flowers
matriculated in bombs
we're trapped in a common dark
hollow-boned with the midnight people
under the bearded earth with its terrible cuttings
away from the stone music of war
away from the empty eyes of ancestors
in a trance of blue-veined dreams
we learn the shape of dry space
and the liquid life below
as winds blow ashes of tomorrow
dust swarms through gusts of quiet
Before the great winds come and the white noise
of night, we'll cut loose from clocks and
stand in fields spread out to nowhere singing mantras.
Before the quiet waits in garments of good bye,
we'll bridge the silence of guitars
and float sound to its center.
Ruth Daigon was founder and editor of POETS ON: for twenty years until it ceased publication. Her poems have been widely published in poetry collectiions (hard cover and E magazines. She also won the Ann Stanford National Poetry Prize, 1997 (University of Southern California Anthology, 1997) and the Greensboro Poetry Award (Greensboro Arts Council, 2000).