OPTIC FIBRE

I'd like to get back there
some day.
Back to the state
where joy and love and revelation are one
and go on and on and on
and I walk in a trance of compassion and insight.
and all anger is foolish, all sadness is tragic

There's a silver thread
Reaching back there
I hold onto the end
I'm down in the caves
Looking for strange life forms
I know there is life down here
I don't want to return,
Not yet, not yet.
I want to find these life forms
later

My silver thread reminds me of there.
like an optic fibre
I hear the music from the heaven
It's really still with me .
It's my lifeline.
My knees are dirty, my hands are dirty
My eyes have become accustomed to darkness

Nothing down here can be so joyous as there.
It reaches a place and then stops
It can't break through
It can't sing with those voices, echoing from the vault
It doesn't fill me utterly, the joy down here
It can fill, but not utterly,
A transformation in quality as the bounds are reached

The baby's soft skin, lashed eyes, nursing at the breast
A remedy for any terrorist
They would see the baby and of course they would
renounce their hate and love too.
If only that were true.
The adoration of lovers, the near fullness of heart
So beautiful, so beautiful, yet it still doesn't reach...
That transformation of utter fullness.

Childbirth is close, after the birth
when the lights of the mountain are shining.

I still have my optic fibre, my song fibre
But meanwhile I'm still down here, in the dark,
looking for new life forms.

Copyright © 2004 Gila Atwood

return to poetry page