L.R. Harvey Poetry

THE HOLY HUNT I’ve done my diligence about the place.                I've snuffled like a blue-tick to find a trace of something tangible—a print perhaps?—                as confirmation that I haven’t lost the track.  A hunter knows , I’ve heard, the presence of                 his quarry, obtains a transitory tingling of the fingertips (or is it heart) that some-                thing’s surely close . Don’t get me wrong,  I wouldn’t deign to call myself a 'hunter' in                 the denotative sense, but if the sole criterion  for such a designation is the latent presence                 of a smoldering below the heart, perhaps I am.  I’m close, I sense, or maybe He is close to me —                Ah, we must consider that the prey would feel a similar enlightening, a ripple at the bottom of                 the well. These hounds of heaven run like hell.

LINGERING AT THE STEPS                      'And the word of the Lord was rare in those days.' * And seeing as he hasn't deigned to answer for a while now, or even (seemingly) stirred,  our natural supposition is he must be out or maybe staying in, though really both  are equally unnerving if followed to their logical conclusions. So how ought we to fare  in such a doubtful circumstance as ours?  Ruling out the possibility of blatant disregard, perhaps our best approach is just to settle in beside the 'welcome' mat and sit a spell,  hoping that we’ll catch him when he leaves the place or meet him on return. Yes, at least this offers us, I guess , a chance of getting in an audience, an infinitely better chance than grumbling off into the night convinced he doesn't care for such as us. Let's knock again.

BEYOND A BUSH But what if this would constitute  as Holy Ground as well, and that , and even over there , and really all of it’s aflame with something well- beyond our marginal ability to see, much less apprehend ? And maybe all our heads are hissing with the  tongues of pentecostal fire, our des- ert pilgrimage preceded by a pillar just as big and hot as theirs. Consider that you and I are currently engulfed in lightning on a mountain's peak! If this is true, Eternal Flame, forgive us  these our sandals and our tennis shoes.                Y ou understand, I trust, our tender feet.

THE DOOR TO ENDLESS LIFE Yes, if I could speak about the place  I would, of course, and in the way my dad can talk about Octobers as  a boy, or Jake, his gimpy yellow lab who never chased a ball—that is,  I’d love to tell it all . But seeing as  I haven't fully made it there myself                (at least not past a passing glimpse  or something like a whiff) so couldn't conjure up the words, I guess the best that I can do is warn you that the trip is long and rather strenuous, which isn't news to you. No, so let us find a shady  spot instead to dream about what maybe  we’ll be greeted with on getting there, wherever 't here' might be. I bet we share this nagging hope.

IN THE HOUSE OF THE UNANSWEREDS                       — to R.M. He’s aggravated on observing that  the neighbor’s houses seem to well- withstand the existential easterlies that  test the structural integrity of all the local houses in the area. Why is it, then, that Mrs. Miller and her porky children suck their forks contentedly while he must sit beneath the steps to wearily anticipate,                (tonight, again, ) the roof ripping off? Perhaps he didn’t build it up to par, and in a certain sense  he’s relatively sure of this, to an extent.  Still, he wonders exactly where he went off code. Allow me to briefly intervene to theorize (and here I find encouragement myself) that maybe it's the honest chinks that welcome in the breath of the divine.               I f so, we're fine.

ON WE GO The pilgrim-type, on finding evidence that he is on the trail, does not then  rest as if arrived. How foolish such a man would be to hug the tree that  holds the arrow pointing him ahead.  How silly, yes, to stay his weary steps at foot of such a blaze, especially if such a tree were, (hypothetically, of course, ) directioning both East and West, both  North and South, as if to make an oath that inasmuch as he proceed in faith,                               he could not, would not, lose the path.

A BRIEF HISTORY ‘For by this word you shall possess the land for your inheritance,’ or that’s the gist of it. And really then, what  more could we entreat than that?— a simple, 10-step process guaranteed to guide us to the gates of endless bliss! Our elbows wrinkled up, and slowly other signs began to testify that surely something wasn’t right. Then looking                down He apprehended what the problem was, and thereupon concluded something                like, ‘if not by that word, maybe this One.’ 

THE WORK OF UNKNOWING                         "By love He may be gotten and holden; but by thought never." - Anonymous  I’ve known You, Lord, as far as intellect's                concerned, as far as eyes grown callous in the dusk can know the light, that is. Like                 viewers at a matinee grown glassily content, (adjusted , so to say,) I’ve known you, Lord,                and known You well, at that. But seeing as the matinee has reached its pending end (or                drawing close, at least,) I'd better surpass this mock reality. Yes, thrust me in the light                till I go blind, and in this blindness, glimpse. 

MORNING MARANATHA* Lean in a little closer, Lord,  the way we so inclined to hear what Mimi muttered. Her s heets were white beneath the ceiling fan. A little closer still, for I too  am short of breath, (a little blue around the lips of late,) but I can yet, like her,  rasp hoarsely to a bending ear.  What is it that I’d like to say? How best articulate what stays unsummoned from the tongue?  Ah here it is. This won’t take long. I'm weary, Lord . *1 Cor 16:22b

ROOTING OUT Enjoy!, the Maker says, a tasty question                on the tongue, this testament that I’m the Endless Inextricable, the Answerless                 of which I Am. Enjoy!, the Maker says,  and we say 'yes, Lord, yes of course,                but given our inherent inclination, plus our narrow ken, You surely understand                our discontent in such a plain command. So please, you see, forgive us this our need                to apprehend the roots of lovely things.' And as the Maker grieves we pull our                 shovels out and start to dig, unearth.

APPREHENDING THE LOGOS We like our conclusions clean, our num-                bers neat, and even (in geometric terms) our circles tight as tires. It's oddly this,                we find, wherein the problem lies,  considering that something latent in                 us won’t divide without a bit left hang- ing off the edge. Maybe we didn’t car-                ry to the tens? A broken calculator? These, of course, are possibilities—or                it's our insistence that we calculate a Word.    

MILES TO GO BEFORE WE SLEEP So lately lost in mental mist,             the kind pervasive this far East,  we’re bound to turn our trust             away from intellect as adequate to guide us to the Holy Peaks.              And yes, perhaps this is hypothesis, but surely most as us, soon lost,              would settle for a nearby Marriott  if not the whispered Voice beside  us saying, garbled but strangely yet articulate, 'Stay the curvy course,                 bemused belovéd, stay the course.'