Bard's-Eye View

A Poet's Perspective by Elkin Thomas
(OR Notes From Elkinville)

Languid We Lay

by Elkin Thomas

The heat of late August
Lapped over into mid-September
And nature, deciding she'd had enough,
Began to stir for change.

Languid we lay, listening in the dark
As the first lazy rains of approaching fall
Dripped from the eaves of heaven
Into the dusty aura of an impatient,
But thankful, parched earth.

And we were thankful, too,
For more than, together, we could name.

TREASURE

by Elkin Thomas

There is treasure everywhere, on every hand
Daily treasures in the series of experiences
To which we must respond
Some treasures are like winds lifting the wings of the soul
Bringing thanksgiving and praise
Some treasures are like wind shears, vacuums in flight
Bringing frustration and pause
All things treasure
Everywhere buried, only to be discovered
Connected in reality and metaphor
To the Great Mystery -- God's presence within
The Kingdom of great price
Growing and branching into every life experience
Transforming from within like leaven in dough
Prompting to choose renewal of the mind
Instead of conformity to this world
(That every present seduction)
The glory of God, hidden only to be revealed
Treasure everywhere buried, only to be discovered

THE CALL HOME

by Elkin Thomas

The haunting, familiar sound
Faintly calls through the vast sea of time
Echoing in the shore shells of every tribe
The last trump to one
Is the annunciation to another
The sending forth of the call home

In our wanderings the sounds
We think to be many
In our returnings we recognize
As one the same
The primordial voice

Like a river rising and falling,
Steeped and sloped,
In the end we find the path,
Most twisted for sure,
A simple circle back to the sea.

How often would we, all creatures
Have gathered together
Neath the shadow of the Almighty
Surely we shall, surely we do

Like whales wading in oceans,
We are part of the sea, part of the sound
The Call is in the sea
The Word is in the wind
In the silence of our soul
We answer, We are coming, we are coming

The Poet's Pen

Tending Toward God 

by Elkin Thomas

All things are tending toward God.
Like the sun in the moving stream
It shines, it flashes and rolls,
It folds down 'round the rocks
And rises again on its rolling ride.

Sometimes we observe.
Sometimes we sense such flashes,
Like diamonds in motion,
And know all things are just going home -
Tending toward God.

Seasons arrive and then depart,
Leaving blossoms and blooms,
Changes tending to completeness:
One season resolves to rest,
Another to rebirth,
Another to extending, to bearing,
To leaving the ripe, to shedding the worn.

The Welsh pine extends,
New birds are born,
All things extending:
Mayflies by days, annuals by years,
We too, by time, are just going home -
Tending toward God.

Poet's Pen

A Rise in Returning

by Elkin Thomas

There is a rise
In returning from the road.
There is joy releasing
From the impending possibilities
Of safe mooring and fresh memories.

In a short time
The lines leashing the inertia
Finally stretch their limits
And tighten their determined grip.
The energy that has propelled
Subsides into a gentle lapping,
As against a vessel's hull,
A rocking of the soul.

Within, the creative pulse
Picks up the roadbeat
Dying in the distance
And dazzles its own vision
With a galaxy of possibilities,
Splayed and sparkling,
Such pulse is unto itself.
It is sovereign discretion.
It is abandoned play.

Feelings of frailty rush forward
To trample the facts of faith,
For frailties are familiar
With the uncomfortable, uncontrollable extremes
Of these demanding displays.
Faith calms the frailties
With mythic reminders of hills,
Steep hills strewn with sliding shale
And shrouded in deep, mysterious mists,
Where are found the sparkling pieces,
Fitted together only by the climbing.

It is the child who loves the hills,
The surprise, the exposure.
The old man frets,
Having become anxious and dulled
By doses of the promised securities
Of old wine that did not keep.

Let go of them both,
For time will see to that anyway,
But follow the child.

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