(no subject)

[ofsatyagraha.livejournal.com]

A Sweet Flying Dream
-Lawrence Ferlinghetti

We were two naked
light headed dandelions
with natural hair blown out
floating high over the landscape
blown by zephyr winds
our long legs dangling
straight down
translucent
dandelion stems
in an archetypal primordial dream
of flying

Sweet hills & waters
flowed below us
as we floated high over
lakes & rivers
& windblown peaks

We
drifted
wafted easily
We
flew wingless
Full of air
our hair
buoyed us

We
trailed our slim legs
in streams of silver air
There
was nothing
blowing us down
or away
from each other

After a long way
and a long while
we glided down
lower & lower
in great swinging circles
The sea
the lapping sea
rose up
and we
were over
dry gold land
close up
and I
I was afraid you would
come against the ground too hard
and I reached down
and took
your two extended hands
in mine
and held you below me
like that
floating
As we drifted
lower & lower
the earth
came up to us
so softly
And
we landed
so quietly
sank
so gently
to the bright soft ground
And lay in the light
flowerless fields

(no subject)

[penguinboy.livejournal.com]

The Lost Pilot
by James Tate

for my father, 1922-1944

Your face did not rot
like the others--the co-pilot,
for example, I saw him

yesterday. His face is corn-
mush: his wife and daughter,
the poor ignorant people, stare

as if he will compose soon.
He was more wronged than Job.
But your face did not rot

like the others--it grew dark,
and hard like ebony;
the features progressed in their

distinction. If I could cajole
you to come back for an evening,
down from your compulsive

orbiting, I would touch you,
read your face as Dallas,
your hoodlum gunner, now,

with the blistered eyes, reads
his braille editions. I would
touch your face as a disinterested

scholar touches an original page.
However frightening, I would
discover you, and I would not

turn you in; I would not make
you face your wife, or Dallas,
or the co-pilot, Jim. You

could return to your crazy
orbiting, and I would not try
to fully understand what

it means to you. All I know
is this: when I see you,
as I have seen you at least

once every year of my life,
spin across the wilds of the sky
like a tiny, African god,

I feel dead. I feel as if I were
the residue of a stranger's life,
that I should pursue you.

My head cocked toward the sky,
I cannot get off the ground,
and, you, passing over again,

fast, perfect, and unwilling
to tell me that you are doing
well, or that it was mistake

that placed you in that world,
and me in this; or that misfortune
placed these worlds in us.