Transmigration for the Spirit
“poetry—that most portable of arts”
~ Michael Schmidt, The First Poets, 13
The most portable of arts, a poem rides
The waves and centuries, right across our hearts
And in them, through them. The oceanic tides
Are what they sometimes feel like in the parts
Of us, we know we share with poets long
Ago. They shipped them out in paper or
Engraved on stone, more often in a song
Accompanied by strings and soul. Deep ore
The writers dug up for the light to shine
On, nuggets, and then turned them into songs
For courage for the rites outside death’s shrine.
A poem travels, enters, settles and belongs.
..Another culture, distant, old and far,
….Appeals and touches like a dreamy scar.