Ellen Porter
11/23/07
A Glimpse of the Godhead

Religion, so often a failed endeavor,
finds growing room, unconventional,
through the poet’s loose-lipped pen.

It is rare that the Beloved
slips and slides away from the beginner’s heart,
but rather, She cajoles, guiding toward
a glimpse of the Godhead—
a furtive glance—
not enough to kill the poet
but to give her courage to stretch her reach
beyond the glorious spread of sycamore,
snow, the sun lending color to all the earth.

Religion, so far, unconventional,
leads the poet, not toward law and decree,
but to a burst of light
soft and passionate
running through her hungering soul.


Ellen Porter
10/31/07
Counterpoint

The joy of the day
comes in great sizzling moments of delight:
the golden, crimson autumn trees
trembling in the sun
the lift of blackbird wings
beneath rivulets of wind
the counterpoint of cloud and sky

And in these dazzling moments of vast beauty
I hold you ever tighter against my skin—
you do not recognize the teetering of my soul

One day I will have loved you
so much
that your loss, through my death or yours
or the fracture of daily time
will leave me empty, utterly still,
mourning

You do not mourn what you haven’t loved

Then only the trees, the blackbirds,
the thunderous sky
will remain.


Ellen Porter
11/27/07
hand in hand

i do not love
with bodily passions
pushing their way into
utter chaos

it is so limiting

i prefer to stray
along ocean’s hem
or mountain’s skirt
hand in hand,
our friendship so woven
it needs neither body
nor soul to speak.

some would call me repressed
but there are a few
who understand that celibacy
brings within reach
the crashing din of ocean
the mountain’s thunderous reply.

these, our beautiful bodies,
hand in hand
receive together
the passion of nature gone
ecstatically wild


Ellen Porter
11/12/07
late in love


our love, my dearest friend
comes late in life
mere moments of dazzling joy

against the backdrop of a stage
where in this shortened moment—
the winter of my days—

we enact the final scenes
rather than the play’s beginnings.
the love we tender will

break us, shatter us
like ice, splintered by a rock
on fragile water,

this my body,
broken open,
bereft.


Ellen Porter
Patient and Caregiver: A Poem For Only Two

Last night moaning
kept me awake
trembling, nearly fainting,
unusual pain,
my own groans
forbidding breath.

So is this how it is to die?
A slow slippery dip
into suffering?

Perhaps worst of all
there is the constant need
to be attended. Often
without the asking,
needs anticipated
and service given.
And again, often
I ask for more:
a glass of water, a chair moved
to suit my desires,
assistance in pulling on my jeans.

Last night proved to me
my hospice need.
I journey on and I journey on.


Ellen Porter
10/05/07
The Calm Out of Chaos
(after Rumi)

Someone sleeps in bed;
I rise in solitude.
Mine will be the greater silence.

Mouth closed
my heart blooms;
God and moonlight enter.

Sweetness fills me;
the calm out of chaos.
Nothing more to do
but, all day,
welcome silence and the Beloved.


Ellen Porter
10/20/07
There is a Pool

There is a pool, unexplored
in the center of my being—
not in my heart alone
but in lung and legs and brain.
There is a pool there
and I wander its edges.

Light green and brittle grass
give way to my footsteps.
When I drop in a stone
there are no ripples but
only surface, mirror, sheen.

I am afraid to bend down
to bend down and trail
fingers through the water
like bait.

This water, I say, bending down,
this water houses crabs,
cancer unformed and scuttling.
And bending down I dare
to wash one finger,
and I feel the legs of crabs
grabbing, pinching, playing out my life.