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Be present with your want of a Deityand you shall be present with the Deity. Thomas Traherne
Sometimes I lose you, as if you were a stallionand the barn door's left ajar. Or I'm due someplaceand can't remember where. In my hellionhair and ripped work shirt, I ransack the placeto find my datebook. Gone. Or I've droppedmy glasses and I'm crawling on all foursto swab the floor with outstretched hands. I mopblindly, my heart stuttering with fear.Don't tell me you're not a stallion. I know.You're not some destination. But I want totell you what it's like to search, althoughthe words are clumsy. Vapor. What it comes to:You are the sky, the boat, the oars, the water.You are the soul that longs to row and you're the rower. [End Page 109]
Jeanne Murray Walker is the author of eight books of poetry, most recently, Helping the Morning: New and Selected Poems (WordFarm Press). Her poetry and essays have appeared in several hundred journals, including Poetry, The Atlantic Monthly, The American Poetry Review, and Best American Poetry. She is the recipient many fellowships as well as 16 nominations for The Pushcart Prize. She is Professor of English at the University of Delaware, where she heads the Creative Writing Concentration, and currently serving as Mentor in the Seattle Pacific University low residency MFA Program. jwalker@udel.edu.
