Vestment (Poem)

I'm taking the lazy route today and posting one of the poem's I've been working on. Okay, maybe not lazy, but I just haven't pinned down another poet for today. So you get me. Yay for you...

This is from a sequence (tentatively called "Cloudfire and a Bowl of Kauri Leaves: Poems To a Former Self") I've been working on in response to the time I spent in New Zealand.

Enjoy.

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Vestment

And he that sat on the cloud
thrust in his sickle on the earth;
and the earth was reaped.

-Revelation 14:16

Enclosed find your copy of the long white cloud,
its golden crown buffed, spires (sickle-like) curved
and ready to reap. Consider it your airline ticket; your

liahona; your bicycle; your box of 8-10 white shirts, wash
and wear, wrinkle-free; 2 suits, traditional style and cut,
conservative, black, dark gray, blue, or brown, no baggy

or pegged pants (even though they’re making a comeback, I
know); 3 pairs of slacks, not extreme or faddish or casual,
not baggy or pegged; a few belts with buckles and 5-6 ties

and 12 pairs of socks and 3 pairs of shoes that all say, I’m
conservative, a vested representative of God. I know
what James says about God’s liberal touch; but that will come

if you’ll start with your fingers like the fingers of Doré’s sun,
peeking from behind the cloud, reaching to sift
the uncertain harvest of a foreign world until they feel soil

part, feel the fern press its head through mist then flatten
against sudden emptiness; until you can roam the lumpy terrain
without tripping on the hem of your righteousness, can

cloak the world in light without singeing every shadow to ash,
without blinding yourself as you trace the cloudfire to dusk.