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Sunday, December 27, 2009

CLIMBING THE TREE

by Tom Kelly


We tune out the preacher and ignore
the priest, no longer feast on bread
and wine, chuckle at the threat
of brimstone and the harpies' endless
pecking through time; we've sloughed off
the beast, its archaic symbols, as well as
ancient runes that lack the promise
our modern energies presume.

Instead, we focus on intention:
in yogic pose, we try to meditate
and mediate that omnipresent flow
whose touch we yearn for, but remains
ineffable. It slips through our fingers
easier than how sorrow finds its way
into the catastrophes of life...

Here at year's end we grasp
for structure, grope through the glitter
and glitz in the evergreen, seeking
good fortune, the star, the hope
of some light beyond the far
end of the tunnel.


Tom Kelly, a 59 year old resident of Virginia Beach, Virginia, has been an attorney in private practice for 27 years.
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