Mercedes Lawry is the Communications Director for the National Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) Association, a child advocacy organization for abused and neglected children. She lives in Seattle. Her poems have appeared in Alaska Quarterly Review, The Bloomsbury Review, Caliban, Indiana Review, Left Bank, New Virginia Review, Poet Lore, Seattle Review, and Southern Poetry Review, among other places.
I was in the happiness of the storm.
Thickness and song. Nothing was superfluous.
High winds lifted and fell in sheets
and the sounds, the screech and whine,
were like bells, so pure.I'd brought the letter from the Chinese boy,
passed from hand to hand
across the thousand miles.What do I know of his courage, now
circling with the ravens over the square
as fear continues to crouch behind guarded eyes.
I think of his spirit, circling too, calling.
But all that we know for sure
is his death. His letter I holdto the tongues of rain,
letting it break apart, the pieces
disappearing. The words go on,
having staked a claim
and what we do with the knowledge of the Chinese boy
could become the storm or the ravens or the rain.
Take such a thing. One small
child in a dusty country.
Look from all points. Round about
and all sides. Think on the idea
of place, yours and hers, the willingness
to lie in unique shadow. Study
the maps, tracing the barriers,
thick, black lines.Everywhere blows a wind
of definition. Turning and turning
under an ice white moon.
And so, the child travels
a precarious route, dodging
the grim and menacing.
Too many chances to fall into sorrow.
Poor luck of the draw.Fingers move across the world
toward home. Here is one beginning.
There, infinite conclusions.
Between, the endless red dawns
of a stolen life as a singular voice
calls out blessings on the morning.
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© Mudlark 1997
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