Ancestral Lights (a poem by Deborah Digges)

And though I know that Heaven may be
only the mind's fear of the wonders it imagines,
the way our best thoughts surprise us
and seem not to be our own, I like to believe
we turn into light around those we love,
or would have loved, had we known them,
and warn them through the blood
by ringing in their ears.


Photo: flickr (Alieness)

Greeter of Souls...

The poet Deborah Digges, who was a professor of English at Tufts University in Massachusetts, died on April 10th at age 59. Here is one of her poems from the collection Trapeze (2004):

Greeter of Souls

Ponds are spring-fed, lakes run off rivers.
Here souls pass, not one deified,
and sometimes this is terrible to know
three floors below the street, where light drinks the world,
siphoned like music through portals.
How fed, that dark, the octaves framed faceless.
A memory of water.
The trees more beautiful not themselves.
Souls who have passed here, tired brightening.
Dumpsters of linen, empty
gurneys along corridors to parking garages.
Who wonders, is it morning?
Who washes these blankets?
Can I not be the greeter of souls?
What's to be done with the envelopes of hair?
If the inlets are frozen, can I walk across?
When I look down into myself I see a scattering of birds,
do I put on the new garments?
On which side of the river should I wait?