POEM: A Person Can Break A Neck Trying To Write An Honest Poem*

I have sat zazen my entire life
& committed every infant pink &
bruised purple morning to memory. I
have fasted & grown gaunt seeking visions,
having raised Presence to my soft red lips
as one lifts a chalice filled with Holy Blood
Of saviors, saints & the wisest madmen.
But it was not until the dim flicker
Of simple light, shadowless on the wall
of the cave that is my heart, scratched in an ancient
hand, that I was so stirred to finally
make out the blessing, once too blurry to read:

"let your writing be your practice,” it said,
let your practice be what you bleed."


*(With thanks to Charles Simic for this favorite line in one of his poems for the title.)