This Silent Night

By Joseph Hesch

Standing on the back porch,
11:39 PM on the 24th.
I’m cold and the chill air frosts
my nose and glasses. 
This is nothing new 
for a late December night,
but something’s different.
The wind chimes dingle-ding
just as they do in August. 
The trees sway and creak
as they did last month
and the months before that.
Perception stretching beyond
fading frame of consciousness,
maybe to snare hoped-for revelation,
I realize it isn't what I’m sensing
that's off. It’s what I’m not.

Over behind the big trees,
and the red-brick suburban bedsteads
lightly snoring smoke into the sky,
the normal hum and howl of
late-night on the Interstate
is absent.
I realize it’s because this is
That Night and travelers are safe
with their own, I hope.
And I want to stay here,
not travel another step,
to breathe in all this cold and quiet,
and breathe out crystaline clouds,
silent hymns of joy.
To be one with
this Silent Night.


Here's a little Christmas Eve poem that was inspired by standing on the same back step as my summer poem, "Illuminati." It's a true response I had to standing there waiting for my golden-haired semi-muse Mollie to do her thing (What else is new?) the late evening of December 24, 2009. Consider it my Christmas card to you, in thanks for the support you've given me in this first year of blogging poetry. I've linked "This Silent Night" up to dVerse Poets Pub for the crew's Open Link Night.

Perchance to Dream

By Joseph Hesch

It’s so dark here each night, waiting for
the memorable flight to fantasy,
the fears or thrills that you may have,
but I almost never do. I lay in this bed
with my itinerary made of today’s regrets
and tomorrow’s dread,
dreaming of being able to dream.
It’s like groping in the dark for a shadow,
something I can’t see or feel,
but I know is there, if only I …

I will slip into the black depths of sleep,
a struggling shipwrecked sailor going under,
only to open my eyes to another awakened darkness
hours later, taunted by a clock that shows
I missed rescue once again.
But last night, before I sank back
to the nothing that is my slumber,
this vacuum of fancy, I once more pleaded
with the universe for colorful release.

As I was about to surrender once again
to the vacant sleeping dark, an angel appeared
and beckoned me to join her,
tucking beneath her wing of white .
“Here,” she whispered in my ear,
“hold me and be mindful of now,
not yesterday, not tomorrow. Feel my warmth,
and drop your baggage. You won’t need it
where we’re going.”

I never knew my gloom could transform

into a world of such light and color,
such sound and feeling, such heart-lifting joy.
But it did.
When I awoke, I saw dawn in a light so new,
it might as well be approaching from the west.
Tonight, I will leave the dreary day at the door,
I will root fearsome tomorrow from under my bed,
and I will prepare for my angel to join me
in our dream.

Nodding Dream

By Joseph Hesch.

I used to march these rooms half the night, 
their blackness the only thing holding me 
on an eyeless path I traced, hand outstretched, 
sweeping for walls that I knew were there 
and for barriers that really weren't.
Even counting my steps, I never quite learned 
where to stop before the crash, 
before the sparks would light up my mind 
but never my vision.

Maybe I was searching for you there, 
your brilliance still over the horizon, 
not measured in lumens, but in heartbeats, 
plunked like strings on a violin, 
marking time until you found me, 
stumbling, mumbling through my jagged nights. 

In this darkness you were surer in your steps, 
sure my outstretched hand all that time
was there for you to hold.
And now so connected, where might we go? 
Are the maps already drawn?
Or will we explore the world
carried by the words we let drift 
in streams like ink, running black 
to the oceans of other hearts?

Cold Truth

By Joseph Hesch
 
Last night the snow
laid its ghostly hands
upon all the horizontals outside.
Some of the verticals and
in-betweens, too,
felt its curative touch.
Fresh-fallen, so softly
whitening the dark,
smoothing the points and edges,
beautifying the uglies that were
too conspicuous before
the fall after Fall.
But, come windy morning,
that which was covered,
and those sojourners
not long passed
have carved their marks
on the once-immaculate.
And with dawn's rising light
they reveal
Winter’s cold truth.

I wrote this poem back in February, right after I began this journey upon the vast sea of zeroes and ones. I think only a few people other than close friends have actually seen it, what with it being "old" and my being just a funny name when I posted it. So, with a few edits, I'm re-introducing "Cold Truth" to visitors at dVerse Poets Pub for the Dec. 27, 2011 Open Link Night, which I happen to be hosting. I think it's a proper poem for this Winter, to remember the past year and my latest journey, leaving my marks, my truth, on pages both white and virtual.