rose quartz

so large there are no words to fill it
so small, a grain, you can
hold it in your hand

the green your eyes turn when you
are thinking, a sunny day, wind
blowing across the sand

it moves so you can't touch it, it
rushes by you, we turn and turn
endless space, our silent way

and we don't understand it, we
log and plan, calibrate, but
it goes beyond all that we can say

this day, these hours, the seconds
you were with me, your warm
breath, your body, and no sin

I look at the air, the sky, the sun
tall trees and water in the river
all people gone, I have no kin

and there are no words, I have no
words that will do to tell of time's 
eternity, the lidless eye of God

watching as we stand, walk, and fall -
our frailty and our strength, the
cruelty that makes love a fraud

so what can I say of this moment
when I stretch out my hands to
the air, find nothing there -

yet I saw the spirit of my mother,
the angel in my window,
my back bowed by care -

God spoke to me when I was here
through the tactile and natural,
my own body and my blood

rose quartz as emblem of your life
you say: the real thing you can
turn in your hand, but flawed

and in and through all things
is the seam that renders it impure
without which it does not live

but lies a dead thing with no heart,
no being, a bell that cannot be rung -
for only in the splitting do we give

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