Death Comes Again by Cheryl Cudmore

Death Comes Again

I am nothing.
I am empty.
God fills me with treasure.
I become something.
God shines on the gate
and the wall too.

Those with no heart
have a key to the gate.
No need to scale the wall.
They are orange lilies.
I’m a dark blue iris
above the ruddy cliffs.

The ring is my pupil.
Through it, I watch
and search for souls
lost in the breaking sea.
The lantern, a beacon,
revolves round and round.

During gales, the surf
whiplashes the wild roses.
Salt spray and perfume.
Battered bodies wash up
on the shore, too weak
to climb the rocky rise.

They are dragged to safety,
They cough up their brine.
These survivors enrich and
tend to the garden.
A reprieve from the shifting
storms of the mind.

They turn to the soil
and sow and prune.
They watch over the sea,
fling petals into the foam.
Then be nothing.
Create something.

Cheryl - April 2008

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Cheryl Cudmore, Poet

I’m a native of Prince Edward Island, Canada and I’ve been a Bahá’í for twenty-four years. I write poetry and have had my poems published in four Bahá’í print periodicals, one print poetry anthology and two e-zines. I am honoured to appear in this poetry blog among other Bahá’í poets.

I have worked in the field of graphic design for about thirteen to sixteen years. I’ve also worked as an editor, publisher and promotional officer for three years in the areas of health and language advocacy. I’m currently employed with a publisher and printer.

Areas of post-secondary studies are visual communication design, fine art, creative writing, entrepreneurial development and accounting for business.

I have a son who is studying art and design at college and he enjoys script-writing and theatre arts.

My other interests are fitness and health, long-distance walking and swimming and painting.

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Going Home by Heather Cardin

I have walked across the prairie in the evening,
I have walked the horizon line. I have walked
roads of wonder, eager dust lifted near
wings of strangers, sights set to weeping.

I have rested here, and waited, sometimes morning.
I have heard soft whispers from somewhere yet unseen
and dreamed of flight. It’s so simple, this moment
when pulse and breath teach lessons I already know, and I believe.

I have hoped for here, this garden, found the scent of soft adieux
to voices I no longer hold. I know transitions are as rainbows,
spirit sweeps its simple way past all expression
muted like the song of insects settled into light.

I find the night and sing it, watch horizon like a memory,
hear this heart of silence like secret places known together.
Nothing touches, nor skin nor breath nor changeling,
and just beyond that shadow, we embark in sound, renewed.

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Heather Cardin’s Blogs: Poet, Book Woman

Heather Cardin is the author of two Baha’i books, with another forthcoming and two at review. In addition, Heather has published many poems, online and in chapbooks, and has shortlisted for prestigious poetry awards in her home country, Canada, including, most recently, the CBC Literary Award for Poetry. She published her first poem with World Order magazine in the summer of 2002. Her long poem, “in Gloria’s Garden,” is forthcoming with the next issue of World Order. Heather divides her time between a teaching position in British Columbia and her home, with her husband and children, in Gatineau, Quebec.

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Tahirih: The Pure One

‘Abdu’l-Bahá said…: “All Art is a gift of the Holy Spirit. When this light shines through the mind of a musician, it manifests itself in beautiful harmonies. Again, shining through the mind of a poet, it is seen in fine poetry and poetic prose. When the Light of the Sun of Truth inspires the mind of a painter, he produces marvelous pictures. These gifts are fulfilling their highest purpose, when showing forth the praise of God.”

Lady Blomfield, “The Chosen Highway” Wilmette: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1954, p. 167 [23]

A short excerpt from a poem by Tahirih:

The thralls of yearning love constrain in the bonds of pain and calamity

These broken-hearted lovers of thine to yield their lives in their zeal for thee

Though with sword in hand my Darling stand with intent to slay, though I sinless be,

If it pleases him, this tyrant’s whim, I am well content with his tyranny.

As in sleep I lay at the break of day that cruel charmer came to me,

And in the grace of his form and face the dawn of the morn I seemed to see.
…
Táhirih (Arabic: “The Pure One”) or Qurratu’l-`Ayn (Arabic: “Comfort of the Eyes”) are both titles of Fátimih Baraghání (b. 1814-1820, d. 1852), an influential poet and theologian of the Bábí faith in Iran. As a prominent Bábí she is highly regarded by Bahá’ís and often mentioned in Bahá’í literature as an example of courage in the struggle for women’s rights. … She is perhaps best remembered for appearing in public without her veil.

One of her most notable quotes is her final utterance, “You can kill me as soon as you like, but you cannot stop the emancipation of women.”
(Wikipedia).

Táhirih was martyred in Teheran in 1852.

Technorati Tags: Tahirih,Baha’i,Poetry,Women’s Rights