Dear everyone, everywhere,

please pray for this Living Russian Poet being treated unfairly in Russia NOW. These things should not be in the "New Russia'

to Yulia Privedyonnaya

Taking a Hammer to the Clouds

taking a hammer to the clouds
they tried to kill the snow
but the snow fell anyway

as always, more beautiful than ever
still snow, yet different-

mysterious happiness settled
over the landscapes of the heart.
as in other countries

known and unknown.
you will not be deceived:

no one can alter
the God-given course of poetry
through the soul's veins

or immemorial joy
you are not deceived

believing in poetry, in happiness,
in, as Pushkin said,
mysterious inner freedom

cherished and cherished

mary angela douglas 24 february 2010

Bent

I threw my words into the golden air

when golden was my expectation

but they returned to me, bent.

through shining kingdomes of

faery-cut glass I kept on

scripting the soul's forlorn menageries-

but words were cut there, too

when staunchless, on

the bitter ground,

glass music slipped

from my hands and shattered.

I carried words in my heart, then, when

chiming inwardly those

heart-breaking bells deposed.

beyond earth

I carried them, still, their

crystal cascade shimmering

sorrowfully out of sequence

small birds quaking barely

alive I cried to see them so-

coming to the final bend in the road

of uncherished language.

I bent before the

least door of Heaven

incapable of more-

I let them go:

they flew straight through--

mary angela douglas 24 february 2010