On The Mirrors of Arvo Part And His Departure

yesterday you wrote

inscribed and ever inscribing

in the pooling of mirrors

crushing the kaleidoscopic colours

of feelings past music into an undiscovered realm

or as if angelic beings held enormous

mirrors reflecting music back

from its beginning in a universe

we could not know or forgot that we knew

or were we driven in fear from the yard of gold
by the dogs with eyes as enormous as teacups, windmills
in a neighborhood of sounds distressed
compressed our hearts, boiling with the lids on tight

so that you alone guessed and then took note

in notes as rare as certain birdsong at night
did you wake to hear? sheer

refractions of the rose, the violet, the forest shards
ah children turn again, you whispered, Christmas uncle
that you are

and then it works

the battered toy, the hidden borealis, star
no longer receding

and in your midnight watches so composed

beyond the guarded borders of our sighs

of the whirling angels, list! that we all stood still

a kind of requiem in ourselves

weeping that this music filled

an ache in the soul

never before comprehended

mary angela douglas 2 october 2016;rev.23 january 2018