The Tide

Sorry about all the Levertov, but she's just so perfect...

Where is the Giver to whom my gratitude
rose? In this emptiness
there seems no Presence.

                          How confidently the desires
                          of God are spoken of!
                          Perhaps God wants
                          something quite different.
                          Or nothing, nothing at all.

Blue smoke from small
peaceable hearths ascending
without resistance in luminous
evening air.
Or eager mornings - waking
as if to a song's call.
Easily I can conjure
a myriad of images
of faith.
Remote. They pass
as I turn a page.

                          Outlying houses, and the train's rhythm
                          slows, there's a signal box,
                          People are taking their luggage
                          down from the racks.
                          Then you wake and discover
                          you have not left
                          to begin the journey.

Faith's a tide, it seems, ebbs and flows responsive
to action and inaction.
Remain in stasis, blown sand
stings your face, anemones
shrivel in rock pools no wave renews.
Clean the littered beach, clear
the lines of a forming poem,
the waters flood inward.
Dull stones again fulfill
their glowing destinies, and emptiness
is a cup, and holds
the ocean.