POETRY: IF I COUNT THE ROSES
Posted Jul 3, 2004

IF I COUNT THE ROSES

If I count the roses I’ll be here all night,
if I count the breaths we take,
  a whole lifetime.
Yet one will be the sum total. Last one given
back to the air, its mother.

And if I count the thoughts we have,
purple monkeys doing slow-motion somersaults through nowhere,
  rich dinners brought on trays of
    giant elephant leaves,
groves and groves of flaming palm trees,
  alternating currents, alternating
    faces, frown and smile, smile then
draw the gash of the mouth down into a frown,
black empty skies, bright empty eyes,

if these thoughts were quantifiable and could be
  counted, and maybe in some
accounting heaven could, by some
    accounting angel,

and if we could count the worlds within worlds
within worlds in a spinning chain out the other side of
dimension itself into God’s own antechamber bathed in
the light of absolute intelligence whose
color bathes everything that exists and
sits it in continual cascades of
    consciousness we can’t make a
move without moving among, each bright

something existing by that light alone,

ah, but I can’t! It’s enough to

sit on a mossy bank and listen to creek
water twinkle by. Listen to each

sweet uncountable twinkle.
                 

Please visit Daniel Abdal-Hayy Moores wonderful website at www.danielmoorepoetry.com