Queron to Morpheus

!

Glass

gardens!

Morpheus

dreamed of Eden,

arose in Shiraz—

Figs that ripened ripen,

and each branch listens—I swear!

Every iota, a silken

ear blooming, choosing—daring to hear

these praises and promises all at once!

Sing the gardens of earth lush beyond compare

where tallest blues meet tiniest burrs to reveal

the moments in a lifetime of pain when the barrows

cradle your cells—and even in letting go you may see

those unreachable places—through moaning birth pains—reached again.

The clowns, saints, doctors, waters and figs you take within you deeply—

they heal you by weaving you tight into the whole—the great tapestry.

***
Sonnets to Orpheus
by Rainier Maria Rilke translated by Joanna Macy and Anita Barrows

Sing, my heart, the gardens you never walked,
like gardens sealed in glass balls, unreachable.

Sing the waters and roses of Isfahan and Shiraz;

praise them, lush beyond compare.

Swear, my heart, that you will never give them up.

That the figs they ripened ripened for you.

That you could tell by its fragrance

each blossoming branch.

Don’t imagine you could ever let them go

once they made the daring choice: to be!

Like a silken thread, you entered the weaving.

whatever image you take within you deeply,

even for a moment in a lifetime of pain,

see how it reveals the whole — the great tapestry.

***

This plantzilla poem is an attempt to cross-fertilize Rilke's translated poem into the queron form with additions of my own experience from meditation and journey spaces.