Learning Her Tongue (v. 5)

[artemisdart]

Learning Her Tongue (v. 5)
Revised again, 01-08-07

Some master's hands cut honey-amber laths
of pine, shaved wood, slid tongue in groove
to form our chair that afternoon.

Our mouths are filled with laughter, and our tongues
with songs of joy -- limbs heavy with caress,
leg locked with leg in wooden frame.
Sun-honey light descends in benediction.

Resounding throats stack chord on chord, notes slip
through mysteries of lips turned trumpet-tuned,
together-quaking strife re-making God,

their mouths lay claim to heaven, and their tongues
possess the earth, slow-lapping shallow
ripples towards their depths, until the egg-in-cup

flames forth to fuse us broken two in one --
chained deep to deep and care to quenchless care,
and both of us by careless tongues undone.


Italicized phrases: (1) Psalm 126:2, (2) Psalm 73:9