blessings

Blessed is grief, which knows no cure but memory; blessed is the mother of grief who suffers scotomata, and sees nothing but the light of the russet homespun coffin; blessed is the father of grief, his face a dead-end, lit by the holy trinity of the clerestory light of the nave, choir and transept; blessed is the silence between breaths and the heart that beats its brokenness; blessed is the universe that makes no distinction between yesterday and tomorrow and in all that lives and becomes eternal in its nothingness; blessed is the remaining little girl, with a pink clasp conquering her unruly red hair, her body in flux, not ruling out joy, not yet ready to find out the secret of sitting nice; blessed is the man that stumbles in the aisle, and curses god, the weight of a small wooden box too much for him to bear; blessed is the swallowing over of the hymns of tears into an echo of movement and the hard foul up of handshakes; blessed is the new silence of a house closing in; blessed is the mother’s voice crocked by love, yet speaks of everyday marvels, of tea and meals and tomorrows; blessed is the father who has no secrets but sitting and waiting; blessed are those soft weave of words that tread carefully on the stairs and the sorrowed wrapper of the self-unravelling; blessed is the purgatory of a room shared and a soul alone; blessed is the permanence of that accidental sealed place; blessed is the bed that lies and the blurred edge of choice that chases the scourge of unhappiness; blessed is the twin scaffolding that lies this way or that, and settles on back to back with serpent feet twisted and coiled; blessed is the scream in her skull; blessed is the tongue with no words; blessed is a mouth that miraculously stays closed; blessed are the words that don’t yet exist, yet brush against ‘no’, ‘don’t know’, and ‘maybe’; blessed is the cold winter sun that knows nothing of night; blessed is the blind confusion of flesh and sleep; blessed are the groans and creeks of a house awakening and the silent tears that run down the panes; blessed is yearning that lights a furnace fire of forced forgetfulness; blessed is the mustness and separation of the solitary human race; blessed are the legs of rumpled trousers, creased shirt, the tongue of a black tie that died on a discoloured bedroom chair; blessed is the shock of white and benediction of cold hands on the thickset married middle; blessed is the hurried fumbling and the slap, slap of base unpractised flesh forcing itself into the ghost of another; blessed is the sand pit of a mattress; blessed is shoulders pinned down, hips lifted and primed; blessed are two wrestlers breaking free from the sweat-filled gravity of need; blessed is the music of a single grunt and sigh; blessed is the luxury of scented soap and hot water that remakes a body; blessed is the day; blessed are those that bet on the permanence of the morrow. Cursed are those that preach and claim to understand.