The Mission Of Angels Poem by Daniel Brick

Angels are always on the move.
Karlheinz Stockhausen

The only tears angels shed
are shed because they despair
of helping us heal our wounded
lives. Oh, we are surely
more complex than our primeval
ancestors. It is an issue of degree.
They lumbered into love and loss
just as we do millions of years
later. I have been told the angels
watched over their vexed inventions
of emotions, and affection, and
love itself. The angels guided
their clumsy but sincere growth
into humanity. So why are we still
creatures of ecstasy and grief?
Why does our human fate move them
so deeply? I have been told
every night a dozen or more angels
descend the Ladder of Ascent, and
glide through the twilight air.
Blending their presence with scents
of lilacs and violets, they place
the needful gift on a flat rock,
or inside a flower circle, both
artfully arranged so we will know
the gift is heavenly. And then
they withdraw into the shadows
from which they keep watch over us
in their inexpressible love
all through the night. So I have been told.