Patrick White Poems

for Jody

The important thing
is to stay ahead of the pain
...

The reason most people are unhappy
is that they love their misery.
They cling to it
like a voodoo doll of themselves
...

It's not so much the darkness
that bothers me
it's just that at these depths
the sea forgets how to dream.
...

I see myself happening
in the flight of a bird across the moon,
in the appearance of the leaves
and the leftover flowers
...

When the sky speaks
it's stars sun moon
but when it sings
its voice is full of birds.
...

If compassion is not
the fruit of your understanding
your tree is rootless and flawed
however beautiful the blossoms are.
...

Sometimes think I'm always
a life too late
to catch up to my own
walking away weary of waiting for me.
...

Out of nothing, out of space, the abyss,
out of thin air, the fluids
my mother and father were
at the sacred junction of two rivers,
...

Something deeper than tears to weep for you.
I weep blood. I weep the silence
on the backstairs with the screen door
that bangs like the sound of one hand clapping
...

To be alive here
is to suffer the godspear of light
that enflames your breath with life
through the heart, the night
...