The Bottle-Mouth Of A Harbor Poem by Denis Mair

(for Terrence George Craddock)

Miraculous works of hands are seeded by faith, but who can tell from whence the seeds have journeyed?

Seeds that settle in may come on the wind. Look how the structure of worship was raised above all other buildings in Strasberg.

By grandeur of heaven-lifted thoughts was the tower raised and the bell placed.

Sad it is to see that speculation blows the wind raising so many sky-aiming skeletons of girders.

O if only the sea of slaughter could be poured back into a harbor's bottle-mouth and rounded by a dream of beauty.

A faith-seeded miracle will again blow heavenward, when a tower laughs speculation back to dice games on market day...

Someday buccaneers, even by their own fumbling rages, will stumble onto the road going to the local Habitat for Humanity.

The furthest-stretching speculation will finally set a lovely lubberly foot... on the first step of a horizontal tower of peace.