The Deepest Well Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

show me Father how to say this

turn the stones to flowers in their hands

that I may withstand



and the Word with me this withering world

caught in a glance, a shrug, a grouping together

at the punch table



oh God if you are able in these smallest of things

to reign, sustain me here;

where they are not gathered to hear



but to condemn.

spare me the quenching then that in every nightmare veers

early in the evening



before the dawn appears as if to shutter it;

to mutter like ravens scattering shade.

how vaulted are the heavens and everything you've made



but they have made even the sky a jail

and launch into it

to capture the sun.



I have written this down as if I were the only one.

before I drown let the Word not waver on the waves

or be dispelled by a cackling spell



consigning Beauty to the deepest well.



mary angela douglas 4 october 2019