Numinous Lantern Moon

Numinous Lantern Moon

Full Moon  May 26, 2021

 

empty your bowl of light

& go long into the young beginning night

follow that horizon band

turn toward the east, the south

crowned by the bright ones

silky with purpose & high

on the drug of consciousness

this bell every moment ringing,

walking, looking, speaking, thinking

in the vernacular of dirt

the boundless grass, the ocean

the malleable malas of clouds

some wish to go out, seek

a frontier beyond this world

black holes, universal moistness

finding the alien other—

what of the Kōlea bird on the golfcourse

that breeds in Siberia

whose flight is 4 days long

over 3000 thousand miles of open water

to the same spot on this island

where poi is pounded from ‘ulu?

& what of the idea now growing

of a dragon in the mind

who encircles a jewel

in a cave at the bottom of the sea

whose innumerable facets

draw their whole world beauty

from compound reflections

of every other resonant face?

why do we close off radiance

& hold apart from the resounding

infinite reverberation of yellow?

this life is too short

to sleepwalk alone

& miss the night rainbow

 

Poem by Qayyum Johnson

Painting by Suiko McCall. She Who Dispels War, 2020. Marigold, turmeric, henna, fire circle charcoal, and alcohol on paper, 14×11″.