"Expulsion from Paradise"
James Bland
Expulsion from Paradise
-- to the things behind indeed forgetting,
and to the things before stretching forth,
to the mark I pursue he prize of the high
calling of God in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 3:13
Side by side, wind-whipped,
a man and woman
stride through
the blurred Gate of Paradise.
Neither in profile,
nor in parallel,
they moan forward.
Their loins, without garlands.
Above them,
a raspberry-cheeked Angel,
face ruined by repainting,
diagonals a sword.
Aloft on a cloud of gown,
the circle of her arms
nestle them
in an indifferent embrace.
The man thrusts
into
the snug weae
of his twined fingers.
The woman --
eyes gouged by shadow --
clutches
her bright breasts.
Can you ear
the timbre of their wails,
song-birded
into the stillness of air?
I want to say to them:
Dudes – take your heads
out of your hands;
lift your clear eyes.
Though eructed
from the Garden of Eden;
burdened to breathe
in our shaded world,
you needn’t fear.
Through the criss-cross
of your somber legs,
engoldened pyramids,
distant hillocks—hard, beautiful;
scrawled in the Janus-faced syntax
of our broken world.
A realm you now enter,
not alone, but together.
Find, not inhospitality,
but the half-welcome
of those already here.
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