LAND OF REST

The old stone wall runs to the west
past the flowering crab and the cedar tree,
up to the farm-house hill where it comes to rest
quite suddenly in a makeshift rockery.

I walked its length to ponder the mason’s craft,
stone on stone in made-up courses, improvised
it seems, or laid up as if to draft
a map to a place not yet materialized

but seen in the stooped farmer’s mystical eye:
a place free of the endless bending toil
to clear the rocky ground for the corn and rye
that sustains a life dependent on the soil;

a land that waves of lined-out hymns proclaim
to weary souls, who view its endless store
and gentle rest, and see no walls to frame
its fertile fields, nor stones to build them for.

THE OCCASIONAL FIRE

POEMS
Life Scroll
Spirit Wings
Death in the Family
Flight Chief
Legacy
Honeymoon Photo, October, 1939
49 Chevy
The Seed of Me
Land of Rest
On Allison's Leaving
Telecom's Bequest
Starbucks, Tuesday, 3:36 p.m.
Action Still
Vital Meaning
Fools

HYMNS
God will not let us go
The rising sun blazed out of night
Light! Light! A shattering light
Worship the Lord
As a doe

ABOUT MARK RHOADS