The 

Holy

Sorrow

Like Sundays,

my sadness 

is holy.

I am

resigned

like the rain

to falling.

I have my

own gravity.

Am I

the only one

to find

living under

a cloud

brings out

the world’s

colors? 

Life is a ruin

and maybe 

that’s 

its splendor,

its rococo

mystery.

Consider 

the ancient

Colosseum

built 

for combat,

with 

only our 

suffering 

as spectacle.

A theatre 

of cruelty

designed

to fleece

the breath

from the

crowd.

Only an

earthquake

could 

increase 

the grandeur

of its rubble.

But I'm after

wholeness.

A liquid 

intelligence

is how I

make my

way.

I embrace

my grief

to ward off 

the perils

of unfeeling.

My sorrow 

is love

for what was

and will 

not 

come again.

If you're

like me

you've 

stumbled 

upon 

a pilgrimage 

to find

a shard

of silver 

in a gold

quarry;

a recognition

of yourself in

unforgiving 

light.

Life is in

the gravel

unloading its

grief at

our feet.

Did I say

gold quarry?

I meant a

salt mine.

Our tears 

seep 

through

its

cracks

like light

from the 

moon.

Still,

don't you 

want

to live

as long as

grit can

make

a flower 

and sorrow

form

a pearl?

I do.

I live

as in a

terrarium.

I could

be

Lazarus,

recycling 

my breath

in order

to bring 

more humidity

to my

retort.

My soul,

uprooted

as an

open hand,

reaches

upward

like a faith.

If I'd not 

found

sadness

beautiful, 

I’d never

have survived,

and this year 

would have

been merely

for coming 

to terms with

just so

unlikely

a grace.

Peter Valentyne

December 2020

 

Pentimento

There is a painting

beneath this one.

Night proves that.

For the dreamer,

day is a still life.

A blue vase 

next to pears

on a sil.

Day is for

negotiating 

objects.

But look closer.

An opaque rift 

in the cobalt

opens a space

occupied solely

by silence

revealing

an unexpected, if

irrational image.

A landscape.

Call it night.

This time

night is a path

along rugged cliffs

where I

wander alone

over roots and rock.

I can’t 

smell the sea

because a dream 

has no scents.

The vase, pedestrian,

the pear unripe.

The path ambles

beneath cumulus

flecked by diving

sea birds,

plovers I think.

In this place

my heart is so full

of love and God

that there’s no

telling them apart. 

The vase, bereft

of flowers but

buoyed by pears

is a pleasant choice

made in daylight.

The path, both

tricky and magnificent

is a mirage 

that will not last,

an unchosen 

image made

of both emotion

and memory;

an adolescent version

of a temporary 

paradise.

Awake, 

I strain

to be simple

as I’ve 

too many

feelings to hold

in or let go of.

Engrossed by

the mise en scene

behind things 

that are chosen

vs. those

bleeding

pentimento-like

through the vase.

Bliss leaves

its bruise.

Night blooms

as if pain 

were 

a flower

in the same way

my blood causes

roses to blossom.

Their poetry writ

like tattoos 

drawn in

disappearing ink

on my skin.

The body is 

its own red sky 

at mourning.

I know my

body’s mind.

Bruises are 

its language.

They teach 

that

time fades

all wounds.

A wound is 

a poem

about hurting.

My roses 

keep score.

Their redness,

a barometer

of unconstrained 

feeling.

The things 

that hurt

have a name.

My body 

remembers

by revivifying 

its canvas.

The mind 

has it’s clouds

but I am 

a whole sky.

Bruises bring 

an angel

the color 

of sundown.

They grow 

and fade

like weeds in 

a victory garden.

I am a bruise

that’s slowly 

fading.

Flowers at 

the funeral

of a boxer.

Little punctual 

memories

of one’s 

own pain.

That’s what 

they are.

Medicine 

from within.

Mornings are

for recovery;

a hospital bed

without a wing.

I lay recalling

whatever I can

before what I 

can and 

cannot do

are dragged 

away by

the undertow

of forgetting.

I am 

inside myself

and

beside myself

all at once,

blown like a leaf

onto the surface

of a stream

as the dream

takes me home

to itself.

What 

happens

at night

stays in 

the night.

Except for 

the exotic

flower I

wake

holding tight

in my hand.

Peter Valentyne

November 21, 2020

 

Random Thoughts 

While Having an 

Echocardiogram

This world’s a hospital

and the sick

are everywhere.

This hospital is

a series of

Chinese boxes

where our bodies

are the last

of the lids

to be

opened.

Be patient

with me.

I am made

of limbs

from the

tree of life.

See, 

I’ve got 

a knot

for a heart;

a scarecrow

with a 

mind

of mulch

and other

remembered

things.

Look

how I 

go about

like some

raggedy God

dragging

all that 

I am made of

behind me.

It will

take a tear

to make

me new. 

Today

the technician’s

hands are gloved

in latex

to contain

any trace

of sensuality.

For myself,

I use

my clothes

for a condom. 

Heaven forbid

I should

unsheathe

my poetry

in so much

artificial

light.

I strip

anyway

as instructed

and lay

on a bed

of crinkling

rice paper,

bare skin

beneath a

borrowed

gown

whose thread-

count only 

chaffs.

Now lie on

your side

and put 

your arm

behind

your head.

You instruct

and I

assume a

rather

cheesecake

pose, 

willing to vamp

for the polite

pornographer.

You who

mustn’t know 

I keep a stone

in my pocket

to keep myself

well.

Nothing

dissolves 

my sorrows

like a pebble.

Above, the

florescents

hum like

a geiger

while I lay

at the mercy

of instruments

designed to

remind me

I am not

made of 

wood.

Okay,

take a breath.

Hold it.

Hold it.

Hold it.

Now, release.

What if 

I were to

shut my eyes

and the world 

drop suddenly

dead?

Or is that

just an

unthinkable

secret

alive and well

inside my head?

Peter Valentyne

November 15th, 2020