Emily’s Journal

I.

A language not quite English writes your soul 

In honest and profound descriptive text

I follow you atop a craggy knoll 

Where fractured rocks with violets are dressed.

Your journal dimly lights a weathered stone 

With moss grown over carvings on the face

I read perceiving death and life are one 

Or nearly so with curtains of white lace

Dividing—but I scratch away the moss

And see the name of Beauty underneath 

“Is this your tomb?” I ask, in fear of loss

And you just smile “This gift do I bequeath

To any brave enough to follow me 

Through life and death mixed with divinity.

II.

The journal of a soul is seldom found 

To guide a would be traveler on his way 

A scrapbook of mementos from the ground 

Or plucked or photographed I cannot say 

I followed on the path you set before 

With fruit and thistles—drank experience 

The swirling visions mixing with my store

I’m drowning in the music of your chants 

And soon I see the currents soft subside 

The vision of your soul turns inside out 

And what was pain before is now applied 

To wizened fables, beautiful, devout— 

And christening the rebirth of your soul 

Still far behind I wander with my goal

III.

Your journal full of wildflowers picked and pressed 

With pastel beauty lays upon the mind 

I see the garden green with blossoms dressed; 

The summer sun with prideful beams are timed

To smile lovingly on these bright friends 

Each flower is a child of sun and earth 

With nature nursing all from seeds to stems

And back again to seeds for new rebirth. 

I wonder if it tickles being picked—

Admired for the beauty and the joy 

And later pressed in pages of a book 

Or sent with verses ribboned to employ 

A tactile picture of the soul’s delight 

To savor in the silver rays of night 

First published in The Ohio Poetry Association’s Common Threads 2022