“Ghost Sharpener II: the Tailor of Time.”

Recently, I found a tiny blue pencil sharpener on my desk that I’d never seen before. The first poem that I wrote about it will not be viewed by the public, but I thought this iteration more amenable to mass consumption. “Zappa” is Frank Zappa, who said that music dresses time; “ontic” means “relating to or having real being.” Beyond that, let me let it speak for itself…

Ghost Sharpener II: the Tailor of Time

The pencil sharpener is small and blue;

So is my soul, sometimes. I wait for bliss

As acrid bombs still fall through Gaza’s sky

And rubble sings its song of heartlessness.

I wait, and yearn, for joy through April rains

(and sometimes through surprising falls of snow).

I long to taste the wine of victory

Fresh squeezed from Paradise’s reddest grapes,

And long to lift the weight of Wisdom from

The rock-face hiding Creativity.

The ghostly sharpener still draws me in,

Still grinds my little no. 2 to dust,

Still breaks my aching dreams within its gears.

I wander through a pathless, darkened wood

And fear to trip upon some errant root;

I sit upon a rock on Georgian Bay

But dare not dive into the deeps below

For fear I’ll strike a rock and break the chain.

I feel that I must choose yet fear my choice.

Why must the choice I make be fuelled by fear?

I’m happy I no longer wear a watch

Because its blunt, banal, internal time

Would never cease to terrorize my thoughts.

When I feel agonized by choice, time slows,

And only steadfast love can lift my soul

Beyond the chaos of chronology.

I know that Zappa’s right, and music still

Plays tailor to the vanities of Time.

The tiny sharpener of navy blue

Will burst in rings of bright cerulean

When opened by the magic major chord;

As Townshend shreds his Rickenbacker’s strings,

As Petty covers songs by old McGuinn,

I see pink sand on some Bahamian beach

And hear the angels’ gloomy post-punk songs.

So, music mends our hard mundanity

And good-time Jesus brings us wine from Gilead

Accompanied by howled hillel Psalms

And feted by soft flute from Anderson.

Though burning worlds careen around their stars,

The stellar music is the cosmic glue

That integrates our ontic house of cards.

The song can heal our sick societies

And grow the rich, dark coffee of the mind.

Each well-played note can grow a mustard-bush,

A hyacinth, or a stout maple tree

Where lions will lie down with tender lambs.