I do not come from this place -
though the sea-chanty of its' name
speaks my distant heart.
I have come to look
and wonder
at fourteen gravestones
in a church yard
where some serendipity
of interrupted migration
from northern ports
placed my surname
upon these Virginian stones.
Dates on headstones stretch
from the Revolution
to my twenty-fifth birthday,
both long past.
Are some of their sons
buried unknown
at Antietam,
dead
at the hands of their northern-born kinsmen?
The dogwood
must be prolific
upon that field.
It is May, and the scent
of dogwood in bloom;
semi-sweet,
somewhere between sandlewood and jasmine,
kindles memory.
From out the church door –
that incongruous building with
Saxon tower on solid Lutheran architecture -
floats the arpeggio
of a well-played mountain dulcimer.
The Shaker tune?
Perhaps a variation
of Copeland’s Appalachian Spring;
or Carter’s Lord of the Dance?
All one and the same air
as I recall.
It is leaping music,
fit for praise and resurrection,
in this graveyard
of my distant southern branch,
burried under dogwood
in the Shenandoah.
Author notes
Rewritten July 16, 09
Antietam: US Civil War battle in Maryland.
Surprises from a geneology search on the Internet.
See also, Airs and Simple Gifts, from President Obama’s inauguration.
Comments
-
Somber and lovely.
When did you make this trip? It reminds me of Intimations of Immortality of course. I find it very moving, conveying a sense of longing and connection I recognise very deep in my heart.
I too am a wanderer...
I think you should take this line
somewhere between sandlewood and jasmine
and make it a positive statement - cut the next line; likewise the "only" in "stopped to look." and the "really"
All one and the same, really.
This is a powerful piece and I question this self-censoring of your perceptions. I think this is standing-back-from owning the material, and shows a lack of confidence in yourself as an artist.
I don't need to ask why this might be - I know you well enough I think! - but i do think it unnecessary. Courage, my friend. You don't need to be afraid of this.
I love the last stanza. It has scale and rings with dignity.
Best RA
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