Richard Jones
True Country
The deliciousness of pain
always surprises me.
Lying in the unmown grass in the backyard
and looking up through a lacework of branches
at swiftly sailing, low-lying, purple-black clouds
that blot out the sunlight,
I find I am looking forward to the coming rain.
A weather depression brings storms
and high winds. The dark will come early
and white candles will light the house
when the power goes out. Inside,
I’ll sip red wine,
and when the electricity comes back
to make myself whole
I’ll drop the needle
on some scratched, well-played blues records,
songs that pine about really loving someone
who leaves you one day for no good reason.
Sadness is being broken like that—
and it’s a long, slow torture that lasts a lifetime,
the falling out of love. Such agony is exquisitely empty
but you can sing about it in words with a guitar,
how loneliness is the palace of night
and pain the true country.
The Fortune-Teller
“I see a farm bathed in moonlight,
an orchard’s shadows, a freshwater pond
shining in the dark like black glass,
a painted rowboat on the bank’s grass.
I see all the ways you will be blessed—
days wandering the mountain path,
two loyal dogs always by your side,
Labradors named Mercy and Grace.
I see no big mistakes, no small missteps,
no shattered mind, no broken soul,
only dew sparkling on the blue flowers
and guardian angels in the tall pine trees.
I see a house, open windows, white curtains.
I see you thank the night for its compassion.”
The Study
Summer nights when I can’t sleep,
I go downstairs to sit by the open window in the study.
I turn on the lamp, take a book from the shelf,
sit in my comfy chair, and soon find myself
listening to the crickets singing outside,
that choir in the trees,
the humming that enchants and delights.
Nothing competes with a chorus of katydids—
open books can only rest quiet in my lap,
as if they, too,
enjoyed the entrancing sound of peace.
To better hear, I turn out my lamp
and sit for a long while by the window in the dark—
books closed, eyes closed, all of us listening.
(These poems are from the book The Minor Key from Green Linden Press.)
Also by Richard Jones: "On Living," "I didn’t expect my father," "Impermanence," "Painting at Night," "Here on Planet Earth," "Selva Oscura," "The Nomenclature of Color," "The Way," "The Silver Cord," "Devotion," "Walking Meditation," "Folly"
In the store: Avalon, Avalon (limited edition), "Devotion" (broadside), The Minor Key
Review: reflections on Richard Jones’ Stranger on Earth
photo: Sarah Jones