The Seattle post . . .
Lazarus
by David Keith Johnson
His heart jolts and he starts up bolt upright;
The atmosphere, pitch dark and stifling hot,
forces him stumbling to fresh air and light;
He gropes, then squeezes through a narrow slot
to sunshine that at first strikes him stone blind,
as roaring voices stun him with their cries;
He strives to focus his staggering mind
upon the shapes that swim before his eyes;
Between their jubilation and their terror,
the crowd around him shouts and mills and surges,
just as confused as he by warring urges;
They all sense they are caught up in some error,
until one calls: Come kiss your wife and daughter.
I will, he answers; First, I must have water.
The London riposte . . .
Elijah and the Widow’s Son
by Kenneth Durham Smith
As I sank deeper,
the darkness became darker
one shade at a time
as each wave
passed farther and farther overhead.
My eyes drained of their memories of light
which floated up and swam away.
My mother’s cries grew faint,
and my body slowly, slowly
rolled over to face the depths.
But a voice plunged through the dark,
called my name, held me,
turned me again to face the dim light.
And, oh, my eyes cried to think of it.
“No,” I said, “it’s too far, it’s too hard.”
I shook to free myself, like a fish
struggling against a net.
But again and again the voice called
and I could not break free.
Then the voice cried aloud
the name of God.
Darkness exploded and boiled
and I was thrown upwards by many hands.
I woke in my mother’s arms,
her tears washing in waves across her face.
For days, my eyes relearned the light.
Even his shadow frightened me.
It seemed the wing of a bird,
disembodied, yet dancing with an ecstasy
that went beyond rage, love, terror and pain.
And when I tried to look at him,
my eyes separated,
the left looked left,
the right looked right,
so that in front of me, where he stood,
there was only darkness, and my eyes
were divided by that darkness
so that neither saw what the other saw
and it was as if I lived in two worlds
and belonged in neither.
Poetry Post and Riposte 