When We Found Our Home

When We Found Our Home

We found the country of disdain.

At the last, after treading upon

Soil unfit for sunken boots,

This green place, our verdant dream,

Unfolded on a misty morn,

When we climbed a hill on a whim;

No man could find it searching.

There is a snake in every paradise;

We found one here: coiled

Vermilion in the unfetched rain,

Fangs flecked with diamonds.

It spoke winged words, led

Deeper, past birds of paradise

Charmed by their own sultry songs,

Past the myriad pools of unbound

Faces pristine in tangled joy,

Past ourselves, far past ourselves.

He poured wisdom in our ear

Honey golden dripping softly.

The ways of grace he knew well,

How to tie and untie the tongue;

He taught us first to laugh,

How to turn laughter up and in,

With ruddy contortions whorling,

How to raise the mind aloft

On furtive wings to refined air.