NaPoWriMo #14: knowledge

This is what happens when I blog and write poetry really late at night: I have no idea where my poems are coming from or going to; they just sort of happen. Since I'm playing catch-up again, I decided to flow with this and see where it went, and I like what happened, even though it's extremely rough.

Hold to the Rod

From the tree of knowledge I’ve eaten fruit
so warm and sweet it glowed all the way to my belly
beams of light escaping from my eyes and mouth
but it wouldn’t have been enough to gorge myself
because knowing isn’t wisdom isn’t living isn’t being
so I walked on down a plain road

where a new moon cast no beam
where cunning fog curled itself around my heels

wrapped me in a cool caress

pulling me backward into the gloom
I caught a star to light my way

but it burned a cold hole in my hand
fell and sputtered out in dewy grass whose blades

sliced cold and wet between my toes

as I faltered on the unseen path
and then I remembered the rail I had let go

and grasping out into the black felt

again the reassuring iron under my hand.

Stars rise and fall, moons wax and wane
but my feet know where to go

even without their feeble gleam
when I hold to the rod.