by Robert Lockridge

Bitter training
Breeds sweet result.
But maybe not what you seek.
Leave behind the faculties made
To cradle and secure your fantasies.
Watch them flow away
Like water through open fingers.
Watch your mind grasp at fluidity,
Scratch and claw at earth,
Reach to the sky
To contain the wind,
Grip and clutch
White-hot coals
In utter and futile hysteria.
Again
And again
And again.
Do this without relief
Until desperate utility
Rules your aimless passion,
And imploding into your heart
Breaks through the wall of self.
From this no effort survives.
No grasping is possible
No comfort remains.
And absent that blinded toil,
The making mind is shattered
Like a glass goblet
On the stone steps at Diamond Hill,
And the universe fills
With the light of a thousand eyes.
Clear direction comes.
Correct function presents itself.
Action is required.
Sweet result,
Bitter burden.
Maybe not
what I
Am seeking.