Waiting On A Friend

Learn to breathe, again

so you can hear your self

in the back of your throat

slowly

Sleep and lay, still

when you wake

for an hour or so killing

time

Like all those ways you

have forgotten your smile

bringing heaven right here and

forcing

Right now like you live

there in the wind of the world.

Criers at breakfast

they tell you to flay

while you are meditating, and to greet

the child

As if he’s a friend

younger you doesn’t know

the shape you’re in

and he laughs his denial

Meeting older self, making demands

of accomplishment

of

you better have done

silently dreaming

See the child, he will sit, given time

love a friend who has nothing to offer

nothing to report back but

that he is wise

See the child, he cries

too at breakfast right there in the wind of the world.

by Timothy Donahue