WARD KELLEY
Shine Eye Gal

There is a voice, a haunting by notes,
a voice to this ghost, stretching notes on and on,
to implore, to yearn, the breathing ones to come forth . . .
to be judged.

There is a dead woman singing in my ear,
her name is Puma, running, running,
eyes haunting sounds of night gliding
by the skin of jungle cats who hide the souls
of those who might be judged.

What does this ghost want to sing to us
who breathe the air of our own desires?
She does not sing words, for only haunting notes
are singular enough to bear a soul forth . . .
to bring one of us forward.

This, then, is what the ghost
will do . . . she will sing
of wrongs and cinder love, she will hum of injustice,
this ghost in my ear; she will yearn and she will think
oh why come forth, oh why, only then to die . . .
but we all must sing this particular song,
although few know what the ghost
did sing . . . how the only judges
of us all, at the end of all the breathing,
the only judge is our very own soul
who must judge the actions of its
own singular life. 

Yes, then, it's what the ghost
still knew, her own soul
judging her alone;
one sees it in her eyes.

WARD KELLEY
Thou Hast Nor Youth Nor Age

I cannot bend this chord,
I cannot frame the sunlight
into a more succinct sound;
and this is what I found,
that certain things of the earth
must be taken as they come
from this ground we all walk.

We all rose up, you know,
all things pure, all forthcoming,
all must rise from the ground,
and this is what I found, or
meant, that all of us of earth
will catapult through air, 
sizzling through the firmament.

And we can pound
and pound the songs
forthcoming, beat with fists
and bone and flesh,
pound and pound
the planet's simple song,
but never will we bend
the chord that is our fate,
those of us who, once flying,
must now learn to burrow
into the ground.
Pound and pound, then
run this song from town
to sound of water, water,
pound and pound and pound,
throughout the simple town,
round and round,
and this is what, at last,
is right there to be found . . .
that our very souls -
the very end,
the very beginning -
are round and round
and round.