Holy Secrets

Below are two poems.  They are written by a father and son.  The first poem is by Kim Stafford, the son.  The second is by William Stafford, the father.

The Secret

After long delay, ignorant of what you guarded

when it came volcanic to your mind, there to be

hoarded smoldering until you found a way to tell it,

your secret is out—your joy too tender to entrust

to anyone, your pain too dangerous to reveal

until you do. And there it is, a birth, with blood,

to celebrate.

But then the bowl in the heart,

where such things first appear, has something

new to hide, some fingerling creature silver

in the dark, with jagged fins and tender wings

that must be held, locked up, suppressed, fed

crumbs as you fend off the world. Little one,

must you leave me now?

Thus we breathe our holy secrets one by one.

 

A Story That Could Be True

If you were exchanged in the cradle and
your real mother died
without ever telling the story
then no one knows your name,
and somewhere in the world
your father is lost and needs you
but you are far away.

He can never find
how true you are, how ready.
When the great wind comes
and the robberies of the rain
you stand on the corner shivering.
The people who go by--
you wonder at their calm.

They miss the whisper that runs
any day in your mind,
"Who are you really, wanderer?"--
and the answer you have to give
no matter how dark and cold
the world around you is:
"Maybe I'm a king."