Vision at Sunset in the Oakland/Berkeley Hills

 

Like smoking thruribles pendulated 

By the ancient hands of patient priests,

Eucalyptus trees sway in the shifting fog, 

Wafting their incense of limbs and leaves 

Inside the church of hills.

Within the herd of flaming beams at sunset 

Goats feed on canticles of underbrush

Bleating, "Halleujah! Selah! Amen!",

The charisma of fiery winter clouds 

Enringing them in aureoles.

 

Moved by the scriptures of high winds,

The eucalyptus are etched by the hand of God upon the copper sky

And the Divine signatures of the boulevards and high-rises below,

A Passion stretched out on the crucifix

Of intersecting streets, their heavenly destination guaranteed,

Expand in the misty, theurgic distance

Of Divine Drama, salvaged.

Like probationers,

The hills and trees stand penitentially

In rigorous prayer and fasting, performing devotions,

Committed to the deliverance

Of their souls. 

 

All is Revealed.

 

The heavenly planes above

Are mere shadows of 

This world.