EPONYMOUS PAUL

by Paul Pines

EPONYMOUS PAUL
     Easter morning

the notion of waking
to the sound of a trumpet
or its corollary
the Roshi’s well–timed slap
what I find hermano
is that I’m constantly being
interrogated
by a wakefulness
that intrudes on my fantasies
of triumph and vindication
reminds me of the power
in those drives
and finally
of their triviality
which I accept with grief
at times relief
at others
as a deepening
of cross purposes
stripped bare

I look for models
find foremost among them
strangely

             Paul
             late of Tarsus

at the “bloody cross road”
of ecstasy
and propaganda
not strange
that he should long
             to see as
             he is seen
but that he fails to see
this already exists
as an interior
condition

             that takes
             our measure

whether
we see it
or not