when the condition of the photograph mirrors the condition of the man...

song:

when rain, (sings light)rain has devoured my house
and wind wades through my trees,
the cedars fawn upon the storm with their huge paws.
silence is louder than a cyclone
in the rude door, my shelter.
and there i eat my air alone
with pure and solitary songs

while others sit in conference.
their windows grieve, and soon frown
and glass begins to wrinkle with a multitude of water
till i no longer see their speech
and they no longer know my theater.

rivers clothe their houses
and hide their naked wisdom.
their conversations
go down into the deep like submarines:
submerge them, with their pale expressions, in my storm.

but i drink rain, drink wind
distinguish poems
boiling up out of the cold forest:
lift to the wind my eyes full of water,
my face and mind, to take their free refreshment.

thus i live on my own land, on my own island
and speak to god, my god, under the doorway
when rain, (sings light) rain has devoured my house
and winds wade through my trees.

image: RPPC, circa 1920, of bill hodge
poem by thomas merton, from the tears of the blind lions, 1949.