{"id":189,"date":"2009-05-29T09:15:52","date_gmt":"2009-05-29T14:15:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.stephenpickering.com\/?p=189"},"modified":"2014-02-21T19:05:33","modified_gmt":"2014-02-22T00:05:33","slug":"a-new-poem-the-cross","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stephenpickering.com\/wordpress\/2009\/05\/29\/a-new-poem-the-cross\/","title":{"rendered":"A New Poem: The Cross"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The river flows uphill.<br \/>\nIt isn&#8217;t magic.<br \/>\nMagic is when it flows downhill.<\/p>\n<p>The arrow of time is pierced<br \/>\nby eternity<\/p>\n<p>The man hanging is<br \/>\nthe soul<br \/>\nawakened.<\/p>\n<p>The milk girl is dancing<br \/>\nThe &#8220;Cotten-Eyed Joe&#8221;<br \/>\non the gym floor of the mind<br \/>\nunderneath which the oceans of the Cosmos<br \/>\nSplash applause and awake our Suns.<br \/>\nOn the head of a pin, spinning,<br \/>\nshe offers distance<br \/>\nheaven&#8217;s wooden bowl.<\/p>\n<p>Living <em>is<\/em> easy.<\/p>\n<p>And the Lady of our feet<br \/>\nwashes the expression<br \/>\nof how things shalt be<br \/>\nfrom the Skull&#8217;s dead head<br \/>\nwith the Water of Life.<\/p>\n<p>Below the willowed valley&#8217;s flowery eyes<br \/>\nsee without looking<br \/>\nreach without moving<br \/>\nteach without speaking,<br \/>\nand love without thinking.<\/p>\n<p>Every time one of its olive branches whispers<br \/>\nthe secret of secrets into the Mediterranean breeze,<br \/>\na new life is born of virgin birth,<br \/>\ntranscendently, through the middle of the true cross,<br \/>\nthe heart.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a92009 Stephen Pickering<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The river flows uphill. It isn&#8217;t magic. Magic is when it flows downhill. The arrow of time is pierced by eternity The man hanging is the soul awakened. The milk girl is dancing The &#8220;Cotten-Eyed Joe&#8221; on the gym floor &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/stephenpickering.com\/wordpress\/2009\/05\/29\/a-new-poem-the-cross\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[35,33],"tags":[418,432,429],"class_list":["post-189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-my-poetry","category-poems","tag-free-verse","tag-my-poetry","tag-poems"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stephenpickering.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stephenpickering.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stephenpickering.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stephenpickering.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stephenpickering.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=189"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stephenpickering.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stephenpickering.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stephenpickering.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stephenpickering.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}