Michael S. Harper’s Gihon…
Michael S. Harper, visiting poet in May, has written two poems about his time at VSC and the Gihon River in Johnson, VT.
Excerpt from: Craft’ Talk, Vermont Studio Center:
I have brought forth books
to break the seal
as solomon broke seal
with the covenant;
‘fornication’
is the great truth,
fidelity is the crime,
if you are to get to heaven
on earth;
craft is an inward journey;
all around you the names
of the saints
are chanted in idioms,
and you must record them,
not to memorize
but to fathom
as the Gihon River
points toward the source;
Excerpt from: Paradise (Gihon River, Johnson, Vermont):
the river is almost frozen;
I have asked for you;
the man who replaced you
edits the campus magazine
which is more than local;
there are painters and sculptors
passing through,
courtesy at the grand union
French on local radio,
the border a half hour away;
Gihon is not in the dictionary;
you can hunt in the Bible
or gloss Milton
to find the tributaries
and transcendence;