Beyond All Bearing

      Copyright © 2018 Susan Delaney Spear. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Write: Permissions, Wipf and Stock Publishers, 199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3, Eugene, OR 97401.

      Resource Publications

      An Imprint of Wipf and Stock Publishers

      199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3

      Eugene, OR 97401

      www.wipfandstock.com

      paperback isbn: 978-1-5326-3740-7

      hardcover isbn: 978-1-5326-3741-4

      ebook isbn: 978-1-5326-3742-1

      Manufactured in the U.S.A.

      For Bruce,

      Emily, Vanessa,

      & Peter—

      Always

      Illustrations

      “Concentric Moon” by Patricia Russell

      The eponymous poem “Beyond All Bearing” was written in response to the pencil sketch “Concentric Moon” by Patricia Russell

      Acknowledgements

      The author acknowledges with gratitude the following publications which first published many of these poems, some in earlier iterations.

      823 on High: “Wild Traveler,” “Easter Lament,” and “Aftermath of a Miracle”

      Academic Questions: “String Theory,” “Royal Revenge,” and “A Word”

      Angle: “Turning,” and “Season Tickets”

      Anglican Theological Review: “Invocation in Ordinary Time”

      The Christian Century: “Wind and Flame”

      Commonweal: “Emmaus”

      Dappled Things: “After the Interment,” “Through the Window,” and “. . . Yet Not Consumed. . . ”

      Don’t Just Sit There: “Faces of the Enemy,” “Twilight,” “Old Ralph,” and “Ode to Twins”

      eVerse Radio: “Meteor,” “Honeysuckle,” “Actuary Tables,” “Tender”

      The Lyric: “Summer’s End,” and “The Lovers’ Knot”

      FUNGI Magazine: “Pricey Recipe”

      Measure: “Behind the Wheel”

      Mezzo Cammin: “Lilac Gowns,” “Priorities,” “A Matter of Participles,” and “Rattled”

      The Nervous Breakdown: “Crescent Glow”

      Peacock Journal: “Angles,” “Occupied,” “Vespers,” and “Blue Irises”

      The Raintown Review: “Fool,” and “Salt Water”

      Relief: “Rainlight”

      The Rocky Mountain Anthology: “Epistle”

      The Rotary Dial: “Forty Julys”

      Verse Wisconsin: “Defying Nature”

      Women’s Voices for Change: “Turning” (reprint from Angle) and “Paper Whites/December”

      “The Lovers’ Knot” won Honorable Mention in the Denver Women’s Press Club Unknown Writers’ Contest in the spring of 2010.

      “Like the Wedding Supper of the Lamb” was a finalist in the 2016 String Poet contest.

      PROLOGUE

      An Invocation in Ordinary Time

      Sing, Muse,

      in common time

      on the upbeat

      of the sun

      Cry, morning’s

      mourning dove

      Chant, mossy

      onyx rocks

      Seek, osprey,

      swoop and prey

      Fling, red-

      winged blackbird,

      melodies

      between the green

      Squeak, smooth

      pinewood floors

      Crumble, loaf

      of humble grain

      Buoy my heart,

      watered wine

      Crash, waves,

      erase my traces

      Croak, frogs

      an evensong

      Sink, ancient

      orange one

      into the blue,

      blackening sea

      Come, Holy

      Ghost, hum

      in common places

      Prove to me

      your extraord-

      inary graces.

      Chores

      I ran down Belmar Street to cross the highway

      all by myself. This was a big girl mission.

      I held the note you wrote up for the clerk.

      Coins clattered. She read, she clicked her tongue,

      dilly-dallied for a minute—stalled,

      then handed me the shiny pack of Winstons.

      My heart beat hard, my errand halfway done.

      With pride I clutched the cellophane-wrapped prize

      and backed out through the squeaky, wooden door.

      Pebbles flew like sparks behind my Keds.

      A Corvair screeched. Its bumper grazed my leg

      and stopped. I eyed the driver through the glass.

      She shook her head and laid it on the wheel.

      Oh, no! Mommy’s cigarettes!

      My heartbeat halted; my lungs forgot to breathe.

      Palms together, Winstons in between,

      I mouthed the words “I’m sorry, sorry, please. . . .”

      I shuddered, then I ran. I never told you.

      I did my lethal best to win your love.

      Wild Traveler

      I rip the yellowed newsprint

      from your German china bowl

      and find mere shards, the fragments

      of a once unbroken whole.

      I trace a fractured rose

      imposed on white and lavender

      and see the pattern you chose

      is stamped “Wild Traveler.”

      Intently searching for

      a more revealing clue,

      I