E p i p h a n i e s

It seemed an ancient ritual-
the loom and shuttle
instruments of a knowledge
I watched while promising myself
that I would one day master
the art of making the way he did.
His was a fidelity to the mysteries
and surely his work was worship
and exemplary. It was one more
evidence of a knowledge I was gathering
as I went from teacher to teacher
so as to make a language
which would fully be my own.
Thereafter, in the mind, he came
to occupy a place and station
given to those who had provided me
with insights and shattering clarity-
such as those poets I drew life from
or that watch maker in Jerusalem
with the numbered tattoo on his wrist.