Angelic Aura

Leaving his house one day, near the end, I looked his way just before I reached the door. He raised his hand in a typical farewell gesture. When he did, I glimpsed something that I had seen before but was too young to recognize. It was an aura. I can think of no other way to describe it. I had seen this same aspect on my grandfather when I was about ten-years old. Years later, I wrote a poem about it in which I described what had pierced my soul as a child. I put it into a poem, because I don't believe there is any other way to properly describe what I experienced. It is something beyond the power of mere words. The words of an essay cannot tell it. Only poetry can approach the sublime. On the same day that I left Jack's house, after I had seen the "glow" again, I went home and wrote an elegy for him. It cannot be fully appreciated, however, if you have not read the previous poem titled simply Grandfather. What I said in that poem applies as well to Jack.

too late i honor you
surrounded by smoke of sweetness
radiating something
some mysterious aura
beyond my ken
you appeared 'twixt two worlds
the gross physical mundane
watery dirty airy one
and the other ineffable glowing realm
the one that shone on you
tugging at you in my very presence
i saw it but knew it not
its glimmering shiny stuff was all over you
and i couldn't sense it
so newly clad in the earthy clothes i wore
my skin and eyes still fairly new
not nearly developed enough to sense the
stuff you were covered in
the stuff of another world
i did not know then nor could not
that you were being made anew
before my eyes
your earthy garb was ragged and worn
but inwardly
in a place i could not see
it was being replaced by shiny stuff
atom by atom cell by cell
until the day came
when the star glow completely took you
now but a shell remains of the form i knew
itself dissipated to dust
and you somewhere somewhen allwhen
are shining brilliantly joyously steadily
a beacon for my soul
whose own earthy clothing fades and fades
with each new day
and the nearer i approach that long night ahead
the more clearly i see your star

The elegy makes reference to the dynamic of this poem.


JUST OUTSIDE THE DOOR
An Elegy for Jack Dempsey Prescott


Startled by an angel reposing on a chair,
clad in human frailty, managing its care,
I recalled how I had seen it many years before,
upon my father’s father, as he stood outside the door.

Yet again the spirit moved, though not a sound was heard.
It shared its holy secret, but never spoke a word.

“All is made of light that flesh cannot contain;
it burns through earthly frailty to grace the night again.

Once the flesh has faded, consumed by endless light,
I revel over starry roads glowing through the night.
So go your way, but mark the skies,
oblivious to tearing eyes.

Soon you’ll note a distant star you’ve never seen before;

then rest in faith I stand again just outside the door.”