MERCY SAVETH

                                                                       in modern English:


Mercy is hendest                                            Mercy is most ready
Where sinne is mest.                                      Where sin is most.
Mercy is latere                                               Mercy is slower
There sinne is lest.                                         Where sin is least.
Mercy abideth                                                Mercy abides
And looketh al day                                        And looks all day
When man fro sinne                                      [For] when man from sin
Will turnen away.                                          Will turn away.
Mercy saveth                                                  Mercy saves
That lawe wolde spille.                                  What law would destroy.
Mercy asketh                                                  Mercy asks
But Godes wille.                                            But God's will.
   --Anonymous

This little poem has gone through my mind often ever since I first came across it abt thirty yrs ago.  I've written it down from memory, so it may not be correct in every jot and/or tittle.  And of course, my interpretation of "sinne" and "Godes wille" is not the most orthodox.

INDRA'S NET

Each the deep red jewel of the world
and its irredeemable flaw,
the nullity of their union
and the flickering back and forth.

The wind scrapes
a dry leaf across the walk.

Our one dog stretches
and m-lessly moos.

PLENTY OF NOTHING

that the sky's not torn
by the blackbird cutting across

that the embolus paces exactly
the absence in the blood

THOROUGHLY MADE

and stained just so,
your pale blue shirt.

The end is the Way,

the beginning is the Way.
And the eternal cold and silence is the Way.
The one moment
your lids blink on yellow eyes.
OUR BIG DOG BOSLEY

Nose to nose through the window,
a squirrel, a little dog.




By the tulip tree,
thickly iced with pink and white,
flat-trimmed, dark green hedge.