Stars

Stars

Philip C. Kolin

God’s diaphanous alphabet to read
bright mysteries hidden behind the clouds.

And when reflected in water mirrors,
they invite encounters with eternity.

Under a wedding canopy of stars,
Adam vespered Yahweh for a twin soul

to share and to console when star-
light left after the feast of forbidden apples.

But God faithfully seeded Abraham’s
generations across the firmament of stars.

And in the fullness of time, the Magi
followed the golden incensed star.

As Christus Oriens rose in the east,
a daystar crowned a dogwood cross.

In the Virgin’s twelve star halo, Revelation’s victory
over those fallen wings, outcasts

from love and worship, dead light nesting
for a third of heaven’s hosts.

In the whirr of night, now, the moon swells
as stars bloom into dahlias and zephyr lilies.

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Philip C. Kolin
Poet & Professor

Philip is the Distinguished Professor of English Emeritus and Editor Emeritus of the Southern Quarterly at the University of Southern Mississippi. He has published 14 collections of poetry, including Reaching Forever in the Poiema Series of Cascade Books, Delta Tears with Main Street Rag, and Mapping Trauma with Third World Press. His poems have appeared in Christian Century, Christianity and Literature, Sojourners, America Magazine, Anglican Theological Review, and Spiritus.

Photography by Kazuend