In-Between by Navajo poet Hershman John

In-Between

Out of the little breath of oblivion
That is night
Take just One star.

-Langston Hughes

1. Secrets

There is a waiting
Like the pages between a book,
Or a doorway,
Perhaps the moment when ice

Becomes water or Water becomes steam-

Only clouds know the secret

Floating above, space.

Above sunrise and sunset…
There is a perfect alignment, a border.
It could be noon of the one black bird Flying through…

It could be the calm of an ocean, lapping sea coral,
Or the edge of sub-zero, smooth icy tanzanite.

Again the moon-egg illuminates the purity of bluejays.
Crickets sing the endless changing of light and hope.

Only clouds know the secret
Floating above.

2. Waiting (a holy being speaks)

The soft breeze drifts the story of crickets-
See and hear the words: I stand in a world below.
A blue Secret above…
I wait to escape as other beings rise through
The space. Locust went first, the first to pierce the sky.
Locust face four birds of destruction, he was so little
But powerful as a star.
I wait to pass through the sky.

Grandmother below will help. Grandfather above waits.

Someone will give me a hand and pull me from in between.

Here below there is no snow, no earth,
Just dizziness and exclusion, as the dark water
Rises-angry as bees, angry as smoke,
Ready to drown, ready to erase.

3. Grapes

Creation is a mirror.
Turquoise Boy,
Moth Girl helped save
Cricket from the waters.

Just past a warm evening,
Before a pious night,
On a dandelion's back,
Deep in a forest by a great
Lake is the reflection.

Crickets sing as stars appear…
One by one, growing full and plump
As a grape. Sweet cool grapes-
Ripe enough to fill a basket.

Ripe enough to stain clouds,
And the sky with a path … Stars
Are everywhere in a blank universe.

Creation is a mirror-

Just take a look.

Note: Written after "Knight Rise 2001,"a permanent light/space installation, of the James Turrell: Infinite Light display, for the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art