The Grail Quest

Perceval almost        pierced the veil,
never uttered     a Christ-laced curse.
Purity of heart     is to will one thing,
wrote Kierkegaard    before the churchyards
turned charnel houses  in excruciated Europe.
Was it a Lapis Exilis,     mother meteorite,
or a lapis lazuli     dish set with wished-
for cuts of fresh meat     in a famine culture,
or a cup that caught      the red of revelation?
Chrétien de Troyes      recounted the trials,
but I trust no poet      pimping a tale.
I figure the Grails were    detours en route
to a single failure,      and all this suffering
night after night    in shining ardor,
in rosary-haunted   Brocéliande,
just served to stir     the gallant heart
of a Galahad     to attempt and test
truth by joust, pursuing    the relic, the elixir
on a pilgrim trail      to the impossible castle.

As a bony boy,      a squirt of a squire,
I imagined its magic       in verbal terms,
an infinite inkwell,      a song Sangraal,
heartsblood held    in the mouth’s round
brimmed, overbrimmed,   meniscal cupola.
Wondering whether    my words were worthy.
I sallied forth      in search of a form,
May the poem, grasped    and penned, be the Grail
sustaining hearts     healed for a spell,
fed in their hunger      not heavenly manna
but humbly kneaded     human bread.

This article appears in January 2024.