James Murdock

Think, Dear Daughter (for Tallulah)

If I have any advice, it is to think,

think, think, dear daughter

of actions, as cannonballs, laying waste

of words, as timbers, crashing down--

splintering skulls so silent as snowfall

Think of the world as a canvas, not square

but everywhere free, your intentions, the paint

Think, think of cars as strange machines,

that houses could be better, such dull old things

Think of plants as people, still good, and

people as sad plants someone stopped watering

Think forever on that interior space

given to us upon our fall from grace,

for those of us who cannot simply go about

never considering our footsteps

as ineludibly vehement and ever-precarious

This world does not treat its thinkers well

People sing forever only songs of our death

Think, my dear, forever of their insanity, and

sing the song of eternity in your low-lying breath

Think of bluebirds as angels, watching--

who have transcended all this ground-dwelling,

living above, wishing for better ways below

but you, good girl, can do more than dream,

as if dreaming were merely a thinking thing

You may think, and therefore grow

an idea which few will know--

that to be simple is to be free, that

nature is given anarchy, and that thought

though burdensome, can be filled with love,

that life -like a spring- is rising up 

Former Albany resident James Murdock is a poet and essayist originally from Athens, Georgia.  He is an environmental science teacher by trade, and his will for expression stems from an ardent love for the wisdom of American Transcendentalism.  He has been published in Penumbra Magazine (Spain), the Blue Mountain Review, and Deep South Magazine.  He currently lives on a farm in Jasper County, Georgia with his wife, Jenna, and their daughter, Tallulah.