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Thank you most kindly. I am: Thank you most kindly. I am most humbled by your most welcome response to this poem.

Once again, we have one of: Once again, we have one of those key events at PostPoems:  the posting of a new poem by Patricia.  And, I am embarrassed to say, once again my keyboarding skills are not as I would wish them to be, but I will try to be careful about typos in this comment. I normally like to locate the poem's center of gravity first, having learned to do this from reading the great scholar Helen Vendler's various analyses of Wallace Stevens' poems; and it is always very useful, to any comment, to do that first.  However, from time to time, Patricia gives us not only a poem's center of gravity, but also one of her entire collection's centers; and she has done that here.  I  like to poiint these out so that, in decades to come, some enterprising grad student can create a grid of all those mega-centers---which will then become an aid to appreciating her entire collection.  Her words, "strings / of spirit in the solid world / that holds me."  This phrase is key---both to the poem that is before us now, and to her expanding collection.  I am already particularly enamored of it because it so succinctly describes and designates the kind of cosmos that inhabits Patricia's poems.  I am going to reiterate that phrase in bold print because I deem it so important, both to the poem and to the collection that contains the poem:  "strings / of spirit in the solid world / that holds me."  Patricia's poems are so artistically consistent that each of them presents a center of gravity---a line, or a couple of lines, or a stanza which, when the reader locates it, becomes a disclosure of the poem's spiritual genetics (if I may mis a metaphor).  Those key phrases, embedded here and there in the texts (I think of the metaphor of Easter Eggs), provide insight into the poems interior mechanism.   Having located our key phrase, we can then move on to find out what is the poem's ultimate purpose as a poem:  to what destination is it moving, and what are the circumstances of its arrival?  This poem locates that information in the stanza that beings with "Mercy: / Just a taste . . ."  And Mercy, which is one of God's foremost qualities, allows us to proceed to some very wondrous vantage points:  the entrance to the Universe itself, the vast space that exists in and beyond the gaze of Polaris, and the blizzard of galaxies.  (I do believe Patricia ought to write captions for the photographs transmitted from the James Webb telescope.)  And then she gives us a process and a purpose that has inspired, even haunted, the ancient rituals  of the mystery religions, and the more modern rituals of fraternal societies of our time:  to become the cntained and the unbound glint of the Unknowable.  To achieve that; to arrive at that; to participate in that---this is what the poem, not just inidividually but in concert with all her other poems, strives to convey.  And because it is one of Patricia's poems, you are assured---even guaranteed---that its conveyance, its presentation of its contents, will be inimitably and splendidly successful. I will close with this thought.  I am not an admirer of Homer; and I happen to believe the theory (and I forget, at the moment, who first proprosed it) that Nausicaa (herself a character in the Odyssey) and not Homer actually wrote the epic, which is why her encounters with him, which do next to nothing to advance his story, are so prominent.  Just hours ago, I was reading an essay that talked about how the author of the Odyssey (Homer?  Nausicaa? or another poet like the later Trochaic Septinarius, of whom the scholar, Taphless Gibler has so eloquently written) composes a scene with all its contents in the foreground.  Nothing is relegated to the background, nothing is left for the reader to search for in the background, or even outside the poem's narrative:  eveything necessary to the presentation of each of the epic's episodes is provided up front and with immediacy.  And I now realize that this poem of Patricia's, and her entire poetic accomplishment, functions in this same way:  everything the reader needs to understand or, even better, to comprehend the cosmos she describes is provided     They tell me that the James Webb telescope is transmitting images from millions of light years of distance.  And everything that swatch of outer space has to show us is presented right there in the collected image.  Nothing is hidden or left to the viewer's fond hopes to be able to take it all in.  And this is how those images resemble Patricia's poem, and Poems, and Nausicaa's epic---everything necessary is foregrounded; everything necessary is provided .  This is how the cosmic aspect of Patricia's poem operates; this is her consistent approach to the construction of her poems; and this is why her poems have such a bright, iridescent future ahead of them.   It has been a privilege to write this response to the poem, and to try, in however a minor way, to offer a useful perspective on the literary art of Patriciajj.  But to her readers (and I am fortunate enough to be among that chosen company), the greatest privilege of all is in the reading of the poems, and in their presentation of her cosmic vision.

Everything you wrote in this: Everything you wrote in this shimmering tapestry of starlight and appreciation for literary granduer is stunning in its accuracy. Cascade has been mesmerizing me for many years now, and I'm always on the lookout her latest posts.     I love the clever endorsement you gave her "Paled By A Thousand Sunday Suns" and your recognition of artistic traits that set her work apart from the rest: "The resonance of sparkling honesty" and words that "flow across the page in a cascade/ of verbal beauty", the latter a whimsical nod to her screen name.   A Shakespearean sonnet was, absolutely, the most fitting choice.   The perfect tribute to our irreplaceable Cascade of talent.    

Despite bananas and: Despite bananas and croissants available to do the little they can do, the poem leaves me with other, unspoken fears . . . as it is meant to.  The poem is coy in the way the best literate ghost stories are, and yet you have accomplished this in far less space, far fewer words, than the customary ghost story provides.  This succinctness is part of your power as a Poet; part of your pillar-ness as a pillar of PostPoems.  I am old enough, and have paid my dues enough, that I can now read what I like, and avoid what I dislike---without owing anyone an explanation.  But one of the reasons I like to comment on your poems is to offer that explanation, because your work so splendidly earns its comments.

Thank you for such a kind and: Thank you for such a kind and uplifting welcome! I have read some of your stellar creations (You're amazing!) and I'm deeply moved and honored by your support. I'll definitely return to your page.   

I'm now glad I took the time: I'm now glad I took the time to find out what had happened to her. I felt like crying when I read your expression. I hope somehow she knows just how loved and missed she is.  

To have made its mark,: To have made its mark, however subjective that process may be, is probably the pinnacle of poetry (universally) and the heart's goal of each poem (individually).   To have thus arrived, as per your most welcome and illuminating response, brings the poetic process full circle and an entire Humanity's breath thus cycled, oxygenating the alveoli of history yet being written as it is lived in the present, thus creating a beacon of hope in the souls of its participants.   Philosophy, as a course of study in all levels of formal education, had personally been a curious experience for me bringing along certian lingering thoughts.   Your most appreciated interaction and well thought out reply has made this apparent and most useful in the pointing out of that organising 'mechanism' within each student, no matter what age.   It is always a pleasure to hear from you and please note that it is not intentional to impose upon you in your current condition. This only makes your interaction even more valuable. And for that I am truly and most wholeheartedly grateful.