Category: Musings

Under the Clouds the Children Play

Breathless giggles

and

toothless smiles,

bright-eyed innocence

and

unconditional love.

See the children

play in the sun,

the shadows

of their faces

filled with

light.

Their small throats full of

improvised songs and memorized prayers,

both offered freely to

the pale blue sky.

For hours,

For years,

For decades.

Life settles on them,

lifts them up,

as the melodious bells of innocence

turn to a

discordant death-knell,

and  flowers wilt

away the will to live.

And the questions

in their eyes

take root,

and grow

unanswered.

And now clouds gather,

dark and threatening,

full of dread powers

and

poisoned winds.

A shadow of a

human being watches

from the edges,

its stench lost

in the wayward

wind.

It approaches

One,

alone

in its sandbox,

putting its life into

an hourglass

to be flipped over,

and over, and over…

Wind-driven rain

drowns the cry for help,

and now a toothless smile

slowly slips on the mantle

of the lonely

One,

now sitting in its window,

clear as rivers,

who dreams

it was one

of the children

playing

under the clouds.

 

The Days Were Few and Happy

The struggle to breathe

grows harder and laborious,

and soon, not worth the effort.

 

The heartbeat softens to a

padded thudding

of arrhythmic improvisation

 

The light, both sun and lamp alike,

grows dim

 

And the features

of your faces

so familiar

are now only

sketches in sepia

drawn by rheum,

inked in cataract,

and blindness creeps with

a serpent’s crafty slowness

to seize small sight

in its unrelenting

coils of darkness

 

But the memories

of grand carnivals,

of dire hurricanes,

laughter, tears

prizes, penalties

trials, victories

unity, dysfunction

safety , strife

 

holiday dinners

and birthday songs

 

pride and humility

for good or ill

all said and done

except the last

goodbye

and  giving the last remnants

of my love

 

The days were few and happy,

and the honor of growing

beside you

made it all

worthwhile.

 

 

Blue Lights on the Runway

I’m leaving now.

The night is cloudy,

the moon obscure,

and the plane

sits

waiting patiently

under its

patina of rain.

 

There are

blue lights

running

down the runway,

matching my mood

at leaving you

safe and warm

at home,

without

me.

 

They comfort,

and mock,

but they will

see me

safely

back in your arms

when we meet

again,

 

And I’ll

be blue

no longer.

I Dream a Summer Love

I dream a

Summer love

of passion,

heat and light.

 

I dream a

Summer love

of rain-kissed kisses,

your lips

unfolding like

flower petals,

yielding,

fragrant,

and soft.

 

I dream a

Summer love

of water and sand,

of ebb and flow,

and give and take,

and swollen tsunamis

of helpless,

trembling release

 

I dream a

Summer love

of consuming sun

and comforting moon.

 

I dream a

Summer love

of gentle breezes,

caressing

gentle, caressing

hands

 

I dream a

Summer love

as loud as the

call and response

of thunder and lightning

 

I dream a

Summer love

as whirling

as the undulating dance

of sea and sky

 

I dream a

Summer love

of starry eyes

that look into

the confines

of

my soul

and see the

infinite.

The Ancient Moon

Ah, look you, men of iron will.

See, fools of tender heart.

Behold, those of noble birth.

Attend, lowest of the low.

 

In all majestic splendor,

the gentler orb turns

soft and saddened eye

to sodden field.

 

There is no one to greet her,

to write a sonnet to her beauty,

no one left now even to ignore it,

or wish in hope upon it.

 

Yet on your ancient quarrels,

as she always has, she rises,

and gazes on your stillness,

wonders at your silence,

and cries the falling stars

to soak, and cloak the folly

of your war-filled hearts.

The ancient moon,

in tranquil glory,

in timeless diary,

writes once more…

They do not love.

In the Black

And these, my hopes,

now come to stillness,

spent in small and looping

hopeless, frothing eddies,

broken on stones

upon this lifeless shore.

 

The angels weep on me.

Their sobs are thunder.

They snap their saddened sodden wings

to the rhythm of

my racing, raging heart

and sear the sky

with lightning.

 

And out there, my dreams…

There! Floating on the rising tide,

are sailing far and fast,

eluding me forever

with full-wind sails,

but a

cracking mast….

They do not know.

Let them drown adrift,

as my sorrow

in my cups.

 

For now, though despairing in black,

beneath black clouds,

by black water, in black mood,

I yet await

the shining sun,

and

the turning tide.

 

 

 

As I Sat Looking at the Sea

As I sat looking at the sea,

The sea was looking back at me.

“Tell me, O man,” it seemed to say,

“Where would you like to go today?”

 

“I’d like to be inside a shell,

a full sail rising in a swell,

a shark fin slicing through a wave,

a sea-snake lurking in a cave!”

 

The sea then laughed

“That’s quite a list!”

and clothed me

with a kissing mist,

 

And plucked me from

the sitting rock,

and took me

from the safety dock,

 

And gave me

all I did desire

of fish, and fowl

and ocean fire

 

And showed me wonders

floating by

not seen before with

Human eye.

 

“Reach out,” it said,

“and touch and feel

the shimmering coral,

the shocking eel,

 

the slick grey dolphin

playing there,

the breaching whale

that tastes the air,

 

“And in the darkness

of my floor

are creatures

best not counted for…”

And as the sun set,

then the sea

released its hold,

and set me free.

 

And sprayed my cheek,

and went its way.

So I remember

to this day

 

When I sat looking

at the Sea,

and in its depths,

discovered

Me.

 

 

 

Moonlight Mistress

Draw me deeper,

Moonlight Mistress

into your land

of soft shadows,

the blush of your

cheek tinged

in deep blue inks

 

Draw me deeper,

Moonlight Mistress,

into the lemon-pale

playpen of your

midnight lair.

 

 

Draw me deeper,

Moonlight Mistress,

into silver-flecked eyes

that hold

mystery

and key

 

Draw me deeper,

Moonlight Mistress,

behind fragile,

obsidian feathers

hiding tender lips

that kiss

and whisper

and sing

of love

 

Draw me deeper,

Moonlight Mistress,

into the

Essence of you,

real and intangible,

far-off, yet visible,

distant, but reachable.

Incomprehensible.

 

Draw me deeper,

Moonlight Mistress,

and disperse me;

I would be the lunar light

suffused upon your

starlit skin

 

Shining on you

from the outside,

glowing with you

from the inside,

until the

cold, unfeeling dawn

baptizes us with dew,

and the

absolving morning sun

dissolves us

together

 

Drawing us

closer,

and

deeper still.

Do the Bones of Men Remember?

Do the

bones of men

remember days

of brave and

daring deeds?

Do they long for

love and battle

when they rode their

noble steeds?

Do they mourn

the silent rhythm

of a strong and

beating heart?

Do they miss the

lilt of melody

and master works

of art?

Do they once recall

the clamor and the clanging

of their toil?

And the scent of

perfumed women

and the seasons

and the soil?

Do the

bones of men

remember night

and moon and sea

and star?

Do they contemplate

the faulted flesh that made them

what they are?

Do the bones remember

holding onto children, home

and wife?

Do the bones remember

anything at all of

loving life?

When we return to dust

I pray our bones will only sleep,

instead of dreaming

of the things of life

we couldn’t keep.

 

Dark Artemis

What verdant limb

tore

the remnant

of

my soul

that you hunt me?

What spore of heart

did I scatter,

that you

search me out?

My desire for freedom

is as deep,

if not deeper,

than your desire

to kill it.

Yet

as I flee your arrows,

my Dark Artemis,

I wonder if I’m really

searching for

a trap,

that you may

claim me

 

Or a corner,

where I must fight

to keep my heart,

or die a trophy

in your embrace,

 

And wonder

which I’ll choose…