Mole Run

Mole Run

Time has made me a mole.

A thrower of dirt, a rebreather

defined by my runs;

blinking in the occasional dazzle 

of that other world

then head back down in the blanketing dark,

swimming through earth with my

double thumbs, sniffing and

pushing with my starburst nose,

living on whatever I find

that thinks itself safe underground.

This poem is a tunnel,

a simple device through which

the wriggling earthworm falls,

 stunned and saved in my black pantry,

where I keep all the juiciest creatures

just for you.

~October 2016

Note: Moles have a special sort of hemoglobin which allows them to absorb more oxygen while above-ground and reuse it later. They have two thumbs per paw, and construct tunnels in order to 'trap,' devour and store wandering earthworms, which they paralyze with a toxin in their saliva. You can find out more about the lifestyle, physique and habits of moles here on wikipedia: 

Images: An Egyptian Poppy with a Water Mole, 1912, by John Crome; Public Domain via wikiart.
Star-nosed Mole (Condylura) by the US National Park Service; Public Domain via wikimedia

Tree Of Shadows

Tree Of Shadows

I dreamed we lived

in a tree of shadows, growing

leaves that were eyes

bugs that were leaves

of birds

or water

and each leaf was perfect

{as each smile was perfect

from you, my love.)

The eyes crawled, the insects

fluttered like lashes.

The leaves blurred, cooed,

curled around us,

the fingers of a god,

winged as an angel.

How did they become

fluff withering, 

and withered

fall?

The hand of god 

dropped me, a seed

a feather

twirling 

from the highest branch,

a parasol of pulse and cry

blown on a wind dark

as heart's secret

(a bloodshadow heart, my love)

and laughter came

from where you watched,

your eye inside the twigs.

~May 2014

posted for     real toads

Fireblossom Friday

Challenge: Seraphine Louis

That indefatigable cultural explorer, Fireblossom, (Shay's Word Garden) has chosen the art of "naive" painter Seraphine Louis for us to write to today.  Louis began as a housecleaner, had a brief flaring career as a painter, then ended her days in a lunatic asylum's mass grave. This is what I got from reading her story and looking at her paintings. Full details (and lots more paintings) at the toads link above.

If you'd like to hear the poem read by the author, please click below:

tree of shadows by Hedgewitch O'theWilds

Image: Unknown Title, by Seraphine Louis

Public domain via wikipaintings.org

Escape from Bugtown

The inimitable Fireblossom has provided a crackling challenge over at Real Toads, and supplied us with a list of words from which we may assemble the title of a poem, which of course, we then have to write--details!. I felt a deep affinity for some of the words, but was also confoundedly attracted to others--the result is a pair of efforts--does this make me a Terrifying Prodigy, or just an Obsessive Docent of the various circles of Hell? Not sure, but here they are, and please don't anyone feel they have to read them both:

The Unexpected Ecclesiastic

(or: Escape from Bugtown)

I thought it odd you

blessed the home

where even a lost dog wouldn’t stay,

where the manger was lined with such nettled hay

no ox could eat, no saviour lay.

I didn't see the wrinkle

of  robe beneath your shell

in the worm holes we crawled

to find the Big Haul

when I was your doll.

I still didn't guess

when tunnel turned catacomb

the clicking wheeze of your true occupation,

the insectile calculation of my twice-damned station

in your holy equation.

When I found my familiar,  

you fought me, of course,

with the bell and the book

the withering look, the Fisherman's hook

the sinkhole, the black hole, the brass cross that shook

till I ran from the grinding

hallelu, from the sermon of you,

your structural integrity beltlessly down

wrapped in noise, blood and crowned

a bug on its back, the Bishop of Bugtown.

~September 2013

This is the poem I feel I was intended to write, so I did:

The Minuscule Incubus

Here inside the lacquered box

of scar and pretend,

only the smallest of devils still fits,

the one with the key,

adroit as a nosetwitch rat

every bit as strong

as a lion till dawn,

tiny as the tip of

a red hot wire

passed with a hiss

through the gray matter

laid over mountains of char.

His muzzle is a mask,

his tail bobbed like a Rott,

his torment an ashen tickle

no longer sweet

not even forbidden,

oblivious

compulsion missing the point.

Somewhere

past this place

where the worst has already happened

and is waiting to happen again,

there's a hole made in a dream

through which I may wiggle,

a worm waiting wings,

if only it were possible

to make myself

smaller than he.

~September 2013

(The other poems in my incubus series are    here )

posted for     real toads

Challenge: Fireblossom Friday

Build A Title

Thanks to all who read  either or both, and apologies for completely giving in to the dark side of my verbose tendencies.

Images: The Reprimand, circa 1890,  by Jehan Georges Vibert, 

Detail from Death and The Miser, 1490, by Heironymous Bosch

Public Domain via wikipaintings.org

Restless

 Restless

I'm looking for peace but night is nervous 
as a pacing man. Instant as I sit my

ears are popped by the self-important buzz 
of an overfed junebug, senselessly, repeatedly
dive bombing the lighthouse

beam of my darklantern hair so

confused that even grey looks bright

here under a muddy sky with no moon.

On the farm behind, a welded gate swings

wide, squealing a pig noise

once twice again. Things rustle

while I stop the scratch of pen to hide
from potential mayhem, outlaw ghosts or 
just a lost drunk tired redneck
wandering in the haunted cow yard 

at 3:00 AM.

The air is overloaded with
an arrythmic rasp of frogsong 
pierced by the bored yap of outcast dogs. 
Only the stars covered with cloud
beautifully make no noise.

Soon the train will come shouting

with its ripping air horn drowning
the murmur of the farmer’s wife saying

“Come in, Come in,”

to someone 

and every third word I write 
I get a slap

on my ear 
from the bug.
All that's left is sandpaper questions
and a world that won't sleep.

May 2012

Photo The Haunted Cow Yard  © joy ann jones 2012