Glass of Stars

Glass of Stars

Whirl in whirl in

in the dance of stars;

Spin the table or

let the table spin you,

say the warding words

better, write them faster

deeper, in something bitter

and sweet as the old Widow's

fizz, her finger dipped

in larceny, lime and sugar,

a yeasty effervescence flourished
like a lacy bubbled flag of air and stars,

the press of love in the heavy glass

a vintage stood on its head

in the riddling rack, troubled

and twisted day by day, until

the acidulated dregs 
of its primitive self drop
like galled stones

rolled away when that last
bit of sweetness comes

that floats the vessel
finally full.

As  I dip my finger

to write your name on my heart

an empathy of shooting stars rattles down

filling my glass in the cold night.

December 2011

The riddling rack is an invention for the proper fermentation and mass production of champagne, credited to the formidable Widow Cliquot and her cellar master in the 19th century, per wikipedia: "...Composed much like a wooden desk with circular holes, the rack allowed a bottle of wine to be stuck sur point or upside down. Every day a cellar assistant would gently shake and twist (remuage) the bottle to encourage wine solids to settle to the bottom. When this was completed. the cork was carefully removed, the sediments ejected, and a small replacement dose of sweetened wine added."



Header Image: Meteor Shower, by Nilo Merino Recalde on flick'r
Footer Image: Label, Veuve Cliquot Champagne
via google image search 

 

The Dawn Singer

The Dawn Singer

The wind is old

in the rose coloured country

where I walk with you towards the dawn

where we drink of a cup

that never was

that brings no loss

that swallows pain

all remembrance 

redone, remade anew.

You sing to me

in a soft foreign tongue

I used to know before being born,

full of rolled r’s and ocean hushes.

Your white skin pearls and uncurls

a parchment of promise, your hands

outline my wants, full of birds and forests

gods and devils, angels and skinwalkers

and the long fall down Eden’s well.

Nothing could be as sweet as

this dream of it, of your palms

under my chin lifting

my face to your eyes,

your voice in my ear a touch

itself, deep cobalt echo of

a distant windrung chime,

our fingertips feathering  

to read the tale marked in braille.

Your eyes of moon;

how their light rips

against the black,

dawn songs sung

above the ears’ range

only in the choirbox

of my heart.

October 2011

Photo: The Rose Coloured Country, by Petteri Sulonen 

Thanks Petteri, both for the use of the image,

and for choosing the phrase from the poem as title.

Petteri Sulonen's photostream on flick'r

Petteri's blog, Come to think of it

Vertigo

Vertigo

The heart is

blind but spinning, like a jewel

transparent in darkness.

If there were light,

igniting colors…

but even in the blind black

colors wait for a chance to break

out of the holding stone

Their sleeping presence spins and

turns inside each facet,

seeds within a pod rusting in the wind,

germ within the seed that soon will know

quickness in the green;

only give light

to what already exists.

Only give the meaning to the form.

But I don’t think

this is a thing that you can do.

You don’t know which the gem, which the jeweler

which the instrument, or

what of me is determined by your incessant tapping

and what by the temper of the stone.

You think I’m soft metal, an abradable plate

blank before you etch it with the acid of your desire,

scratched by the stylus that swings between your legs

to give back in my life the imprint of your will.

But I am diamond hard,

and it’s hard to shape what spins in darkness,

and hard to see what’s carved

in the fretwork of scars upon the holding stone;

wind in the dead leaves dancing

a horn of honey poured into the sea

a network of veins full flushed with color

that waits for light to be given

to what already exists.

September 1987, revised February 2011

Posted for Magpie Tales # 53

Uncredited photo of a salt cellar provided by Magpie Tales removed