Crows

Crows

The  crows come down

from their high spy tower,

a gypsy synchronicity of black

but they tell me nothing

any more, beaks macerating silence,

eyes shiny blank as linoleum;

no answers, only sharp corvine curses,

cracks as they pry the suet butterfly

from her metal corset

and convene in iron symmetry

a privacy of devouring.

It's plain that I'm not Odin

though I've given more than my eye,

that the gossip of the green world

passes me by, the old feed of

voices an ejaculation of clouds,

alabaster riddles in indigo night

while I dream white dreams

in the periwinkles,

forgotten as Sleipnir's name

wondering if ragnarök

is still to come, or already

gathered up in the trees.

~December 2012

 Optional Musical Accompaniment

Posted for   real toads

Challenge:An Ink-Stained Wordlist

I had a lot of help with this one, first from Kerry's list of favorite toad words at the link above, then from the speaking photography of my friend Petteri Sulonen, whose picture, Crow Taking Flight with Frozen Treetops is at the header. 

Process notes: In Norse mythology, Odin possessed two ravens, Huginn and Muninn(Thought and Memory) who flew the world and brought him back its news. He also had a magical eight-legged horse named Sleipnir whom he rode between the worlds. Odin gave his eye under the world tree to learn the wisdom of the Frost Giants. You can click the tags 'odin' or 'Huginn and Mugin' below for more poems about these symbols.

Thanks, as always, Petteri, for the inspiration.

Widow's Walk

Widow's Walk

or, Bring Me Brains for Christmas

Intellect's a tongue-tied bystander

when instinct

commandeers the sprung ship,

rigs a shredded sail.

 

Thought's a pacing widow

looking out to sea,

a singularity

emotion devours.

The mind's a dolphin thrashing, snagged

in the reaction net; let some kind

clever hand untangle her, before

she's sliced for the silver can.

~December 2012

Posted for   real toads

Challenge: Words Count with Mama Zen

The inimitable Mama Zen asks us to state our dearest Christmas wish in 50 words or less. Christmas is a time when my emotions often get the better of me, so I am echoing the Scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz: "If I only had a brain..."  Santa?? Igor???

Header Image: Woman by the Sea, by Pierre de Chavanne

Public Domain via wikipaintings.org

Footer: Photo copyright Octavia Aberto,  National Geographic Photo Contest 2012

All Rights Reserved

Black Horse

Black Horse

I'll be off now;

lost is better than found--

gone as a jet horse in purple night

impossible to see

my blackness in the dark

as see blotted stars by broken day.

I'll be wearing the mist;

empty is better than full--

 an icy locket at my throat

pearled with thorns and carrying a face

I'll never show again

where leaving is better than staying

looking is better than finding--

opening the quicksilver box,

I let the songbird out;

flying is sweeter than singing.

~December 2012

Didn't expect to be posting anything for awhile, but had a dream. Hope everyone has a fulfilling and happy holiday season. I may or not be posting further this month, depending on the muse.

Comments are disabled on this post. Thanks for reading.

Image: Black Magic, by Rene Magritte

via wiki-paintings.org

All copyright belongs to the copyright holders.

Musical Interlude

I'm taking a few days off, folks--I'll leave you with some music till I get back:

Never You

Never You

A glassfull of repent

a metamorphed eloquent shoe

shirt flannel-and-books' humus scent

but never you

never you, back to take me as I'm meant.

No anise seed kiss bent

by morning's honeysuckle light

from you, my closed room, my lament,

no welcome night,

drinking maté, taking blood sacrament,

corrupting the convent.

A ghost braiding our hands,the blue

notes of your lion taming breaths

but never you,

come back to dance a minuet with death.

~December 2012

Posted for    real toads

Sunday Mini-Challenge

Kerry has us working with a stanza form taken from Pre-Raphealite poet and painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti's work

 maté: ...a tealike South American beverage made from the dried leaves of an evergreen tree...~dictionary.com

I am not entirely happy with this effort, but am posting it for the prompt, primarily as one of those examples of compressing free verse to form, and how a poem changes and shifts in your hands. Here is the free verse original:

Never

An empty cup

one eloquent shoe

scent of flannel and books

but never you

again, no anise seed kiss

in  honeysuckle light

never you, my closed room,

drinking maté at night

pulling me up on a darkling look

to walk hollow dusk

wordless as wind

closer than breath

the braids of our hands

your lion tamer's voice

calling out the stations

of a backwoods cross,

your snake-handler's grace

in the bittersweet hymn

you gave me to dance, piped through

the panflute you made of my ribs,

never again

this side of the oven

where the bright fire

may or may not

burn as hot

as these embers

remembered of never

never again

you.

~November 2012

Image: Tristan and Isolde Drinking the Love Potion, by Dante Gabriel Rossetti, 1867
Public Domain via wikipaintings.org