Messengers
The wind's given up
polishing the moon's face;
she pushes instead for
an avalanche of umber,
her dustdevils reborn
to a grey-marled sky.
Dawn slips in short of breath;
the color it paints on is water
tumbling not falling,
night-tossed, twisted, taken
fast as kites scoop stunned bugs
thrown homeless into the storm,
all to make that flash, those stings
that wear the names of gods.
On such indelible filaments, such
lineaments of wind, we find
our last flight, my love,
still hunting with hearts of kites
who feed on the turmoil of air;
just so we catch adam by atom
the tiny life that lets us soar.
Before we drown in the wash of years
Before we drown in the wash of years
before rain beats us flat as black matte,
rot-wet as winter leaves,
let us play blue-winged angels,
silhouettes cut in a burn as bright
as the sun's heavy heart,
running messages
between the worlds.
~August 2014
posted for real toads
Weekend Challenge: Feature Artist Kelly Letky
Kerry O'Connor has induced the multi-talented Kelly Letky (mrs mediocrity, the blue muse ) to share her other thing she does so well (besides poetry) with us at the pond this weekend, so that we can be inspired to write something to her work. It was very hard to choose a photo from the images she generously shared with us. Thank you Kelly.
If you'd like to hear the poem read by the author, please click HERE
If you'd like to hear the poem read by the author, please click HERE
Top Image: November Sky, copyright Kelly Letky, at the blue muse
Used with permission.
You can find Kelly's exceptional poetry at her blog
This is exquisite writing, Hedge.
ReplyDeleteAn avalanche of umber... sums up the glorious colour of this photo. And I love your kites scooping up the homeless bugs. You include so many interesting word pairings, and each a memorable image. This poem needs to be read more than once, and I will definitely return to it tomorrow.
what an intriguing image of the color being water tumbling...which not only gives it color but motion...the lightning as strings that bear the names of gods...the hearts of kites feeding on the turmoil of air...i see them whipping back and forth....
ReplyDeleteyour verse always invokes an emotional response in me and this one is no different. love the line "before rain beats us flat as black matte".
ReplyDeleteIf this isn't "painting with words" I don't know what is.
ReplyDeleteand then the emotion of it …
"still hunting with hearts of kites
who feed on the turmoil of air;"
Just lovely.
The entirety of this is brimming with depth and for me, this stanza:
ReplyDelete"On such indelible filaments, such
lineaments of wind, we find
our last flight, my love,
still hunting with hearts of kites
who feed on the turmoil of air;
just so we catch adam by atom
the tiny life that lets us soar."
I so enjoy this portion, Hedge...the idea of kites for hearts and feeding on the atoms of air...love the use of turmoil, too.
As I said though...I love the poem as a whole...excellent writing!
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDelete"let us play blue-winged angels,
ReplyDeletesilhouettes cut in a burn as bright
as the sun's heavy heart,"............the lines carry for me forbearance, love and grit...
This speaks melancholy of that picture so well, how reality is towards the dreams - like that umber veneer of a clouds.. Somehow we still manage to fly..
ReplyDeleteOnly you could take something as innocent as kite flying and give it a whiff of the Old Gods, wrap it up in Mother Nature gone hormonal, and close it with a killer last two lines the way you have done here.
ReplyDeleteFrom first to last lines, superb writing ~ I specially like the storm flash and the rain beating us to black matte & blue winged angels ~ Your poem left me breathless ~
ReplyDelete"Dawn slips in short of breath"
ReplyDeleteThat's everything poetry should be.
I never know quite what to say when I visit your page--and I don't get here often enough. But I wanted to tell you that today as I read this with tears in my eyes, your worked moved me on some level that I hadn't expected--just gorgeous writing!
ReplyDeleteI am, as always, in awe of your word power. My november sky will forever be enriched by these magical words... I was enthralled from the first line on. "Still hunting with hearts of kites" sounds like the perfect way to live.
ReplyDeleteI hoped you would choose this image .. I knew you would offer the perfect poem.
ReplyDeleteI can't say I comprehend what you've written
ReplyDeletebut it dances so blithely on the tongue.
Will you think I'm crazy when I say
It reminds me of Gerard Manly Hopkins?
Cheers!
Jz
brilliant, Joy. a new favorite ~
ReplyDeleteSuch words of freedom, of living and pure joy...
ReplyDeleteYour images and phrases are unique. This is a beautifully written piece.
ReplyDeleteSo beautiful...I posted a piece for open link Monday I had written a couple of weeks ago and it seems were thinking along the same lines..."Dawn slips in short of breath" "just so we catch adam by atom the tiny life that lets us soar" I love these lines.
ReplyDelete"still hunting with hearts of kites
ReplyDeletewho feed on the turmoil of air"
--this is stunning imagery. Excellent piece!
Just a beautiful poem, Joy--I have been away and away from computing just getting back online and ==that adam by atom line is really something, and the kites seem to me to be both kinds-- the hunting birds, and those that just live off wind, life's small pleasures--it also reminded me a lot of Gerard Manly Hopkins, the Windhover? I think that's what it's called dapple drawn dawn in its riding or whatever--that headlong rush into the imagery--it is just lovely--I am a little word-dead right now--just terrific though, thanks. k.
ReplyDeletekites... and homeless bugs. this is beautiful.
ReplyDeleteMaybe age teaches us how small our efforts ever could be--our mortality, our dimming coil--yet in that humility there is all our poems ever could be, flecks of radiance thrown wide into the arms of the destroying wind. I get the heft of dust storms here, have you seen them there? "Stings that wear the names of gods" is such a perfect way to speak of angst writ large, and so casual a way to speak of lightning -- both. Again, "the tiny life that lets us soar" --- and "let us play blue-winged angels ... running messages / between the worlds." All we ever could be, yet how great that is ... A real two-headed battle axe here, swinging between Valhalla and Dorothy's whipp'd Kansas. (Or are we talking Republican Oklahoma?) Great work, Hedge. Whatever has made this a quiet summer for you in production of poems, each bulb still thrills with great wattage.
ReplyDeleteYes, I've seen a few dust storms--small compared to the Thirties, but skewed and alien-feeling. Thanks for getting it, B.--this is all about poems, or mostly...I think. I am like Sandburg, sometimes even I don't understand them. The confusion of the medical thing really did take me out for awhile, but I have been writing on and off since then--just not ready to post them. I like them to ferment. ;_) Thanks for the kind words, and for reading, as always.
Delete