Maleficium
By dark lantern, by crimson candle, in
an absence floating in wine without bread,
the Necromancer toasts in mandrake hopes
the golden miracles of his dead.
His chamber is fumed with dubious pasts, an
offering's smoke where the last choke occurred.
His breath has gone dry as his corpse-woman's eye,
ceremonially opened with a theurgic word.
But that eggshell gaze is blind as stone, her
songs of the oriole fluttered away.
The nods of owls and mnemonic howls
work a brittle sequence no cello can play.
The final shriek puts grit in the lens, so
it never divines what time's drown erased.
The owl and the oriole dice for his soul;
every spirit that rises wears his own face.
In my dream you've left fetches and dust behind.
You stand by the door of a bridge's arc,
the wild blue river in flight from your quiver,
your shades all spent arrows that killed their marks.
February 2025
Necromancy: "..the practice of magic involving communication with the dead by summoning their spirits as apparitions or visions for the purpose of divination.." ~wikipedia
Maleficium: "the practice of malevolent magic, derived from casting lots as a means of divining the future in the ancient Mediterranean world"~wikipedia
Theurgy:".. the ritual practices associated with the invocation or evocation of the presence of one or more deities..."~wikipedia
posted for Word Garden Word List
Images: The Necrophile. 1965, ©Jean Benoit Public Domain
The Blind Man of Toledo, 1906, ©Joaquin Sorolla Public Domain
Perfectly titled (I had to look it up, not having seen your notes right away), this poem builds and builds while the vision of the subject blurs and misrepresents. it is one thing to acknowledge ghosts or to see what it is that they may want, with a view to dispelling them, but it is quite another to move in with them in the narrow spaces inside crumbling walls where all turns to meaningless dust. There find the dead love, the dead past, the dead versions of one's self, and not least, the dead horses beaten to motes in an obsessive --I was going to say "frenzy", but "trance" seems more to the point.
ReplyDeleteI especially love your penultimate stanza, and your use of "dice" as a verb. That's tricky business but here it works marvelously, especially given the symbolism of those two particular birds. Finally, the Benoit illustration is unsettling and absolutely apt. You put such care into all of your work, Hedge, and I can't tell you how much I respect that. The power of your writing testifies to it.
A beautifully-wrought poem that carries me into a disordered darkness, "dubious pasts," "mnemonic howls" with a figure who stands at its center whose "eggshell gaze is blind as stone." Loved every stanza but especially the second, and the ending is surreal and sad.
ReplyDeleteThis is as somber as the music "no cello can play" (I love that line), and yet, so beautifully written. I read it a few times through. Though regarding the malevolent, it's gorgeous, hedge. I love your rhyme, your way with words.
ReplyDeleteAh, one of your favorite kinds of darkness. I’m for the last lines, that indeed find their marks.
ReplyDeleteWow, just wow, Joy. You gave me a delicious shiver up my spine with this dark tale, and how beautiful is your imagery! I love these lines especially:
ReplyDelete"His chamber is fumed with dubious pasts"
"eggshell gaze"
"The nods of owls and mnemonic howls
work a brittle sequence no cello can play."
"You stand by the door of a bridge's arc"
A searing vision, disturbing and eloquent. I won't quote back the entire pen but that third stanza especially is marvelous. Every word is purposeful and feels imbued with magic.
ReplyDelete