Epona's Dream

 Epona’s Dream

In eons’ life my white-lashed eye has caught

consuming cross the goldgreen grasslands' wave

the endless star broomed dance of come and go;

generations of ravens laughed 

as cactus centuries passed, yet

one short wishful glance, only once

a glimpse of you, the dark stallion in 

a sunmist I’ve seen prancing, seen you stand

more than horse and less than man

fiery four legged totem, dolmen jawed

pounder of the white wolf’s skull.

Never have you come to graze

the pastures I have wished and wayed,

hooves flying to me under the sickle moon. 

I dream you still as your high red eye

rolls white, sleepless on your

gravid seraglio.

Do you likewise dream of me, once only

glimpsed, the fleetly fading stippled stray

stranger, maverick mare whose mane unbound

that gold and silver ribboned sleet

stretched on prairie air with the tossing wheat;

do you ever think we might

outrun the wind that blows behind the stars,

feel again grey muzzles nudge up dawn, 

hot blow of breath, trembling flank, equine

hammering heart be all our wealth

of soul, of singing, all of rest?

Or  am I the one that wandered a step too far

in the moon of slipping tides

the one you fed just once in the hungry night

content to watch the shadows swallow back

the  empty chalice of a symbol

when the wine’s poured out?

A dreary jog a weary winding fate 

bound to go ahead of you and wait

for journeys end, the last low luminous gate.

January 2012

Posted for    real toads

Prompt: Photography of Margaret Bednar

Process Notes: "In Gallo-Roman religion, Epona was a protector of horses, donkeys, and mules. She was particularly a goddess of fertility, as shown by her attributes of a patera, cornucopia, ears of grain and the presence of foals in some sculptures suggested that the goddess and her horses were leaders of the soul in the after-life ride..."~wikipedia  

As usual, I have taken a few liberties with the mythic elements.


Image: photo by gracious permission of  Margaret Bednar

Forensics

Forensics

Shall we do an autopsy

on the thing that’s dead between us? 

Shall we look at the floor and say,

“The directionality of the blood splatter

is consistent with arterial spray?”

Which of us will play the coroner 

in this cold case reconstruction?

I say I have determined

the cause of death to be asphyxia.

The victim was burked, killed the way a lion 
sometimes smothers a buffalo, 

by clamping its jaws over the muzzle,

replacing breath for breath. I can tell

by the swollen heart, the eyes and lungs,

where the petechial hemorrhaging shows

all the hypoxic arguments ended in

our fingers breaking the hyoid bone, closing

the muzzle, crushing the words.You say 

it's plain by the rosy pink of the lividity

that the body has been subjected to

prolonged, intense cold. Decomp's begun;

the tissues begin to fail, the cornea dulls

so that looking at each other, no ectoplasmic

bridge springs up, nothing of affinity in eyes 

dead red, sightless wide. We've come
to the limit of forensics. No chromatography,

no strike of a DNA match

can light up this black puzzle.

June 2011

Posted for OneShotWednesday  at the inimitable OneStopPoetry

“...The term "burking" comes from the method William Burke and William Hare used to kill their victims during the West Port murders. They killed the usually-intoxicated victims by sitting on their chests and suffocating them by putting a hand over their nose and mouth, while using the other hand to push the victim's jaw up. The corpses had no visible injuries, and were supplied to medical schools for money.”

~ enotes.com/forensic-science/

Image courtesy google image search, no credits available, originating site 

I am Stylish Now

 

Shay(Fireblossom) at the Word Garden  has nominated me for some oddball award these crazy young whippersnapper intertubes people pass around, which requires that I bare my soul to a universe of prurient strangers. Oh, I don’t have to write a poem? No, I merely have to list seven unusual, unknown  things about myself. Apparently this process conveys an automatic gift of stylishness which will overcome all natural laws hitherto prevailing in my life, which is about as stylish as a wen on Kate Millhouse’s cheek would be. Oh, it’s Middleton? My bad. Anyway, here are seven diverting and deeply secret things about me which should disqualify me for any kind of stylishness accolades, but seemingly, like so much of life, have the opposite effect:

1. I have never had a manicure. Well, when I was little, my mother sawed my nails off with a dull scissors, and painted them fire engine red a lot, but I’m assuming that doesn’t count.

2. My first pet was a cricket which I caught under the streetlights one night when I was about nine and kept in a little cardboard box. I was devastated when the  Mean Little Boy in the upstairs apartment told me it was not a cricket but a gross giant waterbug. My budding interest in entomolgy died at that point.

3. I have named all my cars. And bikes. And computers. My current computer is called The Beast, and my car is V*ger, as in the Star Trek movie.

4. I  am not a packrat per se, yet I find it impossible to throw out articles of clothing I have worn in some positive and happy context, which have long ago ceased to fit me or ever even remotely have the possibility of being worn again unless we have world famine and I also contract a wasting disease. I have a red velvet mirrored Mexican Wedding Dress from 1969 that is only recognzable as a piece of clothing by supreme efforts of the imagination, yet still sits in my closet, barely holding together enough to stay on the hanger.

5. I had a horrible maiden name which is so secret in my whole life I have only told three people who didn’t know me then. No, I’m not telling it here, either. Suffice it to say, all my married names have been words of one syllable. I won't say I actually chose my husbands for this reason, but it certainly didn't hurt their chances.

6. I love reading and won a prize for reading the most books in my entire school over the course of a year in fourth grade. It’s one of my proudest accomplishments.

7. My least stylish secret: when I was twelve  I promised my grandmother (born in the early 1900’s) never to wear make-up. This request came about because of my mother, who liked to shock her with-- you guessed it-- fire engine red 40’s style lipstick, plucked eyebrows, coal black mascara and bright green eyeshadow. I kept that promise as long as she lived, and seldom wear anything but powder and a little neutral lip gloss even now when I probably desperately need a full paint job.

Many thanks to my dear friend Shay, especially for listing me among her favorite poets, and I am passing this stylish award on to Sherry Blue Sky, at StarDreaming, and even though he's a guy, the most stylish-est of bloggers, Galen (aka the G-Man) at Mr Know-it-All


If this award were instead for most serious, substantive, topical and diverse blog, I would pass it on to my friend, writer, photographer and post-modern Renaissance man, Petteri Sulonen, who runs a little place called Come to think of it, as well as helping me here with my technical issues. He writes on everything from politics to Zen Buddhism with insight and clarity. His current post is on renewable energy, well worth reading.

I'd also like to thank one of my favorite poets,and one of the most gifted, Brendan at  Oran's Well, for including me in a list of twelve recommended online poets. The entire list is well worth exploring for those who love poetry, not least of all  Brendan's own site.