Dionysia

 

 

 

 

 

 Dionysia

 

 

In another century

I was a girl of a certain flavor

grown to twist and pruned to bear

a fruit never eaten, only pressed.

 

You were the satyr,

the goat-song in the convent, a

dovecote of vestals who cooed as you

taught them to break their glass vows.

 

At the bacchanal we all danced

indifferent to stares of the Keres. You stole

the god's thyrsos and wound it with lamb's ear,

soft and treacle sweet as your smile.

 

That cup that was

filled then to overflowing

is broken now, but too late, I think

for those who've already drunk.

 

 

 

 

November 2021

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 posted for

The Sunday Muse

 

 and

earthweal's Open Link

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

thyrsos:  a staff or wand of fennel used in Hellenic ceremonies, espec. Dionysius ~wikipedia

Keres:  female death spirits who roamed freely during the yearly Athenian festival of  Anthestria .~wikipedia

 

 

 

 

 

Images: Wine glasses, author unknown, via Sunday Muse  Fair Use

Marble relief of a maenad and two satyrs in a Bacchic procession. AD 100, British Museum Public Domain

Basket of Berries

Basket of Berries

When I was a peach

they stood in line to split me.

My sweetness spangled their chins.

When I was champagne,

they stood in line to toast me.

My slipper overflowed their little brains.

When I was a basket of berries

they fought like cats to juice me,

to suckle up a fool's Cointreau.

Now that I'm a stone

it's logical they've left me;

they didn't come to build, after all.

~April 2013

Images: Chandon Cremant Imperial, by Alphonse Mucha
Public Domain, via wikipaintings.org

Calanais Stones, by Kelvyn Skee , on flick'r

Coffee With The Incubus

Coffee With The Incubus

(Incubus V)

Though more often cruel, silent inscrutable and hot,

the incubus has his tender moments

intimate, revealing, when he forgets

how he got his tail

and for whom he split his foot.

Then he sighs in deep indigo

like any lover, and lets me stroke his suede skin.

His scaled fingers catch and pull in my hair

but he puffs smokerings thru thin lips 

and frees them with a circle of loosening steam.

Closest when the darkness is complete,

when the sun has yet 

to kick the moon from his bed

and all of us are locked and loaded,

he tells me things that 

were never in the contract

knows I won’t repeat them

except to ring the fey bells

of faerie back under the smooth curl

ram curved above his scarlet ear.

His voice is heated air under the hiss, 

the random honesty of coffee splashing

into the cup, well creamed and sugared

drunk fragrant at the birdsong hour when

dark and light at last kiss goodbye.

 

Soaked as a biscotti dipped and nibbled

dunked in black heat, I know

I was formed for pleasure

to be crisp and never fall apart,

but sometimes all that

dissolving

wet sweetness leaves me

crumbling on the lip.

March/April 2012

Part of the Incubus series

Image: Cup of Coffee After Dunking and Eating a Biscotti. by sameold 2010  on flick'r 

Shared under a Creative Commons 2.0 Generic License