The Crow-Mother

 

 

The Crow-Mother

 (a triquain)

 

 

As a child

I knew a crow-woman.

She loved shiny things, breathy south wind

and tall corn, green in the field of desire. She

wore onyx feathers grieving the time

when she had real words, not

just for me, 

but for everyone. She

was friend to doves unable to mourn,

a lover of small clouds which could never give rain,

a mother of all misplaced things: keys

coins and rings, strings, lost girls

life passed by.

December 2021

posted for Fireblossom

at The Sunday Muse

Note: the triquain is a counted syllable form based on threes. It normally consists of seven lines, each line increasing in syllables by three to twelve, then decreasing again by three to the close. This is a triquain swirl, which is slightly different in containing 13 lines. (3 - 6 - 9 - 12 - 9 - 6 - 3 - 6 - 9 - 12 - 9 - 6 - 3).

 

 

Images: Crow Prince Charming, © Rene Magritte   Fair Use

Crow woman cosplay, via Sunday Muse   Fair Use 

The White House

 

 

 

 

The White House

 

 

Fall is sky

of milk and water, of

sand and blood, a field of ev'ry fruit

and folly, gathered around the slant white house that

rocked its boards like a boat and took in

the moon's footloose orphans.

The white house 

grew a child;

it seemed safe there by the

warm muddy lake,rough beach of red dirt,

trees bent over brown water by the weight of locusts'

spell chanting out the night, the old gods'

didgeridoo. There were

always dogs

 

in the yard,

toys on the floor, music

in the hall, food in the kitchen, bells

of laughter rung on blue sheets, your bright virgin eyes

umber as winter oak, wild as wine,

alight in the white house.

Now the child

 

is grown, you

are gone, and nothing is

safe. The white house, drifting in its trees

by the clouded lake, is a slow rocking boat un-

manned but full; October's hand turns wind

 to firelight for moon's

last orphan.

September 2021

 

 

posted for 

The Sunday Muse

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Process Note: This poem is written in the triquain form, consisting  of seven line stanzas with lines of 3,6,9,12,9,6,and 3 syllables respectively.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Images: Old house, author unknown, via Sunday Muse  Fair Use

Autumn Day circa 1986,  © joyannjones 

 

Mistakes

Mistakes

Dark flutters

words melted like butter

burn the tongue, her hand on your shoulder 

on a night from which every dream has been wrung

I looked for your face but it was wrong,

wrong for me to come here

with my snakes

wrapped around

the sad mistakes truth makes.

posted for   real toads

Challenge: Micropoetry

Note: This is a triquain, (a seven line poem with syllables of 3-6-9-12-9-6-3) to which I have arbitrarily added a final couplet (3-6.)

Optional Musical Accompaniment

Image: author and title unknown, fair use via the internet.
No copyright infringement intended.