...~* Poetry from my heart of hearts *~...

[Kätzchen]

Over the years, I've written some of my own poetry: Some of my poems are about how I view social issues or the human condition... But I wanted to leave some of my poetry here in this community. I hope you will enjoy the poetry and/or prose that I have written over the years. ~ALK :candle: :candle: :candle:










Pythagorean Melody

These thoughts,
Transposed: onto your Berlin Papyrus,
Come from the cosine
Of indexical, yet identical thought –
Not Euclidean, nor Chaldean by origin.
But some would say follow this star:
Star of night, or the
Star of day
Numbered in succinctness – a
Delectable: ballet.
Perplexed by the theorem
No angled cosine to save; yet
Though I know the camel travels
Isolated, yet free to roam rivulet – oh!
Water of life, plenty for thirst
The desert will not perish, nor its fruits
Dates, coconut palms, and currants bleeding with juice;
In Egypt the kings sleep – but the
Queen of the Nile,
Who walked more than many a mile,
Was buried at deep before birth –
Ideas born of myrrh
Frankincense adored with gold
Nonetheless, brilliant and bold
Pharaohs’ scepter was touching my soul:
Like a stealth mathematickoi
Code of honor
No breach of trust –
It’s a must.
Cicero'd by trig tempered rhetoric
Quietly listening as an akousmatikoi
Conceptualizing:
The akousmata, tis powerful
Bend it with imagination
Flow with the force of the river – you
Stepped into the waters
Cleansed; and as you emerged, the
Stellar musculature of medicine will
Take hold within your might:
For tis the principle of the strongest
Dreamed link, predicated on a starless journey –
No moon to wish on, but
Deeply moaning, we go into the night.
Never looking back,
There is nothing to gain,
‘cept the repeat of an egregious stain
Cultured by anger, greed and bane –
There is no ‘iron’ veil.
This Pythagorean Theorem
Remains steady,
For what is behind you
Propels you, feel the pain
Motivated by numbers, it
Will manifest in transmigration
Of the peculiar soul
Purification, rituals, mysticism
Equations translated into music
Pounded out by heart
The path to heaven
Is true, just start.
Harmonious, they don’t give a damn
This anvil of life
Cascades into a freefall,
Navigating perilously
Mitigated with gall,
Jettisoning the baggage
No time to stall;
This cup will not pass
This way again, for today – nor
Tomorrow, but certainly in the present, a
Diabolical amusement is
Explored from a lens:
Molten in lava black,
Red hot with thunder,
Encasing the problem
With shellac’d metaphysics,
Preserved forever more
Never: lack.
Hang on tight
I’ve got your back.
Arranged in the motion
Of a key
Sharpened with knowledge
Sting worthy of a bee
Hark! Hear that voice –
Carpathian Mountains speak the answer;
For in my heart
I rejoice.

LDS (2007, March 31)

[Kätzchen]

Untitled



Come closer to my heart

And feel the sounds that long to take you

Through all the hollows: a labyrinth of sorrow.

The sorrow of my life

Has long been dimmed from the walls of fear

But the still, deep and cool blue waters of my being

Welcome the clatter of the babbling brook: your Presence.

The sounds that pulse through my being

Are shaped by good and bad

Mostly, conveying a sharper image ~

Yours: for proper consumation.

I will listen to the sounds of your streaming brook:

Echo’s that come from the corridors

Being sought out methodically by your deep hunger

Releasing trinkets of treasured wisdom

Spun of the finest microfibre: a llama’s woolen fur

Meant to keep me warm inside

For those days that I will miss you most ~

I turn to memories

Made by the pounding of surging waters

Colliding within this deep labyrinth

Where sorrow did once reside

Only Now: with patience and time

The wounded and healed: do abide.



LDS (2006, Sept. 13th)

[Kätzchen]

The Etymology of You




Where shall I turn my gaze to?

Is it within today’s moment?

Which skin of thought will be capricious?

Around the corner, in my mind

A slow burn of fear

Cast waves of bent emotion

A paroxysm

Imploding

My existentialist point of view.

It seemed so ordinary

This seepage of entanglement

But it floated

Off like a silken slip

Pieces

Jagged, sharp, puncturing ~

The

Store of desire

Changing the garment with struggled stain

I’m no different ~

You proclaim.

Everyone is just everyone

Simple

No pain.

Even in the immensity of shared feelings

The towering inferno

Of shame

Dropped like a floating balloon

Was swept away

By the fullness of this new moon.

Here and now

Appearing like a light

Emerging from the fog of life

Is the

Etymology

Of

You.




LDS (2006, Novemberr 30th)

[Kätzchen]

I have several close friends who have lost loved ones in death over the past few years and recently, I learned that my mother has been diagnosed with cancer. She's a Psy Nurse and she keeps working as if there is nothing wrong with her - determined not to miss one moment in life - saying that she'd rather keep herself busy until the end. When she came to see me this past spring break, she let me in on the news because I asked her if she was going to come to my universities commencement ceremony next year - even though I graduate this December. She said she didn't think she would make it. Each day I talk with her by phone, I wonder if it will be the last time I hear her voice.

Since then, other losses have occurred in my own family. I feel like I've been through a threshold of painful experiences - a series of them - and when I wrote the poem below, I had no idea how much I would need it for myself. So, I'm leaving it here tonight - not only for me - but for others who might need some small bit of encouragement, too.

:candle: :candle: :candle:


The Valley of Bones

Dense is the structure upon which our foundation is built:

chakra's
pleading for balance and harmony
living cells
searching for truth
blood
giver of life, the invisible hand we seek



Temple of mine:
as we work to breathe, in and out;
let my mind release all there is, which is toxic
let my mind welcome all that is nourishing,
for as we wander through the caverns of life
we seek safety from what hurts us:




As we reach for what best there is
let us remember where our densest manifestation of spirit lay,
within the valley of the bones:




The last part of our body to solidify,
the last to decompose,
we dance to the drumming of the living pulse
as if we grow like a rose.
Encumbered at times in a thorny briar
seeking relief from a scorching fire
our beloved bones dance, our hips in scarlet;
bathed in the blood of life,
a single desire:




to be released from our pain and sorrow
rising from sack cloth are our smoking ashes;
the river of Gilead's balm washes us,
and releases us to experience life anew;
causing us to allow what the drumming vibrations signal --
to rise from the valley of death,
to the embered skies which are hued in blue:





Soaring to heights yet explored



let us dance:
dance for all that is new,
dance because we know it's true,
that where balance and harmony exist
it's because in the valley of the bones
we dared to dance:





dancing




dancing




dancing



in
shades of glorious
blue.





LDS (2008, December 24th)

[MysticOceansFL]

The question that is asked the most; we hear it everyday,
“What time Is it?” they want to know, and then they go away.
It's time for bed, it's time for work, or time to feed the fishes,

It's time to take your medicine, or wash and dry the dishes.
Time in seconds, time in hours, so many freckles past a hair,
depending on the zone, or whether daylights savings there.
Time is measured many ways from minutes to months,
Time is what keeps everything from happening at once!

A time to live, a time to die, a time for having fun,
Clocks and calenders alike, all scheduled by the sun.
Intervals that cant be hurried, will not be denied,
a season that we know that's coming, as surely as the tide.

If there ever comes a time when time will be no more,
I wonder how we'll know to quit, or when it was before.
Do we hurry? Do we loaf? It depends upon the time...
Had we started earlier, we'd be finished with this rhyme.

author Erin F "Time"

[Kätzchen]

Le Fragrance du Jour

I’ve been on my own for far too long,
Not that this is what I prefer –
It is just the way the ‘cards’ were seemingly dealt:
Even if I wanted to melt
It would take careful timing,
Diligence of mind,
Deliberately applied and felt.

Today, as I make my way into the world,
I stand before my closet –
Scanning my wardrobe, left to right:
Sweaters begin on the left,
Migrating toward the middle of night wear;
Then Slips, garters, stockings and skirts,
Dresses made for a Cascadian night.

Lifting, teasing out, sorting colors I feel akin to,
Holding them close before me –
I decide if I should try them on:
Slipping one on, then relieved
Over and over again, I go
Kinesthetically, making conscious choices,
Until a perfection of fit - has been achieved.

Thus is the fragrance of life that I live by,
Not entirely on my own –
I seek that which is most likely to send these vibrations:
With deep need for me
My desire is to make you groan,
Sated only by your ability
That causes me to moan.

~LDS

(24, November, 2009)

[Kätzchen]

Some poetry that I have written over the years...
I thought I would leave a few of them here tonight.


:moonstars:



Beneath the Winter Snow

Every season brings its change:
Spring with its scented rain,
Summer with its incredible sunshine; and
Fall with its leaves of glory, conveying earths strain.

Whilst all previous seasonal changes exemplify change,
Winter gives a promise: the promise of undying hope --
The hope that buried priori will reveal its passionate syrup,
Bubbling in its crucible; dangling by a rope.

Laden in the throws of effervescent primordial epiphany,
Your Star leads me through the darkness of night.
Hallowed by the presence of an eerily shrouded Moon
My eyes dimly see: refractions of your prismatic light.

Buried in my heart of hearts is the seed of Your love:
Encased by coldness, the crucible engenders its glow;
Melting, metaphorical seasonal changes: galvanized-
Beneath the Winter Snow.

LDS
(9th, November, 2007)



:moonstars:



An Exercise in Abstract Puzzle Theory


How practical is it,

When the obsession of your mind

Exists only in the shadows?

Who’s half blind?

Will the fruit of your efforts

Personify the kiss of a stone-cold,

Calculated flame, meant to burn?

Adding exacted guilt?

In the hours it takes to comply

Work must be done on the fly,

Wander then delay, purposely with precision;

Relief, again, will come during the Fall rotation,

With a round-like Key: on the by-and-by.



LDS

(25th, January, 2008)





:moonstars:



Ode to Billy Bob

You thought you would weaken me
Being all brazen with your `tude
How dare you strut like that
‘come taste the mood’.

I raise the ambiance
To titillate you back
Inviting you to try on my love
Don’t gorge, just snack.

I lift my dress a smidge
And adjust my garter and hose
Careful to take in the effect
I lean over and kiss your nose.


Your hands held my face
Your tongue sent me into throws
could it be your magic
really curls my toes???

Taking off my rings
And stroking gently my wandering curls
I see you weakening
Cuz i’m not just one of those ‘girls’.

Billy Bob, you keep that up
I like you just like that
You lead, I will follow
Thanks ~ Your Playful Pussy Cat.

LDS
(10th, July, 2006)



:moonstars:


Words

my dress fits in a loose way
but your hand will never lose it's direction or impact
night or day.

the Bear in You manifests like a dare
will I shed my dress?
With your help, I stand bare.

Standing still like a deer caught in your gaze
yes Dear, I am smitten
by the energy of your haze.

My Femme energy may seem Coy
but as i slide through your legz
You realise, I am a sensual Koi.

LDS
(27th, August, 2006)


:moonstars:

[chefhottie25]

Some poetry that I have written over the years...
I thought I would leave a few of them here tonight.


:moonstars:



Beneath the Winter Snow

Every season brings its change:
Spring with its scented rain,
Summer with its incredible sunshine; and
Fall with its leaves of glory, conveying earths strain.

Whilst all previous seasonal changes exemplify change,
Winter gives a promise: the promise of undying hope --
The hope that buried priori will reveal its passionate syrup,
Bubbling in its crucible; dangling by a rope.

Laden in the throws of effervescent primordial epiphany,
Your Star leads me through the darkness of night.
Hallowed by the presence of an eerily shrouded Moon
My eyes dimly see: refractions of your prismatic light.

Buried in my heart of hearts is the seed of Your love:
Encased by coldness, the crucible engenders its glow;
Melting, metaphorical seasonal changes: galvanized-
Beneath the Winter Snow.

LDS
(9th, November, 2007)



:moonstars:



An Exercise in Abstract Puzzle Theory


How practical is it,

When the obsession of your mind

Exists only in the shadows?

Who’s half blind?

Will the fruit of your efforts

Personify the kiss of a stone-cold,

Calculated flame, meant to burn?

Adding exacted guilt?

In the hours it takes to comply

Work must be done on the fly,

Wander then delay, purposely with precision;

Relief, again, will come during the Fall rotation,

With a round-like Key: on the by-and-by.



LDS

(25th, January, 2008)





:moonstars:



Ode to Billy Bob

You thought you would weaken me
Being all brazen with your `tude
How dare you strut like that
‘come taste the mood’.

I raise the ambiance
To titillate you back
Inviting you to try on my love
Don’t gorge, just snack.

I lift my dress a smidge
And adjust my garter and hose
Careful to take in the effect
I lean over and kiss your nose.


Your hands held my face
Your tongue sent me into throws
could it be your magic
really curls my toes???

Taking off my rings
And stroking gently my wandering curls
I see you weakening
Cuz i’m not just one of those ‘girls’.

Billy Bob, you keep that up
I like you just like that
You lead, I will follow
Thanks ~ Your Playful Pussy Cat.

LDS
(10th, July, 2006)



:moonstars:


Words

my dress fits in a loose way
but your hand will never lose it's direction or impact
night or day.

the Bear in You manifests like a dare
will I shed my dress?
With your help, I stand bare.

Standing still like a deer caught in your gaze
yes Dear, I am smitten
by the energy of your haze.

My Femme energy may seem Coy
but as i slide through your legz
You realise, I am a sensual Koi.

LDS
(27th, August, 2006)


:moonstars:



i really like your poem "words"

[Kätzchen]

I'm taking a small break this morning (while having some breakfast) and I wanted to leave 2 poems today that mean a lot to me. I have long adored the works of (1) Czeslaw Milosz and recently, I have begun to learn more about a wonderful Romanian poet - (2) Nichita Stãnescu.


Burned Forest
~ Nichita Stãnescu

Black snow was falling. The tree line
shone when I turned to see -
I had wondered long and silent,
alone, trailing memory behind me.

And it seemed the stars, fixed as they were,
ground their teeth, a stiffened nexus,
an infernal machine, tolling
the halted hours of conciousness.

Then, a thick silence descends,
and my every gesture
leaves a comet tail in the heavens.

And I hear evey glance I cast
as it echoes against
some tree.

Child, what were you seeking there,
with your gangly arms and pointed shoulders
on which the wings were barely dry -
black snow drifting in the evening sky.

A horizon howling, far from view,
darting its tongues and anthracite,
dragged me forever down the mute row,
my body, half naked, sliding from sight.

In distances of smoke the town afire,
blazing beneath the planes, a frigid pyre.
We two, forest, what did we do?
Why did they burn you, forest, in a toga of ash -
and the moon no longer passes over you?

From the book "Bas-Relief with Heroes"
english translation by Thomas Carlson and Vasile Poenaru.


How It Was

~ Czeslaw Milosz

Stalking a deer I wandered deep into the mountains and from there I saw.

Or perhaps it was for some other reason that I rose above the setting sun.

Above the hills of blackwood and a slab of ocean and the steps of a glacier, carmine-colored in the dusk.

I saw absence; the mighty power of counter-fulfillment; the penalty of a promise lost forever.

If, in tepees of plywood, tire shreds, and grimy sheet iron, ancient inhabitants of this land shook their rattles, it was all in vain.

No eagle-creator circled in the air from which the thunderbolt of its glory had been cast out.

Protective spirits hid themselves in subterranean beds of bubbling ore, jolting the surface from time to time so that the fabric of freeways was bursting asunder.

God the Father didn’t walk about any longer tending the new shoots of a cedar, no longer did man hear his rushing spirit.

His son did not know his sonship and turned his eyes away when passing by a neon cross flat as a movie screen showing a striptease.

This time it was really the end of the Old and the New Testament.

No one implored, everyone picked up a nodule of agate or diorite to whisper in loneliness: I cannot live any longer.

Bearded messengers in bead necklaces founded clandestine communes in imperial cities and in ports overseas.

But none of them announced the birth of a child-savior.

Soldiers from expeditions sent to punish nations would go disguised and masked to take part in forbidden rites, not looking for any hope.

They inhaled smoke soothing all memory and, rocking from side to side, shared with each other a word of nameless union.

Carved in black wood the Wheel of Eternal Return stood before the tents of wandering monastic orders.

And those who longed for the Kingdom took refuge like me in the mountains to become the last heirs of a dishonored myth.

[Kätzchen]

As I was walking today, I found a poem that was left on the trunk of a tree - the tree was absolutely gorgeous and of course, the leaves on trees, around here, are beginning to change.


Trees

I think that I shall never see
A poem as lovely as a tree,
A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth's sweet flowing breast.
A tree that looks at God all day
And lifts her leafy arms to pray,
A tree that may in summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair.
Upon whose bosom snow has lain
Who intimately lives with rain,
Poems are made by fools like me
But only God can make a tree.

~ Joyce Kilmer
(words used by permission of Aline Kilmer)

[Kätzchen]

It's been a long while since I've written anything - prose or poetry - but I've been experiencing a lot of change in my life this past year. I am not sure how others deal with change in their lives, but since I have been through so many threshold experiences, I think the poetic side of my brain is broken (for the moment).

Well, maybe in time, things will change, yes?


Anyway, recently I was at Powell's Book store and I picked a book off the stand to browse through and it was a book of Anne Sexton's poetry. I found this poem and it spoke to my heart...



Letter Written on a Ferry While Crossing Long Island Sound

by Anne Sexton




I am surprised to see
that the ocean is still going on.
Now I am going back
and I have ripped my hand
from your hand as I said I would
and I have made it this far
as I said I would
and I am on the top deck now
holding my wallet, my cigarettes
and my car keys
at 2 o’clock on a Tuesday
in August of 1960.

Dearest,
although everything has happened,
nothing has happened.
The sea is very old.
The sea is the face of Mary,
without miracles or rage
or unusual hope,
grown rough and wrinkled
with incurable age.

Still,
I have eyes.
These are my eyes:
the orange letters that spell
ORIENT on the life preserver
that hangs by my knees;
the cement lifeboat that wears
its dirty canvas coat;
the faded sign that sits on its shelf
saying KEEP OFF.
Oh, all right, I say,
I’ll save myself.

Over my right shoulder
I see four nuns
who sit like a bridge club,
their faces poked out
from under their habits,
as good as good babies who
have sunk into their carriages.
Without discrimination
the wind pulls the skirts
of their arms.
Almost undressed,
I see what remains:
that holy wrist,
that ankle,
that chain.

Oh God,
although I am very sad,
could you please
let these four nuns
loosen from their leather boots
and their wooden chairs
to rise out
over this greasy deck,
out over this iron rail,
nodding their pink heads to one side,
flying four abreast
in the old-fashioned side stroke;
each mouth open and round,
breathing together
as fish do,
singing without sound.

Dearest,
see how my dark girls sally forth,
over the passing lighthouse of Plum Gut,
its shell as rusty
as a camp dish,
as fragile as a pagoda
on a stone;
out over the little lighthouse
that warns me of drowning winds
that rub over its blind bottom
and its blue cover;
winds that will take the toes
and the ears of the rider
or the lover.

There go my dark girls,
their dresses puff
in the leeward air.
Oh, they are lighter than flying dogs
or the breath of dolphins;
each mouth opens gratefully,
wider than a milk cup.
My dark girls sing for this.
They are going up.
See them rise
on black wings, drinking
the sky, without smiles
or hands
or shoes.
They call back to us
from the gauzy edge of paradise,
good news, good news.





Anne Sexton, “Letter Written on a Ferry While Crossing Long Island Sound” from The Complete Poems of Anne Sexton (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1981). Copyright © 1981 by Linda Gray Sexton and Loring Conant, Jr. Reprinted with the permission of Sterling Lord Literistic, Inc.

Source: The Complete Poems of Anne Sexton (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1981)






http://www.allamericanpatriots.com/files/images/long-island-sound-sunset.jpg

[Kätzchen]

(The poem below is one of many that I like very much by Czeslaw Milosz)


Bells in Winter

~C. Milosz

Riding out of Transylvanian mountains,
Through primeval forest and Carpathian ridge,
At nightfall, once, halting at the edge
Of a fording place (my companions
Had sent me to find the way), I dismounted,
And setting my horse to graze, unstrapped
The Holy Scriptures and read, rapt
By the Letters of Paul—at once I was granted
Such a gift from the rushing stream
And light of the setting sun's fire,
That the sight of evening's first star
Lulled me into a powerful dream.
A young man in ornate Greek attire
Touched my hand and said—“Time
For mortals runs like water. I've probed
Its depth to the very bottom.
In Corinth Paul rebuked me, for I robbed
My father of his wife; he barred me from
The common table of my brethren.
Since then I've been exiled from the horde
Of Saints, all these years my love of sin
Led me, poor plaything, floored
By temptation—to satisfy demands
Of eternal Damnation. But from the slime
My Lord and God, unknown that time,
Tore me with a lightning flash.
Your truths amount to nothing in his hands;
His mercy saves all living flesh.”

Awakened under the great starry skies,
Surprised by this help unexpected,
My former cares now trifles rejected,
I wiped with a kerchief my moist eyes.

I've never journeyed to Transylvania.
I didn't bring back messages to my church.
But I could have.
This is an exercise in stylistics.
The pluperfect tense
Of imperfective countries.

Instead I will tell you something that hasn't been fabricated.
The tiny street almost opposite the university
Is really called Literary Lane.
On the corner, a bookstore but no books, just drafts and sheets
Heaped to the ceiling. Unbound, tied with string,
Printed and handwritten—Latin, Cyrillic,
Hebrew letters. More than a hundred, three hundred years.
They must have been worth a fortune.
From this bookshop another could be seen,
Similar, almost facing it,
Identical proprietors: faded bears,
Long gabardine caftans, reddened eyelids.
Unchanged since the year Napoleon passed through.
Nothing has changed here. The privilege of stones?
They are that way and like it. Beyond the second shop
The lane curves along a wall, passes a house
In which a poet, famous in our city,
Wrote a tale about a Princess named Grazyna.
Right by a wooden gate with studs
Huge as fists. Under the vault, on the right,
Stairs smelling of paint, where I live.
Not that I would have picked Literary Lane,
It just happened, there was a room for rent,
With a low ceiling and a bay window, a wide oak bed,
And a stove that heated the raw winter,
Consuming logs brought from the hall
By the old servant, Alzbieta.

There doesn't seem to be any reason—
For I soon went farther way than any road
Through woods or mountains could reach—
To think about that room over here.

Yet I am one of those who believe in Apokatastasis,
A word that promises returning movement,
Not what is fixed in Katastasis,
And appears in Acts 3,21.

It means: Restoration. This was believed by Gregory of Nyssa,
Johannes Scotus Erigena, Ruysbroeck, and William Blake.

Thus each thing, for me, has a dual existence,
Both in time and when time shall no longer be.

And so one morning, in biting frost
And cold drizzle, in a dreamlike gray mist,
The air suffused with crimson light
Turning snow banks rosy, and streets made slick by runners,
Smoke and puffy steam, sledges clanging, jingling,
Horses coated with hoarfrost, each hair distance.
Then bells—from Saint John's,
The Berardines', Saint Casimir's,
The Cathedral's, The Missionaries',
Saint George's, The Dominicans',
Saint Nicholas', Saint Jacob's.
So many bells. As if all hands pulling ropes
Were erecting a solemn edifice above the city.

So Alzbieta, wrapped in her kerchief, would go to morning mass.
For a long time I've thought about the life of Alzbieta,
I could count the years but I prefer not to.
What are years, if I see the snow and her tiny shoes,
Funny, pointed, fastened on the side.
And I'm the same, though the conceit of the body
Begins and ends.

Once again chubby angels blast heir golden trumpets.
And the stoop-shouldered priest in his chasuble,
Today I'd compare him to a scarab
From the Egyptian wing of the Louvre.

Or sister Alzbieta communing with the Saints—
Witches dunked and broken on the wheel,
Under the image of the could-kissing Trinity,
Until they confessed that at night they transformed to magpies,
Serving girls taken for their masters' amusement,
Wives delivered divorce decrees,
Mothers with a package below the wall,
Leads with grimy fingernails along the letters,
When the choirmaster, a sacrificer, a Levite,
Climbing the steps, sings: Introibo ad altare Dei.
Ad Deum qui laetificat juventutem meam.

Prie Dievo kurs linksmina mano jaunyste.

Mano jaunyste.
My youth.
As long as in the ritual
Of my own words
I swing the censer and the smoke rises.

As long as I raise my voice to implore:
Momento etiam, Domine, famulorum, famularumque, tuarum
Qui nos praecesserunt.

Kurie prima masu nuejo.

What kind of year this day? Easy to remember.
A year when the Eucalyptus forests froze in our hills,
Free wood for every fireplace, enough to stock
For the rainy season and storms from the sea.
In the morning we cut logs with a chainsaw,
A strong, predatory dwarf, bursting in the roar and stench of burning.
And the bay, low, beneath us, the reveling sun,
And the towers of San Francisco, beyond the rust-colored fog.

Behind me, the same consciousness unwilling to forgive.

Perhaps only wonder will save me.

If not for that, I wouldn't dare to pronounce the prophets' words:

“Whatever can be Created can be Annihilated; Forms cannot;
The Oak is cut down by the Ax, the Lamb falls by the Knife,
But their Forms Eternal Exist forever. Amen. Hallelujah!”

“For God himself enters Death's Door and always with those that enter
and lies down in the Grave with them, in Visions of Eternity
till they awake and see Jesus in the Linen Clothes lying
that the females had woven form them and Gates of their Father's House.”

And if the city below was consumed by fire,
As well as the cities of all continents,
I would not say with my mouth of ashes it was unjust.

Judgment, which began in the year seventeen hundred and fifty-seven,
Though not for certain, perhaps in some other year.
It might come to pass in the sixth millennium or next Tuesday.
Suddenly the demiurge's workshop will silence in unimaginable stillness.
And the form of every single grain will return in glory.
I was judged in my despair, for I couldn't comprehend this.

[Kätzchen]

I crave…

Your melody: crashing against the still waters of my being;

Your crescendo: placing your fingers on the keys of my instrument, gracefully blurring every sound my keys will make.

Your delicately placed strokes on me: until my soul bursts aflame in the fire of your all-consuming hunger;

Your need to pull my hips toward your being: your provocative skill, plying me gently as I plead for release.

Your hand exploring my chasms: causing my soul to weep with the Lilies of the Valley;

Your mouth: partaking of my milk and honey; drinking every morsel, my body willingly delivers to you.

Your tongue: lapping, tasting, savoring, probing and willing my pearl to bare its luster.

Your mind: enveloping my mind; unwrapping all the gifts stored within.

Your desire to make me yours: your all-consuming kiss that pierces through me, body and soul.

Your appetite: for what I have will feed you; the depths of my being and my untouched reserves have yet to be tapped.

What is my desire?
You …


© LDS

:moonstars:

[Kätzchen]

Your love lifts my soul from the body to the sky

And you lift me up out of the two worlds.

I want your sun to reach my raindrops,

So your heat can raise my soul upward like a cloud.


~ Shahram Shiva


>>> LINK (http://peacefulrivers.homestead.com/Rumilove.html)<<<

:moonstars:

[Kätzchen]

Blue Bird Theory in Three Tings

*Ting, Ting, Ting*
From waterfalls to paddling to night-swimming in a pool
To ‘funny you should ask:’
That night, while sitting on a bar stool
Your blue eyes sparkled with mystery, and
Your beautiful pearly smile carried me across
The skies of a desert, rippling with white-hot sand

Well – ‘little did you know’ – back when we first met
I took a sip of your whiskey and I made a simple bet.
*Ting, Ting*
‘Knock, Knock,’ you came a calling
Whispering these beautiful words:
I’ll fall asleep tonight
See where they take me
Fly with the maple seeds
See if she wakes me

Counting down – 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 – in light years
Buzzing like a bee, you were, in my ears!
*Ting*
“Thy words have I hidden in my heart
That I might not sin against thee:”
I may not know where I’m going (baby)
I said, I may not know what I need
One thing, one thing’s for certain (baby)
I know what I want . . . I want you
And, thirteen moons later like the heavens in a storybook night
I rehearse your words that cause the strings of my heart to take flight.

[Kätzchen]

I'm Dancing in the Wind

All these years,
spent looking for you,
nothing could stop me
not even time anew.

For even now, in this very moment,
not much seems to be different,
even if it's left unspoken.
Unspoken or not,
sent screaming to the heavens
or downward below the seas,
the one thing that mattered
was the deftness of your reverie:
the magical presence of your wit,
the boding essence of your anger,
the reverent way your smile dented my heart,
I thought for sure, we'd never be apart.

But all those years spent looking for you,
didn't tear down any wall or uproot any painful premise,
for all the times you dared me to go on without you,
I stood here:

Dancing in the wind,
Dancing in the wind,
Dancing in the wind,
yes, my darling,
I'm dancing in the wind.

-LDS-
(c) June 30th, 2012

http://www.advancedphotoshop.co.uk/users/2715/thm1024/wind_dancer_oloferla.jpg

[Kätzchen]

Today is Sunday September 16th of 2012 and I spent the day in reflection. Recounting events of my life's journey and how I felt during times where I felt like I lost a piece of my heart or a piece of my identity; somehow thinking, during past space of time, the possibility of how I would recover parts of me that felt like I would never get them back, periods of time in which I experienced deep grief, the type of grief that shuts you down, making it near impossible to function or even rationally think about what you do to survive on a daily basis.

During those periods of my life, I was in college. College was a good place for me to heal, one could say. Not only did I have tremendous obligation to my studies but even with the formidable schedule of study, handling day to day life which was spent working too and little slices of social time, here and there, I found myself drawn to the works of Czeslaw Milosz.

I found him, in author form, one day, in the stacks of literature at my college campus library. I was wandering in the literature section and came across his name and thought to myself, "What a name this person has! They are not from the western hemisphere, I must find out what they write about, what they think upon and maybe there, in their works of literature, I may discover something about me."

Well, I did. I found out about the deep suffering Milosz endured in his home country - on the outskirts of Russia, having lived in Poland and Lithuania and during tumultuous eras of political and social strife, his family sought safety near the Carpathian Mountains - which lasted for not too long. Eventually, during the years of exile that he and his family endured, Milosz wrote about life in terms of his own worldview that was shaped by the years of exile and post-exile safety of having taught literature and linguistic studies at University of California - Berkeley.

Miloszian philosophy acts like a healing balm to me and I go through periods even today where I have to have my fill of writings authored by Milosz. I've featured two of his poems here before: How It Was & Bells In Winter. In other poetry forum threads, I've left one or two other poems of his, but cannot recall them tonight. Tonight, I leave the poem below as an offering to anyone who might find a strand of thought or glimmer of light as the read this particular Mioszian strand of thought.





Esse

I looked at that face, dumbfounded.

The lights of metro stations flew by; I didn't notice them.

What can be done, if our sight lacks absolute power to devour objects ecstatically, in an instant, leaving nothing more than the void of an ideal form, a sign like a hieroglyph simplified from the drawing of an animal or bird?

A slightly snub nose, a high brow with sleekly brushed back hair, the line of the chin - but why isn't the power of sight absolute? - and, in whiteness tinged with pink two sculpted holes, containing a dark, lustrous lava.

To absorb that face but to have it simultaneously against the background of all spring boughs, walls, waves, in its weepinng, its laughter, moving back fifteen years, or ahead thirty.

To have. It is not even a desire. Like a butterfly, a fish, the stem of a plant, only more mysterious.

And so it befell me that after so many attempts at naming the world, I am able only to repeat, harping on one string, the highest, the unique avowal beyond which no power can attain: I am, she is. Shout, blow the trumpets, make thousands strong marches, leap, rend your clothing, repeating only: is!

She got out at Raspail. I left behind with the immensity of existing things. A sponge, suffering because it cannot saturate itself, a river, suffering because reflections of clouds and trees are not clouds and trees.

Czeslaw Milosz (1954): The Collected Poems 1931 - 1987

Translated by: Czeslaw Milosz and Robert Pinsky
Copyright (c) Czeslaw Milosz and Robert Pinsky (1988).

http://s19.radikal.ru/i192/1105/be/dea1d9e96eea.jpg

[Ginger]

I crave…

Your melody: crashing against the still waters of my being;

Your crescendo: placing your fingers on the keys of my instrument, gracefully blurring every sound my keys will make.

Your delicately placed strokes on me: until my soul bursts aflame in the fire of your all-consuming hunger;

Your need to pull my hips toward your being: your provocative skill, plying me gently as I plead for release.

Your hand exploring my chasms: causing my soul to weep with the Lilies of the Valley;

Your mouth: partaking of my milk and honey; drinking every morsel, my body willingly delivers to you.

Your tongue: lapping, tasting, savoring, probing and willing my pearl to bare its luster.

Your mind: enveloping my mind; unwrapping all the gifts stored within.

Your desire to make me yours: your all-consuming kiss that pierces through me, body and soul.

Your appetite: for what I have will feed you; the depths of my being and my untouched reserves have yet to be tapped.

What is my desire?
You …


© LDS

:moonstars:



So many truly lovely lines: "willing my pearl to bare its luster"

Nice!

[Kätzchen]

I wanted to share another poem tonight by a poet I came across recently. It's called Blue Flower by Mihai Eminescu (translated by Corneliu M. Popescu). A Romanian poet too, like Nichita Stãnescu, Eminescu was heavily influenced by German philospher, Arthur Schopenhauer.
,


BLUE FLOWER


"You ride the clouds and range the sky
Your net about the stars cast;
But do remember dear at last
My soul can never soar so high.


You build tall palaces in Spain
Of fancy's fragile masonry;
You search in vain the sullen sea
And roam Assyria's plains in vain.


The pyramids their summits press
Against the clouded heavens high,
Dear heart, it is not wise to fly
Too far afield for happiness!"


T'was thus she spoke in whispers low,
Her hand laid softly on my head,
But l just laughed and nothing said,
Yet what she told was truth, l know.


"Come where cool crystal brooks complain
Their fleeting fate midst forest greens,
And where the hanging cliff out leans
As though to thunder on the plain.


And somewhere, up some little glade,
To gather raspberries we will climb,
Or sit and watch the sky sublime
From near the rushes' tasselled shade.


While many a story you will tell,
And many a lie you'll whisper too;
But l will read on petals true
You love me not, you love me well.

As rosy as an apple's rind
Will be my cheeks burnt by the sun,
And my long golden hair undone
Around your neck in coils you'll wind.


While if your lips on mine should burn
No one in all the world will know,
My hat is broad...and even so,
T'were only your and my concern.


And whet moon comes shining through
The gap where tangled branches part,
You'll hold me very close, dear heart,
And l will clasp my arms round you.


And when we walk the twilight gloom
Of forest paths that homeward run,
We'll gather many a kiss, each one
As fragrant as the violets' bloom.


And long amid the starlight glow
We'll stand to talk outside my gate,
For no one comes that way so late,
And who should care l love you so?"


Another kiss and she was gone;
Like post l stood in the moan's stream!
O beautiful beyond a dream,
O small blue flower all my own!

Alas our love that grew so fair
Has flown and faded from that hour,
O my blue flower, my blue flower!
The world is sorrow everywhere.

http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs51/i/2009/272/5/9/Blue_Flower_by_darkegion87.jpg

[Kätzchen]

AThousand Fathoms Deep

In a world where seeking the best in life
Is sometimes confused with being a saintly wife,
I thought it would be wise to strip myself bare
So I could hear the unspoken and see what’s not there.

What I found out, as I removed parts of my self,
Was that I saw great confliction and how it affects my health.
As I removed each mask with deliberate stealth,
I came to see clearly, my lack in terms of wealth.

Just like a clever, well-written haiku,
I could see how my very existence ached for you.
But the reason I am even remotely aware
Is because it’s no coincidence that I can feel how you care.

How do I know this, you might begin to ask,
I know without a doubt that life is no easy task.
Living with less amplified my need to the core,
Living with less has also proved what my soul needs more.

“It is only when you are empty
That a soul is ready for life anew…”
I swear I read that, somewhere before,
As I spent hours, upon hours, longing for you.

So, one day a few weeks ago, naturally by intuition,
I decided to improve my naked ambition.
I undressed from my life of cluttered desire,
And simplified my excess baggage and made a roaring fire.

Now as my life bursts aflame and is seen upon this altar,
I hope it gives you strength, in case your faith should falter;
Living a life that is worth more is not a price that is too steep;
It’s a selfless act of love and devotion: AThousand Fathoms Deep.

L. D. S.
© February 11, 2013

[nycfem]

Who wrote this? I love it (the most recent poem you posted).

[Kätzchen]

Who wrote this? I love it (the most recent poem you posted).

Poems penned by L. D. S. are penned by me.
There are even a few other poems in my thread,
and also in Arwen's 9-word Poetry thread, that
are penned by me (as well).

Thank you nycfembbw: for the compliment,
that you enjoyed (loved) the latest poem I penned.
:bouquet:

[Kätzchen]

Balance and Reflection

I tiptoed carefully
as I walked across
a body of water
on a log with moss,
wary of slipping
while deep in thought
wandering carefully
no fear of being distraught,
letting myself be filled
by scent ladened air
of magical ponderings
that I want to share,
tempered by the memory
to deeply care:
balance and reflection.

-LDS-

(May 11th, 2013)

http://candletales.lt/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/Kvapioji-vetiverija-1.jpg

[Kätzchen]

Melody in See Minor



Like strings plucked by time,


I hear your enchanted melody


And marvel, “Are you mine?”


If I focus long enough, I see:


I see your shadow,


I see your formidable essence,


I see your soul dancing,


And it mesmerizes me:


Luring me into a trance like state,


I breathe you in and exhale smoothly,


Eclipsing the moon and twinkling stars, of late.


I lift my face up to the sky --


Feeling incredibly high --


And, intoxicated by the very existence of you,


I feel you nearby and sigh.




© LDS


17th of May, 2013

[Kätzchen]

In light of what appears to be incessant miscarriages of justice (in the US and elsewhere around the globe), I find myself thinking about the much beloved and well respected poet, Czeslaw Milosz: Born in Poland, having survived two Totalitarian government regimes and other atrocities of his era in life, poetry by Milosz provides a way for me to make sense of a world filled with corruption and in dire need of redemption.


A Magic Mountain

by: Czeslaw Milosz (1911-2004)
translated by: Czeslaw Milosz & Lillian Vallee

I don't remember exactly when Budberg died, it was either two years ago or three.
The same with Chen. Whether last year or the one before.
Soon after our arrival, Budberg, gently pensive,
Said that in the beginning it is hard to get accustomed,
For here there is no spring or summer, no winter or fall.

"I kept dreaming of snow and birch forests.
Where so little changes you hardly notice how time goes by.
This is, you will see, a magic mountain."

Budberg: a familiar name in my childhood.
They were prominent in our region,
This Russian family, decendants of German Balts.
I read none of his works, too specialized.
And Chen, I have heard, was an exquisite poet,
Which I must take on faith, for he wrote in Chinese.

Sultry Octobers, cool July's, trees blossom in February.
Here nuptial flight of hummingbirds does not forecast spring.
Only the faithful maple sheds its leaves every year.
For no reason, its ancestors simply learned it that way.

I sensed Budberg was right and I rebelled.
So I won't have power, won't save the world?
Fame will pass me by, no tiara, no crown?
Did I then train myself, myself the Unique,
To compose stanzas for gulls and sea haze,
To listen to the foghorns blaring down below?

Until it passed. What passed? Life.
Now I am not ashamed of my defeat.
One murky island with its barking seals
Or a parched desert is enough
To make us say: yes, oui, si.
"Even asleep we partake in the becoming of the world."
Endurance comes only from enduring.
With a flick of the wrist I fashioned an invisible rope,
And climbed it and it held me.

What a procession! Quelles délices!
What caps and hooded gowns!
Most respected Professor Budberg,
Most distinguished Professor Chen,
Wrong Honorable Professor Milosz
Who wrote poems in some un-heard of tongue.
Who will count them anyway. And here sunlight.
So that the flames of their tall candles fade.
And how many generations of hummingbirds keep them company
As they walk on. Across magic mountain.
And the fog from the ocean is cool, for once again it is July.

Berkeley, 1975


"A Magic Mountain" from The Collected Poems: 1931-1987
(The Echo Press, 1988).




Poem found online ~>> HERE (http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/179564)
Biography of Milosz found ~>> HERE (http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/czeslaw-milosz#poet)

www.poetryfoundation.org (http://www.poetryfoundation.org)

[Kätzchen]

The Peace of Wild Things
~ Wendell Berry

When despair for the world grows in me
And I wake in the night at the least sound
In fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake,
And great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
Who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief.
I come into the peace of still water,
And I feel above me the day-long stars,
Waiting with their light. For a time,
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

http://imgc.allpostersimages.com/images/P-473-488-90/26/2627/DQ9MD00Z/posters/ira-block-flock-of-canada-geese-flying-over-a-lake-at-sunset-pennsylvania.jpg

[Kätzchen]

http://cdn.buzznet.com/assets/users16/keltiecolleen/default/16-inspiring-fortune-cookie-messages--large-msg-131673085307.jpg

:kissy:

[Kätzchen]

I have written lots of poems, the past few years, but lately, while having so much time on my hands, I found myself rearranging books I've kept, over the years. I came across a much loved literature studies book, found myself rereading portions of literature; then turned a page to find the poem written by Adrienne Rich. It's one of few poems that I absolutely love: Love, because it's rich with timeless wisdom, and an certain depth of agony, that I've known one or two times in life. Not something I think anyone should experience, but life often is the subtle teacher .... especially as seen and felt through the lens of Adrienne Rich.

Diving into the Wreck

First having read the book of myths,
and loaded the camera,
and checked the edge of the knife blade,
I put on
(5) The body armor of black rubber,
the absurd flippers,
the grave and awkward mask.
I am having to do this,
Not like Cousteau with his
(10) Assiduous team,
aboard the sun flooded schooner,
but here alone.

There is a ladder,
the ladder is always there
(15) hanging innocently
Close to the side of the schooner.
We know what it is for,
we who have used it.
Otherwise
(20) it's a piece of maritime floss
some sundry equipment.

I go down
Rung after rung and still
The oxygen immerses me
(25) The blue light
The clear atoms
Of our human air.
I go down
my flippers cripple me
(30) I crawl like an insect down the ladder
And there is no one
To tell me when the ocean will begin.

First the air is blue and then
(35) it is bluer and then green and then
Black. I am blacking out and yet
My mask is powerful
It pumps my blood with power
The sea is another story.
(40) The sea is not a question of power
I have to learn alone
To turn my body without force
In the deep element.

And now: it is not easy to forget
(45) What I came for
Among so many who have always
Lived here
Swaying their crenellated fans
Between the reefs
(50) and besides
you breathe differently down here.

I came to explore the wreck.
the words are purposes,
the words are maps.
(55) I came to see the damage that was done
And the treasures that prevail.
I stroke the beam of my lamp
Slowly along the flank
of something more permanent,
(60) than fish or weed.

The thing I came for
The wreck and not the story of the wreck.
the thing itself and not the myth.
The drowned face always staring
(65) Toward the sun.
the evidence of damage,
Worn by salt and sway into threadbare beauty.
the ribs of the disaster
Curving their assertion,
(70) Among the tentative haunters.

This is the place
And I am here, the mermaid whose dark hair
Streams black, the merman in his armored body,
We circle silently,
(75) about the wreck,
we dive into the hold.
I am She: I am He.

whose drowned face sleeps with open eyes,
whose beasts still bear the stress,
(80) whose silver, copper, vermeil cargo lies
Obscure inside barrels
Half wedged and left to rot
we are the half destroyed instruments
That once held to a course,
(85) the water eaten log
The fouled compass.

We are, I am, you are
By cowardice or courage
The one who find our way
(90) back to the scene
Carrying a knife, a camera,
a book of myths
In which
our names do not appear.


~~~ Adrienne Rich (1972).

[Kätzchen]

Today seems like as perfect as a time to post about another favorite poem. I have always liked the poem The Road Not Taken, by Robert Frost. In fact, thanks to a graduate level course I took a few years ago, we studied perplexing literature, literature that most always people think they understand, but actually don't.

Robert Frost's poem is, as articulately described in a blog post link that I'll leave below the poem, an poem that "...isn't a salute to can-do individualism: it's a commentary on the self-deception we practice when constructing the story of our own lives" and "the best example in all of American poetry of an wolf in sheep's clothing" and, as David Orr goes on to emphasize with profundity, that "It may be the best example in all of American culture of an wolf in sheep's clothing: -- David Orr (poetry columnist for the New York Times Book Review).

https://i2.wp.com/www.historybyzim.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/The-Road-Not-Taken-e1408286150236.png

Here's the link to the blog post by The Paris Review, which speaks to the poem authored by Robert Frost and the book authored by David Orr, The Road Not Taken: Finding America in the Poem Everybody Loves and Almost Everyone Gets Wrong (Penguin Press, 2015).

https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2015/09/11/the-most-misread-poem-in-america/

[Kätzchen]

A Song On The End Of The World

On the day the world ends
A bee circles a clover
a fishermen mends a glimmering net
Happy porpoises jump in the sea
By the rain spout young sparrows are playing
And the snake is gold skinned as it should always be.

On the day the world ends
Women walk through fields under umbrellas
A drunkard grows sleepy at the edge of the lawn
Vegetable peddlers shout in the street
And a yellow sailed boat comes nearer the island
The voice of a violin lasts in the air
And leads into a starry night.

And those who expected lightening and thunder
Are disappointed.
And those who expected signs and archangel's trumps
Do not believe it is happening now.
As long as the sun and moon are above
As long as a bumblebee visits a rose
As long as rosy infants are born
No one believes it is happening now.

Only a white-haired old man, who would be a prophet
Yet is not a prophet, for he's much too busy,
Repeats while he binds his tomatoes:

No other end to the world will there be,
No other end to the world will there be.

-- Czeslaw Milösz --

[Kätzchen]

Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees for an hundred miles through the desert repenting.

You only have to let the animal of your body love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you about mine.

Meanwhile, the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain are moving across the landscapes, over the prairies and the deep trees, the mountains and rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clear blue air, are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, the world offers itself to your imagination, calls to you like wild geese, harsh and exciting, over and over, announcing your place in things.

--- Mary Oliver
In Dreamwork
(Atlanta Monthly Press, 1986).

http://www.thesimplestencil.com/images/hd-vinyl-decal-photos/628/Wild-Geese-In-Flight-Removable-Wall-Decal-Stickers-Stencils.png

[Kätzchen]

The Peace of Wild Things
(Wendell Berry)

When despair for the world grows in me
And I wake in the night at the least sound,
In gear of what my life and children's lives might be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
Rests in his beauty on the water,
and where the Great Heron feeds,
I come into the peace of wild things,
Who do not tax their lives with forethought,
Of grief. I come into the presence of still of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars,
Waiting with their light. For a time,
I rest in the grace of the world, and I am free.

https://i.pinimg.com/736x/d6/54/d1/d654d1bf5824dbcd1a7b4af5bcdf32c0.jpg

[Kätzchen]

Touched By An Angel

Maya Angelou

We, accustomed to courage
Exiles from delight
Live coiled in shells of loneliness
Until live leaves its high holy temple
And comes into our sight
To liberate us into life.

Love arrives
And in its train come ecstacies
Old memories of pleasure
Ancient histories of pain.
Yet if we are bold,
Love strikes away the chains of fear
From our souls.

We are weaned from our timidity
In the flush of love's light
We dare be brave
And suddenly we see
That love costs all we are
And will ever be.
Yet it is only love
Which sets us free.

Angelou, M. The Complete Collected Poems Of Maya Angelou. Random House, 1994.

[Kätzchen]

Diving Into The Wreck
-- Adrienne Rich (1972)


First having read the book of myths,
and loaded the camera,
and checked the edge of the knife-blade,
I put on
the body-armor of black rubber
the absurd flippers
the grave and awkward mask.
I am having to do this
not like Costeau with his
assiduous team
aboard the sun-flooded schooner
but here alone.

There is a ladder,
The ladder is always there
hanging innocently
close to the side of the schooner.
We know what it is for,
we who have used it.
Otherwise,
it is a piece of maritime floss
some sundry equipment.

I go down,
Rung after rung and still
the oxygen immerses me
the blue light
the clear atoms
of our human air.
I go down,
My flippers cripple me,
I crawl like an insect down the ladder
and there is no one
to tell me where the ocean
will begin.

First the air is blue and then
it is bluer and then green and then
black I am blacking out and yet
my mask is powerful
it pumps my blood with power
the sea is another story
the sea is not the question of power
I have to learn alone
to trust my body without force
in the deep element.

And now: it is easy to forget
what I came for
among so many who have always
lived here
swaying their crenellated fans
between the reefs
and besides
you breathe differently down here.

I came to explore the wreck.
The words are purposes.
The words are maps.
I came to see the damage that was done
and the treasures that prevail.
I stroke the beam of my lamp
slowly along the flank
of something more permanent
than fish or weed.

The thing I came for:
the wreck and not the story of the wreck
the thing itself and not the myth
the drowned faced staring
toward the sun
the evidence of damage
worn by salt and sway into this threadbare beauty
the ribs of disaster
curving their assertion
among the tentative haunters.

This is the place.
And I am here, the mermaid whose dark hair
streams black, the merman in his armored body.
We circle silently
about the wreck
we dive into the hold.
I am she: I am he
whose drowned face sleeps with open eyes
whose breasts still bear the stress
whose silver, copper, vermei cargo lies
obscurely inside the barrels
half-wedged and let to rot
we are the half-destroyed instruments
that once held to a course
the water-beaten log
the fouled compass

We are, I am, you are
by cowardice or courage
the one who find our way
back to this scene
carrying a knife, a camera
a book of myths
in which
our name do not appear.

[Kätzchen]

It's an wistful, warm and sunny afternoon here at home. And all afternoon, in-between texts with my mother and coming across literature I've kept on my cloud drive, I came across the poem by Oriah Mountain Dreamer (The Invitation).


I saved that poem years ago, when I first came across it. It's an very favorite poem; it's strand of thoughts conveying an particular reality that's often something I struggle with - concerning ideas of relationship ideals, ideas interconnected with an culture of perfection, and the often misunderstood ideas surrounding grief, heart ache, betrayal, and 'cardinal sins' which shape your life in unexpected ways.



Especially the italicized part of Oriah's poem, below. Truthfulness and honesty carry an lot of weight (Integrity), in my world. I don't really understand this strand of thought, in this particular passage of her poem. But, I often meditate on this poetic portion of verse.



~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


The Invitation



It doesn't interest me what you do for a living:
I want to know what you ache for and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart's longing.

It doesn't interest me how old you are:
I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love, for your dream, for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn't interest me what planets are squaring your moon:
I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow, if you have been opened by life's betrayals or have become shriveled and closed from fear of further pain.

I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own, without moving to hide it, or fade it, or fix it.

I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own;
if you can dance with wildness and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful, be realistic, remember the limitations of being human.

It doesn't interest me if the story you are telling me is true:
I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself. If you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul. If you can be faithless and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see Beauty even when it is not pretty every day:
And if you can source your own life from its presence.

I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine, and still stand at the edge of the lake and shout to the silver of the full moon, 'Yes.'

It doesn't interest me to know where you live or how much money you have:
I want to know if you can get up after the night of grief and despair, weary and bruised to the bone and do what needs to be done to feed the children.

It doesn't interest me who you know or how you came to be here:
I want to know if you will stand in the center of the fire with me and not shrink back.

It doesn't interest me where or what or with whom you have studied:
I want to know what sustains you from the inside when all else falls away.
I want to know if you can be alone with yourself and if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.

~ Oriah Mountain Dreamer

https://fineartamerica.com/images-medium/pastoral-autumn-kristin-elmquist.jpg
Photo Credit: Kristin Elmquist

[Kätzchen]

https://cdn.photographylife.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Red-Sky.jpg



“The passionate heart touches the sky. The meditative mind enters it.”
― Yasmine Sherif (The Case for Humanity: An Extraordinary Session)

[Kätzchen]

Burned Forest
~ Nichita Stãnescu

Black snow was falling. The tree line
shone when I turned to see -
I had wondered long and silent,
alone, trailing memory behind me.

And it seemed the stars, fixed as they were,
ground their teeth, a stiffened nexus,
an infernal machine, tolling
the halted hours of conciousness.

Then, a thick silence descends,
and my every gesture
leaves a comet tail in the heavens.

And I hear every glance I cast
as it echoes against
some tree.

Child, what were you seeking there,
with your gangly arms and pointed shoulders
on which the wings were barely dry -
black snow drifting in the evening sky.

A horizon howling, far from view,
darting its tongues and anthracite,
dragged me forever down the mute row,
my body, half naked, sliding from sight.

In distances of smoke the town afire,
blazing beneath the planes, a frigid pyre.
We two, forest, what did we do?
Why did they burn you, forest, in a toga of ash -
and the moon no longer passes over you?

From the book Bas-Relief with Heroes
English translation by Thomas Carlson and Vasile Poenaru.

http://www.hotelsienaborgogrondaie.com/sienahotelstuscany-2016/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/stelle-cadenti-e1470816752251.jpg

[Kätzchen]

How It Was

~ Czeslaw Milosz

Stalking a deer I wandered deep into the mountains and from there I saw.

Or perhaps it was for some other reason that I rose above the setting sun.

Above the hills of blackwood and a slab of ocean and the steps of a glacier, carmine-colored in the dusk.

I saw absence; the mighty power of counter-fulfillment; the penalty of a promise lost forever.

If, in tepees of plywood, tire shreds, and grimy sheet iron, ancient inhabitants of this land shook their rattles, it was all in vain.

No eagle-creator circled in the air from which the thunderbolt of its glory had been cast out.

Protective spirits hid themselves in subterranean beds of bubbling ore, jolting the surface from time to time so that the fabric of freeways was bursting asunder.

God the Father didn’t walk about any longer tending the new shoots of a cedar, no longer did man hear his rushing spirit.

His son did not know his sonship and turned his eyes away when passing by a neon cross flat as a movie screen showing a striptease.

This time it was really the end of the Old and the New Testament.

No one implored, everyone picked up a nodule of agate or diorite to whisper in loneliness: I cannot live any longer.

Bearded messengers in bead necklaces founded clandestine communes in imperial cities and in ports overseas.

But none of them announced the birth of a child-savior.

Soldiers from expeditions sent to punish nations would go disguised and masked to take part in forbidden rites, not looking for any hope.

They inhaled smoke soothing all memory and, rocking from side to side, shared with each other a word of nameless union.

Carved in black wood the Wheel of Eternal Return stood before the tents of wandering monastic orders.

And those who longed for the Kingdom took refuge like me in the mountains to become the last heirs of a dishonored myth.


__________________________________________________ ______
__________________________________________________ ______
__________________________________________________ ______

Czeslaw Milosz is an widely respected author of poetry, prose and historical accounts of two totalitarian regimes he survived, during his life time. Milosz is an Polish literature author (Nobel Laureate), who has since passed on, once taught at UC-Berkeley. He's my favorite author of all time (hands down).

To learn more about Milosz, click this ~~>>>>>> LINK (https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/czeslaw-milosz) and this ~~>>>>>> LINK (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Czesław_Miłosz).

The first book I ever read of his was The Captive Mind (1953), for which he earned the Nobel Prize in Literature.

https://d1w7fb2mkkr3kw.cloudfront.net/assets/images/book/lrg/9780/1411/9780141186764.jpg

[Kätzchen]

Once in a blue moon, I feel inspired to share a poem that has meant a lot to me, even if the poem is authored by someone else other than me. I've shared a few of the poems I've written over the years, but I've also shared poems authored by others whose poetry has helped me to process what I think and feel about things in the world.

Today, I want to share the poem penned by Leonard Cohen: Anthem. It's off his 1992 album, titled The Future.

My favorite strand of thought from his poetic verse, is as follows:

"There's a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in." ~ Leonard Cohen (Anthem).



Anthem

by Leonard Cohen


The birds they sang
At the break of day
Start again
I heard them say
Don't dwell on what
Has passed away
Or what is yet to be

Yeah the wars they will
Be fought again
The holy dove
She will be caught again
Bought and sold
And bought again
The dove is never free

Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in

We asked for signs
The signs were sent:
The birth betrayed
The marriage spent
Yeah the widowhood
Of every government
Signs for all to see

I can't run no more
With that lawless crowd
While the killers in high places
Say their prayers out loud
But they've summoned, they've summoned up
A thundercloud
And they're going to hear from me

Ring the bells that still ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in

You can add up the parts
You won't have the sum
You can strike up the march
There is no drum
Every heart, every heart
To love will come
But like a refugee

Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in


Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in
That's how the light gets in
That's how the light gets in



http://cdn3.volusion.com/zausr.eprhq/v/vspfiles/photos/6187-2T.jpg




Link to story about this particular song by Cohen is found @ Quartz magazine ( HERE (https://qz.com/835076/leonard-cohens-anthem-the-story-of-the-line-there-is-a-crack-in-everything-thats-how-the-light-gets-in/)).

[Kätzchen]

Here is a poem I penned and contributed to Arwen's 9 words: a poetry challenge thread (http://www.butchfemmeplanet.com/forum/showpost.php?p=798623&postcount=1849):

9 words:
perfection, beauty, truth, damaged, trick, proud, demons, pretty, control


~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


Hiding behind the veneer of
damaged beauty, is
nothing but sheer love
of self interest, in
the name of proud demons
not worthy of a sinner's reproach.
Truth is, control is no
Perfection:
It's a trick, if you trade
Self worth ---
In exchange for
What's yours, by birth.

-Kätzchen-
(May 14th, 2013)

[Kätzchen]

I was browsing through a personal collection of favorite poems, this morning, and came across a poem by Sara Teasdale. When I read it, it felt like Teasdale was describing how I feel, right now, about the person I spend my time with and dearly love with all my heart. I dedicate this poem to my love (James) for all the many ways he lights a fire in my soul. Indeed, I am 'swept by the tempest of (James's) love'. :stillheart:


~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


I Am Not Yours

by Sara Teasdale


I am not yours, not lost in you,
Not lost, although I long to be
Lost as a candle lit at noon,
Lost as a snowflake in the sea.

You love me, and I find you still
A spirit beautiful and bright,
Yet I am I, who long to be
Lost as a light is lost in light.

Oh plunge me deep in love—put out
My senses, leave me deaf and blind,
Swept by the tempest of your love,
A taper in a rushing wind.

[Kätzchen]

https://i.pinimg.com/736x/00/3d/d7/003dd7d2e3d6861bdf33242082d484e0.jpg

[Kätzchen]

https://boomsumo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/I-Love-You-Poems-Never-Imagine-My-Life-Without-You-Stay-My-Love.jpg