Dead days

The Oracle feels the winter too. Once again the rose is the symbol of hope.

Dead days

I want there to be music, not this ache
just beneath the light that never shines,
not the bitterness of tongues
that cannot form words of compassion,
those men who place a finger to their lips.

The lake is bleak today, gunmetal grey,
mirroring the light that never shines,
full of cold breath and water running
to the sea, beneath a canopy of ice.

The moon is dead, turned into the cold night,
and frost-mist rises around our feet,
one with the sky, cloud-fog filling
our dreamless sleep.

The roses too sleep within their frozen buds,
licked and furred with hoarfrost,
dreaming of the light that shone and will shine.
They will not recall these dead days.

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Oracle 1. 2. and 3.

Today, I stuck with the words the Oracle gave me, more or less in the order they appeared. The first poem was strange, and I know what I think it means, and it’s not something I’d be comfortable putting my name to. So I asked for another, also strange, and the third one is so sad I gave up. She’s in one of those moods today.

Oracle 1

Those are not women,
this not their honey-garden.
Their screams rise like bubbles
into the elusive pink
of an unattainable sky.

Sleep, she says, and dream,
rolling back the mistaken paths,
find the origin, unadorned,
not an idol to worship,
no entrapment, but the true light of day.

Listen to the singing,
the songs that have always been,
immutable as the bed of the sky,
the silent stars,
the stuff of our making.

Oracle 2

Sun like wind roars red
we have one skin
yours is black
a man-smell
I watch it rust
in the frantic blowing.

Could it be
we are only dreaming
of this cool forest
its dark gentle depths?

Oracle 3

Who put out the lie
that spring was coming fast
and I would be with you?

From this rock
all I can see is water
neither you nor diamonds
and the men taking you away.

Hope springs eternal

The Oracle poured this out in a rapid silver stream. Grateful to whoever/whatever she is.

Hope springs eternal

It runs beside me that bright gleam
and sings between the banks
of the diamond stream.

I hear its heart beat steady
as a deep deep sleep

and taste all the honey of the world
in its rough raw breath.

Sun rain I turn my face to both
until the ache has washed away
and the sky rises clear and high

so I can see the wheeling hawks
hear their cry.

There will be no more madness
in these coming days no bitterness
searching through the rubble of the past

I leave the husks and shells for the woods
with squirrel panache to whisk away

and walk with you the gleaming path
of the eternal mother’s way.

Turning leaves

Turning leaves

Storm cloud points a finger,
and the wind screams. The sky
streaks with petal-pink as the sun
rises, and eaves drip diamonds.

This last day of the calendar year
is just a day, full of light and shadow.
No god will be offended, turn his face
either backwards or forwards.

The sun is a distraction; there
should be frost. We should strain
into icy fog where our dreams
of spring are cocoon-curled.

They are there across the red water
of another sunset, swimming in tepid
pools, curled inside sunburst eggs, the
stirring roots of the garden-in-waiting.

The slide will be gentle; the green
is already here, bird music already
playing spring chords. There will be
no sadness turning over new leaves.

A painted day dream

I’m very late visiting the Oracle. I tried yesterday and ran out of time. Tried to pick up where I left off, but she gave me this instead.

A painted day dream

It was a painting of sun on water,
white sand, a paradise, so far from
the grey, the ordinary things.
I imagined walking the woods
of a tiny tongue of land, misted
by distance, its low hills
lapping the sea, a green largo
in a concerto for blue and gold.

By the mere

The Oracle gave me a story poem. I’ve just come back from wandering in the woods by the stream and found a large pond, long and meandering, among the trees.

By the mere

I heard her first, her quiet sobbing
by the mere among the trees,
there was no wind.

My feet among the dead leaves sounding
loud as horses hooves, I waited,
standing still.

Her gown I glimpsed was russet red,
a hind, she was, so hard to see
among the trees,

until she shook her dark hair, raised
her face so pale, so fair, and stood
upon the bank.

The woods sobbed with despair and sorrow,
as soundless as a bird she dived,
red salmon-leap.

Too late, I cried out, wait, not yet!
The bramble brake barred still my way
the path too long.

The mere was smooth and not a ripple
marked the place where she had gone.
The water dark

as winter nights without the stars
was undisturbed, no pale face raised,
to see the sky for one last time,
was to be seen.

The woman-peach says

Been too busy to compute for the last few days. I grabbed a short ‘hello’ from the Oracle and will get back to reading catching up later this afternoon.

The woman-peach says

this garden is full of life-juice,
though the wind howls,
the days swell with winter cloud,
and our hearts ache
for the careless days of summer warm.

Though hoarfrost coats dark branches
thick as rust on wrought iron,
the ship is there, riding soft billows,
laden with roses.

This garden

The Oracle knows what’s on my mind.

This garden

This garden soothes like the breast of the sea,
like the shell of an egg in a wild bird’s nest,
like a pebble as pale as herons’ wings,
in the rippling shallows beneath the sun.
It soothes like the head of a long-lost dog,
laid on my lap, the look in his eyes
deep as the sea, soft as foam and feathers,
confused with those wisps of hurrying clouds.

Ask

The Oracle gave me a cadralor that I condensed into a different type of rhythmed poem.

Ask the wind where the light has gone
the green of spring.
I see it only in prismed hues
of rain-shot arcs,

in purple cloud of sunsets, gold
that briefly breaks
through storm-dark then is swallowed up,
so none remains.

The rocks that dream in red and black
could ask the sea,
the waves that washed away the rose,
pale petals lost.

But ask her, in the pearling mist,
she’ll tell you why
blue is grey and only lake birds call—
cold winter’s here.

Five badger songs

The Oracle gave me these. I don’t feel peaceful, but she probably knows that.

Five badger songs

1
The birds
sing less and less
sky a mist of shadows
this light too dim to see
forests—we wait
for spring.

2
Shanties
sea songs gull-screamed
dancing across wild waves
borne on the seals’ hoarse bark
follow the stars
to me.

3
Gardens
are winter-sad
rose music is silent
dreaming of better days
remembering
bee-song.

4
Raining
on the river
where fish swim regardless
dim waterworld soaring
where weed-wisps wave
like clouds.

5
Night dark
only starlight
on the lake pale glitter
aeons away falling
soft as summer
raindrops.