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Raven

This is my 16th terzanelle, and the longest one I’ve written. This is also my first attempt to alternate between four meters in a consistent fashion. You should find that, starting with the second tercet, there is an interlocking pattern of hypercatalectic iambic pentameter, iambic pentameter, catalectic trochaic pentameter and trochaic pentameter. They’re all pentameters, but four different types woven together in a sort of braid. I was curious to see what the effect of this patterning would be. For the most part, I’m not unhappy with the results.

Raven

rugged feathers brush against my neck
something perches staunchly on my shoulder
croaking wisdom through an unseen beak

it seems an ancient being shrewd and sober
black as empty space between the stars
something perches staunchly on my shoulder

i sense a stern reproach to all my fears
dreads that formed from countless gripping losses
black as empty space between the stars

with rigid countenance it keenly watches
game to see me through each anxious qualm
dreads that formed from countless gripping losses

it came from somewhere in the subtle realm
skies abruptly filled with calling ravens
game to see me through each anxious qualm

this spirit somehow heard my lamentations
cries of savage pain that shook the clouds
skies abruptly filled with calling ravens

they soothe my grief in smooth or raucous chords
offered ever since they found me wailing
cries of savage pain that shook the clouds

this spirit and their spirits ever sailing
pass to me a gift of light and song
offered ever since they found me wailing

with rough and yet a clear enlightened tongue
subtle caws resounding in my spirit
pass to me a gift of light and song

whenever all is still i feel and hear it
rugged feathers brush against my neck
subtle caws resounding in my spirit
croaking wisdom through an unseen beak

Ravens have been special to me my entire life. Everyone who knows me for any length of time will eventually notice that ravens behave a little differently around me than they do other people. They still act like ravens, but they seem to show an awareness of me that they don’t of others. Maybe one day I’ll end up befriending one of these birds and I can study its behavior more closely. They’re fascinating beings.

Publication History:

Blue Unicorn — Winter 2004

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The Lotus Tree

I was inspired to write this poem after one of my full moon visits to a particular redwood tree that grows near a place called Usal Beach, north of Fort Bragg, California. It’s a remote beach, accessible only by six miles of dirt road, after driving at least 60 odd miles of remote highway. Most redwoods grow straight up, a single spire swaying up to the clouds. However something has inspired this tree to grow very differently. About fourteen feet from the ground it suddenly spreads out into about thirty individual spires, each of which have grown over the years into mature redwoods. When seen from a short distance, the effect is that of looking upon an enormous chandelier. I call her “The Lotus Tree” because of the whorl-like pattern of her individual spires.

This tree has a strong presence about her. And judging by the path that winds up to her knees through a grove of similarly twisted redwoods—though none so spectacular as herself—it would seem that she has connected with quite a few people over the years. Knowing her has been one of the great blessings of my life.

The Lotus Tree

This poem has been published in my book an inkling hope: select poems, available in Kindle and paperback formats. Out of consideration for those who have purchased a copy, I have removed it from this post and online viewing in general.

This poem was incorporated into my villanelle/terzanelle project, so “the grove” and “full moon visit” are my 15th and 16th villanelles, respectively, and “the sagess” and “astral visit” are my 14th and 15th terzanelles, respectively.

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Lost

This was inspired by some personal reflection on the effects of modern development on the Australian Aboriginal songlines. I imagine that they’ve been disrupted to an extreme. Some things are simply not meant to be disturbed.

Lost

the sacred markers are gone
rusted rocks moved aside
magnificent beech and myrtle cut down
even once immovable markers defiled
that cliff face on the east of the valley
cut for quarry
that granite outcrop once there on the hilltop
bulldozed for a mall
the songlines are lost
scarred by countless hands
yellow machines billowing black smoke
there is no way back to the dreaming

rivers shifted off course
plains cleared and plowed
canyons gutted for ore
fences barb borderless boundaries
even the clouds are dirty

i once walked the songlines
heart that i was
i knew the markers and respected them
soul that i was
there in the dreaming before all this
but i have lost my way
i cannot find the markers
how shall i return to the dreaming

everything has been sacrificed
the way is lost
all is forgotten
lessons of the ancients
guidance of our ancestors
spurned and rejected
they weep for us even now
they walk among us watching
even they cannot find the markers
ripped from the earth
songlines erased for the next ten thousand years
even they are lost from the dreaming
wandering among us
crowding the rooms of our angular homes and towers
flowing in limpid flood throughout our lanes
moaning and wailing soundlessly like drizzle
sharing our torment

the way is lost
the dreaming lost

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Transmigrant Memory

She has a connection with horses that is difficult to understand or explain. I’ve met people like this over the years, including my friend Del. Maybe they’re remembering something from a previous existence? Following this train of thought, I found myself writing this poem, my 12th villanelle.

Transmigrant Memory

For Bonnie

Horses race upon the fields; thunder rolls within the earth,
Where laughing neighs are echoed up the canyons to the peaks;
Lightning flashes in her eyes, dark eyes full of silent mirth.

She storms amid the thronging herd; all the valley holds its breath,
Where jays watch from the aspens, ravens from the elder oaks;
Horses race upon the fields; thunder rolls within the earth.

Billowed sepia-colored mane whips across her chestnut cloth
And dances in the ether, blown in long unfurling arcs;
Lightning flashes in her eyes, dark eyes full of silent mirth.

Each passing nimbus rains a mist, morphing like some giant wraith,
And shadows cast below them briefly dim the verdant brooks;
Horses race upon the fields; thunder rolls within the earth.

Feelings flood her human heart; karma wrought a human path;
Where deep within her nature something equine rears and strikes,
Lightning flashes in her eyes, dark eyes full of silent mirth.

A knowing broods within her soul, welling up to issue forth,
And somehow she remembers; visions fill her heart with aches—
Horses race upon the fields; thunder rolls within the earth;
Lightning flashes in her eyes, dark eyes full of silent mirth.

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Presence

For most of my life I have felt a presence, always near. And though I have never heard its voice, I can sometimes feel its influence on my thoughts. I’ve often thought that it could be an angel. This, my 11th villanelle, reflects upon this lifelong presence and its influence on my existence.

Presence

A gentle guiding whisper touched my mind,
Behind the din and chaos, where subtle voices speak,
And counseled with a wisdom firm and kind.

Although I faced the world without a friend,
Among the thronging masses, alone within my grief,
A gentle guiding whisper touched my mind.

A being came from somewhere far beyond,
Beyond this realm of vision, a place we cannot see,
And counseled with a wisdom firm and kind.

My heart was pulled to view the spaces grand,
Where filled with awe I trembled, while always there unseen,
A gentle guiding whisper touched my mind.

Where dreams and waking vision merge and blend
A shade has often offered encouragement discreet
And counseled with a wisdom firm and kind.

I ventured far and wide a vagabond,
And when I ached with hunger or shivered in the breeze,
A gentle guiding whisper touched my mind
And counseled with a wisdom firm and kind.

Publication History:

One-In-Four — May 2004

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Aeolian Strains

There is a real live aeolian harp about smack in the middle of New Mexico. I saw a picture of it online some years ago, and in 2004 decided it was time to go visit this living art piece. It was conceptualized and built by a medical doctor turned astronomer, Bill Neely, and his friend Bob Griesing, during June and July of 2000. The owners of the Traditions Shopping Center in the Mimbres Valley commissioned its construction and installation, and not long after they let it fall into disrepair.

It may just be a thing of metal to most, but to me anything that harnesses the wind or manifests music is itself alive, and this does both. And not just alive, but conscious and life-affirming. It was a sad thing for me to find it there, like a wounded animal, still facing the sand-blown wind to play its injured song.

A week after I visited this neglected oracle in January of 2004, I found myself writing this poem, my 10th terzanelle, in Flagstaff, Arizona where I was waylaid on my way back home by a nasty cold.

Aeolian Strains

Neglected with a broken string, the harp turns toward the wind,
And plays the subtle song of distant desert moods;
A song that’s lost amid the sound of reckless worldly din.

This singing weather-vane, the song of which would soothe,
Stands in a field of novelties, an oracle ignored,
And plays the subtle song of distant desert moods.

An art piece with a living soul, from mystic magic born,
The voice of whispered dreams, harmonic and serene,
Stands in a field of novelties, an oracle ignored.

In random moments brief, the mad rush grants reprieve,
Enough to hear the vibrant strings exhale with gentle breath
The voice of whispered dreams, harmonic and serene.

Or, gusts are sprung upon the chords that bring a bold caress,
Where heavy song is raised in timbres manifold,
Enough to hear the vibrant strings exhale with gentle breath.

She’s like a fallen angel, lamenting all alone—
Neglected with a broken string, the harp turns toward the wind,
Where heavy song is raised in timbres manifold,
A song that’s lost amid the sound of reckless worldly din.

Publication History:

Illuminations — Spring 2005

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Cloud

This poem, my 7th villanelle, is inspired by the visual and psycho-spiritual effects of cloudscapes moving up the canyon where I live in Brooktrails, near Willits, California. The clouds rise up the canyon all the way from Willits, which is 10 some odd miles away. They phase through tall redwoods and bold madronas as they obscure plots and houses in heavy shifting mists that reveal and reconceal a hidden world of thought and green.

Cloud

This poem has been published in my book an inkling hope: select poems, available in Kindle and paperback formats. Out of consideration for those who have purchased a copy, I have removed it from this post and online viewing in general. However, the above player can still be used to listen to it.

Publication History:

The Lyric — Spring 2004

Illuminations — Spring 2005

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Night Walk

There is a State Nature Reserve of old growth coastal redwoods called Montgomery Woods about 30 miles west of Ukiah, California. On full moons nights, as the great sky-pearl climbs toward zenith, I’ll drive out to this reserve and walk the three mile loop through these woods, up one side of the long narrow vale and back down the other.

This poem, my 6th villanelle, reflects upon those walks and their effects on my being.

Night Walk

This poem has been published in my book an inkling hope: select poems, available in Kindle and paperback formats. Out of consideration for those who have purchased a copy, I have removed it from this post and online viewing in general.
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Silent Consolements

Maybe there is something in the spirit of nature itself that reaches out to nurture those children who are born into the absolute worst of conditions. Maybe it is not just an instinctive will to survive that pulls such newborns through scorn, abuse, and repulsion.

This poem, my 5th villanelle, reflects on the notion that there are spirits within the wilderness, even though it may have been completely “developed” over by man, that reach out and try to protect on some level the nascent sentience of newborn human life when it finds itself festering, neglected and malnourished, in a puddle of terror, neglect, and disease.

Silent Consolements

Vaulting crags called down to one, who cried within the crib,
Squalling shrieks of unmet need that hailed to no avail;
Voiceless hopes were whispered on the rasping desert winds.

Scents from coarsely pillared halls would sooth with subtle kiss;
Lakes like mirrors mimed the stars from vales in mountains tall;
Vaulting crags called down to one, who cried within the crib.

Shadows pooled in pulseless ponds where aimless fancies swim;
Hints of sagebrush shrugged the dark where with a fragrant lull
Voiceless hopes were whispered on the rasping desert winds.

Streams in yawning canyons raced beneath their tufting mists,
Leaping down cascading cliffs, and guarding every fall,
Vaulting crags called down to one, who cried within the crib.

Dawn and dusk each passed in turn with burning pastel drift;
Colors paused on peak and plain where passing all the while
Voiceless hopes were whispered on the rasping desert winds.

Life began in bleak despair, too deep for one to live;
Sorrows crushed a tiny heart, but soundless through the pall,
Vaulting crags called down to one, who cried within the crib—
Voiceless hopes were whispered on the rasping desert winds.

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Path by Moon

Inspired by my many full moon walks in the Montgomery Woods, a State Nature Reserve of old growth redwoods about 30 miles west of Ukiah, California, this poem—my 4th villanelle—invites you to leave the wide and beaten path to venture into the mystic unknown of personal exploration. This “path by moon” is a metaphor for the discovery and pursuit of ones own unique path in life.

Path by Moon

This poem has been published in my book an inkling hope: select poems, available in Kindle and paperback formats. Out of consideration for those who have purchased a copy, I have removed it from this post and online viewing in general. However, the above player can still be used to listen to it.

Publication History:

Zephyr (web-based) — May 2004

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Moonpines

After nearly a year of spending most full moons deep in the Montgomery Woods, a State Nature Reserve of old growth coastal redwoods about 30 miles west of Ukiah, California, I felt compelled to dedicate a poem to my experiences therein. One peculiar trait of a forest of old growth redwoods during a full moon is the tendency for one among the towering ranks to fall entirely in the path of moonlight. It only lasts for a few moments to a few minutes, but the effect is absolutely striking, echoing deep into the psyche for all time. This is my 8th terzanelle.

Moonpines

         Montgomery Woods at Full Moon
            Mendocino County, CA
                Winter, Spring and Summer of 2003

Gently gleaming from shadowed depths, a single pillar shines,
Held in place by the full moon’s gaze, suspended on the night;
Bold within the enshrouded gloom, the silent moonbeam climbs.

Vaulted high into moonstone heights, both bark and bough alike
Etch mosaics of subtle hue in countless shapes and shades,
Held in place by the full moon’s gaze, suspended on the night.

Shifting softly with light subdued, the moon with traces vague
Brushes ever so faint the forms where rays, diffuse and dim,
Etch mosaics of subtle hue in countless shapes and shades.

Slowly walking, devoid of thought, low glimmers skim the skin,
Moonlight faint as a whisper’s breath, with tingle and tickle touch,
Brushes ever so faint the forms where rays diffuse and dim.

Sitting down where the wood is deep amid the moonshade hush,
Downy zephyrous breezes join the opal-toned caress,
Moonlight faint as a whisper’s breath with tingle and tickle touch.

Sudden, deep in the patterned depths one massive tree is blessed,
Caught entranced by the moon’s embrace, and all my heart is thrilled;
Downy zephyrous breezes join the opal-toned caress.

Here my spirit escapes the mind and laves in peace until
Gently gleaming from shadowed depths, a single pillar shines,
Caught entranced by the moon’s embrace, and all my heart is thrilled;
Bold within the enshrouded gloom, the silent moonbeam climbs.

Publication History:

Blackmail Press (web-based) — Spring 2006