Highland Encounter

 

No Poem

Ivory Woman

 

The fissures were dark as the baked clay path

forsaken by water and all the gods

who walk the earth

who hold grim sway over moisture's moods.

 

Deep gaping cracks,

mouths howling for the wet

to gel the fibers,

find their way to her once smooth ivory face

now scarred .

So we raced her forward, her tribe, her lovers,

her cousins from the mountains.

We found her man singing to broken flowers

and carried him to the wedding day

where she was draped in a foreign cloth

spun solely from the

memories of bees.

 

Anxious and benevolent priests

blew silver horns

as her marred and glorious head shone

as if a wounded butterfly.

And as they nodded in time honoured fashion,

like the skitterings of small animal feet,

as pale tappings on the doors of dreams,

among the leaves and desperate dirt...

the first drops of heavy healing rain.

Lady Cameron and Cow

 

Not at first did she notice the

loosening of shackles.

It took every well

she ever called hers

to dry up before the first hint.

But as the bats in her stone house

now called that place home,

prison bars began crumbling.

'Shedding the stuff!" A banner in her head.

Tight shoes from the walker,

barnacles from the gray whale,

unfit mate from the sad young heart.

The liberation of loss was upon her

to stifle the ache

to salve the wounds.

She had after all her rings,

and a fine highland cow called Doris.

Leopard Skin Pillbox Hat

 

She had some spots

which she refused to change,

ingrained, darkly hidden.

A source of amusement and terror

but only to herself.

Perhaps they ought to be changed

but to what?

Wisdom fashioned by the years,

informed by the socially slick,

wrought in places of spiritual scrutiny?

 

Conformity once more bustled imperiously,

but champions of the bright spots

grow tedious

as she contemplates her rough hewn secrets,

so she decides on the familiar...

there just aren't enough leopards to go around.

Muriel's Crow

 

No Poem

Muriel's Flight

 

No Poem

Muriel's Miracle

 

No Poem

Through the Wallpaper

 

First many hues and textures

of every love I've ever had

ripping through the gaping fabric

stopping long enough to stab and soothe

with cobweb thoughts

the long since tended yesterdays

frail with inattention.

 

When rose and thorn both slithered off

came all at once the bright toothed demon

from time beleaguered

snapping at the once strong ropes

secured to better futures.

Chewed them till the hopes long nurtured

in social clearing devoid of hurt

were spat out bloodied.

Ropes and hopes now stained the paper

that stuck upon my lonely wall.

 

But this parade was never over,

ghouls and tawny dancing bears

bowed and leered with equal focus

till the shards of this good moment

flew all together in white dove splendour ,

brought up the rear of this invasion

polished the present with brightest caring,

then through the wallpaper gone again.

Past the Village

 

No Poem

The Call

 

I thought I heard a call

around the valley floor

it rang.

My name I think

but I'm not sure.

To heed the call is brave

and to climb outside

the mountain walls.

Brave or foolish

if it was the name of another.

Warrior Queen

 

I have no bravery to match

no faith to gird the pulp

The causes steeped in young man's dreams

have leeched and drained away.

 

Passion that once swelled my chest

is brittle as dry stick

This world has sucked the strength

from me

like marrow from the bone.

 

Yet she rises as a beast disturbed

the morning in her teeth

and everything that I can't be...

is she.

Talks With The Sea

 

Can I really trust you I ask ?

Just out of reach of your foamy fingers

stories dying in mariners' throats

you claim still as your own.

And do you mull and tell or ever feel

the need to share their

drowned and stunted wisdom,

their bright futured hope,

their lovers' quickened sighs.

Fair your shingled gurgled laugh

and fairer yet your wind tossed plume

when juggling you perform,

your calm and strong backed sunset skin.

 

Sometimes in your briny blood we dance

when dry and gritty air

drives us to your summer palace.

A venerable family friend you are

with loving whispers in your teeth

when straggling cousin,

your tide caressing moon

draws us to a treacherous edge

with unfit partner.

I spin gloriously

in your best and bountiful neighbourhood

I cry in your rock pools for a nearness to God,

fall as a child into your cool limbed embrace

and trust you will be fair.

 

And what think you of me ,

if ever behind your sad eyed face you do ?

A fellow sojourner perhaps

or just another stolen story,

trust corralled,

with which to feed the hungry fish

your teeming henchmen.

The Queen Returns

 

Through dusty floors I drag

this faded ermine cloak.

Mosaic windows hold back the light

but not enough

The matted, grubbiness shows.

Royal blood ,thin as death's eyelids

slither in my dark bent shape.

This sharp flinty kingdom has lost its friend.

 

Yet... somewhere, not near,

church bells are fiercely sounding

footsteps clatter in my house of stone.

“She comes ! She comes !”

a cry of hope rings down in the street

and my old eyes now shine in the scattering gloom .

 

“The queen ! The queen !”

A quickening pulse beneath this hood of shame

and this cast-off robe of offense

discarded on the chilly flagstones,

lies as a conquered beast,

till her feet, warm and strong

chase away this dust of death.

Under Northern Skies

 

It was a boat like no other

from a rich uncle

in the big city, from Glasgow.

Instant promotion

like when the two sided jacket

came from Toronto

Silk... a tiger and an eagle.

 

Undisguised envy from the others,

...snotty nosed kids .

A gleaming varnished deck

sails as white as sheep head bone.

Miles of string

to give it a sense of freedom,

but that it might still know its owner.

 

Up the mill dam

the rain as faithful as any mongrel

out there proud it was

knifing through the black,

but still belonging.

My very own falcon.

A friend I could depend on

under Northern skies.

Catch the Wave

 

On waves of hope and of despair

the spirit, cork-like floats.

On terrible swells and breakers

we glide like any surfer.

 

Expert we are at not going too deep ..

too soon.

While I Was Sleeping...

 

While I was sleeping mushrooms grew

and half mankind or more

went hungry to their bed.

When I was wrestling succubus

bloodless leaves, pale and homeless

fell to indifferent sod.

 

AS I squeezed uncomfortable pillow

empires slowly grew

in dark and hostile gardens

and while I gasped a dream away

a foreign child

breathed first astonishing air.

 

While I was sleeping mushrooms grew

and a door in heaven opened softly wide

while lovers listened

with darkness on their smiling lips

and woodland beasts would make no plan

nor know regret.

Wise old men with intact answers

pale and bloodless to their own sod fell

as this blue ball spins in the nocturne.

 

While I was sleeping mushrooms grew ...

today I will pick mushrooms.

White Bird in the White Tree

 

White bird in the white tree,

Love in the poor man's house,

A smile on the busy street ,

The truth among the lies

Why?

 

Side by side on this withering path

the answers hunker down.

Behind a cereal box on grocer's shelf,

or in hermit's cave

on a battered island

out of view

from headland's scrutiny.

 

Hide and seek the chosen discipline

as solutions mock

but happier now with mystery than before...

I am not provoked to chase and grasp.

 

Side by side on this withering path

the answers peek and call

yet smugness now must dissipate

like morning mist

from scree filled hills

and supermarket aisles

for I have caught the flash of glorious thigh

and...

though sadly battle scarred

I know...

the game is on again.

The Windmill Girl

 

My dark, broad shouldered friends

sit and circle me

with clinging night

their foggy words swirl all around,

words of breath, their story now

attends me.

 

“ Windmill girl, gaze eyed at the dying day

when all the world found lovers

finds her tears among the musty flour.

Her desolation ...

her only fierce companion

beneath the yellow ripped sky.

 

Early night owl on the sill

eyes as big as the thoughts of gods

leads her through the stuttering leaves

past the tree where the robber hung

to the lake where the howling started.

 

Close by a window where a witch was leering

near the faerie twitching peat bog

beyond that place that no one speaks of

through St. Leonard's forest

where the last dragon died.

 

And sleeping 'neath a

bush of moonflowers

wearing his life upon his face

and hands that made a wild horse tame

was he. “

 

Then my dark and true companions

slipped from their shoulders

their cloaks of jet,

let the streams of morning

invade our circle..

as a feather fell upon my head.