Tag Archives: Sounds

Prima(l)

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From 2015…..

^#^#^#^#^#^#^#^

They wander, and yonder they go in the dark
with glow sticks, beyond
them the moonlight, and barks
the taffeta, heavy-set makeup and screams-
the night of the beggar, of horrors and dreams.

The rustle of paper, the rattle of chains-
Billy and Molly fight over the brains.
The princess and pirate, too shy to speak up
the conjuring words while Dad just drinks up.

A drop in the bucket-a thump in the night
the blood of the ghoulish departed from sight.
The clown with the paste face, the witch all in black
the ogres and goblins all stomp and attack.

The flapping of ravens, the quiet of stares
at once-a-year play acting- acute and with scares.
Then beating the pavement and swarming the lawns
the tidal rush crushes, and then they are gone.
All manner of monsters and bold super-kids
Just listen for drumbeats, like Gene Krupa did.

*************
Soundtrack prior to writing/reading this poem: Sing, Sing, Sing.

eau

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a fragrant voice,
a merging sound
to gather yellow, red and crowned

in a glottal stop
between the soundings
of the clock.

in a fashion, step
betwixt the puddle
stones and ripples, mixed.

lovers with their grasping hands-
arose, then reached at its command
and cleaved the blood-pricked
thorn, alone

in silence
and in clamored tones.

present perfect

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I do not wish to know
tomorrow’s faint and slow
ascent, nor do I care to see
if yesterday was lithe with glee –
Wasn’t last year so obsessed
and burdensome?
We can attest.
And back ten years, if sighted, could
we not have worried where we stood?

To keeping in the ‘now on scene’,
I hope that all my words are keen
and opening new each day
-as morning glories say –

that past affronts have gone to sour
and I embrace a blooming flower
that opens with the sun.

And here I have begun.

I find it in the feet of bell tones

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I find it in the feet of bell tones,
after sorbing the sound as struck and deep.

I see the auric crest at the tip of leaves
in the moments of late summer’s wanton eve.

I feel the arc that bows in honor
of poetry heard, and hopes that won’t cease.

I hear it in the intake of calm
from the instant of lighting, the droning that sleeps.

It caresses the silence just beyond music,
and lingers on fingertips framed in release.

It walks in the tawny remembrance of noon-tide,
and ploys in the finish of our masterpiece.

And sounding the whisper of midnight and morning,
the tolling of hours when time passes, sweeps

away the cache of conflagration
leaving morsels we should keep.

I find it in the feet of bell tones,
with sounds that amble soft and sweet.

purpose

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I stood among you all,
at the edge of the wood,

a place of curiosity, felled
by absentminded fates.

So meant for heartier work
to weep away the runoff – dissent,

the wet and grime that infiltrates
the ground, I’m to abet

and keep your floor unfettered
from labor, a hollow sweep.

Explored and secreted with man’s lust
and beauty, pages turned and creased by hand.

Housing your scoundrel kin,
a respite from the elements, secure

yet open to view the sun
and neighboring vines, their vow unspoken.

And now, the years have culled me in
and I’ve become a part, somehow,

of green and life, of hope and fate
a place of refuge, I have been.

**********
#summerofprompts

I wrote this in response to poet Mary Biddinger’s recent prompt on Twitter, to write a nature poem from a non-human point of view… This is a combination of a nature poem with a childhood memory of a place in a nearby woods from my home.

answer

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there is no answer
only trees with spindled branches
that vanish in the beauty of the green

and trails that wander off
behind the distant hillsides, pastoral scenes.

no remedy – with wind between
the spruce’s fingerlings
since moved along to coastal shores and things.

no antiphon in plummeting
in ocean depths – it’s just serene
and emptied of all guff
and echo that there’s ever been.

no pleas as silent offerings proceed
to culminating crests, and heights convened.

and this, the peace of things
that is to be –
the answers all in all, are unforeseen.

a foothold in the daisies

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The clouds are just now learning how to speak.
There’s a foothold in the daisies,
and a slow descent of water from the creek
The sun is rising amber, slow and weak.

The melody of morning turns
it’s ear upon the repeat cooing dove
and smells of honeysuckle
wafted in from somewhere down the grove.

A single tuft of flowers out among
the complete scene of hurried traffic,
other places here and in-between-
a foothold in the daisies –
a shared embrace,
devotion to a yellow speck in space.

And safe return to where began this whole mystique,
and I am learning -just now- how to speak.

abandon

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snow melting abandon
stenciled-
meant to carry away
the weep of wintry
bitterness.
drops that melted
from ice gripped
with steadfast assurances.
each drip an escapee
of purpose,
prone to wander
and feel its own
way, with only the sound
of sequent kin
that silence with distance.
winding catacombs
lead to some outcome,
to a gathering of likeness
that feeds the living
and absorbs
the dissolute elements
of the dead.

Immersion

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It seems like a metamorphosis
of sorts.
There is evolution of the language
in the shade of pines,
assuaged by a sun companion,
the complexities of the song
from her secret heart-
a pastorale,
that lures and covers me.

I become sacrificial
and my tongue,
a voice in the chorus,
melds with the music.
A heightened song
of concurrence-
wrapped in vines of honeysuckle,
floating in basins of still water.
Ringing true, long after
the last word is uttered
in near, deep silence.

walk

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The public order
of the ocean,
a blur of mist and foam.
The captive sounds
of marching throngs
so felt this far
from home.

A crushing flood
of tides and breakers,
twelve bars into song
assuage the mystic
caravan singing,
everybody
let’s get stoned.

Shrieking, cry the gulls
above the din
of skin and groans.
I toss a shell.
It’s gonna rain.
I feel it
in my bones.