A Dream of Ancient Light

Franz Marc, The Dream

 

Born of ferocious fire clouds—

angel or ghost?

An almost there, like

a trace of perfume lingering

in the indigo night

from bright blooms blanketing fields

in colored harmony

 

~vivid and haunting~

 

somehow like a dream–

of verdant paths with deer and ponies,

where we bird-fly over the bluest river

into the secret of when

and what was, and here—

we follow tendrils of sun-songs

to the ancient light of then and if. . . forever.

 

The Oracle made me work for this puente today.  The humidity has lifted, and a mockingbird is putting on a concert in my backyard.

 

 

.

 

 

 

The Moments Between

Odilon Redon, “The Muse on Pegasus”

 

In the moments between

the dream hours

she joins my father

in the timeless night–

not asking if this universe

is real or true,

 

~only that it is~

 

all I can embrace–

the magic of a laugh,

the sun dancing in

the promise of a new morning,

and the rhapsodic songs of the stars,

lingering.

 

The Oracle gave me nearly all the words for this puente, so–I just went with it.

Circles

Vassily Kandinsky, “Several Circles”

 

In transit

we wander, seeking

what? Circles

unbroken

form constants, our existence,

balanced symmetry–

 

light and dark

not opposites, but

shifted hues

shimmering

through time and space, reborn in

stars, flowers, the sea.

 

For Colleen’s Tanka Tuesday challenge, a shadorma sequence, using synonyms for the words Kerfe chose, transition and harmony. I hadn’t intended to write about circles, but since Kerfe and I seem stuck on them, I suppose it’s not unexpected.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Story of Dreams and Wonder

Reflection, Odilon Redon

 

Almost-color in the clouds–

dark ghosts–that blush-tipped feathers

wing away, the dreams that linger

 

~in the after-winds of time~

 

we watch the fire-heart of the sky

dazzle us with flower-flames–

singing songs of a thousand ifs

 

~in a shimmering symphony~

 

the heavens dance,

giant birds soar, their iridescent splendor a-flight,

traveling home, bright jewels in the night.

 

A double puente, which probably isn’t a form, from my Saturday morning collaboration with the Oracle. I’ve been having a hard time focusing the last couple of days, so I’m taking it.  And Redon, of course.

 

 

Poem up in Ekphrastic Review

Johannes Vermeer, “Woman Holding a Balance”

 

I’m pleased that my small poem, “In the Balance,”  was among those selected as a response to the Vermeer painting “Woman Holding a Balance” for the most recent challenge in the Ekphrastic Review. My thanks to editor Lorette C. Luzajic for choosing my poem, along with such excellent poems and short prose pieces.  You can read them all here.

The Language of Flowers, NaPoWriMo2020, Day 11

John Singer Sargent, “Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose”

 

Dance

with flowers in your hair,

carnation, lily, lily, rose,

hear their secret voices

rising in the air—

carnation, lily, lily, rose.

 

Breathe

perfume on a summer breeze,

carnation, lily, lily, rose

listen to the song of sky and trees,

carnation, lily, lily, rose.

 

And if your heart is seeking why or after—

remember here, the children’s laughter

a sudden memory that dazzling blows–

of carnation, lily, lily, rose.

 

This language of flowers, your soul comprehends–

the joy, the ghosts, the beginnings, the ends.

 

Today’s prompt for Day 11 of NaPoWriMo asks us to consider the language of flowers, which led me to Sargent’s painting. I also consulted the Magnetic Poetry Oracle  becuase I knew she would have something to say about this subject. The form of this poem seems sort of nineteenth-century Romantic.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Artist Says: NaPoWriMo2020, Day 6

Bosch, The Garden of Earthly Delights

 

I paint what I see—

the tree-man’s visions,

 

pictures of what was,

of what might be,

 

wondering if once opened,

my mind-doors can be closed–

 

I have no answers,

this may be a chimera, after all–

 

but do take a strawberry,

they’re delicious, yes?

 

Day 6 of NaPoWriMois an ekphrastic prompt:

a poem from the point of view of one person/animal/thing from Hieronymous Bosch’s famous (and famously bizarre) triptych The Garden of Earthly Delights. Whether you take the position of a twelve-legged clam, a narwhal with a cocktail olive speared on its horn, a man using an owl as a pool toy, or a backgammon board being carried through a crowd by a fish wearing a tambourine on its head, I hope that you find the experience deliriously amusing. And if the thought of speaking in the voice of a porcupine-as-painted-by-a-man-who-never-saw-one leaves you cold, perhaps you might write from the viewpoint of Bosch himself? Very little is known about him, so there’s plenty of room for invention, embroidery, and imagination.

I’ve combined this prompt with the  dVerse  prompt, where De has asked us to write a quadrille(a poem of 44 words) using the word “close,” or some form of the word.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Clouds Come Drifting, NaPoWriMo2020, Day 5

JMW Turner, “Norham Castle Sunrise

 

“A few stars glimmered through the morn,

And down the thorn the dews were streaming.”

–Francis Ledwidge, “The Dead Kings”

 

Always the clouds come, drifting

colored in the hazy shades of after

though stars glimmer through, sifting

light diffused from ancient gas and matter,

 

colored in the hazy shades of after

time moves on, translucent or opaque—

light diffused from ancient gas and matter,

and so, we ache.

 

Time moves on. Translucent or opaque,

our thoughts grow dim and dark

and so, we ache—

forgetting glory, gone the spark,

 

our thoughts grow dim and dark

with spite, thinking of past wrongs,

forgetting glory. Gone the spark

of dead kings and their songs.

 

With spite, thinking of past wrongs,

we dream in owl-feathered night

of dead kings and their songs,

and wait for lark-trilled light.

 

We dream in owl-feathered night,

though stars glimmer through, sifting–

and wait for lark-trilled light,

but always the clouds come, drifting.

 

The prompt for Day 5 of NaPoWriMo was way too busy and complicated for me, as it involved “twenty different projects” to include in one poem. Instead, I went to the Oracle again for a start, then wrote a pantoum for Jane Dougherty’s Pictures and Poetry challenge based on the lines from Francis Ledwidge’s “The Dead Kings” and the Turner painting above.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sleepwalking: NaPoWriMo, Day 4

 

Marc Chagall, Le Somnambule

 

 

Wake to the sky-blush

a brilliant fevered-red

 

breathing spring,

listen—

 

as you recall the dream (was it a dream?)

of moon music

 

floating through the window,

of languorous light

 

dripping puppy-tongued

over the forest,

 

and diamond ships

sailing across the midnight-blue sea.

 

Then ask–

what of the fiddler?

 

whose song whispers of longing,

of belonging, of why,

 

but embracing if

in a kiss

 

of honeyed notes,

almost velvet

 

a symphony of smoke and angels

time and life.

 

The prompt for Day 4 of NaPoWriMo asked us to consider dream images.  Of course, I consulted the Poetry Oracle. Chagall also created paintings of a fiddler on a roof.

 

Connected: NaPoWriMo, Day 2

 

 

Clouds, charcoal and white,

are fringed with a golden glow,

tumbling like puppies at play, fake-ferocious,

and without stop

until they drop,

exhausted, to lull with doggy grins

 

over gray-green Atlantic waves

that echo their play—

here the whole world sways–

and the gulls cry in syncopated beats

completing the symphony of breeze and sea–

 

steady breaths,

in and out

 

as the amber beach grass dances

and the wind brushes my cheek

in a salty kiss, a tingle, a promise

in this mystique

of what is, was, and might be—

 

everything luminous, electric,

connected,

alive.

 

For Day 2 of NaPoWriMo. The prompt was: to “write a poem about a specific place —  a particular house or store or school or office. Try to incorporate concrete details, like street names, distances (“three and a half blocks from the post office”), the types of trees or flowers, the color of the shirts on the people you remember there.”

I chose to write a poem based on a place in a painting that my mother painted. I have no idea if it is an actual place she visited, or when she painted it. The figure is kind of odd, but I’m captivated by the movement of clouds, waves, and grass, and well, this probably isn’t a finished poem either.

I’m also linking this to dVerse’s Open Link Night, where Grace is hosting.