Across the mists of morning

A brief and delicate scent

Drifts near, from trailing vines

Lush with shades of lavender==

The sweet and faint perfume

Rides the air of day,

Slides softly into night

Wafting toward the stars,

Slipping gently into my dreams.

She was certain, my mother,

That in some other life

With another soul,

Her voice sang out

In the firelight,

In the lantern, torch-lit spaces

Where music swelled,

Where melodious Spanish

Encircled the Gypsies’ Romany.

There, the rhythms

Of her feet, her graceful arms,

The flick of her skirt

Held enthralled all who saw

And heard.They were the witnesses

Of her other soul.

She was certain, my mother,

She had once been a Gypsy in Spain.

You are speaking

I hear the sound of your voice

   But I feel the smooth hardness

   of the mug in my hand

   warm as a rock along a mountain trail

   baked for hours of sun

   radiating even though the air is cool

   as though some fine particles

   of sun have been caught and held within

 

I hear your voice

There are words in the sound

That should somehow coalesce

Into sense, into meaning, yet

    I watch the light refracting

    on the liquid within my cup

    glittering as moonlight on the ocean

    Night air clings to my skin like wet silk

    I smell the rank seaweed and dying sealife

    Listen to the ocean’s rhythm as the water

    retreats and snatches

    scratches the sand

 

You are speaking words

I do not want to hear

I raise the cup and swallow

Allowing the rich earth tang to circle my teeth

Lie along and beneath my tongue

Before it slips down my throat

    Like long ago firefall at Yosemite

    over the cliff edge to a cool lake below

You are waiting for my response

The liquid within me cools

I raise my eyes to yours

Between us there is no sound

Only a quiet

    The stillness of a forest

    in the moment before dawn wakes the day

I have no words you want to hear

None that I dare speak

Beyond a plea for release

I ask, “Would you like a cup of coffee?”

    My voice is like the twig snap

    that startles animal awareness

Our silence shifts to the tense waiting

Of the hunter and the prey

Then slides away

 

“Yes, I think I would like a cup.

Thank you.”

 

I rise to perform the ritual

Knowing that for now

We will sip the fresh brewed coffee together

    as the hunger and the fear

    retrace to their source

    on the seconds that pass

    while an infinity of sky

    gentles moment into moment

 

#CoffeeAndRitual #Poetry #TransitionalMoments #EmotionalTension

As I read the most recent prizing poems,

I begin to understand why

Mine are not and remain

Like orphaned children

In a forgotten country village.

They perch upon a doorstep

Watching the seldom traveled road

For someone to come along who will

Really love them and take them home.

 

#RejectedPoems #Poetry #PoetryContests

 

I long to talk again to you of poetry–

to speak of the subtle shifts

that may change a tide:

 

Why the choice of “a” or “the” is better;

why there never was

and should not be a “the”

in the first line

of Houseman’s XXII: R.L.S.

 

I long to talk again to you of poetry,

to speak of the subtle shifts

that may change a tide.

 

To share again with someone

who knows the uncommon melody

who will instantly recognize the source

of the melody’s elusive lure.

 

I long to talk again to you of poetry

to speak of the subtle shifts

that may change a tide.

 

We knew, you and I,

that there would be this longing after–

when the other of us was gone

beyond the reach of speech

or written word–

for, it is rare that a poet

finds another spirit so alike.

 

Yes, we knew, you and I,

and mourned before time

the inevitable silence

that one of us would bear.

 

Oh, how I long to talk again

of poetry with you.

 

#Poetry #PoetCommunity