Once I lay in Summers heat;
laid on the grass, 'neath a
tall swaying tree, sole
shade in that sunlit field.
I looked up through the rocking
limbs, through the myriad sighing
leaves, and saw a shining speck of
dust come floating in the breeze.
And I laughed to see it hanging there,
just floating in the breeze.

Life, the state of living.

Survival, the act of continuing the state of life.

To live, to be whole, to be happy, to bring joy to others.

To survive, to continue the state of life, with no regard for any but oneself.

Consider which one should choose.

I look at her face, and smile, and warmth
swells in my chest as I see her smile in turn.
Age has dulled her blazing beauty, and lies
on her now like a mantle of lead, bending her
back, arresting her tread. And yet our love has
grown, not withered, and our hearts speak truly to
one another, for we are joined, in heart and mind,
and we care for each other, more than we do
ourselves. As the years have passed, our forms
have withered, have become vessels of the most fragile
glass, through which the light of ours souls burn as stars
in the infinite heavens, and our souls communicate, one
with the other, for there is no boundary, no obstacle left,
so far down the road. We speak little, for our actions speak
more clearly than words, and when we do, we seek only to
confirm our love and our trust, unnecessarily, for we are one,
and forever will be, in this life, and beyond, together, for all
eternity.

I sit in front of the fire and think, of olden
days, of yore. Of those moments which, by
virtue of their power, still shine golden, or
shimmer darkly, like ebony in a pool in the
dying light, out of the mists of age and forget-
fullness, this both a blessing and a curse, to one
who has lived so long as I. For I have seen many
triumphs and celebrations, and many more defeats
and fruitless victories, these like the long dark shadow
stretching out from the pillar of my accomplishments.
This pillar is the anchor of my life; without it, I would be
lost in the sea of my own wretched failures. And yet,
still, from my vantage point atop that shining monument
that enshrines all that was, is, and will be good in my life, still
the shadow grows, along with the pillar itself, for though
I have passed that point of sweet and soaring ****** at the
epitome of my life, and have long since begun the descending
spiral towards the grave, I am not yet dead. And yet, even as my pillar grows, so does my shadow, and its length grows longer as my years increase, and the memory of past failures compound one upon the other, until they are stretched far out to the distant horizon, and have filled it with darkness and shadows, for the sun is low, as my age ascends, and so the shadows lengthen. And yet. Through all of this, of the pain of my failures, of the tragedies of my defeats, of the defeats of others who were close to my heart, peace is with me, and I have no fear, and I am happy, and I give of myself to others, and expecting nothing, receive all, for the gratitude and happiness of others in response to ones generosity and love, is the greatest reward that one may hope to attain.
For I do not dwell only in the past, but in the present, and do not impose worry and fear upon my soul through vain speculations of what the future may bring, and instead live in the present, and think on the past, and act according to what I believe to be right, before the eyes of man, and the eyes of God. And all is right with me, and I am happy, and as I sit here before the hearth, the fire leaping merrily, and crackling like a thousand distant fireworks, I smile, and sink softly into sleep.

I once walked a lonely path,
that threaded its way so elegantly,
throughout that vast and wooded
sea. I had thought to walk for peace of
mind; for that calm and refreshing clarity,
that comes from long unbroken solitude.
But instead, to my increased confusion,
knowing as I do that all men walk with the
seeds of chaos and confusion buried in their
hearts, I found that my thoughts walked
with me, down that lonely mountain path.
My attention lingered, as it were, on the
roughness of the track, and from there leapt
from wood to sky, to consider the path itself.
Such a wondrous creature, this winding thing,
such a strange and marvelous structure! So simple
to see, to comprehend, upon ones first inspection,
but upon further query and strain of ones senses, one
sees that indeed, against all sane reason, it warrants some
further reflection! Oh true, very true, this thing of which I
speak, so endearingly, is merely a track, an ignominious scratch,
stretching its dusty way through these unending woods, but think, for a moment, simply think, about all this, all that I have to say, regarding this humble path. Think how it stretches, for miles, for years! All unbroken and unwearied continuing on through cracked gorge and wooded valley, over hills and mountains tall, never speaking a word of complaint or discomfort, only seeking to deposit its travelers at their desired destination, and continue on its way. Consider if you will the vastness of this earth, of the uncounted millions of miles that lie between her frozen poles. If you are certain of nothing, be certain of this; that this single path stretches the length and width of our planet entire, be it a dirt track through a sighing wood, or a goat path high among the jagged cliffs and peaks of Patagonia, or even the mighty ocean currents used by those unknowable dwellers of the capricious sea.  There is only one path, one long mighty river with innumerable tributaries, which stretches its way to the ends of the earth, and back again, and everywhere in between. Such were my thoughts that day, as I wended my way down that interminable path, and such was my concentration upon the fascinating madness that lay within them, that I hardly noticed that the sun was dying, and evening was coming on, and only when the light was gone, and the darkness began to weigh heavily on my soul, that I roused myself from these winding thoughts, and even as I did so, a light drizzle began to fall, which soon compounded into a driving rain, under which I was left to stumble and trip my way back down that terrible path, back to the small hamlet where it began, or passed. And yet I was glad, for I had gained, if not what I had desired, a thing of worth at least as great, if not more so, and that strange mad enlightenment which I had gained while walking the long and wearying miles of that mountain path would, I knew, remain with me, for better or for worse, for always, and for forever.

Drifting....seed caught in the wind of life,
one more among many; a grain in a storm
of a thousand sands. Wandering, lost in the
sighing ether, suspended between earth and
sky, it sees many things, and yet sees nothing.
Meaning is lost to it, feeling torn from its numb
grasp, in the hour of its waking. It has known
nothing, has felt nothing, save for the grey air of
the world without, and the grey within; there
where his heart had been.

I walk and think of yesteryear,
as I wend these winding ways;
I loved the life, the youth of
Spring; yet I yearned for the
cold and the fleeting days.


My passion rose in the Summers
heat; a fire awoke within me. Yet
even as I reveled in that pagan
idyll, I pined for the cold and the
frost and silence.


I saw the sleeping trees of Autumn;
I gazed at the burning wood. But
even as my heart rejoiced in my
breast, I knew that it was not enough.


Now I walk in Winter-tide, and behold
the blackened trees. The crackle and snap
of dead leaves underfoot is like an
ever present symphony, in that pale winters
day. I pace under bough, under cloud,
under sky, and the wind loves me, and is
present at my side. Age lies on the sleeping
hills, and youth is far from me, as I wander
through the frosted halls, of that wondrous
Winter wood. And I looked out at the silent
land, frosted under weight of snow, and I
saw that it was good.

lying here listening, I think of many
things, as I listen to the soft sound of
the singing sands in the cool nights
autumn breeze.

I think of many things, in the time before
dawn, of loves lost and loves found, and
loves never to be had. I think of life and death,
and the whirring of cicadas, short lives filled
with sound, and wonder as to the mysteries of
the universe, and whether rain will come today.

Confused and lost in the morning chill, I wander
back to myself again, home from exile in the day dream lands; and I smile at the rising dawn,
illuminating the snow all around me, and my breath
frosts in the frozen air, as I gaze out at a frozen lake,
and wonder what will be.

the hearth crackled, the flames spat.
Warmth came from its dancing recesses,
and with it light to greet the shadows.
I curled in front of this ancient thing,
yet newborn through the strength of my
will. And I dozed before the flickering flames,
courting shadows as well as light. And my
heart was glad.

The Oak stands tall in the verdant spring,
his hair arrayed all about him, resplendent
in leafy splendor. Birds sing in his branches.

Vigor runs in his ancient veins, his boughs
heavy with seeded acorns; squirrels chatter in
his reaching limbs, arms stretched to the azure
heavens, in that time of swelling Summer.


The cool wind blows, in Autumn, in time. Leaves
flushed with crimson hue, fall to lie amid the great
oaks roots, and among the faded grass, sighing; The
fox hunts in the flaming wood.


The old oak stands firm, its branches swaying in the
cold winds of winter. Its boughs are bare, its stems are
black, the bear is sleeping, the days are short. Yet life
remains in the sleeping wood, buried deep, waiting for
the song of the laughing brook, for the robin and the
thrush; waiting for green Springs return.

The waves on the bracken shore,
wind on the heath. The seabirds
wheeling, far aloft, in grey and
stormy skies.

cliffs stern to the keening wind,
trees bent in the forceful gale;
scattered grass sways before
the tide.

Tall stone and weathered rock,
lying spread about its feet.
Young woman, standing, hair
tossed by the laughing wind, as it
passes on its way.

Patched cloak snapping, her frayed
hems snapping, eyes shining before the
storm, she stands tall in the shrieking gale,
yet sways as a willow, fair in the light of
the lingering sunset.

she stands, feet set, head high,
her eyes are bright in the fading
light, keen as she stands before the
storm; knowing it will come. Knowing
that it will pass her by.

The suns shining here,
the clouds are softly rolling,
to the winds gentle sighing,
as it passes the old oak by.

Oh the winds softly shushing,
as it passes the old oak by.

See a maiden there,
young and fair, a spring
in her step, and leaves in
her hair. See her stepping,
light as air, as she hangs the
washing from the old pine boughs;
her eyes are bright, her face without
care.

Oh, look and see that maiden there, with a
spring in her step and leaves in her hair.

The power of a voice is
like a light, in the darkness,
if spoken in love.

The sound of a whisper
spoken quiet in fear is
like the softly sharp sound,
of a scissor snipping velvet,
in sounds absence.

The tenor of a song, sung sweetly
in the silver light, in the welling
brightness of the fair moontide, is
scarcely to be described.

the cadence of the laughter of
a child in joy, is a thing to be
yearned for, and ever received.

The tears of a woman, weeping
softly in the dark; an ache in the heart,
a grief to the soul.

The power of a word is like a
bell in the silence, like the light,
like the darkness, and like the
silence returned.

The power of a word is
in the hearts of all, in the
voice and in the heart, if
spoken in tones of earnest
passion, if spoken in careful
thought.

Trees here, some old, some young;
weathered stone and pale sky.
Leaves, yellow red and orange
faded; lifted from the edge of the
high stone cliff by the wind, skirling,
there on the reach, between Earth and
Sky.

I rest beneath the spreading bows,
an oak, ancient in in life, in the living
earth, wise in the ways of growing. Wheat
surrounds us, I and the tree, together an island
amid the shifting gold, swaying in a gentle breeze,
born of the hazy south, warm and kind. The sun shines
down, as it sinks to meet the flat horizon, and fall beneath
the world. Clouds streak the sky, as the blue yields to the gold
of sunset. The birds are singing. And I wake, to behold the dawn,
and I hear the birds singing, as they too wake with the light.

Winter, Weather,
Snow and Heather,
Freeze and Feather;
Owl swifting, white
of wing. Cold and ashes,
Love and slashes,
Fire bright in the wintry
night.

To her side I laughing fell,
there in the violets, and in
the warmth of summers noon.
Love burned in my straining
breast; light reflected in the beauty
of her smile. We ran in that pagan
sunlit idyll; Life, the race and the
scented joy, as we ran in the grass,
in the light, and in laughter. Lovely, she,
in sunlit grace. Our joy the limit of
life and sky.

Still lovely, she, in death, as in life.
Lovely still, as she is laid to her rest,
down among lilies and lilacs and silk,
and amidst the tears of the living, bereft
in their joy, of the life and the youth and
the laughter that was she. I cry out in a
broken voice, "Allele! Remember the joy
and the summer and the wind in the trees!
Remember the long days laughing in the
shade of the oak, of the leaves and the
breeze and the waterfall splashing! Go not
softly into the dark tomorrow. Take your life
with you. Do not end in the darkness, alone,
in the darkness." Whispered the last, voice rough
in sorrow. And I wept, there, in the summers starlit
dark.

She stands there by the open window,
its mornings gray that lights her face.
her curls are long and fair and golden,
dulled by the light of the cold winters
morning; truthful in its stark demean.
Her face is pale and fair and lovely;
dark shadows circle her eyes, and her
eyes are gray, cold as the dawn, as they
watch the procession of men down the
road; in black are they robed, and their
cowls are dark. Her figure is lovely, or
was lovely, once; angles there are, and her lines
are hard and stark and sharp. Tall she stands
in the wasteful light, her pride a mantle, to
hold back the tide. Dressed in a sheet of
shimmering gray, almost she would blend into
the grey dawning morn, were it not for her hair,
though lackluster and shorn; longer it was in
summers fair past, till she cut it with shears and
shivers and hate. The cowled procession slows
to a stop, before a man and a pit and a naked tree.
He speaks in a voice of resonance and power; not
a tear is shed in that makeshift bower, not a tear,
not a whisper, not a head bowed in grief, for the
man they had carried. They spared him no pity; he
had shown none in life. The woman watches from
the empty tower, no tears shed there in her ancient
bower. Cold she stands in the cold morning grey,
robed in power and pride, and great beauty, past.
She watches as they lower her dead lord inside, no
coffin, he; too many had he broken. She watches
in silence, in pain, and in pride, foolish though it be
in the grey mornings light. Dirt over him. Dirt under.
A paupers grave, in a field, in winter. No honor in death;
he had had none in life. Last shovelful thrown; the ground
is smoothed over. The priest and his men leave the grey field
empty, save a tree in the center, stark in death.
she watches, and remembers, and falls in her folly, in her cold,
prideful folly, to join him in death, who had murdered her love.
To join him, though he it was who had murdered her love, and her joy and her dreams, and her young, laughing beauty. Fallen she, through prideful
folly.

Love, the fairest, purest joy.
To hear the laughter, high
and sweet, and to see her
running, swift and fleet, as
she flies for the joy,and for
love of the race. Long is her
laughter, fair is her face; her
form expression of poise and
grace, lovely, she, in the dying
light, as she stands there caught
between rest and flight. Lovely
still as night comes on, lovely as
darkness hides her form, lady fair
and pure and sweet, lady; I will
wait for the dawn.

She stands there on the
tufted mound, the lilies
of the valley all about her,
surrounding her in
scented spring. Lovely, in
the hidden dale, in the
sweetly scented spring.

I love the way the thrush is
singing, down by the cold-water,
swift-water, streaming; its babbling
the thrush mistook, for laughing in
the madding way, that streams take on,
when lost in glee, in Summers gladding,
madding sway.

Grey dawns the morning cold; dew
gathers on the mould. while robins sing
in freshen voices, and water runs in the
swift-water way, in the mornings lovely
cold.

Autumn,
Summers dying,
leaves falling;
fire in the trees,
Herald of Winter.

Rain falling, soft in the misty dale;
the sun is hidden in the even of the
day. Violets and poppies, lilies and
lilacs, all fresh with the rain; life
bringing, cool in that time of the
colored evening. A wind is whistling
in the towering trees, setting the leaves
all to sighing, and the branches to
their sway, but naught of that but a fleeting
breeze comes down to rouse the nodding
blooms, and stir the grasses from their
stay. Night falls, with the winds dying,
and all is still in the sacred dell, save the
insects, and the rain, and a nightingale,
singing softly in refrain, poet sweet, in
the falling rain.

A glade in a wood,
gloaming in the
twilight. The scents
of nightflowers, subtle
and disturbing, contriving
to surround us in
heady confusion, as
we stumble through
paths enchanted, there,
in the shimmering
moonlight. There, as we
walk our ways, under
stars, under moon, in
the darkling gloom.

Love,

a childs sigh, soft in innocence.
the sun on the heads of the lilies
in the field, the wind in the trees.

Joy,

laughter, high in the morning, low
in the evening. Her hair in the sunset,
ablaze with reflected glory, her eyes,
shining in the light of suns dying; mien
of angels.

Sorrow,

sobs in the stillness of the deepest
night. eyes red rimmed in the
morning light. the sound of a lock
softly clicking; tears on the threshold.

The man strides to the marching
drums, blood hot for the boiling
fray, beside him marches kin and
friends, comrades all for the ******
fray. On roll the marching drums, pipes
skirl and trumpets bray, all to the sound
of stomping boots, all to the waiting
fray.


Now, hark to the trumpets sound,
loud and clear in the morning air,
foemen sighted, foemen there! Out
from the town exceeding fair. Now
comes the faster beat, and comes the
sound of running feet, as men roar with
joy and fear as they rush headlong in
the morning clear, as they run to the
speeding fray.


The man lies on the trampled ground,
and listens to the wrenching sound of
the groans and screams of tortured men,
dying there, on the ****** ground.


Away above, beyond the clouds, and over
the buzzards circling, there through a shining
rent, the man near death a vision sees; an eagle
high, balancing, above the fates of Lords and
men. As his dying breath escapes his lips, and
darkness comes to take him home, the man
hears a distant sound; the eagle calling down
farewell, down to the twisted, ****** fell,
above the loud, tumultuous roar of men
survived from the ****** fray, crying all in
joyous voices, "Victory! Victory!"

Bittersweet the memory.

I saw her there, standing in the shade
of a thicket; birch trees in the failing
Autumn. The long grass caressed her;
the wind stirred her hair. Lovely she, in
the failing Autumn, there, on the cusp of
winter. Lightning; storm on the horizon.
Green eyes lifted to catch the rain, falling,
there in the nearing distance. She breathes
in, out, her eyes fall closed as she tastes the
air; rain and soil, sunbaked in the past heat of
the noontime. Grass, wafting upwards. The
trees stir; the shadows of the leaves flit across
her form, face uplifted to the rising storm. Her
raiment snaps, back and forth; the winds uprising,
howling forerunner of the coming storm. Her hair
streams back, a midnight pennant, running out all
behind her. The roaring of the winds upsurges in its
splendor, its howling crescendo reached at last; The trees
bend, backwards in the gale, graceful in their dying,
leaves torn and scattered, out among the plains, and
across the rippling grasses, soaring in the ecstasy of
the winds. She stands, there, in the moment before the
storm, straight she is, and tall, swaying as the trees wherein
she stands, pale in the twilight. The wind howls in wanton
abandon, wild and glorious; rain strikes the waiting earth,
the grass bends in homage, down before the fury of the torrent
descending.
The lightning cracks in the darkling sky,
the thunder roars in violent time; the storm falls
in the failing Autumn; darkness comes
in the clouds obscurity, ebon in the raging heavens,
and all was lost there, save the wind, and the rain,
and the darkness of the storm.

I saw her there, standing in the shade
of a thicket; birch trees in the failing
Autumn. The long grass caressed her;
the wind stirred her hair. Lovely she, in
the failing Autumn, there, on the cusp of
winter. Lightning; storm on the horizon.
Green eyes lifted to catch the rain, falling,
there in the nearing distance. She breathes
in, out, her eyes fall closed as she tastes the
air; rain and soil, sunbaked in the past heat of
the noontime. Grass, wafting upwards. The
trees stir; the shadows of the leaves flit across
her form, face uplifted to the rising storm. Her
raiment snaps, back and forth; the winds uprising,
howling forerunner of the coming storm. Her hair
streams back, a midnight pennant, running out all
behind her. The roaring of the winds upsurges in its
splendor, its howling crescendo reached at last; The trees
bend, backwards in the gale, graceful in their dying,
leaves torn and scattered, out among the plains, and
across the rippling woodlands, soaring in the ecstasy of
the winds. She stands, there, in the moment before the
storm, straight she is, and tall, swaying as the trees wherein
she stands, pale in the twilight. The wind howls in wanton
abandon, wild and glorious; rain strikes the waiting earth,
the grass bends in homage, down before the torrent
descending. The lightning cracks in the darkling sky,
the thunder roars in violent time; the storm falls
in the failing Autumn; darkness comes
in the clouds obscurity, ebon in the raging heavens,
and all was lost there, save the wind, and the rain,
and the darkness of the storm.

I stare, down into the
indigo darkness of the
sea. Land is far from me,
and horizons darken with the
mass of storms. Alone I wander,
and land is far from me, alone
in the gloam with the sky and the
sea. Light shining in the darkling
depths, heralds of the raven night,
a storm is brewing and day is gone,
and land is far from me.

I wander on.

conflict is eternal, present, real.
To attain peace is not to erase
conflict, but to accept it, not to
embrace your enemy as a friend,
but to accept that he is as he is, ****
him, and move on.

A girl I once saw,
and her eyes were
green as the grass
in springtime, and
her face was soft,
innocent,and fresh,
and yet her eyes were
cold and distant, and
in them were distance,
and an apathy to swall-
ow the world. She was
broken and harsh and
silent and alone.

And I loved her.

What is life, but the ending of
death? Long pain and fleeting joys,
to be taken away at the Final Dark.

Long pain with no beginning,
joy fast, far, and fleeting.
Life a stretch of joys and
sorrows, Death a release to
soft tomorrows.

Endless Cycle.

Think,
if the depth
and breadth
of the boundless
sea, were combined
with the serenity
of a flower, and
the stillness of
a clear pool,
forgotten
in a timeless
vale, if all
these qualities
were instilled
in a mortal man,
would he not
be an expression
of the Spirit
of God?

Words,
imagery,
poignancy,
laconic
brevity,
extended
profundity,
rhetorical
brilliancy,

Poetry...
bringer of insight,
harbinger of wisdom,
manifestation of
wonder.

Joy, profoundest of
sensations! Ah! To be
lifted on the crest of
surging bliss, to be
graced with the comfort
of quiet euphoria, come
after a day spent in labor,
and finding the simple
comforts of home awaiting.
Joy, profoundest of
sensations!

Once I saw a girl, standing
by the shore of a deepwater
pond, smooth and black as
polished glass, and she seemed
sad. Her hair matched the water,
in sheen and in color, and her skin
was the pale of alabaster, and there
were freckles on her cheeks and around
her blue eyes, and her lips were red.


I walked over to her, slowly, and I doffed
my hat, because she looked so delicate and
frail, and I deemed she would appreciate
all courtesy and propriety, and I composed
myself for the speech of gentles.


I said, "Lady, forgive my intrusion, but I
saw you standing here, watching your
reflection, and you seemed sad. Are you
alright? She looked up at me, and her face
was solemn, and her eyes were sorrowful.


"Sir," she said, and her voice was steady, though
it was laced with grief. "Sir, I am grateful for your
kindness, and you seem a gentleman, and not used
to the hardness of the world, and so are innocent of
true pain and true sorrow. This is a comfort to me, a
great comfort, and so I thank you for your bearing, but
now leave me, for I am weary and full of sorrow, and
desire to be alone with my thoughts"


I was struck then, with the beauty of her speech, and
beheld that she was indeed weary of both heart and
body, for her eyes were red rimmed, and her hands
shook with the smallest of tremors as she stood, there
before me.


"Lady," I said, " Lady, be not frightened to share your
troubles with me. It is true that I am a gentleman, and
therefore unused to the harsher rigors of the living
experience, but, believe me, Lady, when I say that
none of this matters to me, nor should it to you. I know
we are still new met, but already I feel as if you were a
close friend of many years, who has been absent for
sometime, and that we are only now reunited. Share
with me your troubles, and I will listen with a kind eye
and attentive bearing, for to me, your troubles are now
mine, and your sorrows my own."


She stood, frozen, her blue eyes wide with shock, and her
bearing was as that of a startled fawn in the moment before
flight. I made no move, and I held my breath, and I held her
eyes in mine, for I feared that if my attention faltered for but
an instant, she would vanish, like a doe into the shadows of the
trees. "Sir," she said, and faltered. "Sir," she said again, "you do
not know what you ask. And why should my troubles concern
you? This world does not allow for weakness to go unpunished."


"Lady," I spoke, and my voice was gentle. "tell me your sorrows."
She shivered. "Be it so then. I will tell you." She shook her head
and stared into the dark waters of the pond, reflective like the sheen of
polished ebony, stared at her reflection, gazing up at her from the
depths, and sighed. "My troubles began a mere three days prior to
this, and if they seem to you frivolous or unworthy, pray do not laugh,
but leave forthwith, and I will know your mind.


"Lady," I said, and though my voice was gentle still, it was now deep
also and steady, as a mountain before the storm. "tell me your sorrows.
I will listen. I will not laugh. This you know. Tell me your sorrows."
She shivered, again, and her lips parted, and her eyes were more full
of pain and of sorrow than I had yet seen them, and my heart ached
in my breast. "Be it so." she whispered, and her voice was as a
splintered shard of purest crystal.


"I was looking into a mirror, and admiring myself,
and was full of joy at the fullness of my figure, and
of the sheen of my hair. So fixed was I on my reflection
that I failed to notice the approach of a beautiful woman,
with flaxen hair and pale blue eyes and with skin the soft
color of the lilies of the valley. She looked at me and asked
why I should stare so avidly at a simple mirror. I replied
that I was merely gazing into the mirror at myself.


Then the beautiful womans eyes flashed, and in them appeared
such cruelty as I had never thought to imagine or to conceive. "Such vanity." She said to me, and my spirit faltered within me. She
beckoned me to step closer. I did, cautiously, and she bent down
to my ear and whispered, harshly, "You are an ugly *****, and are
so outshone by my beauty that you are as a flickering candle compared to the glory of the Sun." With this she turned and left me, and since
then I have been here gazing at my reflection, and wondering why
God should choose to curse me with so terrible a form as mine." She was crying, the young lady, standing by the depths of the
deepwater pond, darker now, with the fading of the light. She would
not look at me, ashamed of the outpouring of her heart, and I felt
the ache within my breast grow, until grief found me, and tears sprung
unbidden to fall, unheeded, in the waters of the pond.


"Lady," I said, and my voice was heavy and laden now with sorrow for the grief of the maiden there before me, and for her crystal tears, shed in sadness. "Lady," I said, "will you tell me your name?" She shivered once more, and bowed her head as she answered, "Johanna." and a single tear escaped her closed lids to trace its way down her cheek, and fall into the blackness of the dark waters of the pond. "Johanna." she said to me, and her voice then near shattered my aching heart. "Johanna." I said. And again, "Johanna." A third time I spoke, "Johanna." I fell silent for
a moment, and saw that she was trembling, and her cheeks were wet.


"Johanna," I said again, and now my voice was loud and strong, so that
she looked up in shock,and her eyes were fearful. "Johanna, you are more beautiful than the sun in all its glory, more beautiful than the stars, more beautiful even than the infinite heavens in their celestial wonder, arching above us. You are more beautiful, Johanna, because you are you.
Johanna. You of the hair of raven hue, you of the skin like alabaster, you
of the eyes of the oceans hue, you of the ruby lips, you, your voice the voice of angels." And now my voice was soft, a whisper to match her own, as I spoke, close to her ear. "Let none wound you, let none dissuade you, let none harm you in word or deed, Johanna, for you are more beautiful than all of Gods creation, because you are you." She looked at me, and her eyes were full once more with crystal tears.
She sobbed, once, and fell into my arms, and wept. And I held her, there beside the deep waters of the pond, and under the vastness of
the velvet blackness of the night, and the moon, and the turnings of
the stars.

Words, sharp as knives in a skillful hand,
turn soft as a child's quilt, when spoken in tones of love.
Words, the expressions of ourselves, the strings that link us, bind
us, hold us, change us. Words, thought incarnate.
And yet, at times they fall short, inadequate to capture the
glory of the moment, or the horror.
This a sorrow, and a comfort,
Twofold as words may be.

I sometimes dream, when I am on the cusp
of waking, and sleeps warm embrace has
loosened, that I stand upon a cliff, overlooking
the vastness of the sea, and behind me is a plain,
stretching to forever, and above me the gulls wheel
in patterns and intricacies I had never before imagined,
and they call to me secrets gleaned from the wind, and the
clouds, and from the waves below. They tell me tales
and legends, and they speak of the lives of the fishes, and
the voices of the whales, and of the meanings in the skies.
And when I wake, and I am daunted by the troubles of the
day, I remember and am comforted, and journey through days
struggles, on the promise of a soft tonight, and of the calls of
the gulls, and the music of the sea.

In a city, future past, and the
streets are cold and clean and flat.
Naught living, none dying, a ghost town, way down the way.
Except.
Except for a lone *** of clay, sitting on the sill, of a cold and sterile building, way up high. And there lies growing a small plant, glowing green and red in the morning sun. Growing, growing,
growing still.

In summer,
I used to run, and
curse the heat. And swim
in the cool waters of the pond.
No more.
For the colder months are coming in,
and winters knocking on the door,
with summer shuffling out the
back. And I welcome old
winter in.

The winds blow, carrying spice and sand and death from the desert, water from the forests, ice from the mountains, fire from the lands of
fire, air from everywhere, and from itself. Stand one day in a high place,
Witt the wind all about you, and none else there but you, and if you listen, you may here secrets whispered to you, on the breath of the wind,
secrets many, and yours among them, for the wind knows all things, and it sees all, forgets nothing.

Grass waving, green on the hillside.
Sunflowers sighing, faces turned to
the light, yearning always. Leaves,
and the grace of the boughs, dancing
in the wind; the trunk is still, standing
tall, as a pillar in the dappled green.
Rain. Rain for the lakes and the trees and
the ponds. Rain for man, and for the flowers,
and for the robin bird, there upon its
perch. Rain and the light of day. A Break in
the clouds. Light shattered, sent in an
arch of shimmering color, and day birds
singing, while light in golden shafts returns,
to grace the patterned forest floor, and to kiss
the waving sunflowers, and the blades of
shining grass.

Us, the people, to me are as
stars, fallen to earth. Each a
small burning point of light,
one among billions, all so close,
and yet so far apart.

Sun shining,
kissing the falling rain,
ripples in a rainbow pond.

Willows,
their hearts are sore,
hair trailing in the clear water.

Sunset,
My heart and I,
alone with our thoughts
and the sighs of the willows.

Heartbreak,
an old sorrow, dulled
by the years and by beauty
and by pain.

Now,
Sharp as shards of
shattered glass, the pain returns
as rollers breaking, over
my life and the span
of years.

And all is grey,
as sand in an ashfall,
as the corpse of a flower, in
the small morning light; as her eyes,
framed in tresses of midnight black,
skin dark and cold as Stygian ice,
as I close them, and kiss her,
once, for memory, twice for
love, a farewell, by the
shadow of the
grave.

And I left her, to be buried, alone in her grave.

And I wept, there, by the pool, in the glade, with the sighs
of the willows a consort to my sorrow, under night and
the light of the stars.

Notes....

Floating in a golden sea of sound....

Silver is the rain and the sighing of the flutes....

Drums for the thunder.

Trumpets sounding, with horns colliding, furious their clashing;

Lightning, hurled from the heavens.

So for music, and the soundings of the storm.

The flowers are swaying, deep in
the hollows of the vale, violet in the
shades of twilight. I sit against a boulder,
there in the center, etched with the marks
of an age forgotten, and think.

A world teeming, cities filled with the
foolish and the wayward, men laid low,
by the seductions of corruption; and am I
not the worst among them? I am halved, I say,
split in twain, divided between the pure and
the putrescent, the wholesome and the foul.

I had lost faith. Life a blur of conflicting desire,
weary I fell, desiring only nothing.
Death touched me.

I was flying....

I saw my life, terror, rage, sorrow, confusion, pain.
All roiling and screaming and laughing. But amid
the turmoil, small and quiet, a small center of peace
resided, oblivious to the darkness, and within were the
seeds of joy and happiness, peace and silence.

Rest.

I saw, and in the realization, I fell.
I awoke in darkness, but I could see the
light. It led me here.

Here to ponder, and to heal.

And to remember.

I sit and dream, on better days,
when the grit and sweat of life abates,
for a moment, for a day. Dreaming I lose
myself in fantasys, love and laughter, they
comingling, with the dark and the dying and
the twisted boughs in the forest under shade.

I love, in days of peace and dreaming, to brew
a *** of peppermint tea, and bringing it up
to my place of seclusion, up among the rafters,
Sit me down and breath the sharpness and the spice
into me, way down deep, and let it turn my dreams
to twisted imaginings, all hued in red and white and green.

They say I'm delusional, when I speak of the things
of my dreaming. They call me antisocial. They are
right. They call me different and strange and freak.
They are right. I know it's wrong, and it justifies all
that they say. I know. But it just gives me a thrill to
watch them froth with rage, the madness in their eyes,
The spittle quivering, hanging from their writhing lips
as they mouth their hatred, in gruesome obscenities.
It makes me laugh a little, inside.

And then I turn and walk away, bored of their hate,
and continue on my way, dreaming, already dreaming,
as I continue on my way.

Poetry,
the life of me,
the breath that buoys me,
keeps me over the darkest depths
of death, that which holds my soul intact,
and keeps my spirit whole.

I only wonder if that is all naught but an artists ego, itself covering the transparent reality that may be mine.