(a travelogue)

He stared down through
the unbroken silence
lapping the shoreline
Water skippers dart around
the rocks and windfall driftwood
settled juxtaposed in cattail reeds
and emerging broadleaf sprouts

A petrified heartwood timber
lie fallow waiting bare barked,
hushed like a pining lover’s
     timeworn love seat,
     rubbed smooth as
     the crystalline waters
     of  half-moon lake

Lingering for a while  ―  
like a hidden stalker,
a perched wildcat waiting
for the full moon’s  
swooning spell to saturate
the thickening dusk quietude;
     arousing the urgent
     call of the wild —
exhaled from the held breath
of the wilderness nocturne
    on half-moon lake

The stillness was scattered
with the soft downy hairs
of the sleeping cattails,  and
the newly shed catkins
a spring gust bestrewed
from a tall resin birch tree
nigh the Sitka willows

     He  sat  quietly ...
     time out of mind ―

tossing his eyes up into the sky;
taking the time to read the stars ―
catching  them  each  again
as they fell into his gentle hands,
to show him who he was

Seeing their sparkly tracers  
trail-out above the cattails,
     from a distance
they resembled falling stars
unable to perceive their own renaissance ―
plashing lightly upon the still-water
     on half-moon lake

A lone shadow glides stealthily
near mid-tarn,.. swimming  
enchantingly with the grace
     of a blackswan
Appearing to glance shoreward
at the glowing low stars
rise and fall, as his eyes
twinkled skyward over
     the moonlit lagoon ―
heavenward of its moonlit ballet;
the lone sleek dark shadow
     slipping through
     a faint circular ripple
stirring the smooth as glass waters ―  
disappearing like a fleeting moment
     waning deep aneath
     a subtle silent wake.

When all the clear lines blurred,
he knew it had been so long ...

     but hearken !
… an interceding
     long drawn out wail  
     echoed  a feral ache
     across the stillness,
     breaking the silence ―

as the shadow reappeared;
     his tears surrendered
to the undulating call of the wild;
he felt the spirit of the sole Loon,
     as black and white
     as the moonlit night,
stir deeply in his wanting heart ―
     lay bare the silence
in lengthy yodeled psalms
to the god of the moon

Diving down deep yet again,
keeping the light he’d been given,
vanishing into the lifespring
sanctuary of half-moon lake


harlon rivers ... May 2018
travelogue: 4 of some more

When words are not enough,
and the world won’t get off her back,
she dances the Devils way,
She’s a princess,
wait she’s a queen,
wait she’s an angel,
wait she’s everything,
a Goddess,
the hottest performing artist I’ve ever seen,

and she’s dancing,
dancing is her therapy,

I mean,
I’m not James Brown,
but it’s a man’s world,
even if Rihanna runs this town,

See,
she’s been suppressed all her life,
and I’m not just talking about Rihanna,
I’m talking about every girl that was ever forced to be a wife,
just to survive in this life,

she was touched by her father,
or brother or cousin,
when she was just a little girl,
I know we all wish it wasn’t,
but it is true,
so what’s a girl to do,
when she’s a clean 13 messing with The ***** Dozen,

this isn’t battle of the sexes,
this is war of the worlds,
wants to be a woman but she’s just a girl,
no No Doubt just burnt out nerves taken turns,

she never asked to be born,
with the burden of being beautiful,
but she refuses to conform,
she is attractable irrational and radical,
so when it’s all too much,
the stares and the catcalls,
the aggressive forceful touch,
the nails across her back like a blackboard,
and the moans become just white noise,
she takes it all in,
she forgives the man because he’s just a boy,
he is an angel even if he has fallen,
she takes it all in,
and she uses all of those abuses,
as the fuel with the tools which induces,
an allusive state of truth which,
allows her to move with intuitive smoothness,
and lose herself in the music morphing into what a centrifuge is,
separating fluids transforming what was otherwise useless abuses,
into a truth that cruises and confuses the stupid stooges,

she dances,
in a statement of glorious refusal to submit to their ideals,
she is more than a princess queen angel goddess,
she is fire burning up all preconceived notions of *** appeal,
the real deal,
dancing sweating cleansing her soul and her pores,
moving faster in progression refuting repression,
overcoming an obsession of oppression and knocking down all doors,
she is not a possession,
though she is possessed when,
she’s a dancing expression of how we all feel and more,

no words are enough,
she shows what we all feel,
she reveals what,
was before thinly concealed,

she is the perfect expression,
of imperfect circumstances,
she is poetic stanzas,
she is the paint on the canvas,
there is no question that she is the answer,
and all of this is made clear when she takes it all in,
let’s go of everything and dances…

∆aron L∆ Lux ∆

#strength #metoo #dancer #ballet #blackswan