Rustles and whispers in the wind,
Speak of secrets lost long ago,
Of power and might and holy fire,
Of crafting and training and hidden light,
Of creation, destruction, and all between,
The Aspen's rustle, the secret call,
All the secrets of the world,
Of Sun and Moon and Stars above,
Of Earth and Sky and Chthonic depths,
Of Sea and Mountains and Plains between,
Of Trees and Rocks and all the Beasts,
Of Iron and Copper and Stone and Wood,
Of all the secrets known to man,
And all that's lost beyond the pall,
What's known and forgotten and known once more,
Whispers to me in the moving leaves,
And all that is and all that was,
And all that could forever be,
Is there to hear by the truest heart,
Rustles and whispers in the wind.

Rustles and bustles
Of a lovely morning breeze
That shines crystal rays.

(with poems from the Chinese translated by Arthur Waley)

My bed is so empty that I keep on waking up.
As the cold increases, the night-wind begins to blow.
It rustles the curtains, making a noise like the sea:
Oh that those were waves which could carry me back to you!

Suddenly she was awake. She could feel a cool breeze on the cheek that wasn’t warm on her pillow. She could smell the damp fields, the waterlogged moorland and the aftermath of recent rain. The action of rain on wood or stone seemed to release particular vapours wholly the province of the night in a small town. There was also the not entirely welcome residue of the past evening’s cooking from the kitchen below. But such sensory thoughts were overwhelmed by the rush of conversation clips; these from a day of non-stop voices that had invaded and now occupied her consciousness. She had listened furiously all day, often fashioning questions as the listening proceeded, keeping it all going, being friendly and wise and sensible and knowing. She could hear her tone of voice, her very articulation in the playback of her memory. It was so difficult sometimes to find the right tone, that inflection suitable to different aspects of ‘talk’. She didn’t want to appear pompous or too serious. That would never do. The thing was to be light, but intelligently light so her colleagues would say to one another – ‘Helen is a treasure you know: brilliant person to have on the team. You can always rely on her. ’ She knew she was often anxious for approval, for a right recognition of her efforts, to be thought well of. ‘Doesn’t everybody?’ she thought wistfully.

There was a momentary flurry of what Helen often dreaded when she found herself awake at night – yesterday’s embarrassing moments. These invariably began with ‘Am I wearing the right clothes?’ It was Caroline’s jacket that came to mind first. That mix of informal but simply smart that can only be bought with serious time and a clear conscience with the credit card. Her favourite blue affair (mail order) with big pockets and the slight pattern on the hem suddenly seemed very ‘last year’. Anna had chosen all-over black, loose trousers with a draw string, no jewellery, but flashy sandals and make up. She’d painted her toenails green. Helen did make up – a little, but not to travel in. She knew she had the right shoes for a long day. Then, those first conversations with Paul, who she’d never talked to outside a meeting before. ‘Keep it light, Helen’, she’d say, ‘Don’t say too much – but then don’t say too little.’ She had found herself – her independent womanly self, speaking with an edgy tone she didn’t always feel happy about. As she spoke to Paul about the coming evening’s football – he’d brought it up for goodness sake – she found herself being funny about the inconsequence of it all, then remembering the passion with which people she knew and loved followed the intricacies of this sport. She saved an own goal with some comment about the game’s social significance she’d picked up off some radio interview.

As the long journey had proceeded she’d been able occasionally (thankfully sometimes) to fall into observation-only mode. There was this sorting of images into significant, memorable, able to forget about, of no consequence at all. She’d been caught by the strange geometry of yellow cones that seemed stitched onto the rain-glistening road surface. There had been a buzzard she’d glimpsed for a moment, a reflection of Sally in the window next to her seat, that mother and her new born in the Ladies at the services, the tunnels of dripping greenery as the coach left the motorway for the winding minor roads, then the view of a grey tor on distant moorland followed instantly by the thought of walking there with her sketchbook, her camera and his loving company, with his admiring smile as he watched her move ahead of him on the path; she knew that behind her he was collecting her every movement to playback in his loneliness when they were apart.

Oh how she wished for his dear presence in this large half-cold bed, as the dark of night was being groped by dawn’s grey. There and there, and now the pre-dawn calls of local birds before that first real chorus of the dawn-proper began. She thought of them both on their last visit to this ancient countryside, being newly intimate, being breath-takingly loving, warm together for a whole night, a whole day, a whole night, a whole day . . . the movies in her mind rolled out scenes of the gardens they’d visited, the opening they’d attended, all that being together, holding hands, sitting close together, sitting across from each other at restaurant tables (knees touching), always quietly talking, always catching each other’s glances with smiles, and his gentle kisses and slight touches of the hand on the arm. She began to feel warm, warm and loved.

As she was drifting back into a shallow sleep she remembered his voice recite (in the Rose Walk at Hestercombe) that poem from the Chinese he loved . .

Who says
That it’s by my desire,
This separation, this living so far from you?
My dress still smells of the lavender you gave:
My hand still holds the letter you sent.
Round my waist I wear a double sash:
I dream that it binds us both with a same-heart knot.
Did you not know that people hide their love,
Like a flower that seems to precious to be picked?

I love You!
Every second
When wind rustles the grass –
Now and tomorrow –
I leap to You in me
In your dark embrace I shine
I am Amergin – who else –
I have praised Your name over all.

Le Breis is Míle Bliain

Mo ghrá Thú!
Gach soicind.
Nuair a chorraíonn an ghaoth an féar
Lingim Chugat ionam
Id bharróg dhorcha soilsím
Is mé Aimhirghin – cé eile? –
Mholas T’ainm thar chách

INSTEAD OF A PREFACE

During the frightening years of the Yezhov terror, I
spent seventeen months waiting in prison queues in
Leningrad. One day, somehow, someone 'picked me out'.
On that occasion there was a woman standing behind me,
her lips blue with cold, who, of course, had never in
her life heard my name. Jolted out of the torpor
characteristic of all of us, she said into my ear
(everyone whispered there) - 'Could one ever describe
this?' And I answered - 'I can.' It was then that
something like a smile slid across what had previously
been just a face.
[The 1st of April in the year 1957. Leningrad]

DEDICATION

Mountains fall before this grief,
A mighty river stops its flow,
But prison doors stay firmly bolted
Shutting off the convict burrows
And an anguish close to death.
Fresh winds softly blow for someone,
Gentle sunsets warm them through; we don't know this,
We are everywhere the same, listening
To the scrape and turn of hateful keys
And the heavy tread of marching soldiers.
Waking early, as if for early mass,
Walking through the capital run wild, gone to seed,
We'd meet - the dead, lifeless; the sun,
Lower every day; the Neva, mistier:
But hope still sings forever in the distance.
The verdict. Immediately a flood of tears,
Followed by a total isolation,
As if a beating heart is painfully ripped out, or,
Thumped, she lies there brutally laid out,
But she still manages to walk, hesitantly, alone.
Where are you, my unwilling friends,
Captives of my two satanic years?
What miracle do you see in a Siberian blizzard?
What shimmering mirage around the circle of the moon?
I send each one of you my salutation, and farewell.
[March 1940]

INTRODUCTION
[PRELUDE]

It happened like this when only the dead
Were smiling, glad of their release,
That Leningrad hung around its prisons
Like a worthless emblem, flapping its piece.
Shrill and sharp, the steam-whistles sang
Short songs of farewell
To the ranks of convicted, demented by suffering,
As they, in regiments, walked along -
Stars of death stood over us
As innocent Russia squirmed
Under the blood-spattered boots and tyres
Of the black marias.

I

You were taken away at dawn. I followed you
As one does when a corpse is being removed.
Children were crying in the darkened house.
A candle flared, illuminating the Mother of God. . .
The cold of an icon was on your lips, a death-cold
sweat
On your brow - I will never forget this; I will gather

To wail with the wives of the murdered streltsy (1)
Inconsolably, beneath the Kremlin towers.
[1935. Autumn. Moscow]

II

Silent flows the river Don
A yellow moon looks quietly on
Swanking about, with cap askew
It sees through the window a shadow of you
Gravely ill, all alone
The moon sees a woman lying at home
Her son is in jail, her husband is dead
Say a prayer for her instead.

III

It isn't me, someone else is suffering. I couldn't.
Not like this. Everything that has happened,
Cover it with a black cloth,
Then let the torches be removed. . .
Night.

IV

Giggling, poking fun, everyone's darling,
The carefree sinner of Tsarskoye Selo (2)
If only you could have foreseen
What life would do with you -
That you would stand, parcel in hand,
Beneath the Crosses (3), three hundredth in
line,
Burning the new year's ice
With your hot tears.
Back and forth the prison poplar sways
With not a sound - how many innocent
Blameless lives are being taken away. . .
[1938]

V

For seventeen months I have been screaming,
Calling you home.
I've thrown myself at the feet of butchers
For you, my son and my horror.
Everything has become muddled forever -
I can no longer distinguish
Who is an animal, who a person, and how long
The wait can be for an execution.
There are now only dusty flowers,
The chinking of the thurible,
Tracks from somewhere into nowhere
And, staring me in the face
And threatening me with swift annihilation,
An enormous star.
[1939]

VI

Weeks fly lightly by. Even so,
I cannot understand what has arisen,
How, my son, into your prison
White nights stare so brilliantly.
Now once more they burn,
Eyes that focus like a hawk,
And, upon your cross, the talk
Is again of death.
[1939. Spring]

VII
THE VERDICT

The word landed with a stony thud
Onto my still-beating breast.
Nevermind, I was prepared,
I will manage with the rest.

I have a lot of work to do today;
I need to slaughter memory,
Turn my living soul to stone
Then teach myself to live again. . .

But how. The hot summer rustles
Like a carnival outside my window;
I have long had this premonition
Of a bright day and a deserted house.
[22 June 1939. Summer. Fontannyi Dom (4)]

VIII
TO DEATH

You will come anyway - so why not now?
I wait for you; things have become too hard.
I have turned out the lights and opened the door
For you, so simple and so wonderful.
Assume whatever shape you wish. Burst in
Like a shell of noxious gas. Creep up on me
Like a practised bandit with a heavy weapon.
Poison me, if you want, with a typhoid exhalation,
Or, with a simple tale prepared by you
(And known by all to the point of nausea), take me
Before the commander of the blue caps and let me
glimpse
The house administrator's terrified white face.
I don't care anymore. The river Yenisey
Swirls on. The Pole star blazes.
The blue sparks of those much-loved eyes
Close over and cover the final horror.
[19 August 1939. Fontannyi Dom]

IX

Madness with its wings
Has covered half my soul
It feeds me fiery wine
And lures me into the abyss.

That's when I understood
While listening to my alien delirium
That I must hand the victory
To it.

However much I nag
However much I beg
It will not let me take
One single thing away:

Not my son's frightening eyes -
A suffering set in stone,
Or prison visiting hours
Or days that end in storms

Nor the sweet coolness of a hand
The anxious shade of lime trees
Nor the light distant sound
Of final comforting words.
[14 May 1940. Fontannyi Dom]

X
CRUCIFIXION

Weep not for me, mother.
I am alive in my grave.

1.
A choir of angels glorified the greatest hour,
The heavens melted into flames.
To his father he said, 'Why hast thou forsaken me!'
But to his mother, 'Weep not for me. . .'
[1940. Fontannyi Dom]

2.
Magdalena smote herself and wept,
The favourite disciple turned to stone,
But there, where the mother stood silent,
Not one person dared to look.
[1943. Tashkent]

EPILOGUE

1.
I have learned how faces fall,
How terror can escape from lowered eyes,
How suffering can etch cruel pages
Of cuneiform-like marks upon the cheeks.
I know how dark or ash-blond strands of hair
Can suddenly turn white. I've learned to recognise
The fading smiles upon submissive lips,
The trembling fear inside a hollow laugh.
That's why I pray not for myself
But all of you who stood there with me
Through fiercest cold and scorching July heat
Under a towering, completely blind red wall.

2.
The hour has come to remember the dead.
I see you, I hear you, I feel you:
The one who resisted the long drag to the open window;
The one who could no longer feel the kick of familiar
soil beneath her feet;
The one who, with a sudden flick of her head, replied,

'I arrive here as if I've come home!'
I'd like to name you all by name, but the list
Has been removed and there is nowhere else to look.
So,
I have woven you this wide shroud out of the humble
words
I overheard you use. Everywhere, forever and always,
I will never forget one single thing. Even in new
grief.
Even if they clamp shut my tormented mouth
Through which one hundred million people scream;
That's how I wish them to remember me when I am dead
On the eve of my remembrance day.
If someone someday in this country
Decides to raise a memorial to me,
I give my consent to this festivity
But only on this condition - do not build it
By the sea where I was born,
I have severed my last ties with the sea;
Nor in the Tsar's Park by the hallowed stump
Where an inconsolable shadow looks for me;
Build it here where I stood for three hundred hours
And no-one slid open the bolt.
Listen, even in blissful death I fear
That I will forget the Black Marias,
Forget how hatefully the door slammed and an old woman
Howled like a wounded beast.
Let the thawing ice flow like tears
From my immovable bronze eyelids
And let the prison dove coo in the distance
While ships sail quietly along the river.
[March 1940. Fontannyi Dom]

FOOTNOTES

1 An elite guard which rose up in rebellion
   against Peter the Great in 1698. Most were either
   executed or exiled.
2 The imperial summer residence outside St
   Petersburg where Ahmatova spent her early years.
3 A prison complex in central Leningrad near the
   Finland Station, called The Crosses because of the
   shape of two of the buildings.
4 The Leningrad house in which Ahmatova lived.


First published Sasha Soldatow Mayakovsky in Bondi
BlackWattle Press 1993 Sydney.

You're the wind the blows the treetops
It rustles through my hair
The hand that touches my shoulder
Quietly, you are there.
You're the story left unfinished
A poem left untouched
For 20 years you fought alone
20 years escaped Death's clutch.
For 14 years you held me
Through plays and concerts all
You filled up puzzles and read the books
Alone, you stood so tall.
You told me all the stories
Answered that question many times
Why I never did see Grampa,
Why I never saw you cry.
You showed me all the pictures
Played Santa on Christmas morn'
We made fruit salad on holidays
You've loved me since I was born.
Not once did I say goodbye to you
See you later, kiss goodnight
I'd see you in the morning
Bananas and donuts under the counter light.
You were a genius in your own way
But never flaunted it so
You taught me games I'd not thought of
You loved me more than you could show.
We offered you a guard dog
A cat to spend your days
You never were an animal person
Dependence is not your ways.
You got home from bingo one night
Laid down to rest your head
Your sister woke to call you
Somehow, you weren't out of bed.
From then on you hid your voice from us
Never to be heard again
Tests and cards and flowers, too
Not one, not two- more than ten!
Leading up to then, you'd had enough
Enough for a lifetime, I suppose,
Because one night you took your final breath
Your cheeks lost the color of rose.
I've never been the hugging type,
And I handle sadness on my own
Crying in front of others
Is something I've never been shown.
The next week had been quite tough
But your sister was always there
Your sister, my Nana, the only one
She told us she would always care.
We said goodbye, a final one,
I tried my hardest not to cry
I'd only said goodnight my life
Not once have I said goodbye.
Sometimes I wish we got you the dog
Maybe we'd share another morn'
I love you for the rest of my life,
The one I miss and adore.
It was the night you'd not return
None of us know why
But now we know you're happy
Playing bingo with Grampa in the sky.

Lying beneath trees in the heat of the day cannot possibly be compared to any other pastime: to watch the light toy with the leaves, shining bright and brighter in the ever-changing gaps in the leaves turned dark by the shadow. The interplay between the light and the leaves in ever-ongoing banter and they hate to quit their game when the sun moves too far beneath the horizon for the light to reach above the boughs and must return to its source. The wind plays a part in the sport as well, when it rustles the leaves and causes a sparkle in the variance of illumination. Tortoiseshell patterns scatter along your  limbs and features and tumble off the cliffs of your sides into the grass you recline on. The filter of light casts playful interlocking patterns of light and dark impossible to decode without the proper encryption, forever lasting while the world speeds past their lazy game.

Dusk!

With a creepy, tingling sensation you hear the fluttering of leathery wings!

Bats!

Glowing red eyes and glistening fangs,

These unspeakable giant bugs drop into view.*

Fibrous wings furred like a moth,

Big ears are just a membranous extension of antennae.

Flying in search of a flower’s pollen laden froth,

Silent except for the hum and squeak of echolocation.

Trap bats in attics, butterflies in nets.

No rabies feared, no bedbug bites to itch.

Clawed feet ****** and grab like praying mantis pincers;

Bloated stomach slopes like a pudgy beetle.

Jaws manipulate like an ant, excise like scissors;

Soft hair rustles like a wooly caterpillar.

They live in darkness, centipedes do too,

Come out at night like cockroaches tend to.

Skittering through the night like daddy long-legs,

Noses snubbed like bumble bee faces.

Wind turbines endanger bats,

Like fans endanger lightning bugs.

Only one percent of bats are vampiric,

Like only a small percentage of spiders are poisonous.

Dawn!

With a creepy, tingling sensation you hear the fluttering of leathery wings!

Bats!

Bats are bugs, aren’t they?

Wind rushing,
A mighty roar,
But silent as the grave.

No sound itself,
No sight itself,
Only movement.

But Aspen leaves,
And Aspen groves,
Moving, rustling,
Whispering, talking.

Each leaf a single voice,
Each branch a quiet chorus,
Each tree a mighty legion.

The grove a roaring,
Rushing, soaring,
Loud yet stilling,
Calm and peace.

Constant movement,
Loud but softly,
The Aspens lull me,
To my rest.

Black, Swiss cheese hulk on horizon
The James Longstreet
immobile old freighter of the bay

Towed to the ignominy
of its last commission
in the curled arm of The Cape
Tides flex their muscles against it
But The Longstreet is steadfast
in its dark purpose

Standing target for practice

A sortie if planes home in on its bulk
Honing their skills
on this  “fish-in-a-barrel”
Thunderhead-etched pyrotechnics
Booming follows the miles over water

Against The Longstreet’s silhouette enduring
even God fixes sights
firing bolts across its bow
taking aim at our futures

Standing targets for practice

Vietnam? Cape Cod?
No difference to teens
before life’s ocean of conscription

Sand is cold beneath dunes
Beach grass rustles
to the pulsing surf
to the wind’s whispers
just below hearing
as if there’s a secret
that must be kept

We are targets for practice
We are meaningless din

Pulling our sweatshirts and blanket closer
The Supremes sing thinly
from transistor
“Stopped for a moment in the name of love—

Thinking it over”

Something’s stirring
- hey honey, sweetie, sugar-
Something’s ******* up and in, like their stomachs,
(why don’t I look that flat, mummy?)
Something’s furious and seething, something strong
And stuck and breathing
My bones in. It’s the *** you see, yeah you bet,
All they are is ***; sweaty, oily, wet
With some such suffocating, suffering, surrendering
Desire to please.

Please the man, the thick man, with your eyes.
Please him with your deadened stare – glare -
Please him with your chest, your hair,
Feel the way that wind rustles and tousles, as you dance,
As you feel the liberation of a thrusty, *****, pleasing stance,
As they slip money between your legs. As they wrap you up, up,
Up in its crinkles, up in its arms,
Swept from your feet and in love, swept up from harm,
Just as you desired.

Love is the one – but what? Love comes from beauty, right?
Full lips, bright eyes, as dead as the night,
The best thing a girl can be is pretty.
(well that’s what they are on screens)
And that’s why I cried when they drew a picture,
Fourteen and they took all our ‘best features’
Ripped them from our bodies,
Bundled them up into one jigsaw creature
-where’s mine?
They forgot me,
But it’s fine – she’s got your per-son-a-lit-y.
And I cried.

It’s easy to say, I know, and I see
That things are better now, I am almost free.
But oh she’s been in the wars:
She’*****; she’s ripped; she’s cut; she’s lost;
That pleasing object onscreen – she’s yours.
But passion’s no good, gotta be pure, sweet and true
Well she’s gotta be new, and a girl's gotta do
What a girl only can do,
‘Til she’s through,
‘Til she’s cold cold and blue,
So hey lady, lady, lay-dee,
Who are you?

Sorry for the passion, words disordered in a heap.
Didn’t mean to make it bleak. Didn’t mean to make her speak.

But you see this is how she might.

Flocked in furious, in flight,
The little bird - the beast - is heard:
Each word, each word, each bite.

Fiery light from a dying star
Cools against your mocha thigh.
Desire formed like fingers
Rustles your hair’s dark light.

Body to body and breath to breath,
We are here and nowhere else.
Unposted selves,
Love without likes,
Hands without keyboards,
Voices in air,
The absence of absence.

Downfall she claims
Dripping in disease
Her dress ripped
Trees dying
Holes cover the seams
Tattered
Sewage covered
Disgraced
Ugly
Taking her vitality
The mass living upon her soil
Population at a high
Charging her for corruption
Her hair cut
In shambles
Uneven proportioned
Greed is the man in lead
Unfairly held to shame
Her belly rumbles
Earthquakes
Crack her skin
Aching
Oozing her blood
Tsunamis wiping out existence
She violently
Throws tantrums
A twister destroying houses
Seeking attention
Under validated
Unnoticed for exotic jungle humanity
Innocence
Her music lifts
The mountain breeze
Sagebrush rustles
Birds whisper
Squirrels leaping
Her captivating body sings
Weak man made her break
Small art gone
Ice caps melting into the abyss
Taking scraps
Leftover bits
Her soul
Missing
Stipping her clothing
******* her gold
Her shirt selfishly torn
Naked she became
Her animals hungry
Oceans sickened
Our anguish
Is revenge
Knocked out
She's becoming manipulated belief
She's in debt to the population
Mother will reclaim
Her dynasty
We the people will be left
In emptiness

I don’t need you to solve my problems
Just listen to me while I cry
I don’t need you to give your life
Just love me when I want to die

Give me time to process
Give me time to breath
Promise that you’ll hold me
Promise you won’t leave

I just need some time to grieve for
The life I lost when I was young
I just need some time to grieve for
All the songs I’ve left unsung

When we wake up in the morning
As the sun peaks through the trees
The birds sing out their warning
As the wind rustles through the leaves

I can feel my heart a glowing
As you kiss me on the cheek
Like a tree I have been growing
Of my sorrows let me speak

I just need some time to grieve for
The life I lost when I was young
I just need some time to grieve for
All the songs I’ve left unsung

When the day is gone
And we’re done with the sun
Kiss me on my head
As I sink into the bed

As the sky’s turn red
And I’m wishing I was dead
You can rock me to sleep
With the nightmares I keep

And I’ll dream of songs unsung
And I’ll dream of songs unsung

The little white clouds are racing over the sky,
And the fields are strewn with the gold of the flower of March,
The daffodil breaks under foot, and the tasselled larch
Sways and swings as the thrush goes hurrying by.

A delicate odour is borne on the wings of the morning breeze,
The odour of deep wet grass, and of brown new-furrowed earth,
The birds are singing for joy of the Spring’s glad birth,
Hopping from branch to branch on the rocking trees.

And all the woods are alive with the murmur and sound of Spring,
And the rose-bud breaks into pink on the climbing briar,
And the crocus-bed is a quivering moon of fire
Girdled round with the belt of an amethyst ring.

And the plane to the pine-tree is whispering some tale of love
Till it rustles with laughter and tosses its mantle of green,
And the gloom of the wych-elm’s hollow is lit with the iris sheen
Of the burnished rainbow throat and the silver breast of a dove.

See! the lark starts up from his bed in the meadow there,
Breaking the gossamer threads and the nets of dew,
And flashing adown the river, a flame of blue!
The kingfisher flies like an arrow, and wounds the air.

TIS past ! The sultry tyrant of the south
Has spent his short-liv'd rage ; more grateful hours
Move silent on; the skies no more repel
The dazzled sight, but with mild maiden beams
Of temper'd light, invite the cherish'd eye
To wander o'er their sphere ; where hung aloft
DIAN's bright crescent, like a silver bow
New strung in heaven, lifts high its beamy horns

Impatient for the night, and seems to push
Her brother down the sky. Fair VENUS shines
Even in the eye of day ; with sweetest beam
Propitious shines, and shakes a trembling flood
Of soften'd radiance from her dewy locks.
The shadows spread apace ; while meeken'd Eve
Her cheek yet warm with blushes, slow retires
Thro' the Hesperian gardens of the west,
And shuts the gates of day. 'Tis now the hour
When Contemplation, from her sunless haunts,
The cool damp grotto, or the lonely depth
Of unpierc'd woods, where wrapt in solid shade
She mused away the gaudy hours of noon,
And fed on thoughts unripen'd by the sun,
Moves forward ; and with radiant finger points
To yon blue concave swell'd by breath divine,
Where, one by one, the living eyes of heaven
Awake, quick kindling o'er the face of ether

One boundless blaze ; ten thousand trembling fires,
And dancing lustres, where th' unsteady eye
Restless, and dazzled wanders unconfin'd
O'er all this field of glories : spacious field !
And worthy of the master : he, whose hand
With hieroglyphics older than the Nile,
Inscrib'd the mystic tablet; hung on high
To public gaze, and said, adore, O man !
The finger of thy GOD. From what pure wells
Of milky light, what soft o'erflowing urn,
Are all these lamps so fill'd ? these friendly lamps,
For ever streaming o'er the azure deep
To point our path, and light us to our home.
How soft they slide along their lucid spheres !
And silent as the foot of time, fulfil
Their destin'd courses : Nature's self is hush'd,
And, but a scatter'd leaf, which rustles thro'
The thick-wove foliage, not a sound is heard

To break the midnight air ; tho' the rais'd ear,
Intensely listening, drinks in every breath.
How deep the silence, yet how loud the praise !
But are they silent all ? or is there not
A tongue in every star that talks with man,
And wooes him to be wise ; nor wooes in vain :
This dead of midnight is the noon of thought,
And wisdom mounts her zenith with the stars.
At this still hour the self-collected soul
Turns inward, and beholds a stranger there
Of high descent, and more than mortal rank ;
An embryo GOD ; a spark of fire divine,
Which must burn on for ages, when the sun,
(Fair transitory creature of a day !)
Has clos'd his golden eye, and wrapt in shades
Forgets his wonted journey thro' the east.

Ye citadels of light, and seats of GODS !
Perhaps my future home, from whence the soul

Revolving periods past, may oft look back
With recollected tenderness, on all
The various busy scenes she left below,
Its deep laid projects and its strange events,
As on some fond and doating tale that sooth'd
Her infant hours ; O be it lawful now
To tread the hallow'd circles of your courts,
And with mute wonder and delighted awe
Approach your burning confines. Seiz'd in thought
On fancy's wild and roving wing I sail,
From the green borders of the peopled earth,
And the pale moon, her duteous fair attendant;
From solitary Mars ; from the vast orb
Of Jupiter, whose huge gigantic bulk
Dances in ether like the lightest leaf;
To the dim verge, the suburbs of the system,
Where chearless Saturn 'midst her watry moons
Girt with a lucid zone, majestic sits

In gloomy grandeur ; like an exil'd queen
Amongst her weeping handmaids: fearless thence
I launch into the trackless deeps of space,
Where, burning round, ten thousand suns appear,
Of elder beam ; which ask no leave to shine
Of our terrestrial star, nor borrow light
From the proud regent of our scanty day ;
Sons of the morning, first born of creation,
And only less than him who marks their track,
And guides their fiery wheels. Here must I stop,
Or is there aught beyond ? What hand unseen
Impels me onward thro' the glowing orbs
Of inhabitable nature ; far remote,
To the dread confines of eternal night,
To solitudes of vast unpeopled space,
The desarts of creation, wide and wild ;
Where embryo systems and unkindled suns
Sleep in the womb of chaos; fancy droops,

And thought astonish'd stops her bold career.
But oh thou mighty mind ! whose powerful word
Said, thus let all things be, and thus they were,
Where shall I seek thy presence ? how unblam'd
Invoke thy dread perfection ?
Have the broad eye-lids of the morn beheld thee ?
Or does the beamy shoulder of Orion
Support thy throne ? O look with pity down
On erring guilty man ; not in thy names
Of terrour clad ; not with those thunders arm'd
That conscious Sinai felt, when fear appall'd
The scatter'd tribes; thou hast a gentler voice,
That whispers comfort to the swelling heart,
Abash'd, yet longing to behold her Maker.

But now my soul unus'd tostretch her powers
In flight so daring, drops her weary wing,
And seeks again the known accustom'd spot,

Drest up with sun, and shade, and lawns, and streams,
A mansion fair and spacious for its guest,
And full replete with wonders. Let me here
Content and grateful, wait th' appointed time
And ripen for the skies: the hour will come
When all these splendours bursting on my sight
Shall stand unveil'd, and to my ravished sense
Unlock the glories of the world unknown.

I feel the wind crash against my skin,
enter my nose and into my lungs. I am
alive today. My eyes are fixated at the thought of

those Narra Trees, standing proudly
in the backyard; how the wind rustles
with their branches; how the noise becomes
music, whispering through my ears. I feel
safety. Safety, like the way I lay

at my hammock—the way I trust
the ropes with an arm-strength
of a man; how they held me so high

that I could touch the sky, like freedom
soars across horizons in form of contrails.

Today, I feel love
and I soar to the

Universe.

There, she is there. She moves in the cold September morning
it's hours yet till dawn but she knows neither light nor dark
nor scarcely where she is. A light, a door, stone steps. She walks

straight up them, eyes ahead; her body rigid as she jerks
forward towards the door, the handle, and suddenly the man
behind the desk. He looks up, his breath stops

he sees her tragic bright eyes, he sees the blood, and
how she holds those small white-knuckled hands; he watches
her terrible face. He knows without asking, but he asks.

They are locked already into an unspeakable knowledge,
only yesterday she was here, distraught and pleading,
it was his chance for brilliance — or at least for goodness —

and he missed it. He has become her jailer now, who
could have been her saviour. He wholly understands,
and it is too late. No one else will ever come to him and say

'Help me, take me, please, before I do this thing . . .'
He will be haunted now for ever by his trial, deceptive
as it was, and he found wanting. No one will accuse him

and he can never be forgiven. His uniform rustles slightly
as he rises, his single offer a cup of institution coffee,
potion for the ******. 'Your jacket's all ******, take it off.'

Oh cry for the breaking day, the sleeping pillows shocked
by phone calls, messages, alarms, weep now and every morning
for the Janus faces, back to back, of guilt and innocence.

Claude Debussy plays gracefully
a dog wrapped in a blanket
starring out the window
as if seeing an angel

hot coffee lingers on my tongue
taste-buds reminiscing the bitter-sweetness

wind rustles the ficus bushes
slight noises in the distance

I feel calm
I have never felt calm before

is this what peace feels like?

everything is going to be okay.

The old oak tree grew at the edge,
of an orchard where little ones play,
and there lived a mage,
who hears trees on a windy day,

Rushing wind rustles leaves,
on that one day brilliant and bright,
With amber gold autumn grandeur on display,
singing tuneful songs delightfully light and gay,
Apple trees trilling events as mysterious as night,
Of love found and lost last May.

The stars over head twinkle
With the thought of young love.
The wind rustles through our hair
To urge on our emotions.
His hand firm on the small of my back,
Pressing hot into my skin.
We sway into each other's arms,
Lips trembling with anticipation.

After exchanged whispers of adoration,
Those trembling lips tremble no more,
And find each other in a sweet moment of innocence.
A first time shared.
A kiss not to be forgotten.

The world outside bustles
As everyone rustles
Through their busy lives.
She sits outwardly still and calm
But waiting for some balm
To come soothe her tired soul.

Soothe the sting and burn
Of having to relearn
How to live and go on.
Soothe the fear and pain
Of having to refrain
From saying what she wants to really say.

If only they knew
If only they saw
The little child
That hides within.

If only they heard
If only they sensed
The trembling babe
That cries at night.

But a grown woman
Has perfected the art
Of painting on masks.
The lines, the colors,
So perfectly drawn on
To hide the imperfect reality.

So the world bustles
With everyones' rustles
Of living their own lives.
And she...
She waits, paralyzed.

In a dream I shall feel
The wings of the world unfolding, and
Worlds spinning on the axis of mad journeys;
And the seas breaking turquoise, upon their rippled surface.

In the heart of the ears
I shall hear the shivering willows, dreaming their
Wood-smoke dreams, full of sap and  funneled sunlight;
Pierced by light for a thousand years

And the flowers sleeping nestled in stars;
Gathered in the deep, among the wood-thrushes,
In coagulated violet forests, all shadowed and dark:
And a whispered peace barely rustles this world.

--To W. H.


With a ripple of leaves and a ****** of streams
The full world rolls in a rhythm of praise,
And the winds are one with the clouds and beams--
Midsummer days!  Midsummer days!
The dusk grows vast; in a purple haze,
While the West from a rapture of sunset rights,
Faint stars their exquisite lamps upraise--
Midsummer nights!  O midsummer nights!

The wood's green heart is a nest of dreams,
The lush grass thickens and springs and sways,
The rathe wheat rustles, the landscape gleams--
Midsummer days!  Midsummer days!
In the stilly fields, in the stilly ways,
All secret shadows and mystic lights,
Late lovers murmur and linger and gaze--
Midsummer nights!  O midsummer nights!

There's a music of bells from the trampling teams,
Wild skylarks hover, the gorses blaze,
The rich, ripe rose as with incense steams--
Midsummer days!  Midsummer days!
A soul from the honeysuckle strays,
And the nightingale as from prophet heights
Sings to the Earth of her million Mays--
Midsummer nights!  O midsummer nights!

Envoy

And it's O, for my dear and the charm that stays--
Midsummer days!  Midsummer days!
It's O, for my Love and the dark that plights--
Midsummer nights!  O midsummer nights!

dreams long lost
swirl around me

in the shade of Arjuna
winds sing a lullaby.

they never die
bide their time
in the cave of eye
neath layer of rhyme

don't the rustles fall silent
yet canopy of new leaves
grow above

crave the same firmament
and away from old griefs
seek new love?

in the winds' murmur
i would never touch them
the seemingly lost dreams

but quietly in the hopes' harbor
rekindle their flickering flame

and let flow in endless streams.

Your life still rustles
in me, in my mind

you think along with my questions
I hear remarks you once made

.....Your life still rustles
.....in me, in my feelings

.....you move along with my blood
.....I feel you flow through my heart

Your life  still rustles
at home, as if you were present

the warmth of your body
somewhere tangibly close

.....Sometimes your voice is there again
.....in the movies that make me feel

.....what it was like, but much further away
.....than when we watched them together

Your life still rustles
in the scents of the woods

taking me by surprise in the seasons
familiar in unexpected places

delicately, our dragonfly conversations
dance in Japanese gardens,
where jewelled concrete pagoda’s
stand stilted, like
timeless geometries, in greening water

then wind rustles timidly through
creek beds and pebbled leaves;
bells ring like wine glasses at a dinner table
and we feel our arm hairs stand on tiptoes,
pricked up to weary voices

(chanting monks, those that sit in circles
monkishly chant, in unison
“there are three meanings of loneliness”)
here, chanting also, we
find ourselves again not alone
enchanted in the fragmented daylight.

but then again, I turn, apathetically, and declare
“let us rest
in the immense imagery of our imagination

for it is easier to sleep,
as rain creeps closer to our doorstep,
than to ***** barricades, levies
and trenches around our house”

Oh, but the way the light reflects upon the Japanese trees
is so splendidly delicate,
and our delicate conversations
feel all so perfect…

so now please, time, lose me
in your whisper.

Forensics couldn't figure out what happened to our bodies because they never looked closely enough into their own eyes.

When we walked out across those wild flower grass plains,
moving
our bare feet meandering , twirling, toes earthy, past the goddess river, bowing our eyes and laying sweet blessings of hopeful poetry at her edges with the mountains ahead of us going on and on and on.

Our heartbeats sinking into the smell of summers afternoons.
We
two beings
stand and watch as the water shows us the way across
her gentle back cool and singing.

We keep on laughing to the forests edge and settle by the Elder Trees to pray for the way ahead and the way already gone, we pray to the sentinel trees for their gracious beauty and we leave a small offering of a song.  

We
two beings

I'm all over Hummingbird
She's all over Dragonfly

Listen to the forest for the sign we can move on,

We
two beings

listen with our eyes and our hearts, ears and noses.
We wait, long moments sensing,
attuning ourselves to the rich forest song.
Later, we see the flash of Owl sister and know it is time to move along

in silence, we listen as we walk and let the sounds we hear guide us.

She's all over Wolf Teacher
I'm all over Lynx Secret Keeper

We're both keeping time alive with our actions.

Way in deep, where the floor is soft decomposition-in-motion and the sky is hardly seen, little tickling breezes stir us, we walk along in silence, side by side, always listening

until our feet meet the edge of a clearing and we whisper our offering:
the story of who we are, why we are here, how beautiful this place is and how it came to be that,

I'm all over Calendula
She's all over Nettle.

Here the sun lays upon us once more and we sit , facing each other

We breathe ourselves into mediation.
We breathe ourselves into silence.
We look at each other
past our skins and through to the light emanating from our DNA

and we start to hum.

We hum our spirit song and begin to unravel so slowly the ways of this world,

we begin to unravel so gently the bags we carry under our eyes
over our knees

we begin to unravel so softly the song of our hearts.

Flowing through us a motion so suspending we seem to no longer be singing, but the sounds somehow pour out of us
our bodies start to sway, no judgment, our bodies start to relax, no suffering

perhaps her toe taps and my ear wiggles
perhaps it's her nose jiggling
perhaps it's my elbow nodding.

We two beings
pray to each other sweet words of beauty
sweet words of honesty

we let those bodies dance
up on our feet
twirling and leaping around the green grass, wildflower clearing
until we feel a twang of connection,

like curious little deer we follow that cord in our chests , pulling us towards each other.

She's on the other side of the clearing and as we make small steps , I feel the boundaries of her person. Her energetic walls , I feel her enter into mine. And we stop, acknowledge the space we are entering and ask for permission to move on. We move on

layer by layer, always stopping to acknowledge, stopping to ask permission until we stand 4 inches between us, breathing.

By now we are no longer thinking, we only sense.
She moves her hand close to my wrist,  I meet her the rest of the way.

All collapses in on itself and opens back up again at our meeting.
She rides her hand up my arm to hold my face so gently.

I bring my other hand to her wrist and she meets me half way. I ride my hand up her arm to hold her face so gently.

I bring my hand to her waist and she leans in softly, she leans in softly.

She brings her hand to my waist and I lean in softly, I lean in slowly.

We move like this, unwrapping each other of clothes, breathing ourselves in meditation, going as slowly, gently as we possibly can.

When we are in our natural way, we wait a moment to take in the beauty, we **** our heads and as our words no longer matter we both know we hear a sounding stream.

We beings
perplexed and amused, find ourselves next to a small rocky stream, somewhere else in the forest. Dappled light finds it's way onto us , the trees and the water. Everything is orange and brown, mossy green with occasional pinks and purples.

She smiles and I smile , we make a motion of gratitude to our Great Water Mother and ask to wash.
When a small fish appears and jumps glistening
we move to scoop up running water in hands, pouring it over each others crowns. Again and again we scoop and we pour, we wash our walking sweat and clear ourselves.

Soon, the stream starts to fade and we are now on flat topped knoll, looking out over shallow banks of a wide flowing river.

The knoll is about the size of a large bed , wintergreen rustles beneath our feet.

We sit together and she brings her face close to mine, I bring my face close to hers and we look into each others eyes until we see.

I bring my lips close to her cheek, she brings her cheek close to my lips. And so we find ourselves tasting each other.
Slowly,
gently,
softly her lips come to my ears and her tongue moves on my lobe. My mouth to her nape and my breath is coming slow. We take as much time as we possibly can.

The Sun has not moved from the afternoon position. We are no longer in a place where time is quite the same.

Soon, I lay on the ground and she comes down beside me. Our dancing hands and tongues never in a rush, at a pace like the tide with movements, repetitive definitive and measured. Washing over our earthen valleys and hills, dipping low to our canyons, serenading our ravines. But never quite touching those extra sacred pleasure places.
She lays on her back and I sit beside her.

I kiss her chest and give thanks to her skin, her blood to milk trees and the crystal caves that lay within. I kiss her belly button and thank her mother for carrying her all this way. Her father for holding her. I move down to her womb and she makes a space for me between her legs, I lay there with my head on her belly listening.

I hear the beating blood and gurgling belly, breath staying slow, I hold her hips. and kiss her womb from the outside. I kiss her womb from the outside. I find I am at the edge of a small curly forest, I pray gently with a song at the borderline and kiss her there too. She tenses just a little and a pause, look to her eyes and see she does not want me further.

I slip out from her legs and lay down by her side.
The wide river is moving and the wintergreen is serenading us with her smell as our bodies movements bruise the small leaves. The sun has moved a little further across the sky, shadows are pulling longer now.

She puts her head to my chest and listens to the heart just below skin , bone and muscle.
She hears my breath and is riding up and down with my diaphragm movements. She slows me down until we are both inside the space between heartbeats. Encompassed in those melodies. We breathe again and see each others eyes. She kisses my heart from the outside and caresses my chest. I open my legs offering her space between them. She moves, lingering, one hand first on my face then on my heart, then on my solar plexus. Then her body is softly laying on mine, her head on my stomach. Listening. She laughs a little because the spaces inside of her don't exist inside of me, she says my secret caves are up in my heart, she heard them. She smiles and sighs a little, resting at the edges of my forest.
We beings
lay here, like this for a long time. Until the Sun is way low.
But we don't move. We just keep right on laying. Our eyes closing.

The wintergreen gives way to a bed of Jasmine vines way up in a tree. When we awake we look at each other and recognize our spirits.
She climbs onto the limb of a tree and sees  way across the forest, to more forest and more forest, to mountains and more mountains.
She begins to transform, her body rippling, scales made of light, emerging from her back, her eyes glistening, her dreams swirling around her, fruits ripe for the picking, some still maturing , her legs start to dance as they form one long tail, four legs with claws follow not long after. She is glowing a vibrant green touched with sparks of grey. A Naga flies out from the trees and is off. Into the night to do what she does.

I lay on the Jasmine, inhale sweet sweet scents and dream my own dreams where I'm an Owl , all my feathers pale pink and deep navy blue. I leap up through the canopy and sweep down into the forest to do what I do.  

Our spirits meet sometime before the Great Grandpa Sun is born again, to greet him with a song, to keep on exploring these earth bodies, to keep on singing to the forests, to keep on smelling and eating and drinking and washing, finding others to play with, to keep on thanking and laughing and moving time along with our movements.

The forensics sent into the forest to look for us didn't find diddlysquat because they hadn't looked deep enough into their own eyes.

the warm sea breeze
rustles through palm fronds
through my hair
it allows them to wave
to converse with me
such wonderful things they have to say
one large gust
and they all laugh at once
the wind stops
the sun bares down
as if the boss or god himself
entered the room
only silence
only that single golden eye glaring at me
causing a glare
burning into me to my very core
but the sea breeze
is brief to return
i can breath
i can speak easy
to the ageless souls encircling me
they wave
i wave back
we all laugh at once

Watch how the white birds float
On fjords, eternally reposed—
The rustles will whisper
        how they keep pristine composure:
                 "Follow the glassy estuary streams,
                  where swans sleep quiescent darlings
                  of their ivory shrouds."

The foliage on the western shore swallows the last radiant sliver of golden sun.

The pungent scent of gasoline reaches my nose and the boat is back in gear, already idling, as he titters anxiously behind the wheel.
“The sunset’s over, are you ready to head back?”

I’m not. Not yet.

I close my eyes and exhale the last drag of my cigarette. Smoke billows out through my slightly parted lips and into the fresh air that engulfs us.

It spreads
infinitely
in front of my eyes, blending into the air around us until it has become one with the atmosphere.  
I open my eyes.

Turning my head to the right, I glance out at the open water that surrounds our tiny boat, stretching far and wide encircling us.

I know that he is ready to leave. He opens his mouth to ask me again, but before he can I reach out and press a finger to his warm lips, silencing him.
He shifts his weight from one foot to the other, clearly uncomfortable, and turns his face from mine. My hand gently drags across his skin as his head revolves on his muscular neck and he allows my fingers to rest peacefully on his flushed cheek,
skin to skin,
me to him.

I drop my hand back to my side and his handsome features reveal a brief moment of relief.

“I suppose we can go now”
I take a reluctant last look at the trees, swaying gently in the June breeze, blissfully unaware that they’ve stolen yet another day from this Indian summer.
He begins to turn the boat, heading the bow back to the eastern shore. Our small cottage peaks out through the thick trees and from this distance it looks like a shy little dollhouse, waiting for us to return and play.

We ride back in silence. Our boat splashes through the water and icy droplets leap out of the lake and sting my face. They are refreshing and rejuvenating. They are replenishing.

I stretch and smile; I look at his face. It is like stone, so focused on the shoreline ahead so that my gaze goes unnoticed.

And then there are words,
dancing in my stomach,
infesting my windpipe,
filling my mouth, tasting so sweet.
I clench my teeth together and fight to keep the truth behind them.

My hair rustles in the wind.

I want to stand on the tallest tower,
the deepest canyon and the vastest desert;
and I want to yell until everyone has heard
and understands.
But I know that he must learn for himself; though my tongue itches to share, to save.

My hand finds him again and grips his wrist tightly.
I wish my hands could teach him what they’ve know
That my memories, my understanding and my acceptance of the truth could travel out of the pores in my skin and into his.
I want the truth to infect him, to spread through him like wild fire.

Then he too will he understand
All That the World Has to Offer.

There is yellow on the leaves,
they shiver in this air, tremble
at the rain that falls
around them; it is a lovely day today

Grey hangs from the sky,
droops around the pavement so wet, rustles
the darkening daytime light
outside the window; it is a lovely day today

I sit inside this heated room
and yet, I feel the shiver from outside, I feel
the rain that hangs from this grey colored
sky, I am in awe at the yellow leaves that fall

it is a lovely day today

I.

Moonlight silvers the tops of trees,
Moonlight whitens the lilac shadowed wall
And through the evening fall,
Clearly, as if through enchanted seas,
Footsteps passing, an infinite distance away,
In another world and another day.
Moonlight turns the purple lilacs blue,
Moonlight leaves the fountain **** and old,
And the boughs of elms grow green and cold,
Our footsteps echo on gleaming stones,
The leaves are stirred to a jargon of muted tones.
This is the night we have kept, you say:
This is the moonlit night that will never die.
Through the grey streets our memories retain
Let us go back again.

II.

Mist goes up from the river to dim the stars,
The river is black and cold; so let us dance
To flare of horns, and clang of cymbals and drums;
And strew the glimmering floor with roses,
And remember, while the rich music yawns and closes,
With a luxury of pain, how silence comes.
Yes, we loved each other, long ago;
We moved like wind to a music's ebb and flow.
At a phrase from violins you closed your eyes,
And smiled, and let me lead you how young we were!
Your hair, upon that music, seemed to stir.
Let us return there, let us return, you and I;
Through changeless streets our memories retain
Let us go back again.

III.

Mist goes up from the rain steeped earth, and clings
Ghostly with lamplight among drenched maple trees.
We walk in silence and see how the lamplight flings
Fans of shadow upon it the music's mournful pleas
Die out behind us, the door is closed at last,
A net of silver silence is softly cast
Over our thought slowly we walk,
Quietly with delicious pause, we talk,
Of foolish trivial things; of life and death,
Time, and forgetfulness, and dust and truth;
Lilacs and youth.
You laugh, I hear the after taken breath,
You darken your eyes and turn away your head
At something I have said
Some intuition that flew too deep,
And struck a plageant chord.
Tonight, tonight you will remember it as you fall asleep,
Your dream will suddenly blossom with sharp delight,
Goodnight! You say.
The leaves of the lilac dip and sway;
The purple spikes of bloom
Nod their sweetness upon us, lift again,
Your white face turns, I am cought with pain
And silence descends, and dripping of dew from eaves,
And jeweled points of leaves.  

IV.

I walk in a pleasure of sorrow along the street
And try to remember you; slow drops patter;
Water upon the lilacs has made them sweet;
I brush them with my sleeve, the cool drops scatter;
And suddenly I laugh and stand and listen
As if another had laughed a gust
Rustles the leaves, the wet spikes glisten;
And it seems as though it were you who had shaken the bough,
And spilled the fragrance I pursue your face again,
It grows more vague and lovely, it eludes me now.
I remember that you are gone, and drown in pain.
Something there was I said to you I recall,
Something just as the music seemed to fall
That made you laugh, and burns me still with pleasure.
What were those words the words like dripping fire?
I remember them now, and in sweet leisure
Rehearse the scene, more exquisite than before,
And you more beautiful, and I more wise.
Lilacs and spring, and night, and your clear eyes,
And you, in white, by the darkness of a door:
These things, like voices weaving to richest music,
Flow and fall in the cool night of my mind,
I pursue your ghost among green leaves that are ghostly,
I pursue you, but cannot find.
And suddenly, with a pang that is sweetest of all,
I become aware that I cannot remember you;
The ghost I knew
Has silently plunged in shadows, shadows that stream and fall.

V.

Let us go in and dance once more
On the dream's glimmering floor,
Beneath the balcony festooned with roses.
Let us go in and dance once more.
The door behind us closes
Against an evening purple with stars and mist.
Let us go in and keep our tryst
With music and white roses, and spin around
In swirls of sound.
Do you forsee me, married and grown old?
And you, who smile about you at this room,
Is it foretold
That you must step from tumult into gloom,
Forget me, love another?
No, you are Cleopatra, fiercely young,
Laughing upon the topmost stair of night;
Roses upon the desert must be flung;
Above us, light by light,
Weaves the delirious darkness, petal fall,
And music breaks in waves on the pillared wall;
And you are Cleopatra, and do not care.
And so, in memory, you will always be
Young and foolish, a thing of dream and mist;
And so, perhaps when all is disillusioned,
And eternal spring returns once more,
Bringing a ghost of lovelier springs remembered,
You will remember me.  

VI.  

Yet when we meet we seem in silence to say,
Pretending serene forgetfulness of our youth,
"Do you remember but then why should you remember!
Do you remember a certain day,
Or evening rather, spring evening long ago,
We talked of death, and love, and time, and truth,
And said such wise things, things that amused us so
How foolish we were, who thought ourselves so wise!"
And then we laugh, with shadows in our eyes.

Cups of coffee and plates with sugar crumbs
from pastry warm with cinnamon and cardamom,
and books overturned on antique tables
with scruff marks and scratches, loved, well-used,
(and me, in the middle of it all, listening to the
heartbeat of this country and its sincerity,
learning wisdom through small things).
He is a six foot springtide of caffeine and literature,
effervescent with sincerity and kindness and warmth.
I smile at him over the rim of my cup, and
suddenly I am swept up and moving with
his current, in love with him and a summer
spent scribbling into casebound notebooks
and with my hair flying in the wind that rustles
the trees around us, and with his lips on my neck.
Wild roses on brick walls and wooden window frames,
and the lavender growing on the curb all smile,
content to witness summer love bloom like
all things tend to do, in this season and this place.
I let him explain to me the stars in nights that
never seem to really begin but last forever;
he teaches me in not-quite darkness what
they mean, and I tell him under fairy-lights
how small I feel in the multitude of this universe.
He nods solemnly and I feel his breath in my hair,
holding me on this earth as he shows me galaxies.

- lund. cs.