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My Etsy shop will close at MIDNIGHT on May 31. Enter code TTFN31 before then for a 10% discount on ALL items in my store--clearing out the inventory before I head out. "Like" my Facebook page or follow me on Twitter to stay updated on where my online shop will open anew.

I Laid Me Down {draft 3}

to sleep and did not know the wolf to fear.

I lay me down, and sleep comes no more, for

The light that glares within the wolf’s eye is

Too near and never will sleep.

I lay me down and sleep, for nearer still

The shepherd sees me this night and he sees

The wolf, who never will understand nor

Can ever overwhelm this other light

And will come not a step closer.

It was in vain to wake, rise early and

In vain to stay the wolf with darting, watching eyes,

In vain to eat my daily bread in snatches and fear.

I have laid me down

because He gave me, beloved, sleep.

{inspired by Psalm 4:8; 23; 91:5-6; 121:4; 127:2; John 1:5; 10:1-18; and personal experience}

I closed my eyes and leaped

A few days ago, for the first time, I voluntarily submitted three poems (Edifice, The Southern Thing, and Sestina for my Charlotte) to a literary journal--Crazyhorse--for publication. Crazyhorse has published a few works by Billy Collins, a major influence on my own writing. I decided to take a chance with this publication because if his poetry found a niche there, perhaps mine could.

My submission was the 34,411^st.

Prayers.

A Return to Blue

A Return to Blue

My parents wore blue so much.

I preferred reds and purples

They wore it all the time

But I would not like

Things for others’ liking.

I did not notice until today,

Further away from home than

I’ve ever been,

How much blue

Nests in my jewelry box

And roosts in my closet.

Edits of previously posted poems--nothing brand new, yet.

Sestina for my Charlotte

Had tea with Charlotte Brontë last week, in wonder at the gold and crimson

rosebud tea service. First thought her a lady of simple tastes, a plain, glass-

like figurine bent over a desk. Silly to forget about the white-hot ember

in her soul, smoldered under gazes of Ms. Ingrams and Reeds. Then, the shimmer

of the black ink, in Jane Eyre’s sketches and Lucy Snowe’s love, lights that haunt

ballrooms perused from a corner. Naturally she drinks beauty from beauty, paper

and pen in hand, analysing her works and mine—my paper

covered with double-spaced seedlings, dandelions aspiring to be crimson

roses. Teatime, then—I by the fire and Charlotte in her usual haunt,

the window seat. “You seem fond,” she said, sketching runes on the frosted glass

with her fingernail, “of the idea of flight. Intriguing.” I watched the shimmer

and flicker of the fire on my teacup. “Thank you,” I said, watching ember

fade from orange to red-black, “But tell me your secrets, things I’ll remember

coming from you, not a dead-leafed textbook. How do I make words, pencil, and paper

sing a nocturne? Or use black and white to paint the shimmer

of stars, like you can? Or make a strobing cursor transfuse crimson

and gold thoughts to cleanse rust from the soul?” Turning from the glass,

she motioned me beside her. “Don’t confine yourself to the familiar haunt,

over-plucking from sedate experience. Seek pastures new: watch and haunt

the whole world. Study your fellowmen, reading their characters by the ember

of their eyes. Before gathering the fragments, study the beauty of broken glass—

And do not shun the books! They are not mere dead leaves of paper

bound in thread and cloth! Walk their orchards and partake of what crimson

fruits you can find amid the leaves. Study and mirror the shimmer

of a sparrow’s feathers—yes, a sparrow.” She paused, glazed in the shimmer

of pale sun through the frosted panes. “But,” she resumed, “doubts still haunt

your eyes—what? Do you aspire to fame? Desire glory and crimson

roses strewn at your feet?” I swirled the tea in my cup and stared at the ember

in the hearth. “Yes. That is one thing I want,” I replied. “Then do not take up paper

and pen. Conquer all with fear and the sword,” she said. “Yes, the world will raise its glass

to you, and you will have blood red roses enough. Hear me: don’t desire that glass

pedestal. If,” she said, “you achieve lasting fame for the dance and shimmer

of your words, well enough. But if you wish to write well, know your paper

and pen are not for your blessing alone—no, be willing to be alone, a haunt

savoring life, for good and bad, and transcribing it so that none can help but remember.

Be unknown, but write well those runes in gold and crimson.”

Her apparition melts away into cold glass, and I am here, a pale haunt

alone in my bedroom, amid the shimmer of a white mid-December,

staring at digital paper, and the clock proclaims 11:45 PM in crimson.

Edifice

Rosy-red doorstep and door—

the kitchen, living room,

and second-story window

shutters darker than the house,

a creamy cast—

and a sleek, dark-thatched widow’s peak roof.

Purple flowers

and glittering rocks

tucked here and there,

gracing the lawn.

That tall black iron ivy-drowned fence unbalanced

the house,

gate thrown wide

On its own terms.

The strange little brass doorknob

never upright—

perpetually Cheshire-cat grinned.

If the gate was open and we knocked on the door,

the intercom crackled

How sweet to stop by to see me!

I’m doing well, ever so well—

Sorry, can’t come down, so busy!

and off we were hustled, the flowers itching at our noses

and the gate closing

Ever so noiselessly.

Just after dusk I saw

shadows behind the windows,

But the panes spied me and down the brown curtains went.

Next day the gate was locked.

I gave it a gentle push

but it pinched my hand.

I blamed the tenant

and the rest of us whispered the ammunition.

We so expertly ignored the house

that we didn’t find out

‘til days later

the windows had closed the lights

and the house had blown itself away.

Red door shards flecked the flowers

and the Cheshire-cat doorknob

had disappeared.

What’s a Poem?

Trouble pixies you yell at to make sense

But they tango and tangle and dangle

Their black-and-white stocking feet

Over the book-edge, laughing up their sleeves

And waft up to pinch your ears ‘til you cry

Stop yelling.

Share your tea with them

They might perch on your mug handle,

Brush up a da Vinci

or van Gogh with their black-and-white fingertips

The flush of their wings might strum Beethoven

or Zimmer in your ears

Set them on the nose-bridge of your specs

Or let them curl up in your ear

Take them for a walk—

What? you think they enjoy

Sitting in their cloth, string, and paper cages?

All day tugging at the dog-eared pages,

memorizing backwards the forward by

a creaking critic who forgot to believe in fairies. 

Billy Collins, during your “August in Paris,”

No, I was not hiding away at all

when you aimed and fired your Ballistics at me

As a matter of fact, I had just had a long tête-à-tête

with a moment’s reflection of a handsome boy

Then maintained firm steady eye-contact

with a loquacious tray on the airplane,

Nodding agreeably at the clouds as they chimed in

And walked a mile in my own shoes before

I made accusations against my rotund torso.

No. I was not hiding at all.

The Wild, the Free, like Waves that Follow o’er the Sea

“Wide nostrils never stretched by pain,

Mouths bloodless to the bit or rein,

And feet that iron never shod,

And flanks unscarred by spur or rod,

A thousand horse, the wild, the free,

Like waves that follow o'er the sea,

Came thickly thundering on."

—Lord Byron, from Mazeppa

Something I love about the make of a Horse

When the Wild thing whispers by--

How Earth formed muscle, bone, and heart,

Water rushed beneath his skin,

Fire consumed his eyes,

And when all was done and seen good,

Wind roared, "Stare back into my eye! Dare!"

Horse laughed

And danced away on Shadow in a whisper of mist.

J. W. Waterhouse, The Lady of Shalott, 1888

The wanton lily bloom gone, you’re the last

Pale flower in this river’s dim expanse—

The mirror of the wild wold—waning fast—

That was once yours to weave. Now, take this chance

To feel the river creep up your white sleeve,

Drift down the river that leads you to your

Dark, mysterious Death, who by your leave

Glides to your unmoored boat by foreign shore.

You lift your face to his: keep it there, greet

Him with your song, art such as Lancelot

Cannot deserve. So, sing your carol sweet—

Indeed, in death ne’er will you be forgot.

The poets metered life beyond your death,

And painters caught your last immortal breath.

{Sonnet inspired by John William Waterhouse's The Lady of Shalott. Here is a beautiful thing for your ears.}

Malachi 3:13-16

"Your words have been hard against me," says the LORD. "But you say, 'How have we spoken against you?' You have said, 'It is vain to serve God. What is the profit of our keeping his charge or of walking as in mourning before the LORD of hosts? And now we call the arrogant blessed. Evildoers not only prosper but they put God to the test and they escape.'"

Then those who feared the LORD spoke with one another. The LORD paid attention and heard them, and a book of remembrance was written before him of those who feared the LORD and esteemed his name.

...
The King will return. All will be made right.

Haiku

Haiku #Summertime

Summer wind in trees

Green-winged butterflies trapped in

A black, crooked cage.

Haiku #Wintertime

Crystal claws grasp roofs,

Your wicked spells everywhere,

You beauty, you witch.

Haiku #Miscellaneous 1

Snatched sunlight, gathered

With essence of spring flowers

All in a tea-bag.

Haiku #Miscellaneous 2

Glue binds book leaves to

Leather limbs, forming the door

To another world.

A historical background of Celtic poetry

"The high status of poets within Celtic societies is well attested and was maintained down to the seventeenth or eighteenth centuries. In Gaelic societies the name for a poet, file (or filid - plural), is derived from a root word meaning "to see". [sic] Celtic poets may be better known as bards and though the Irish and Scottish peoples poets also came to be known as either file or bard, originally there was a distinction in rank between the two with the hereditary file having the higher status and greater training." --on Celtic poetry from The Poet's Garret. The rest of the site is worth a read.

"I would build that dome in air, / That sunny dome! those caves of ice!" --Coleridge

Will my world of words prosper? or will it flutter down in ashes from the fire, the residue of the warring clash of dream and reality?

I'm just curious.