that's mrs. mediocrity to you

It felt like a long ago dream,
that moment in the sun when everything changed.

She remembered the crow cawing loudly overhead, a warning.

She remembered the smell of smoke and the neighbor’s cries,
the damp earth beneath her back,
soaking up the sweat that ran from her body.

Forever stretched all the way up,
touching the cloud of regrettable sky.

She closed her eyes and saw red.

She opened them and saw nothing.

Silence was everywhere in the air around her,
and she held still, so still, trying to listen.

Beside her, a green shoot pushed up through the earth,
a feather tickle to the back of a dark-spotted hand.

A smile flew fast from her mouth, a strong white swift,
and carried old laughter away on the breeze.

The fleeting shadow of yesterday crossed her face,
just once.

And tomorrow became eternity’s muse,
dancing softly and praying for rain.

through taproot and tangled tributary
into the dark
cave hollow hole of fortitude
where you hold my broken
and i
offer crooked silence
as ancillary billet
while time marches down the skin
of our guarded intermingled spines
in the guise
of everlasting ants
heaving heavy minutes
on scarab-colored backs

at night
our sighs fill the sky
turning earth into petrified
remembrance
and we spring leaves
from gnarled fingertips
brushing tears from our cheeks
as we whisper dirty jokes
to the moon

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.

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Linking in today over at dVersePoets for Open Link Night, join us!

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in the hush
in the quiet

under breath
beneath the bridge

i never cross
never burn

forest blaze
dancing flame

pirouette
in deep dark shadow

spin spin
never stop

my heart
is your whisper

my voice
is your silence

my music
your zephyr

i am quiet
always quiet

winding through
your ancient labyrinth

never lost
never sorry

for your imprint
on my skin

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This was my view last Saturday. The tiny slice of lake we could see through the trees from our cabin, covered in a fabulous morning mist. It was one of the best fall-weather days we’ve ever had in the mountains.

Today I am back in my studio, the view ever-familiar, monkshood, hydrangea, and anemone still competing for attention. There is still green to be seen, though browns and grey have begun their slow creep across the landscape. A confused bachelor’s button has sprung up recently and begun to bloom, just below my window.

Last night, the Hunter’s Moon. Huge and round and refusing to be shadowed by earth. Black sky and golden light, twinkling stars and crisp air that smells of autumn. Every time I walk outside I find myself drawing in a huge breath, trying to capture the scent of another season.

Trying, perhaps, to capture all this color, and hold it deep inside so that I might pull out its memory in the grey months ahead. This was all Mother Nature’s idea, you know, to paint the landscape with extra vibrancy in autumn so that we might have that extra quilt to pull up around our shoulders when Old Man Winter comes to stay.

Also last night, the first indoor fire of the season. Books and knitting and wool socks and this ceiling that hems me in just a bit too much.

But I have a good imagination and if I close my eyes, I can always find Orion, waving down at my gypsy spirit.

Holding a place for me outside, beneath my favorite sky.

.

i come to this place

for the silence

and i can’t stop

listening

.

.

an ending

a beginning

.

all tied up with a beautiful bow

.

i stand here wondering

(wandering)

about now and the clarity
of a chrysanthemum

grounded and brimming with growth

what it would be like to live so simply

sun water soil
and perhaps wind
to worry about

and those creepy things that eat at you
leaving holes to let the air whistle through

i have no answers

(pondering)

but i am just as fine with that
as the clove scented rose

clinging to a vine no one wants to climb

growing hips (ha!) for fuel and tea

so much stronger than the
colored bits of beauty
you sniff around

thorn and cane build bud and blossom
roots wrap fingers around earth’s core

i stand here

(wondering)

the waltz of time has fewer ripples
than the calamity of youth

there is much to remember
and little to miss

except the key to everything
and even then, it’s nice to know
that one exists

i have a dancing map,
you know, the kind that shows
where to place your feet

two pair speckled across the page
in a sneeze of pattern
meaning nothing without music

i’m always so busy listening
i forget to follow directions
until i am left alone, arms flailing
on the opposite side of the room

this is the dance i was born to do
not the wallflower so much as the floor
each step you take leaves an imprint
and each night i crack the code
of your travels

i could follow you then
find my way home or at least
back to bed

but i have bells on my ankles
and this tattered ancient skirt
and the moon plays an old piano song
with her broken, bony fingers

i am night and you are shadow
turn and spin
turn and spin

i need the light of stars
upon my skin

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Linking up with the fabulous dVerse poets for Open Link Night – join us

Already, I find myself taking green for granted.

It’s hot, hot out there, and the landscape has changed from the yellow green of spring to the grey green of summer.

I try to remind myself how much I will crave this green come February, but I also remind myself that human nature drives us forward–always, always–into what’s next. We have such a hard time standing in place and embracing what’s there before us.

I accept this as truth even as I try to change it. I pick bits of time from vine and branch, and savor them like wine. I remind myself how precious every moment is, but just like anything you have enough of, I assume there will always be one more. And another, and another and another.

I try to find the balance between my own pragmatic mind and the ticking of the clock.

And then some days I don’t think about any of this at all, because it’s summer, and really, all I need is to soak up some sunshine.

We are always growing, always setting seed, always reaching for the light. I don’t care so much about trying to control any of it any more, I am happy to just let it happen. I don’t take any path at all, I just wander towards whatever strikes my fancy, with dirty feet and blistered toes.

I always end up in the same place anyway, here, beneath this same old golden sun.

My green eyes match the horizon just now, and if you don’t look too hard, you might not even see me.

But I’ll be out there, wandering, until winter brings me home.

beneath the sky

beneath the moon

stars and storms

bit and broken

sway and sidestep

hope and hollow

june and january

gold and glitter

arms waving

we dance