Under the Arbour

There is no answer.
When will I stop missing you-
the only question.

Pirouetting
years trip
toe to toe-
spinning reckless,
unknown end.
Through all,
my monsters faced,
slight grace was kept,

~always.

Knotted fear
gave way
in moments still
when beauty
reigned over
stricken days-

~rebalanced.

Today the dancer falls.
Uncoordinated fear
as tender flesh
betrays inherent lush.
Discordant rock-hard
pebbles strewn beneath
my will-less breast.

Where is grace
and beauty found
when traitor turns
upon herself?
The enemy within,

~visualize

I tell myself,
less have beaten
greater odds.
In one heartbeat
life can change,
and graceless move
toward its end,

~fini?

Dancers painted as the four directions,
their feathers frayed and tattered as our pride-
pleading elemental insurrection
in setting white blood promises aside

Mercurial, the promises obtained.
On reservation land we die, detained.

The Swallow, The Constant Reformation
and The Defiance set sail 1653.
Prince Maurice and Rupert to command them-
brothers tied with cords of bravery.

Clear the skies and bright the stars to guide them,
gone those many months, companioned might,
till evening fell upon the twelfth of August-
The Swallow and The Constant lost from sight.

One astray off Anegada Island,
storm-swept against the looming coral reef.
Timber torment, splint and limb asunder.
The Defiance crew swept under in their grief.

Spilled and split from stem to stern upended,
her sailors sinking far below the tide-
beneath the raging storm so high above them,
to gasp a final prayer before they died.

Sweet Liora slept on languid cushions
of kelp that shift upon the ocean floor.
Her dreams of human love vast as the sea
that thundered on the wide and barren shore.

Down, so swiftly down to where she rested
the Prince of ships sank low as though in death.
Waking to her dreams she dragged him upward
and pressed upon his lips her living breath.

Silken were the arms she wrapped around him,
urchin spines were knotted in her hair,
silver were her tears as she implored him-
To live! To breathe! To sip the salty air!

Hour followed hour still she nursed him,
willing him with spells and siren song,
binding him with vows and mermaid promise-
Oh let his heart beat fierce and free, beat strong!

Just before the moon rose from the water,
the sun bidding farewell unto the day,
he opened up his eyes and whispered faintly-
Marina- as his life’s blood slipped away.

Fragile, where the ragged coral tore him,
the voice of his beloved in his ears,
clasping tight the love notes he had written,
wet with broken dreams and mermaid tears.

On his silent breast a golden locket,
battered as the sea withheld her grace,
smiling from within, his joy, Marina,
the tender light of love upon her face.

Sweet Liora held the necklace gently
and with his letters bottled them in glass.
Green as water from the sea that claimed him-
she offered up his soul- nereid mass.

Fraught with purpose and determination,
with love above all else in hand and heart,
leaving warmth-drenched southern seas behind her,
knowing there was ‘naught to do but start.

Year led on to year, with days unending.
Liora followed each unfolding shore
searching for the form of his Marina,
knowing she would grieve forevermore.

Brokenhearted, sick with painful questions,
Marina scanned the ocean’s silver gleam,
holding her beloved in her breathing,
seeing her Maurice as in a dream.

Drawn unto the water’s edge forever,
day on day, her faithful footfall sped.
Watching for his ship, her aching’s answer.
Wishing him alive, fearing him dead.

Dreams will flesh the edge of sweet illusion,
Marina caught the flash of mermaid fin.
Splashing in the surf, her skirts around her-
denying faith the only mortal sin.

Bobbing in the sea where she retrieved it,
the locket cased in glass with letters sweet,
poured with his eternal, deep devotion,
the waves a gentle tumult at her feet.

Weeping tears of grief and those of longing
maid and nymph made one by love’s decree.
One who lifts her eyes to God’s own heaven.
One who slips beneath the constant sea.

*Please forgive the meld of fact and fiction…The Defiance did go down on the reef off Anagada Island in 1653, piloted by Prince Maurice, where he was lost. He and his Brother, Prince Rupert, were on route to the West Indies when his flagship the HMS Defiance crashed in a hurricane on the coral reef near Tortola in the British Virgin Islands. Who he loved and who loved him is unknown to me…except in my own imagination. I mean no disrespect to those that truly lived and loved~

The quiet place
I need to hold
eludes me.
No sweet alone,
no borrowed time
to find.

Soothe the baby,
rock her gently,
whisper how
the days might fall
with love’s soft breath-
and yet…

My muscles clench
against the ache,
stomach tight-
a vacuum pulled
and taut beneath
one wayward heart.

Drapped in silken webs-
gossamer, the ties that bind,
strung with drops of dew.
Tenderly surrounding me,
clothed with rare and precious veils.

Come into the woods of my desire,
beneath these spreading boughs of leafy green.
Dance with me within this raging fire,
unveil the dreams within, so seldom seen.

Hold me close, with arms both sure and tender,
then press your kiss upon my upturned face.
Catch me when I fall, my love, surrender,
enraptured here as passion leaps from grace.

Born again in love’s complete releasing,
forged once more in time’s renewing flame,
dipped into the well of hearts unceasing,
to know that we will never be the same.

Please whisper what my heart already knew,
before this sweet romantic rendezvous.

When I, before God’s eye, a supplicant
rebuke the face of fate, the weight of years
that bows a back once supple, stooped by time-
recanting veils of youth, to which I yield,
proved false, the voice of spring, her whispers low,
teasing the dreams of peasants and of czars
to ache for all, invincible and new
clutched to the breast- impossible release.
Me, sinking low, the sea reflecting stars,
and bending down beside the glowing bars.

*last lines of each by William Butler Yeats…When I Am Old…done as a challenge poem.

I bought a Chinese fan today
at O’Houlihan’s on Cayuga Street,
cream colored silk. A handpainted
willow girl, colors muted with age,

kneeling on a long ago scarlet rug…
her face so like my niece, Jiang Shi Ting,
carried in the arms of my two sisters from
the Shaoguan orphanage, bourne away

on an ancient bus, a bone-jarring ride
over washed out roads to Guangzhou.
Grace, Margaret…and Emily, with
rosebud mouth and guarded eyes.

Her fingers poised with gentle grace over strings
pegged and tuned on a dragon’s back, notes rising
heavenward through blooming cherry boughs,
scrolls, ink and brushes resting beside her.

Spring at least one snow storm away
on this Central New York morning.
In Shaoguan plum blossoms
stretch and swell in the falling light.

I move the fan in quiet arcs,
kneeling on a moss green braided rug,
the woodstove crackles,
oak acrid, cherry fragrant.

Breath of China falling soft
against my winter-weary cheek-
lost in thought, caught in dreams
where Ithaca meets Guangzhou.