August 2020 – Image & Verse

Hiking Paradise

…a hike in the Oregon mountains…

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Hiking Paradise

Filtered by the towering woodland canopy overhead, sunlight drifts down dreamlike to settle radiant, igniting the breathtaking forest cathedral before me. Suddenly, a young doe bounds onto the trail ahead, stands proudly, pausing in the warmth of the rays. She considers me briefly, then disappears as quick as a stolen glance, quiet as passing time.

I dart my eyes here, then there, in a vain attempt to follow. Its then I catch a glimpse of silver-blue, reflecting resplendently, where massive old-growth trunks part — Lost Lake! This is the prize I sought on my hike today into this Cascade wilderness paradise.

I step through the opening, to climb a huge boulder. A deep expanse of chill mountain lake unfurls before me, sparkling cerulean and sterling, in the crisp quickening breeze. I sit, pull my legs under me, and lean forward — enthralled. Elbows on knees, I marvel, mesmerized by the energy and splendor of this natural wonder.

crystal on blue lake
dances in gilding sunlight
crisp breeze stirs old growth

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NOTE to “Blogger” site owners: I enjoy reading your work, but frustratingly, many “Blogger” sites DO NOT let me post comments? 🙂 So sorry if you don’t see personal comments from me on your “Blogger” site. But I will keep reading your work — and welcoming and responding to your comments here on Image & Verse.

Click below for more hiking at dVerse:

Haibun Monday 8/31/20: Take a Hike!

Helianthus Gold

Helianthus Gold

across the meadow
last night’s dew clings
fondly to the old-growth

wrapped in crystalline embrace
it adorns the stately cedars
as if diamonds
that sparkle
in the morning sun

a splendor befitting
their regal beauty

this Spring day
begins bright and crisp

bird songs lilt
carried on a light breeze

in the meadow
Helianthus raise their golden heads
to follow the sun’s journey west

I see you afar
approaching on the path
backlit by sunrise
your hair golden in dawn’s glow

lover beholding beloved

I sit
warmed in daybreak’s window
with tea and fascination

I watch you
as you stop to rest

in this moment
my love spills over
floods ’round me
until I am consumed

your lips sculpt a smile
I’m swept away
on passion’s tide
this golden sunflower morning

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To read more poems at Sunday Muse: CLICK HERE

Musicality

Musicality

we were jazzing along the lake
the moon bee-bopping this magic night
saxing its light upon us
it pianoed into my very soul
fluting up thoughts of tympanied love
trumpeting my chorded lust
drumming my erotic fantasies
wowing me in musicality

swellingly, the moment classicalated
my mind piccoloed in joy
as I oboed eagerly into you ear
celloing my deep-felt feelings
trebling you to my clef
I violined your quivered lips
and symphonyed my arms around you
to crescendo you in strains of passion

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Click below to read more poetry at dVerse:

Meet the bar, verbing

The Balance

The Balance

when the wheat
is sorted to chaff
and the grain
is drafted for bread

then life
again shows its nature
its necessary contrast
of yin and yang

as the grain cannot exist
without the chaff
neither can good
manifest without the bad
neither can light
manifest without the dark

this is the weight
this is the depth
this is the mystery
this is the meaning

this is the balance

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Click below to read more poetry at dVerse:

Poetics: Waiting on Wheat

The Vast

The Vast

standing at the edge
feeling far below
the great tides

the ebb and flow
the rise and fall
the vast undulation

sparkled golden
glinting in sunlight
like the windblown sway
of tasseled wheat
burnished aureate
rolling ripe for harvest

this is the come and go
of centuries
wave by wave
day by day

might incarnate
the power of indifference
the surge of perfect apathy

and I
insignificant
as a grain of wheat
in an unfurling field
stretching to the horizon

insignificant
as the grain of beach sand
bounced and tumbled
below me here
dragged helpless
in the relentless undertow

a froth-topped crest
translucent aqua
rises up in beckon

a silk of azure
slides smoothly
down its sloping back
as it dances
on the cerulean deep

how easily
I could slip in
slide seamlessly
into that fathomed realm

down down ever down
into the bottom black
into the waiting silence
without so much
a noticed sound

absorbed
into the churn and roar
without so much
a ripple
to disturb the steady surf

a subtle crease
irrelevant
erased
even as it came

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Click below to read more poetry at dVerse:

Poetics: Waiting on Wheat

Time Traveling

Time Traveling

careful hands
peel back cracked
and yellowed glassine
from faded aging pages

too often ignored
this dusty photo album

tonight
I’m liberating memories
life moments
immortalized

faces and places
call from another time

life’s had its bumps
and its beauty

bittersweetly
I time travel

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Click below to read more poetry at dVerse:

Quadrille #110: Shall we bum around a bit?

Vigilant

Vigilant

I dwell still
in the sky clouds
above the first place
above Anahuac
above the valley of origin
I am Xoloti

Chimalma is another
we dwell
Chimalma and I
and too Xiuhpilli
Quetzalcoatl also
we watch
ever vigilant
quiet and patient

we watch by night
watching with Meztli
we watch by day
watching with Tonatiuh
we watch our people

the sons and daughters
of the Toltec
of the Aztec
of the others
who were there
we watch now
how they are treated

we are quiet
and we are patient
but we are not happy

if our patience breaks
so then too will our silence
and we will send down
the spirits of Cuauhmeh
our eagle warriors
to stir the hearts
and ignite the souls
of our peoples

then there will be
a roar of truth
then there will be
an uprising of justice
then will we at last
settle this

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To read more poems at Sunday Muse: CLICK HERE

Memory Tree

Memory Tree

when your life
finally converges
at the vanishing point

and all that you’ve sown
and everything you’ve reaped
becomes a forever past

may there remain a memory tree
rooted in the soil of time
nurtured through the ages

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To read more poems at Sunday Muse: CLICK HERE

Why Dog

Why Dog

why do you find me dog
why will you not let me be
you belonged to her

but she is gone

you know this is so
don’t you dog

I see it in your eyes
the sadness there
sadness I recognize

the sorrow
pressing in
as these night winds stir
darkness pressing in

but she’s gone boy
lost into the lightless realm
beyond this chill encircling us

you shiver
you feel it too
don’t you boy

but I’ve no emotion here
save grief
as is buried
in your worried whimper

I’ve no good comfort here
but come
come here boy
that’s a good dog

I know
I know
me too boy

me too

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Click below to read more poetry at dVerse:

OpenLinkNight #272: On This Day…

Le Filou

Le Filou

when donned the mask
the transformation
smoulders forth the other

the fantasy
on wings of dreams
your lovely le filou

she is she
yet too
the other

unleashed at light of passion’s moon
manifest at your request
sustained this night
at her delight

she is your isis
she is your venus
she is your every longing loosed

and you

her jester
her lustful fool

she brings everything in life you miss
bestowed with aphrodite’s kiss
but as you burn you should know this
beneath the mask waits a strange abyss

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Click below to check out the clowning around at dVerse:

dVerse Poetics — Clowning Around

Laughing Larry

…in keeping with my ‘dark’ suspicions about clowns…

Laughing Larry

“gaze upon me
if you will
my countenance crafted
to fool
and thrill

I’ve spent years in greasepaint
fear
and sorrow
I rue the past
I dread tomorrow”

they call me laughing larry

it wasn’t intentional
you see

I only wanted her to
hear me

to know my heart

but her laughter
her hollow
taunting laughter
her laughter wouldn’t stop

it wouldn’t stop
and I needed her to hear me
to understand how I felt

but the laughing
and laughing
the incessant laughing
I simply couldn’t have the laughing

so I made it stop

now I hide behind this painted smile
now everyone is laughing
and laughing

but I no longer hear

I’ll spend years in greasepaint
fear
and sorrow
rueing the past
dreading tomorrow

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Click below to check out the clowning around at dVerse:

dVerse Poetics — Clowning Around

Broken Wing

Broken Wing

There was a time, not long ago, when I was proud of my country, this United States of America. My patriotism stirred when we were lead by a proud, intelligent, strong, black man. A man of principle and courage. A man who embraced truth. A man with a sense of decency, and a sense of humor.

But then my country broke my heart. We elected Trump. On the heels of a time of light and possibility, we have been dragged down into a time of despair and darkness. We let ignorance rule the day.

I still embrace the fading image of America. I still have hope. I still feel the reverberations of the time that was Obama. But now truth and liberty has a broken wing. When it is over, said, and done, it WAS a time — and there was never enough of it.

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(Above is 144 words. Below are my fully expressed feelings)

There was a time, not long ago, when I was proud of this country we call the United States of America. My patriotism stirred when we were lead by a proud, intelligent, strong, black man. A man of principle and courage. A man who embraced truth. A man with a sense of decency, and a sense of humor.

It gave me hope that we, as a country, had turned a corner, and were going to move away from, and above the unfortunate and misguided hatred and stupidity that would rear its ugly head from time to time. That we were smarter and better

But then this country broke my heart, and enabled a racist, a bigot, a misogynist, a spiteful demagogue to take power — it elected the utterly unqualified Donald Trump to be our President. On the heels of a time of light and possibility, we have been dragged down into a time of despair and darkness – and it’s our own fault. We have allowed ignorance to rule the day.

I still embrace the fading image of America, but it is impossible to be proud of our leadership at this time in history. I still have hope, because I still feel the reverberations of the very recent time, when this country stood tall, when this country began to again lift and soar, the time that was Obama. But now truth and liberty has a broken wing. When it is over, said, and done, it WAS a time — and there was never enough of it.

Sadly, not nearly enough of it.

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Click below to check out more wonderful words at dVerse:

Prosery Monday: A Time

Not Wanting

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Not Wanting

when the human spirit learns to love
and be grateful
finding more joy in giving
than receiving
when all, even the least
can live in dignity
not wanting for the core
of their humanity
— then will we ride the saucers
shining to the heart of tomorrow

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Click below to check out more streaming and dreaming at dVerse:

MTB: Stream of Consciousness Writing

Arc of the Ages

Arc of the Ages

do not hide
from the great orb
of unquestioning fate
that spins in the spaces
of destiny’s light and dark
days of falter and fear
approaching
moving
unsteady on legs
of unquenchable doubt
what your mind must
conceal from the assassin
of joy and forgiveness
held pure
tested
by time and the hands of
the waiting who cower
yet smile
singing truth through
the hail and barrage
‘cross the bow mast of glory
seeking broad measure and berth
as all that you seem to
desire slips slowly like
rain down a vent pipe
to plumb deep
the black dreams
such is the slag-shattered
glass of the future
that moves slow
through the arc
of the ages
who’ve waited and
watched ‘neath the moon
of deliberate ancients
that revolves in the
void of the others
that see what we
knew to be ever
the voice of the lost
to the light
of the dawning that
heralds the word of
this time that’s upon
us and holds us at
last in the fire
of visions and
longing for all that
we are to be
here in our heart
of the moment
that flees like
a squandered teardrop
forever away from
our failing grasp

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Click below to check out more streaming at dVerse:

MTB: Stream of Consciousness Writing