Like Oleander
The sun was blinding then,
across the eastern Mediterranean,
I watched her fingers brush the greenery aside,
going for the oleander,
I watched for movement
of a gloved hand adjusting a veil,
of an elongated leg brushing up against silk chiffon,
of honey curls swishing from side to side,
of that slight crease preceding a smile.
I followed her into the woods,
where shuttered village homes
stood in shadowed rows of cypress trees,
I walked along trails of scent, Samsara,
with a hint of citrus in the air.
I hopped along pretending I was
as ethereal as she,
dreamlike,
suspended,
as everything she touched,
as everything she breathed.
I watched her enter the winding lake
that afternoon in June,
transparent,
shimmering against the light,
she could have been fairy dust,
everything was just
too beautiful,
too fragile,
too much.
Navigating Silence
Beyond binary opposites,
the noise of corrosive dissent,
there exists the limitless
and the sublime
mass contained in the now
is freedom in lava flow,
seeping into bedrock
forming reveries of basalt
while mountains of rage recede,
frame after frame of flitting light
melding into calcite white,
glacial blue, volcanic black,
interwoven valleys of flickering gems
all within grasp
if only you’d listen to this stillness
of time lacking presence, if only
you’d listen to the prescient void
of heaviness in light, if only
you’d listen to the silence of landscape,
of sound stretched to its ultimate end,
drifting on vastness of smoky water,
mist rising into the glimmering sky above, if only
you’d listen
just listen
It’s the crack in the stones I brought home
listen
it’s solitude delivered on a black sand beach
it’s a wish in a sculpture garden one afternoon
listen
it’s where hopes stand erect
on the edge of heaven and space
listen
it’s the sound of surrender
listen
Tiresias, the Seer (a poem in 9 Tankas)
Drifting, in deep sea
lulled to sleep by the rhythm
as if in a womb
embraced by warm blue water
immersed in fulgent daylight
Then came the trigger
engulfed in stone-throwing waves
the gods were angry
leaving gashes in the hull
everyone caught in their wrath
Time and time again
was of the utmost essence
time of arrival
the call of the port beyond
ten minutes stretched to ten more
and I was the ship
and I was the traveler
trying to make it
to the other side, on land
I was also the captain
Held on to the wheel
as if gravity of life
expectant, restless
heavy with bags of panic
forcing me to a back seat
The anchor was dropped
and the gates were flung open
I stood again caught
in the midst of the mad herd
moving to someplace, not here
I thought of nothing
surrendered to the chaos,
the blur of a crowd,
then an ancient figure came
close, an epitome of white
gleaming like the golden fleece
waves collapsing in waves,
time melding into time,
flames of beautiful hope
something imploding within
I am holding on
now to stillness from above,
sublime clarity,
all is variegated,
distinct, I am in no rush.