gather us now
at fingerposts &
streetlamps in the fir
bone crunching the
frostcrust snow
under our woolen
scarlet, some
edges cut thin
"how do you do?"
"i am well, and you?"
"fine, i couldn't
be better."
"it's cold, we should
have a bit of tea."
— and so forth
and so on as the
sleigh bells silver
their ever closer in
a pale empress coming
could you not
see all is well as
might have been?
a slendering into irrelevance
pict-too pict-too painted blue
—and now the unwanting
to crawl down to bed in seek
to find a dream in shiftspace
between the you and the me
that clackbone cracking
after the summer, corewood
once living, now dead
kiss me before the afterglow fades
pict-too pict-too all painted blue
to slip to my slendering again
growing at distance
eyes play watchmen
observing in steel as
a hand strokes in time
with the machine
sudden summer rain
calls to the napping
of grey dark the room
i still ache to dream
winter tales,
winter song
distractions become bliss with
the fever of fingers dancing
in the darkest shadows and
a kiss before that small death
where stars blur and blend
slipstream into one present
into rising waves of pasts
beyond remembering
to crash into you
i carve the etch of me
all whalebone & darksea
a riprap black taking
all wavecast offerings
adding to that nightinked
& lowing in underwave,
that etchcarve of me
tangled on wyrding
bonds stretched to strain
cairn flags flutter in
the winds set aflame
Another rune poem of mine, where the rune is selected at random.
Today’s rune is mannaz, which has a core meaning of “man”. The extension of the rune also includes “mankind” or “human”. Going further, some have interpreted this rune to mean rational thinking, family, social order and self-awareness.
i stranger am i
unknown to be
i stranger am i
fatigued to be
trial as k
no answer find
weary talking in
wandering warrens
of stranger am i
That is what one gets when one listens to rumors.
Rumors lead to hope. And “hope”, as the song goes, “is no good”. You would think we would not learn to base our decisions on hope. That is what we get for thinking, as my grandmother was fond of saying.
Better to put that bear to slumber once again. Help him to hibernate and sleep this long, cold winter of the soul away, away.
We can try to explain but the words come out all wrong and we speak of pain, people think we like it here. Ever the tears to hide, slip on a smile — wooden and hollow — and give in to the dreaming on.
Even if… there be lions. Ever and hungry.
the peopling ages raw
meat hook hanging
— don't pretend to kiss me,
this savage morning hurts
let me dance the razor's edge
the deaf talk my broken digits
the blind point my way home
underneath, i weary stone