I ... entered the poem of life, whose purpose is ... simply to witness the beauties of the world, to discover the many forms that love can take. (Barabara Blackman in 'Glass After Glass')

These poems are works in progress and may be updated without notice. Nevertheless copyright applies to all writings here and all photos (which are either my own or used with permission). Thank you for your comments. I read and appreciate them all, and reply here to specific points that seem to need it — or as I have the leisure. Otherwise I reciprocate by reading and commenting on your blog posts as much as possible.

11 July 2006

Tracks


For Connie

I walk the beach
in our winter sun,
gathering stones and shells.

The heavy lace-up boots
I bought in Lamesa, Texas,
leave distinctive tracks.

      ***

We stood on a small rise
at the edge of Indian land. 
‘This is my ocean,’ she said.

I gazed at acres of prairie,
waves of rolling scrub,
an endless, hypnotic horizon.

Heat lay like a cape
on my shoulders.
The wide, flat roadway
shifted and bled.

An older landscape rose
through structures
of present time.

I knew the curve of its earth,
I knew the shape of its light.

      ***

I walk the winter beach
tracking my footprints back
to find the place I entered,
a pathway through the scrub.

A man stands in the shallows
fishing the outgoing tide.

The breeze freshens.


Submitted for dVerse Entwin(n)ed Poetics June 2013

I met Connie in Lamesa, Texas, in April 2006 when I was a guest in her home, a featured reader at the annual Forrest Fest arts festival (behind which she is the driving force) and we also celebrated Beltane together. Put in touch by a mutual friend, we recognised each other at once as soul twins, and still keep in touch.

And here is her twin poem for me! —



Without Time
for Rosemary


I gather tears in my eyes

Remembering heat waves rising

On the distant prairie edge as together

We survey the blue and ridged rim of sandstone cliffs

Bearing the scarred bones of Apache warriors

We miss the lone buffalo that roams

There, the golden eagle I hoped would

Re-appear for my visitor from down under,

The cliche road juggles us back through shinery

Past red and black Indian blankets, yellow sunflowers

A budding Ycca tall and slender sprouting from the earth

To un-posted property from the

Trespass we have entered, a place

Where time stands still and the moment becomes

Buried treasure in the badlands.

My Australian friend blends into the

Landscape, a desert Rose . .

Soon we will return to our respective realities

We are distant, separate in our bodies

Hemispheres attempt to separate our souls,

Yet and still, the spirit transcends the borders

Her ocean waves bump against my prairie sand dunes

We are one under the moon
                               

Connie Williams