She

…for she resembles the greatest Mother,
round & plump with verdant life
& fleshy fruits, near to bursting with heavenly elixir.

She mirrors the mysterious Moon,
every woman’s confidante & sacred sister,
such pale beauty,
tell me true, do you not sometimes weep for it?

She is a Goddess-made tapestry,
each thread a divine gift & blessed quality,
in her resides every face of woman,
your mother, sister, wife, lover, daughter, friend…

for she is beautiful and necessary,
beautiful and strong, beautiful and precious…

Day 28 – Prompt: Space

Not outer, well I suppose you could – but a poem that touches on space, openings, distance, size.  Mine is about the small space/span of time of daybreak.

——————————————

Aurora

Aurora sways,

arising in the first blush of dawn.

I see a chalice made of petals

and brimming with nectar that shimmers

like radiant diamonds melted.

My throat clenches in sudden dryness

and like a serpent’s, my tongue flickers out to taste the air.

Lips the color of coral part in a moist, breathtaking smile

and even with such space between us,

I am rocked to my core.

Curves swirl

and twirl,

slow

lazy,

as a ribbon

falling through the air,

and as my avid gaze travels the valleys and hills of my Goddess,

I feel both graced

and diabolically rapacious.

How I long to pluck those petals,

savoring each one as if it were my last meal.

I will devour the Lady,

consume the flesh in a torrent of nips and bites,

drain the elixir in leisurely, tender sips.

Decadence such as this sets my blood to thunder,

my body to fever

and I move forward,

reaching hungrily,

ravening for the beauty before me.

It is a futile chase, as always.

Every step forward pushes Aurora back,

my Star simply scintillates in silence,

smiling when I collapse in defeat,

kneeling in stardust strewn by my Beloved’s passage.

My hands scoop up the cool, crystal leavings

and rub them into fiery flesh,

seeking to quench the thirsty bonfire at my center.

Like yesterday

– like every day,

I fail utterly.

Aurora has conquered me again and knowing this,

brightens until tears stream from my beauty-blinded eyes

and my Flame is all I can see then fades.

I remain,

locked in slave-like adoration

and begin my daily penance…

Day 13 – Prompt: Ghazal

Today’s prompt is to write a ghazal. I’m ignoring it (yes, again!).
—————————————-

Lovely Amaranth

Lament for me, lovely amaranth,
that you will not adorn my tomb.
Instead, I will be handmaid
to Persephone and don a garland
of somber asphodel,
plucked from the banks of Styx.

From Hades’ realm, I will throw
wide my vision, aching to
gaze upon the living,
weeping that I may not join.
Yet every tear I shed shall
serve to feed the cypress guardians.

No instrument have I, save voice
yet I shall be a lyre,
and keen soft and sad,
a dirge to cause even those
who reside in Tartarus,
to stand in silence,
ignorant of their torment
for only scant, sharp moments.

They shall be swept up
by piercing sadness finally recalled
and a taste of life once more given,
only to awake from reverie
as the last note
wastes away to cold silence,
dead in the air.

And then they shall weep,
for all that has slipped
from their grasp,
and despair for just a moment
of warmth in the sun.

———————————————–

(c) jp 4/13/12

Day 10 – Prompt: “Steal” the 1st Line…

…of someone else’s work.  I’m ignoring today’s prompt and reposting an old work that I wrote about 2 years ago when my friend was ‘stolen’ from the world by cancer.  I wrote this roughly a week or so after her passing.  I think it’s called “reply poetry” – when you have two subjects holding a conversation of sorts.

—————————————————————————–

Sorrow:

 

My memories run rampant,

over shared laughs and hen-cacklin’ sessions

that lit the heart in a blast of colors

too vivid to be named.

The stars seems to pulse in darkling light

more than any other night I’ve lived

…yet blurred by this grey river that flows from my eyes.

 

Joy:

 

Embrace the grief but share it with me,

and I shall help shoulder the bitter burden

turning it faintly sweet.

I will place a bubble in your heart, filled with light

and giggles and frozen snapshots of togetherness

and name it treasure, this mélange of bittersweet beauty.

 

Sorrow:

 

All seems to lead me into grief,

the scent of hay arose and lit upon me and I thought of open fields,

endless and waiting for some lucky child to lay upon the ground

staring at clouds, dreaming

and was brought to tears,

thinking no more dreams for her.

 

And what if my mind turns traitor and my memories of her,

now done in bright colors, fades to

ever fainter hues, finally all that is left is dust and ashes

which puff away into  the wind’s ever-traveling hands? 

 

Joy:

 

Understand it cannot, will not be.  

For I am a phoenix and from the ashes

I rise, again and again

and protect your cherished reminisces in

gilden-fire and wings of molten love.

 

You are a chalice of silver and pearls

and I will fill your hollow spot with a sacred infusion

of amber grace, tawny strength and saffron-infused love

and watch them swirl gently together, each bead and drop suffusing your soul

as it sips, restoring that which you have lost.

 

Sorrow:

 

Everything is blossoming, every hue of green is painted by

Nature’s hands.  Petals of pink, white, and lilac float on the breeze,

like a pastel snowstorm and I think how beautiful, how lush, how vibrant

it all is and count myself lucky for a heartbeat before I crash

and remember, she won’t see it and I feel ashamed and guilty

for my brief touch to your hand,

…but even moreso, I am run through

with a lance of sadness and grief, that I cannot share it with her

ever again.

 

Joy:

 

Oh how wrong you are!  You can, you will, and you must

share it with her every fresh spring.  This is your gift to her, so that she

will carry on in you and be remembered.  As you feel the breeze on your cheek,

inhale the delicate lacy scent of dogwood abloom,

and marvel at just how very blue and clear the sky is above

against that explosion of green, you carry her in the bubble I gave you

and from within this, she is witness to it as you are.  As you feel, she is.

And that is the most beautiful gift you have to offer,

that she lives on, in your living.

——————————–

(c) jp 4/2010

Day 9 – Prompt: Be Someone Else

Write as if you were someone else – real or imagined.

——————————————–

Even the Dead Sing

 

Odin be praised,

I have found the here and now, the crux, the roots

and I utter a charm, in search of welcome.

 

All-Father, sip of my devotion

from the many chalices left

strewn upon far away fields.

In glory and song and joyful lust,

we fought, a host of men until

only I was standing. 

 

And then,

I looked for the Tree, the Well, the Door…

 

I wandered far amid the snowy plains

devoid of growth, of life

until I found Your beacon, Your holly tree

with leaves obscenely verdant,     pulsing

among the land shrouded in snow,     silence…

Then I cast my spear skyward,

crying out in ragged, fervent voice a dedication.

 

What god received my thrust, I do not know,

but lo, Alfadr, blood fell from the sky!

Fell in fulsome showers

like roses, like lightning, like gemstones

of ruby, carnelian and garnet spilling from a mighty fist.

 

Twas then I saw the one-eyed raven,

a spot of glossy black

hidden ‘mongst the dark green branches,

its avid eye, red-rimmed and ever-piercing,

judging my soul, found my secret…

 

For I        I…

am a woman,

yes…                  I roar, WOMAN!

 

And I have worshiped you

since, as a mere jente-barn,

I watched my brothers learn the warrior’s dance,

their spears flashed like fishes.

Oh how I longed to caress the bright silver!

 

For many seasons, I have cavorted in battle,

sung amongst slaughter and watched smoke rise,

lightly towards Your hall.      I whisper another charm.

 

                                                             Am I worthy?

 

 I beg you, Open the door to Your hall, Odin

and let me stay with those who have fed You already,

let me bang mead-cups with my brother-warriors

and sing raucous odes to Your honor,

for even the dead sing!

Let me spin tales of gruesome combat, of fell skirmishes

and of argent spears tipped in the finest claret.

 

 My heart, stilled in these frozen lands,

will beat in fearsome joy to be einherjar, at Your side.

And I shall be happy, forever in Your presence.

—————-

(c) jp 4-9-12

(jente-barn loosely means girl-child in Norweigan)

(einherjar – those that have died in battle and are brought to Valhalla by valkyries.)

 

Day 8 – Prompt: Go outside!

Another simple prompt – and an awesome one – go outside and be inspired.  It fit perfectly into my plans as I was going to go on a hike anyway!

Here’s a sample of my day: Check out the rest of my pics on my main blog!

 

————————

The Alabaster Rose

Where the wild rose grows    alone,

in a field,

under a beryl sky

unmarred  by brume or haze,

housing only dreams

and infinity

-there, just there..

is where I whisper  prayers and hopes,

heard only by the wind

and each petal on the rose,

my connection to divinity.

————————

(c) jpp 4-8-12

Day 7 – Prompt: Color

Today’s prompt is color.

——————

Titian Flush

Some say day fights night, night fights day
to fade, to lessen…
This is not a truth.
And when snow falls, sparkling in the air
like sugar,
then
…then it is an outright lie.
Oh, how the twain meet, cuddling
as lovers under the aurulent glow of moonlight.
at dawn & dusk,
witness the titian flush on
both faces,
passionate tendrils tease inwards,
trailing like a strand of albicant pearls.
Earth watches, fettered voyeur to
the sky-bound love,
and weeps isabelline tears while two are one,
sad they must part and be
Night…
Day…
and wait, again and always, for that too-short

slice of time when
a periwinkle veil studded with wishes,
embraces the firmament,

giving solace as it creeps
slowly,

so slowly
on columbine cat’s paws to once again

be whole.

———————

(c) jp 4-7-12

Day 3 – Prompt: Wedding

Well, actually the prompt is to “write an epithalamium (sometimes also called an epithalamion)”- which is about celebrating a wedding.  However, as I am single and never was one for planning my dream wedding – I used it only as a slight influence.  In my poem for the day, I wrote about lovers – Time and a nameless woman…
—————————————

Charlatan’s Soul

Dip me
in light effervescent~
see this shell as smashed diamonds
& thousands of motes of light.

I refract wisdom & magic
with each fey-touched breath
of my charlatan’s soul.

Glimmering like candlelight
tw-tw-twitches,
I light my own path & need no eyes.
Do not call me Delphi.

Kindred sparks
flutter in the dark,
…fireflies beckoning.

A simple chalice is mine
tarnished & unadorned
yet beautiful still…
it holds the same elixir
as the finest gem-encrusted goblet.

My sweet lover,
the scoundrel & thief Time, whispers
endearments tinged of mint & stars & earth.

I want to roll in such secrets,
inundate my flesh with sky-blushed promises
& lushness so rich that I am
as a cat after too much cream.

In such rapture,
I shall not notice what has gone missing;
plucked from me as a fat grape from the vine…

Time only takes what he must.

—————–

(C) JP 4-3-12