Once Upon a Time

Once upon a time
I told a tale
I did not hear
that hot wind wail,
imagination
setting sail
across a sea of obsession.

But here I sit
and hear the sound
of magic whirling
round and round
image, symbol,
word unbound
the engine of my travels.

Between the stars
and midnight sea
I sail to find
just what can be
teased into
words of fantasy
one keystroke at a time.

Imagination
into tale -
the words, they own me
as I sail.
They push me into
What If's gale -
the telling has my soul.

Contemplating Helen

Run your fingers through the dusky wool, Lady,
colored rich purple by the death of snails
combed soft and fine,
oiled with the best
to wrap around your distaff
and pull into a fine thread
by the twirling of your golden spindle.

Royal purple, the color of congealed blood -
do you think of him sometimes,
the beautiful man who stole you away,
and how the blood streamed down his throat
from the arrow's flight?

Royal purple - you know the cost of its weight.
As you look upon the man who would not let you go,
who turned the world upside down
for the green hills of your birth,
where he sits, content,
king of the country he received as a wedding gift,
does the purple make you remember
the spilled blood,
the smell of fire and the sound of tears
wailed into the afterworld?

I watch your kohl-rimmed eyes,
and see your shining hair,
and your smile revealing nothing as you drop your spindle,
pull down the thread,
and I wonder what tale your own lips would give
if you, and not the poets,
had recorded your adventure.

Mountain Afternoon

The wind roared in the pine trees
from time to time as I watched
the last patches of snow
on the mountainside
turn to mush,
and trickle down into the creek.

Nearby,
a branch fell from a dead tree,
and a raven cawed,
and I contemplated
the World Tree
and Thought and Memory,
Odin's storm crows,
and the ways of fate
and wisdom
and sunshine scattering like diamonds
on the lake below.

And the wind roared,
and the snow melted,
and the stream flowed.

Some things, after all,
take care of themselves.

Beneath the Stars

I stand beneath the stars,
spinning, spinning
as I watch them
dance around Polaris,
then watch the moon rise,
shyly at first
as she peeks over the mountains,
then dashes up into the sky.


How I personified her once,
the moon,
Artemis of the bow
drenched in pale white light
her hounds yapping at her feet,
and wondered how the Norse
ever saw her as a man,
even as I dreamed of space flight
and watched the rockets blast off
to circle round her,
pick up her rocks
and carry onward
our dreams of the future.

Ah, such dreams -
I thought by now
I would be walking beneath that cold white surface,
in a city built by our hopes
and dreams of the future
waving farewell to children
ready to colonize Mars
and their own dreams
as my tomorrows moved into today
and theirs were just beginning.

Funny how dreams
and reality
don't necessarily meet up,
but still I watch her
and the stars
spin round and round
and the dreams spin round and round
as I think of how tomorrow
becomes today,
and today becomes history,
and hope ever dawns on the horizon.

Thinking of Athena

Athena,
that wise goddess,
seeing the way the world was shifting
back in the age of bronze,
and watching the fate of other goddesses
during that dark era
where goddesses became weak and bullied,
put aside her bare breasts
and bell skirts,
snakes twining up her arms,
and kissing her last lover farewell,
left the wild ways
of her neolithic youth behind her,
letting herself be reborn
from Zeus' forehead,
armed with spear and shield,
dressing always as a girl,
her daddy's darling,
potent in perpetual adolescence.

Times, though, change.

She, like all the other old gods
are still with us.
Stripped of their temples,
they walk among us,
warming themselves
at the altars of our day-to-day lives,
personifications of just what we do
to get by.

Sometimes,
I think I glimpse her,
a gray-eyed woman in her power suit,
walking into boardrooms
making deals,
other times, I see her on campus,
dressed in comfortable crisp linen blouses
and swirling natural fiber skirts
or sensible trousers.
She often attends women's workshops,
where she teaches all the interesting things
using her shuttle and spear,
like how to win in politics,
how to knit and make beautiful things,
how to shoot.

Now that the Thunderer
is not quite the power broker he once was
and she no longer needs him as cover,
I wonder if she will bare her breasts again,
let the snakes twine back up her arms,
and find a lover to kiss once more,
put away her girlish dress,
and become, once again,
fully woman.