The Rood and the Thorn

This is dedicated to everyone, who was, under the assumption the world would end, today. Also, after listening to all of Chopin's nocturnes, early this afternoon, both his Piano Concertos, Liszt's Un Sospiro, Stravinksy's Firebird, I must say, I think a colossal sigh came over the world. Thanks to Liszt! Expect a poem on Rusalka... me embodying Rusalka... dedicated to (Dvorak) tomorrow. And bear with me, in my wondering if Delacroix really said Malibran was catering to the masses who had no artistic taste?! I love Delacroix, but I would also love to take a "time machine" and see Malibran, and her sister, Pauline (Viardot), perform. Forgive my not having any "profound" ramblings. Things have been rather horrid, today, despite my immersion into beauty, and the subsequent intoxication. Remember, we are all Phoenixes, but we go to different fires. And, despite beauty's intoxication, I've been feeling horrid... more so at the moment, with this execrable stomach pain, and, what I hope isn't bronchitis, or, Sol forbid, Pneumonia! *With the CellCept that would certainly kill, or do a number, on me!* Do not pray, but sing, for me. And I will prevent the day's arrival, the night's arrival, so death can find its perfect breath, a sigh, if you will, from what was being forsaken, taken, by what we "expect" :

THE ROOD AND THE THORN
Await the lark, and see,
For every cloud that bleeds
No consolation in the dark,
And rip apart, the black ivy.

Forget the lily opened white,
And didn’t want any hue
Save a clear stream of water,
Without any shade of light,

Color of Cypress, and its root,
Apple untouched but craving soot
The blood delivers from the rood,
But there is no flesh to make it true.

There was no lark when lily grew,
And no frost upon the sleepy grass
Or dead volcanoes erupting: the pass,
Of deepest night unto its death,

Annihilation of the ghost, the breath,
The birds sit in their morning pews
And do not mourn their brood,
But sing to praise of flesh and youth,

And I know what you will never see,
To rip apart the black ivy, the white lily,
The clear stream of water,
Without any shade of light,

Is to take the blood from the rood,
What seems to you the morning’s light?
And turn it into fresh laid snow,
Where roses bleat, but thorns won’t grow.

A poem, dedicated to Bunbury

I realize it's been quite some time, since I've posted. I'll admit I have been in horrific states. But, this morning, circa 5 am, I woke, looked out a window, and saw my dogwood tree, full bloom. White blossoms, illuminating the shadows that foregrounded it. And, of course, this image incited me to write a poem, which I am dedicating to Bunbury:

DOGWOOD TREE

Your white flowers exemplify shadow,
Reaching towards me from the bushes
Who are green but seem of deepest black,
To break from night and take the daylight back.

But you, a haven of phosphoric blue,
Dotting the sky when night is most profound
Helped lost sailors hope, when none was found,
Blossomed, to be rooted, from tip to ground.

The rain falls, in a small swell of petals,
It breaks against those shores that are distant
And yet, so close, the earth and the ash,
Your flowers bob, and petals clash.

Better than gloaming, grooming the past,
To move into a future, and wear its cape
Blacker than the night sky, your escape,
Of rain, wiping tears, from the wind’s cry.

Putting its sorrow back in the earth,
The sorrow that a farrow cow won’t feel
But embodies, to ever dream of a new calf,
Is nothing, if not, that dreaming lasts.

Your white flowers recede into daylight,
And I mourn that their light must pass
Unless another night comes, another dawn,
But when air gives root, my dreams, are gone.




*Expect some ramblings, reader(s)?, from me in the upcoming weeks. I have not vanished. Baudelaire wrote, in relation to genius the public is like a slow running clock. (This was in an essay on E. Delacroix). I've been thinking how true this is, particularly in contemporaneity. I'd never declare myself a genius, I am not one, however, it seems the aristocratic population is diminishing. We must work to sustain the blood line! C'est Moi? The Jewel of the NIL!*