A candle
Burns
With a certain virtue:
Demon, saint
Hesitate;
Damnation speaks
I am
Revealed in
Flickering shadow
Heaven
Slender shining
Tear streaked
Patience beast
Dancing
To the sense
Of smell
Sing praise
To the arch
To the pedestal
Nod the fire
Dream the sleep
Of kings.
Posts Tagged ‘Sleep’
Hoka Hey
Posted: November 5, 1991 in PoetryTags: Beast, Candle, Damn, Dance, Demon, Fire, King, Saint, Shadow, Sleep, Tears
0
decomposing, I lay in sleep,
wrapt in the silk of a thousand worms,
mixing with the rain
and the earth and the air,
melting like ice cream
on the sunny sidewalk.
Midion
Posted: August 26, 1991 in PoetryTags: Boy, Cry, Dreams, Echo, Eye, Hope, Mirror, Monster, Moon, Nothing, Salt, Shadow, Sleep, Trees
mud from the river-bottom
sieves through my heart
and dries brown tile
upon the sunny corridors
of hope.
shaken by the fist
of my own excitement
I feel my lungs
fill with salt
left by the cataracts
of beautiful plants
breathing.
to hold all of you
for one moment
would be to watch it crumble
and cry like
a waning moon
doused in the ink of the ocean.
little boy,
tiptoe carefully
through the echoes
of the fallen mirror;
the leaves
will put it back together.
the stitch of a sewing machine
manufactures my poetry,
sleep baptizes
my worried face into peace.
the dances of dreams
drum my skin into rest,
slipping me between the teeth
of monsters who plague my visions,
færies who cover my ears with storms
to mask the whispering
of nothing.
I fall without recollection
through cell walls,
shrieking with my senses,
soundlessly touching stars
with the shadows
of my fingertips;
hurtling at frightful speeds,
awed by the size of it all.
broken,
reflecting the trees
at fractured angles
agonizingly compounded,
the spilled eyes of an insect
encrusted with river mud
cracked and dry with age.
alley flower
Posted: August 14, 1991 in PoetryTags: Flowers, Green. Purple, Mirror, Night, Sleep, Universe
fiery stamen and
splay-topped tendrils;
multicolored electric octopus,
singing, gesturing in Indian splendor
inside a spherical universe of glass;
mysterious flower
writhing to the silence of the void;
infinipodal walker,
reaching and grasping at a terrible mirror,
constantly searching the circumference;
hot green stalks sadly follow
my curious fingertip
across the sky
as I trace patterns on the clear cage;
pink and purple fans dreaming
support the slim emerald-waisted dancers
teasing the fluorescent pollen
on the central stem;
flickering tirelessly,
chanting throughout the night
as I sleep.
I, Ape
Posted: July 16, 1991 in PoetryTags: Ape, Closet, Dragon, Fly, Forest, Green, Light, Mom, Mushrooms, Purple, Rat, Rock, Sand, Shoes, Sleep, Sneeze, Stars, Tide
I, ape, eat mushrooms
in a forest of multicolored furniture
all from the room of a girl
I knew.
the carpety grass is foaming upwards.
shoes play hide and seek when I
sneak around in the closet.
they shut it always behind them.
find them cavorting and wagging their tongues.
I live in the closet.
I read old travel books and sigh.
funny little bugs comb my hair for me.
the shoes galumph like tiny dragons.
my rat escaped.
I, ape, drink cappuccino
alone under the pillars of marbled ice cream,
whittling leaves to stick to their sides with thumbtacks.
sorry.
I sit quietly under a quilt made
of Stars by Mom long long ago that is too small.
it’s fun to push around
on the tiled floors
on my butt, pretending to have no legs.
the leaves turn purple with the sunset paintset.
everything is quiet and
you can see your reflection in everything.
I, ape, peer through the closet door slats
but can only see the carpet that changes color.
sometimes I can’t fly my kite for the roof.
then,
I move the stuffed animals
and make them nod and wave.
there was a lake, big and pretty and I was scared
to throw rocks into it.
there’s a story behind all these shelves.
I wish I had some pudding.
just to sit and eat pudding;
lick the back of the spoon
in this forest
of chairs.
I, ape, wear a green felt hat for no reason,
puzzled by the paintings in the empty museum.
I search all the video games for quarters.
nobody’s home.
dusting the lampshades is fun;
it makes me sneeze and then I dance in the mucous-mist.
I sing myself to sleep in the queer half-light
of the green stone moon
poking my head in holes in the ground.
I play a silly flute
on the sand left by the retreating tide,
sometimes dragging a stick for miles,
then falling asleep
on the carpet.
I, ape, remember all this,
dreamed before I was built of gristle
and hair, wound with a turnkey and set on the linoleum
to live.
my nest in the rocks was burnt
when I returned with some candy I’d found,
so I ate it in the wet soot.
I’ve smoke in my eyes.
I’ve loved you for so long;
now I can fly
and I leave all this hair and skin
and my shoes
behind.
beyond the door of sleep
lies Hypnos, drenched in sand.
it is snowing autumn leaves
and the smoke from his pipe hangs like frost,
a fog which curls to shut my eyes like a child’s.
I’m waiting to hear the rain
On the roof, fallen from the stars
Listening for the moonlight sound
Of the ink of the mollusc night
Seeping down through the clouds
To wake me in my sleep.
Only as I’m falling to sleep
Can I imagine the plummeting rain
Supportive of the windswept clouds
Obscuring the world of hoary stars
And in the corners of the night
I cannot hear a sound.
I steal away without a sound
To the land I wander in my sleep,
Dead under the silent night,
Tucked in for tomorrow by the gentle rain,
Guarded by those winking stars
Beneath the halo of the clouds.
Floating buoyed through the clouds
Amidst the growl of thunder’s sound,
I gaze upon the veil of distant stars
Through eyes opened wide in magic sleep.
The tears of wonder fall as rain
To the gods of that wintry night.
In the vaulted halls of timeless night
I wander blindfolded by the clouds
Through my mind the pictures rain
Exploding violent in muted sound,
Rocking my ancient soul to sleep
With dreams of newborn stars.
I pray to those alien stars;
I close my eyes each coming night.
The unpredictable tide of sleep
Rolls thick as stormy ocean clouds.
I was illuminated by the awesome sound,
And woke to the wistful rain.
The stars are hidden behind the clouds.
The night has fallen with accustomed sound.
I sleep, waiting for the rain.
[sestina]
yeah, I like to wander through the blue haze
right before bedtime looking a-
round at all these fuzzy shapes that are way
out of focus and measuring how sleep-
y I am and how tired I am and
how exhausted I am and how ever
else I feel in the repair department.
it’s sort of liquidly buoyed stum-
bling about through blue and orange and purple
fuzz Jello spots feeling woozy and diz-
zy but not quite ready to go wholly
to the dream lands and really wake up and
exert again but you know being just
sort of stoned and content that you’re going to
fall asleep sometime soon and you’re not rush-
ing it so I always like to smile as
I’m trying to think of something to write
about before the locomotive of
the sleep beast pushes my head underwa-
ter again and I relearn how to breathe.
Untitled Poem #103
Posted: February 10, 1991 in PoetryTags: Ocean, Sleep, Tree, Whipped Cream, Wind, Window
I can hear the sound of the ocean
as I float in my sea of whipped cream sheets.
the wind in the trees outside my window
calls me softly
to sleep.
Untitled Poem #102
Posted: February 3, 1991 in PoetryTags: Bones, Frog, Orange, Purple, Sleep, Stars, Wind
patterns of orange and purple
dancing savagely over my eyescape;
distant creatures swaying beyond the veils of sleep.
a windswept cliff of grey,
tough grasses growing squat in the wind,
the sound of the sea rings in my ears as I decide.
the mountains were smoky tonight;
mist drew thick curtains to wetly blind.
trees stirred, restless in the dark like masts and
my breathing becomes slower.
beneath my froglike skin, bones sharpen.
I hear flutes and pipes echoing off stars
through the frames of space.
A Small Purple Linear Stain
Posted: January 9, 1991 in PoetryTags: Dream, Eye, Fog, Pain, Rain, Scream, Sleep
I can’t help thinking what
I’ve done to make you scream
So loud, like that, that night;
It was so much a dream.
But when I woke from fog,
My face was moist with sleep.
My hands dug in the earth
To climb the mountain steep.
Embankments grey and high,
I felt the tracks of rain.
A snail has crossed my eyes
To salve the lines of pain.
[iambic trimeter, even!]
No-one’s Watching
Posted: November 20, 1990 in PoetryTags: Believe, Death, Fear, Forest, Sleep, Spider, Tree
the universe is more fragile than you think.
let your billiard ball physics take note of it.
Things just outside paper thin partitions;
madness overwhelms the left-side brain
when the Right is given free reign.
don’t try to explain away the phenomenon —
your senses will rarely betray you:
listen, smell, touch, believe.
patterns are infinite, on and on,
beyond those boundaries we teach;
deafness we teach blindness we
handicap those who are gifted.
beware that which is just sleeping
the sleep of the age-old which may
be mistaken for death, the calling
of nothing. even awake
we sleep, dormant and helpless.
in dreams we pass away for a time
to roam the realms of memory;
dark forests of fears and toadstools,
a thousand and one nights I have
lain awake counting spiders’ webs,
drinking water that glazes frozen pools.
the pulse that lies beneath
the rough-edged bark of a weathered tree
to the precarious balance of an acorn wreath.
never are you quite alone enough
to say that no-one’s watching.
Who can stand
Just lying awake at night
Waiting for sleep
To come dust your eyelids
With secret sand
Glittering and feather light
Weighted to keep
Them down without skids.
Sleep
Posted: March 16, 1987 in PoetryTags: Beauty, Cat, Dreams, Elf, Flowers, Friend, Frog, Grass, Imagination, Knight, Maiden, Prince, Princess, Rainbow, Sea, Sleep, Tom Sawyer, Unicorn, Witch
Sleep
Dreams
White picket fences
Knights of the Round Table
Picturesque cottages
By a blooming pasture
With a lake some distance away
Away over a patchwork quilt
Of grass and poppies
And lilies and daffodils
And snapdragons and
Dandylions and petunias
And myriads of colored flowers
Like a living rainbow.
A silver-maned unicorn
Prances through the colorful sea
With an Elf princess on her back
Wading towards an unknown goal.
Shall she stoop to kiss a frog?
At the edge of the sparkling lake,
Unicorn as guardian, companion, friend
An entire land
Filled with knights and maidens
And emerald cities and Cheshire cats
And evil witches and giant beanstalks
Nottingham castles, Tom Sawyer’s clubhouse,
Sleeping beauties and handsome princes
A land whose boundaries are imagination
And not worldly restrictions and rules
Every land is different
Unique to that person
And this is what
Dreams
Are made of
Froggacuda's Weblog 