One Word

with midnight dreams we dance
unyielding, i stir unwilling to awaken
incessantly seeking
You

like virgin wings of the monarch, your shape gently unfolds
i clutch the edges of slumber
aware in my wakening you will be gone
Again

you have come before, tauntingly teasingly tendering talents
only to vanish with the coming dawn
stranding in your wake, blurred
Images

i pray one more heartbeat
one more tick, one more tock
one more time
Together

only with eyes closed
my head pillowed
can i see you
Clearly

i hold my breath
sinews stilled by anticipation
the weight of a thousand dreams
Waiting

at last!
lyrical expressions birthed in the mist of dreams
dangling before my outstretched
Hands…Eyes

one Word
an impeccable, exquisite
splendidly uncovered
Word

a preeminently boundless
fantastically fortuitous
aimlessly flowing
Word

ten thousand dreams flowed like sunless waters
harboring sounds in the darkness
musing and scoffing at the ancient
Bard
 
a creak and a groan hail the pre-dawn day
as this merry minstrel swings
his stocking clad feet upon the hard, cold
Floor

crooked and leathery fingers sweep sleep from weary eyes
ere lifting his trusty quill and jaundiced parchment
from the hollows of the black cherry
Ark

carefully, painstakingly, his pinkish tipped tongue
pecks the dry tip of his plume (a habit of untold decades)
eyes straining to capture focus
Before—

like a magician’s gold coin
flowing from hand to hand
the oneiric one
Disappears

he scribbles one word
the barren parchment
surrendering to his
Touch

the aging poet sits in silence revering one word
weeping like raindrops on a willow tree
a lonesome tear falls falling
Fell

the liquid glass plunges
a final resting place
upon the yellowed
Parchment

“what will you be?”
he whispers to the moist word
“what words will follow?”
Creating—

a sonnet
singing Shakespeare’s ictus?
how will i see
You?

a haiku?
childish thoughts wasted on the one
i have so
Longed

perhaps…an epic adventure
before the wisp of life
is swept
Away

will we journey to faraway lands?
with endless horizons and bountiful botany
donning fantastical
Flora

or kingdoms of pixies and pansies
hobgoblins and sprites
enchantresses and evil
Queens

a land of watermelon wines
and licorice vines
throw in a baritone bullfrog or
Two

a place with a beginning, “once upon a time”
a middle
none too wearisome i
Beg

a grand finale scholars will anticipate
hoping my story ever ends
spewing clever critiques with no room to cause me
Dread

one Word
kindling the imagination
of poets and
Lyricists

one word
borne in the night
an invitation to begin writing
Again

Copyright © Jim Hirtle | Year Posted 2021

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