The Juniper Prize: Between the Known and the Unknown

“The Juniper Prize: Between the Known and the Unknown” That man built a house of straw and sticks and the stories that burned within - all consuming the titled prize; like a bird sings a song the metre repeats and sticks. yet, another banner, belies an untitled grimm feast for sore hungry eyes - ravenous writers devour their characters easily mindful, with or without consequence, like true cannibals - then once swallowed, reborn, like burning birds in a story, their wings downed freedom, or clipped find a way to rise phoenix after phoenix from within the fire of their depths, to sing you sweetly back in, into their throats, so, to speak, repeating feasts, softly sponged with treacle and tar, the feathers still stick they spread their lives, like legs, such trifles, such small delicacies small crying poesies pop out and up like strawberry jam in a dream sliding out between alabaster abstracts, transparent bodies of work – birthed then, the abysmal, the assigned ghostings; in absentia ashes like white feathers like snowflake flags surrender a fragile laced life released over the see to take flight upon the salty breeze then up into the dissipating clouds moving open like a gate the ghosts below, heart-blown watch on, assessing their time alone; youth undressed falling secrets, wanting, Love blooms, the pretty song sings later, adorned in golden autumn leaves still glistening with shining woody dew begins bending seductively towards the thin vain branches of Winter, melting into its conditional frosty eyes of granite hewn blue towards that true forest of communion teasing catch-me-if-you-can-you, then a cold warning – all is glass, all is new manna a clear feast for sore hungry eyes, feathery dreams of the heart, pure and pristine, but the mind has a will all of its own making, its own devilled considerations to succeed the imminent emissary; as snow-drift eyes are read one melts like Jarlsberg over their thorny hearts into the arms of the marauding angel the scent of violets and rose petals and laudanum elicits tranquility from the approaching storm - the gurney on wheels hushed urgency rolling fast down well-lit dissinfected corridors the distant sound of intubators performing their task like well-oiled automatons needles and pins count back from 100 oh for a decent hamburger a much-wanted last meal the hunger remains for it all, it holds on, it holds on let us make it gently through that place in between the known and the unknown one considers what follows in between bowing heads let us take a moment of silence; the cold dream falls upon the best and worst of us – all, we take a little sleep some of us do and some of us don’t, welcome “It” in this is not a simple Frost falling, even the straightforward is complex and in the many words the unfound remains hidden, at best; bleeding hearts are read cored like fresh green apples a large bite taken, bittersweet moments the red letting necessary the green taste of youth bites us back, untrusting; That woman built a house of straw and sticks and the stories that burned within - all consuming the titled prize; the mind boggles mysterious tomes strange words it’s all Medusa heads and bluebeard tales, heads begin to roll very green very read such strange words enable us to transcend; in the end, the dead by all means find a way to sing again through the lips of others speaking their words they are passionately kissed like the cold heart of a Rose seen through glass coffin they are, summoned, awakened, again brought back from the dead Candide Diderot.’25 “I have wished a bird would fly away, And not sing by my house all day; Have clapped my hands at him from the door When it seemed as if I could bear no more. The fault must partly have been in me. The bird was not to blame for his key. And of course there must be something wrong In wanting to silence any song.” (“A Minor Bird”/poet, Robert Frost) “Though I have never caught the word Of God from any calling bird, I hear all that the ancients heard. Though I have seen no deity Enter or leave a twilit tree, I see all that the seers see. A common stone can still reveal Something not stone, not seen, yet real. What may a common stone conceal? Nothing is far that once was near. Nothing is hid that once was clear. Nothing was God that is not here. Here is the bird, the tree, the stone. Here in the sun I sit alone Between the known and the unknown.” (“Nothing is Far”/poet, Robert Francis) “She is as in a field of silken tent At midday when the sunny summer breeze Has dried the dew and all its ropes relent, So that in guys it gently sways at ease, And its supporting central cedar pole, That is its pinnacle to heavenward And signifies the sureness of the soul, Seems to owe naught to any single cord, But strictly held by none, is loosely bound By countless silken ties of love and thought To every thing on earth the compass round, And only by one's going slightly taut In the capriciousness of summer air Is of the slightest bondage made aware.” (The Silken Tent/Robert Frost) “The woods are lovely, dark and deep, But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep.” (Excerpt, “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”, Robert Frost) see (is spelt as I want it spelt).