Melee, mire, mad mistletoe.
Amiss, misconstrued?
Meltdown reactor, mellow?
Morning, dawn miscued?
Urgency, how you came in.
Blanch blank lightning pin.
Sycamore the serried sin.
Crater's rim, blind bin.
Abscond, pond, wild wizard's wand.
Lizard idol weird.
Boundless basilisk, braid bond.
Doubtless disappeared.
Bay leaf, beckoning light, bent.
Apostles in black.
Berserker, the basalt pshent.
Chasm dark, the crack.
Tympanic temper-fount, sound.
Sonic fire, coat nerves.
Little mountain, mound resound!
He who avoids swerves.
Mechanize, our armies!
Together stand and fight!
Belay, malaise! Trees, trapeze!
Otherwise good night!
Immortal! The portal prays!
Languid legs a-splays!
Lachrymose lark, sing always!
Grizzly bears may graze!
Mackerel falls, thy seas! Salmon:
Better that you live.
Setting, rising? Sun, on stun?
Grit, pittance? Safe, shiv?
Falcon, flight. Polite, fright? Why?
Good to listen up.
Welder's arc, do or die? Lye.
Code crayon covenant's cup...
Born of fire.
Black water.
A singular spine—
I learned how to live unkissed, until...
The Tasman bared its teeth,
A cold, crushing mouth.
The moon is an honest Manipulator,
pulling the tide
like a noose.
grinding the heavy ocean
against my spine.
White surf choking
my basalt throat.
The sky tears open,
it's raining roses and love riots,
soft ruin
on wet basalt.
Let the gale howl
its wrath.
Against my ledges.
I filled the night's chalice with knots of desire.
The tempest cracks
over the peak—
Tie me to your Tongue;
make the storm's voice
the only thing
holding me above the waves.
A fossil of fire.
That gouged the dark.
I ask the heavy air:
If time turns, will scars stain the sky?
Bare basalt bore no banner on its face,
Yet lichen kept the oldest song of rain;
The cliff received no chronicle of grace.
No cedar dreamt the patience born of stone;
A hidden fissure gathered gifts of rain,
Till silence made the heart of granite known.
No moss proclaimed dominion over shale;
It gentled hardness by the law of rain,
Till mountains learnt the meekness of the frail.
Then yesterday gave birth to one green leaf;
The hidden seasons kept their tryst with rain,
And time unveiled the provenance of leaf.
The fern arose where none had granted birth;
The dew restored the first bequest of rain,
Till forests claimed their ancient right on earth.
I left the valley poorer only thus:
The least beginnings outlive loud acclaim;
Stone learnt that quiet is the root of us.
O wind, have you been waiting?
O widow, wailed for long?
O wasteland, silver plating?
O will within, burn strong!
Nicker, wicker, ichor.
Fate, Fortune, fancy-free.
Blood of heart, run thee thicker!
Gibbous moon, smile at me!
Golem, shall we pack the bags?
Well, we're wearing rags.
Singularity, smile a-sags?
He who loses, brags.
Yes, and when we older grow:
Carrion feeds the crow?
Lava bursts from, volcano?
Unsteady its flow!
Elder race, did you leave trace?
Basalt towers. Doors.
Panels in the sky, thy face.
Falcon? How she soars.
Weapons wild electrical!
Blast them through the drains!
O causality, thy call!
Wait not for the rains!
Rematch. Planned. Numerous. Strong.
Eyes of glass, thy spark.
O eruptions, last thee long!
Help them fear the dark!
Chaos, steps of pyramid.
Ancient orb thrown down.
Forbidden zone? It got rid!
King without a crown...
Form: Séadna
The hawk hung high on heavy wing,
Above the grey, gasping tide;
Where gorse–gold fires fiercely sting,
And the pale–faced changelings hide.
A silver breath on basalt stone,
Where the cold, keen waters climb;
The sea–caves hum a hollow tone,
A rhythmic reaching of time.
The Fomhóraigh stir in the peat,
Where the dark, deep bog–pools sleep;
With rhythmic pulse and restless feet,
A secret, old watch they keep.
One–eyed kings in the iron mist,
They rise from the shelf of salt;
With a heavy, crushing, blue fist,
And a step that makes earth halt.
The rowan bows it's berried head,
To the wind's wide, wintry wail;
Where ancient kings and heroes bled,
Beneath a torn, misty veil.
The currach dances on the crest,
Of a salt, soul–shaking swell;
The sailor seeks a silent rest,
Where the deep–sea giants dwell.
A lightning fracture splits the blue,
Over jagged, iron shore;
The old world breaks and births anew,
In the Atlantic's wild roar.
The emerald pulse of Ireland's heart,
In the rain's rich, rushing scent;
A landscape torn and pulled apart,
In a wild, green wonderment.
soft feather
bog winds whisper on heather
where the soaring eagles fly
high
stones upright
stand frozen long to incite
from high cliffs leaning on sea
free
lakes misty
blue morning shrouds reeds twisty
slow swans turn into cloud tuft
fluffed
breeze saline
blows on Moher cliffs marine
grey waves pound on basalt stone
lone
bay twilight
white gulls traverse with delight
dark night folded by wan tide
dyed
Mist feathery drifts
last night’s breath loosening
above basalt slopes of Huatung
Pacific swallows trace morning brushwork
over Fuli’s rice paddies
new green scented with rain.
Xiuguluan River flows jade mountain-born
among ancestral stones
white willows in Ruisui weep
dew-kissed
cycad fronds catching first sunlight
Leaf pearls gather on my thatched sandals
Walami earth holds stories in its coolness.
Bihe Pond rests hidden in Wanrong’s stillness
waters reflecting the tribe’s quiet prayers
Bamboo leaves in green and gold
crested mynas gather in quiet repose
wind moves with the chime of a temple bell.
Ancestral path wanders into the Central Range
oolong tea clouds drift
above Qilai’s blue ridges
A white egret lifts over Guangfu’s terraces
air clear as poured Longjing.
A bulbul calls
blue magpie glides
the slow unlayering of day
Huatung Calligrapher’s span warm to newborn light
time unspools—
bright
unmeasured.
Light widens
dawn follows Yu Shan’s shadowed valleys
the world in quiet promise
soft light
drifting into morning.
She snaps like a brine tendon,
spilling embryo chords across the basalt shelf.
Tongues of nacre split her sides,
each vertebra strung with gravid silence.
Kelp-blind, she threads the continental rift,
her fingernails seeded with unfinished continents.
Magma foams in the pouch of her pelvis,
grinding up vowels like crushed coral.
volcanic
activity
liquid
magma
cools
contracts
chisels
rasps
measured
patterns
settling to
hexagonal
colonnade
morphed
entablature
unique
marvel
unsigned
sculpture
Stepping over the threshold
Locating the floor buttons
I press the 3rd floor
~ my brain images still flashing ~
Disfigured long flames curl around
Cherished memories-
Dry spruce branches smoking and crackling
Glowing coals cooking steaks in a fire
Above the crashing waves on the North Shore
Of Lake Superior with mom and dad
Laughing and sipping root beer
Spying a twisted piece of petrified oak
most likely a plank
From an ancient sunken vessel splintered
In the Gale's of November
Loosening the piece from the grips of glistening
Basalt boulders, etching our names and place
Of discovery above striated agates embedded in
Crevices a millennial ago
Proudly displayed on the mantle above my fireplace
Gone
Now
Only precious memories remain
I flash the card lock on my hotel room
Entering
The
Future
2/18/23
A 55 gallon barrel
Full of pulverized
Oyster shells
Mixed with wood ash
And sawdust
And porklard
55 gallons of
Pulverized oyster
Shells.mixed
With basalt.
Alkalinity
Alkalinity
Mind the
Bushels bouiz
Mind the
Bushels!
Pines dressed in pearl hues-
bleached cotton sky. Plumes carve
night shades into taint
of crushed bones. Stone
basalt tools grind glacier till
into pallid skin
colored clay, shaped
into ornate bowls that cradle
crow ossein. Hunter.
https://allpoetry.com/poem/14732450-Cosmos-by-Chrisbreva1?c=1166602438
Adding numbers on fire
Stars burning in the night
Lightning chiseling basalt stones
Statues speaking to fight the tides
Thunder hunting a pruning fork
Eliot staring at Mars descent
Venus is dancing in his lap.
Volcanoes bringing mountains down
Fighting whales eating caviar
Men peddling the play of all
Exploding starfish littering highways
Four by four by four and eight
Poets cutting on carving boards
The moon crushing an elf's face.
https://allpoetry.com/contest/2732551-Quote4x4x4-8
(In the 17th century, when thinkers
were first getting to grips with gravity,
they named it "kindly inclining".)
Seeds adrift on water
coalesce:
fueled by affinity,
they form a community.
Last pearls of wine
combine:
electing against space,
they cling to the curve of the glass.
Berries stain the fingers
that rupture them,
their plasma clasping the hand,
rather than leave unthanked.
We scraps of matter
are emboli,
swimming in Not-Being.
An impulse in the void
coagulates our Something.
Swathes of stellar gas contorting,
slab on slab of basalt pressing,
horses on the hill cavorting,
algae in the swell fluorescing,
ospreys on a rock face nestling,
children tumbling and wrestling,
matter moves to matter.
We are starstuff all,
and motion is our purpose.
We are aided on our journey
by the steady pull
of starlight.
TIDE IS OUT
The iodine of the seaweed smells
And the rattle of empty seashells
Trouble not the whale’s sleep
While crabs scuttle to the deep
TIDE IS IN
Shriveled seaweed in basalt crevices revived
Fish skeletons washed under the rocks
Boats slurp and plop out of the mud
Hungry breakers eat afresh the land
..................................................
Other poems of mine, similar to this, are available at
https://www.fictionmagazines.com/magazines/five/
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