Green moon in a dirty sky,
snow drifting in,
a subliminal huff-huff,
of polar bears stalking.
Ice crackles, bewitched
caw-clawing crows
gather to sleep
amid bad dreams.
If we gaze too long,
a green sheen
smears stinging cheeks.
When making love
to the pillowing dark,
snarling monkey's chase
naked angels
across a gloaming night.
In red and white stripped socks
toes curl.
Phantasmagoric broomsticks
swish tinsel
from bleary eyes.
Later than predicted,
a deeper snow arrives.
Wooly hats flap sleepily
as we reach down
into their long-neglected nest.
The world birthed an arching column,
its broad shoulders eclipse the sun
obfuscating the golden grain colored rays
What are their thoughts? Are they an eternal refrain?
Their hunched posture, knees pillowing breasts
Ashen hair cascading like the foam of the Aegean,
the waves of time flowing down its taut trapezius
A breathing landscape living atop the one we roam
It is done roaming, there is nothing left to see
Its eyes cavernous, with pupils yawning endlessly
The pressure of its presence turns the sand it sits upon
into a picnic blanket of stained seawater glass
yet with all it carried, I sense it carries no burden
for there is no more journey left.
There is gratitude that the only act remaining
is to wait.
Written: December 25, 2023
___________________________________
The phone did ring; can you hear?
Pillowing loss cursed by fear.
Drowning in distraught remorse,
Smoggy how we fell off course.
Once saffron shades burnt our path,
now murky vines choke with wrath.
days and nights drudge on insane,
Black cherry cold fills the veins.
Hands met each other again this morning
they touched gently - caressed - loved.
It has been a long time
since they prayed together like this.
It was a silent sermon
a benediction.
Fingers intertwined like sea anemones
tenderness kissed each fingertip.
Left hand was shy
right hand coaxed and urged
until they danced slowly, as one
with their bones, veins,
callouses and crinkled skin.
They are old hands, beautiful hands
they will stay together now
and not stray
for they live in faith
bound as one with the blood
that nourishes them.
Together
they have accomplished many great things,
they also have shared shameful times,
they let those memories
flow away as they rest together
in pillowing palms.
These hands weep as only the shape of love can.
They have explored, they have cradled,
they have known violence,
experienced
horrors and dark deep nights of despair.
They bathe together now
wash the mind that moves them,
remain devotional
until at last
they fall from the flesh into the earth that
birthed them.
——-
Know...Trees
The sun flatters the trees:
“Send your exquisite
growing higher! Closer to me!”
The sky invites the trees:
“Incline your branched crowns
upon my pillowing blue!”
God comforts the trees:
“I have the count of every hair
of every human head...and of
every branch and twig you loft!”
The twilight sings to the trees:
“Find peace in your sleep:
I will frame your silhouettes
before the stars!”
————————————————————————
(c) sally Young eslinger 1/23/21
Thanks be to God
Nestled high upon a pillowing cloud
Hidden from prying eyes
Surrounded by fragrantly perfumed blooms
The imagination runs then flies
Balconies envelop the building within
French doors that open out wide
A welcoming feel takes over
Pulling you deep inside
Marble floors that are glossy and shine
Collectable art hangs from each wall
Chandeliers that are a centrepiece
A warm feeling welcomes all
Imagination takes you through a portal
Suddenly you run then fly
Soaring up high to a pillowing cloud
To your castle in the sky
DAMSEL CAUSING DISTRESS
The knight errant sent for me, but I’ve gone missing
For three days now, while he’s composed a ditty:
In the tide of feminism I still haven’t given up kissing
Being what is termed fatalistically pretty -
But I can be the ‘no’ that makes for nice
When his flame burns under his boiler suit,
Then I’m decently torpid like a fish on ice
Where the guts need to go when the runts root -
A pillowing breast, my nightcap a soliloquy
To hell with his billowing sails and pregnant ships
Let him go, this guy who’s got everything but me
With his big thighs, big legs, big hips -
All the things we women should shun
Save satin, silk, squirm, sperm, and …sun.
(c) Rosemarie Rowley
From IN MEMORY OF HER (2008)
O, my life like a gray, gray smoke,
That's newly pillowing from an old engine.
O, my life like a trumpeting
That's sweetly sounded by an elephant.
As fair as a river, my life stream in meanders,
So deep in gush am I;
And I will pour thee still, my watercourse,
Till a' the seas gang flood.
Till a' the seas gang flood, my stream in deluge,
And the rocks bath in sweeping waves:
I will spurt jet out till, my waterway,
While the sands o' life shall run:
And fare thee well, my only grit!
And fare thee influence, a while!
And I will draw closer again, my currents
It was routine thousand atoms transmutation.
At a glimpse I was played by you
In some tricky lines I was fool
And lovely velvet blossoms fill me
When autumn September fall,
In a summer night March
If maybe it'll be taking a hand
But it leads me into your growing land.
When I close my eyes and sigh a bit
You quench my thirst at it's best
On some battered moment.
Up there knows I ask you
Billowed it's hindrance to be with you.
Where love throb so blissful
Smelling you seems so dreadful.
But FACEBOOK is only our rendezvous.
At times in some boring days,
When one hot summer March
Hit autumn and lovely September.
In a midnight caveat of caviare
Only FACEBOOK is our rendezvous.
And there, a melancholy time comes,
When you breath I hear it sounds.
Voila! I mesmerized when it hit me grounds.
But you assure me the best roses,
To believe in it's fragrance poses.
God knows 'twere be going deep.
Pillowing the scented rhythm feeble heart
Where you light a candle with me
And said you will be there in our place
On FACEBOOK that serves as our rendezvous.
-Dedicated to all those suffering with an eating disorder. Beauty, true beauty, belies a gentrified, pretty exterior. You are not alone-
Benighted whispers and spurning dreams
Forthwith in blisters and burning streams
Shameful saunters in billowing blight
Hereto haunters with pillowing plight
Weep and wither betwixt a bawling bloom
Seep shall deliver amidst a falling fume
Expel and deliver for the morning's bright
Swell and shiver for the swarming's night
-
A watchful kind of morning this
The sky a billowing pinkish bliss
In stark relief scattered oaks stand
As sentinels for the waking land
Soon the pink has faded away
To white pillowing clouds at play
The wind has started to gently blow
Stirring where the golden grasses grow
Time my child to wend our way
Homeward where our hearts do stay
I think the afternoon brings rain
Our winter song's first refrain...
A crow and a seagull lift up the sun
With "Caw!" and a bright white wing.
Swift cars wheel 'round the shopping ground;
I hear their motors sing.
New steaming clouds from canneries rise,
Their growing billows pillowing skies.
What a great delight to see and hear
The work of nature and man so clear.
Who would disown it? Who'd say nay?
To the joy of being on this beautiful day?
Not I; I love it; love it strong.
This is the Eden where I belong.
A crow and a seagull lift up the sun
With "Caw!" and a bright white wing.
Swift cars wheel round the shopping ground;
I hear their motors sing.
New steaming clouds from canneries rise,
Their growing billows pillowing skies.
What a great delight to see and hear
The work of nature and man so clear.
Who would disown it, who'd say nay,
To the joy of being on this beautiful day?
Not I; I love it, love it strong;
This is the Eden where I belong.
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