Short Ocher Poems

Observable fire flashes
Oceanic at times
Opaque reflective flair
Ocher pigments inside
Openhandedly gave
Opulent fashioned ring
Offering it with heart     ...

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Orangey,
burnt almond hews
color
the horizon;
as Sol's chariot
like a spent
ember,
glows amber;
inking
infinite
ice crystals
with a coppery
terracotta ocher;
as
it arches and sets....

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ellipses tremble
trace in waters
a deeper kiss than this
though deeper still
revelling in waves
sunken, slips
heavy under
starry-starry lights

i feel tall
those empty hollow places
that leave me under your skin
all deeper to the sound of standing-still
deep ocher core...

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She’s out there,
Beyond leaves turned ocher
And pines in breeze atremble …

She’s out there,
Glimpsing, too, this white-hot sun
Aloft in pale, bright blue …

She’s out there,
At her job away from home
These many lonesome hours …

Yes, she’s out there,
But within my heart
Each moment does she linger....

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So very many words
(Powerfully lush creativity)
Colors
(The dark edge of silver, reluctant ruby, smoldering ocher)
Imagery
(The periphery of sunset, the bouquet of rain kissing hungry earth)
Oh that I could whisper
The one word
That can describe You
(my poet, my lover, my King)
The sweet echo of
Your Name...

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So very many words
(Powerfully lush creativity)
Colors
(The dark edge of silver, reluctant ruby, smoldering ocher)
Imagery
(The periphery of sunset, the bouquet of rain kissing hungry earth)
Oh that I could whisper
The one word
That can describe You
(my poet, my lover, my King)
The sweet echo of
Your Name...

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Once lit by flickering torch light 
with animal tallow mixed with ocher
daubed on subterranean rock walls
now lit by streetlights or LED headlamp
slashes of spray paint and magic markers 
splattered on concrete bridge abutments,
boxcars, or walls of tenement ghettos,
but the message is the same
we were here....

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Great Goddess
In fertile essence you were shaped
Upon your head
ambiguous braids were draped;

Breasts as mountains
Belly the great giver of life
Monthly cycle an ocher fountain
Created from ancestral strife

Venus of Willendorf
30,000 year old
Archetype Matron 
of Mother Earth
Corpulent bestower
Of genesis and birth....

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Someone told me about
wet ocher leaves
blanketing this colorless man,
standing still in places
that tear apart.

He had maps of dark paths
that he followed, 
sadly leading only to absence,
there falling away like viridian,
melting as do mummies 
in salt water,
changing from solid to flow,
opening tiny voids in his heart....

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The tines of the rake
comb through a dispersing blow.

Some heaps hold, 
ocher clumps form random hillocks,
most slip through the iron teeth
dancing drunkenly away.

I was called out into the rushing air.
Physical work with the dead and dying
is indeed a calling.

Meanwhile the dead keep falling; 
my arms shake a cerecloth
into the vivid swirls of an afterlife....

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The tines of the rake
comb through a dispersing tumble.
Ocher clumps form random hillocks,
most slip through the iron teeth
dancing drunkenly away.

I was called into the rushing air.
Physical work with the dead and dying
is a ‘calling’ isn’t it?

The newly deceased keep falling.
Maple leaf bones crackle underfoot.
I scoop their remains,
brush an autumnal cerecloth,
shake the dead into swirls of afterlife....

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Listen to poem:

A Summer Vale

     Hints hailed she raised her ocher veils,
          Expose those enlightened from shade,
               Spun tales of yesterdays reveals,
                    Golden treasures anoint the blessed,
               The abandon of buttered skins,
          Urbane exodus blooms on roads,
     As summer vale blows saffron breaths.

2019 September 05

*3rd Place*

FAREWELL, SUMMER
~~nette onclaud...

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Fragrant flower, Jasmine infused,

the evening breathes comic book laughter,

colors white and green and yellow.

Our heroes, our saviors in bold of

twilight blue and mud red ocher.

Perfume fingers stretch forth on evening breeze

searching for that champion 

only to find, beneath primary hues,

a miriad of diffuse pastel hides

beneath balloon exclamations,

our vain attempt to save us from ourselves.




04/22/18...

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From cradle to grave the sun baked
the skin leather, un-oiled
and rain did not fall
for Isis with held her tears.
From the bloody care of womb
children popped like bread from
the oven of women, the urns of life, 
earthen were their colors
ocher, saffron, and 
some as black as basalt, rich…
with a Nubian glow.
How the small ones squeal
at the wadi’s edge.
How the toes of man and beast
dance at the skirt of mother Nile, 
sensuous, rippling with the wind,
or placid in the doldrums of summer sun....

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