aphorisms numbers three through five

aphorisms numbers three through five

  

find silence.

I’m shy even to say that much.

let go the music of wires, the color of etherwaves.

wind will do, sky will do.

refrain being entertained.  listen, observe.

here is full.  now is full.

stillness has never left any soul alone.

she told me so.

 

neil reid © march 2012

 

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being

b e i n g

there is a gate, we call it sky
 
when visible, we call it cloud
 
or sun’s bright shadow
 
or dusk, when we close our eyes
 
 
there is a gate, we call it heaven’s eye
 
and there is no intent to restrict, rather
 
it means to say, here is the heart
 
you live within, here is the heart
 
that is your own
 
 
now that you see it, let it blow away
 
and blanket all your thought
 
 
like grains of dust between your toes
 
 
permeable, be like that

neil reid © july 2011

 
 
photo credit:
Both photographs, “Sunset in Taos” by Annell Livingston (images 8502 and 8507 respectively); used here with gracious permission (and appreciation).  See the full set of four (and so much more) at her blog somethingsithinkabout.
 
Annell is a gifted artist (and poet) who lives and works in the high desert of New Mexico.  Please visit both her art website and poetry blog as well.  Annell writes about the creative process, It is a problem unsolved, that turns into another problem unsolved and I must continue.  I am responsible to the process.
 
poem commentary:
This poem would not have been written without seeing these photographs; and then, it could hardly help from writing itself.  In truth, it already was, just in image rather than word.  My blessing this time to get to perform the wording part.  With much thanks to Annell.
     Actually I am more than fond of doing poems in response to images, be they photographs, paintings or otherwise.  I think these images make evident the relationship of image and word: an equality of meanings, just in different languages.  More, I agree with Annell, it is our part within existence, our responsibility, to participate and respond to what we experience.
      neil

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plum cipher

plum cipher

before you bloom
be like rock on fire    inside earth
first    fire    of all that blooms

before you bloom
be like sea    emerald mother’s    eye
womb    like threads inside

before you bloom
be like laying    sleeping stone
weathered    like gracious thought    generous

before you bloom
be like respiration    green    fingers    brows
beside the road    still while movement    abounds

before you bloom
be like bark    tan bleached    arms
like a ladder is    into limbs    receiving light

before you bloom
be like ocean’s blue    in mirror glass
be like wind    like rain    like dazzle moon    like

before you bloom
be like fusion bright    marry dark    and sight
amalgamate photon synthesis    seedling like

before you bloom
other’s feet will trample on    fingers    toes
and you will bloom    anyway    endlessly

because your are fire water rock sky womb
bare as the god who would be your breath

neil reid © april 2010

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Postcards home from sky and sea

With thanks to my friend Sean for providing the visual cues that roamed the beach and wound up writing these postcards here. Look see Sean’s SKY ARCADE gallery. Beautiful.  Imagine these perhaps, arriving in your mailbox.
 

sky above the bay, Sean Fraser

 

Postcards home from sky and sea

 

A finger of dry stone, where sea resides.

Piled high in summit, white mountain sky.

 

A shadow shore, brilliant, above the clouds.

No more clear the thought, waves like toes.

 

White falls in columns, splashing down.

Rolls like cotton awaiting a harvest hand.

 

No place, no way, a cloud won’t go.

Some clouds sail against the wind.

 

Clouds reflect any dream they can catch.

A beach abridged by absent waves.  Footprints following.

 

What light you cast into clouds will return.

Someone’s postcard home.  You were there.

 

Clouds have wings.  How else do they fly?

A crayon curve lost into clouded sky.

 

Far faint whispers allow ripples to dance over sand.

Some shout while cousins keep silence intact.

 

Sky roses scattered about.  The gardener’s stepped away.

Sand ripples like water, where my toes want to root.

 

Rose lips, a bridge into evening sea.  White over white,

layer sky, an extra blanket for the night ahead.

 

White streak, an opening in dark blanket sky.

Distant procession walks where horizon goes.

 

Tracks in sand, searching rain, then turned.

There’s a shadow where rainbows fall.

 

Wishing you were here!

 

 

Neil Reid © September 2009

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Mothen wing

Mothen wing

 

 

Said mothen wing to candle, I seek the flame. Said table to flutter, one candle lit, the other not. They rest on me. Said moth to table, I am beneath the sky. Does it rest on me? Said flame to sky, I see myself undone. Sky whispered back, unquenchable.

 

 

2004 © Neil Reid

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The dreams that grass dreams

The dreams that grass dreams.

 

 

Each night sky climbs down close,

answering the small prayers of grass, left

lingering on echoes where feathers have been.

Each night grass takes it’s secret drink,

    and sky says – tell me.

    Grass answers – here, and here,

here a man’s feet passed over me, and here,

another’s crossed and vanishing into brown

    on the dry hillside,

here a deer’s small stone feet, here

a child and dog, scattering like leaves,

here a deeper impression – someone slept,

    roots whisper – and dreamt.

In the telling, grass is healed.

 

    Some nights I awaken -

Do I hear the rustle of your passing embrace?

The trail of your fingers across my bare skin?

    Each night spirit comes, slipping beneath

my garment of memories, faithful or not,

drawn along the long thread of my dreaming,

healing doubts branded by the sun’s long gaze.

    Some nights – it’s you, laying beside me.

 

And each dawn, briefly, the grass

is blue shadows and sky is green swirls.

 

 

1998 © Neil Reid

 

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