Cyril Darkcloud

Wind, its very essence is to move – the freest of all that is free, moving where and when it will. With the very first breath of birth life drinks the freedom of wind. The name that has been so recently torn from him was given at the moment his lungs first filled with the free and moving air of the wind. One does not control the wind, one enters it, feels its freedom and moves. He breathes deeply filling his lungs with the harsh and bitter Wind that has scattered and dispersed his name and his past and borne him to these lands where life is lived far from the skies. He turns his face upward and his eyes move across the darkened heavens until they find the Great Nomad, the one who wanders and is never lost. Filling his eyes with its light, he sits on the stone ledge of the mountainside and thinks of the child whose eyes he promised he would meet at this star. After some time, he removes the locket from around his neck, opens it and prays silently over the smiling face of she who will again be his daughter. Tears well up within his eyes but do not fall and he looks upward once more, his eyes reaching out through unshed tears for the Nomad’s light. To be exiled, to move within the currents of a Wind terrible in its freedom, to be a man without even the consolation of the name of one’s youth – sterner indeed even than death is the love that has made this choice. He rises, the moisture in his eyes borne away by the swiftly moving air, and steps off of the ledge. No, one does not control the wind – one enters it, feels its freedom and moves.

 

More to follow .....

Burying Hawkie Snyder

 

We buried Hawkie Snyder yesterday.

Put him in a muddy hole

        next to some old preacher's grave.

Carried him in a brownish box --

        the damn thing weighed a ton.

The handles were brass and wet with rain

        and slippery in my hands.

My shoulders ached from carrying it,

        Hawkie weren't no little man.

Of course it rained, it always does.

But this was not some gentle rain,

        a rain just barely hard enough

                to get your pant legs damp

        and give a little extra bother

                without any extra pain

        while it picks up some poor sinner

                and takes him through the Pearly Gates.

No, this here rain was different.

It came down in slams and angry streaks

        and slapped all the mourners in the face

                and made them drop some extra tears.

The rain was hard, but we all came --

        dying's serious stuff around here.

We all came and stood around

        in dark blue suits and overcoats,

                black dresses and them little hats with veils,

        and watched the reverend sprinkle holy water

                that got swallowed by the rain

        and tried to hear the prayers he said

                and not to look each other in the face.

His wife set a couple roses

        and a couple tears upon the box

                before they sunk it in the ground.

His boys each threw a spade of dirt

        and maybe choked, "Good-bye."

Then they all headed for the cars

        and me, I stuck around to say good-bye

                to the dead folks in the crowd.

Conflicted. Conflicted and confused.

 

Conflicted. Caught between the poles

 

of the geothermal considerations

 

underlying tectonic shifting of plates

 

and the clearly compelling character

 

of a creature first found dwelling in an arcade.

 

Conflicted. Conflicted and confused.

 

Conflicted and considering the possibility

 

that the key may lie with another arcade creature

 

made of colorful pixels and called Donkey Kong. Edited by: Cyril Darkcloud at: 4/30/02 8:37:37 pm

(Conversion Confusion, this is the post that started it all off)

 

 

Me and Her

 

Me and her,

we've been saying

words of parting

to each other

since the minute

we first met.

That's how close we are.

 

Me and her,

we felt the moisture

from the urgent splashing

near the bottom

of each other's eyes

and folded up our smiles.

That's how close we are.

 

Me and her,

we heard the hunger

kicking in the silence

in between our words

and our opened mouths

forgot to speak.

That's how close we are.

 

Me and her,

we felt our bodies

get in the way

when our spirits tried to touch,

and so we each let go

of the other's hand

and knelt to pray.

That's how close we are.

First words so often

are distant words --

words plucked with haste from the seams of life,

the stammering edges of event and feeling

that do not quite meet in thought --

reluctant harvest of the separation

of life from self

and life from life,

and the unprotected heralds

of cities whose location

only further speaking might disclose.

 

 

My apologies for not having sooner expressed my gratitude for the very kind words and the welcome with which my application was received. Your first words to me have certainly made it much easier to begin getting to know the members of the community elsewhere on the boards.

 

Once again, my thanks.

I have read words

that have left in my mind

imprinted pictures

of places and times

and faces and voices

painted with colors of rhyme.

 

I have read words

that have opened my eyes

to the seeing of mystery

in the mundane of life

and the brightness of suns

shining within other skies.

 

I have read the words

of this poem with a smile

remembering the feel

of the touch on my mind

of actions and notions

I did not see first with my eyes.

 

A very fine piece of work, Ozymandius. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

There is an intriguing sructural dimension to the poem:

 

Stanza 1

* Silence - which is in its own way an absence of movement. No sound vibrates within the air, for example.

 

* Life is portrayed as slipping away rather being expressively lived.

 

Stanza 2

* Time moves past the narrator rather than the narrator moving in time.

 

Stanza 3

* Sound which is a form of movement [see above].

 

* Life is being expressively lived away from the place of silence.

 

Stanza 4

* There is an imperative to move perceived by the narrator.

 

* This imperative identifies the narrator as one painfully poised between silence and sound, stillness and movement.

 

Final Stanza

* It was the expressive living of love [sound] that let to the numbing stillness of loss [silence] and it is difficult to risk sound only to possibly fall back once more into silence.

 

Nice job.

Edited by: Cyril Darkcloud at: 4/20/02 9:55:35 am

* Picks up phone, dials and orders pizza. *

* Hangs up. *

* Changes mind. *

* Picks up phone, dials and orders more pizza. *

* Asks for extra peppers. *

* Hangs up. *

* Waits for pizza delivery. *

 

Fun poem.

Far too seldom

I chance to read

a bit of verse

that speaks to me

as this one did.

 

Very nice work, Justin.

Edited by: Cyril Darkcloud at: 4/9/02 7:47:40 am

Davey's Pool

 

Mom says Davey Sanders

was just about my age

when he jumped into this pool

 

and he had red hair

and a cowlick

and a horn that set

the dogs to barking

when he rode his bike to school.

 

She says this pool

ain't got no bottom,

at least none that

no one ever found

 

and that when Davey

held his breath

and ducked his head

they never fished him out.

 

She don't like me

coming up here

to the strippings

and sitting on this rock

and sticking my feet

into this pool

and staying here alone.

 

But I come up here

when she's working

in the mill

on Tuesday afternoons.

 

There's a bunch of rocks

on that bank

above the old coal road

 

and it takes

sixteen puffs

to climb them

 

and then I'm

in the elderberry bushes

and the laurel

and the birch trees

growing near the pits

where the old guys

used to dig for coal

 

and then it's past

the rabbit hole

and I'm here

at Davey's Pool

 

and my shoes are off

and my feet are wet

and I'm sitting on this rock

 

and I whistle

'til the wind gets still

and then I listen hard

 

'cuz I think sometimes

the air says most

when the wind's

hardly moving at all

 

and the sounds

that it makes

itch in my ears

 

while it muffles

the chirping and songs

of afternoon birds

 

and leaves a trace

of a ripple

under the leaves

floating in Davey's Pool.

 

 

Edited by: Cyril Darkcloud at: 4/23/02 4:22:19 pm

This is one of the most enjoyable reads I have had in quite some time.

A poem

a dance of words upon a page

left by your hand

before my eyes.

 

Your words

and the feelings they invoke

as my eyes

move through their dance.

 

A touch

upon my own thoughts

left by your hand

and its dance of words.

 

Very nicely done, Annael.

Nothing Came Between Us

 

I see my image

in your eyes.

I look so far away.

I feel the need

to cup my hands

in a cone around my mouth,

breathe deeply in,

collect my voice

and shout.

 

But I seem so far away

the words will just get lost,

lose their breath

and fall away

somewhere in between.

No sound to hear.

No echo to return.

 

We sit so close,

not far apart at all.

I could stretch my fingers

out across the empty space

and rest them

on your arm.

But I see my image

in your eyes

and I look so far away.