Friday, May 29, 2009

Isthmus Crypticus


Bird Shrine ~ John Jude Palencar

Your scarecrow legs rise from grain husk dusted shoes
Laces long gone to the pyramid of empirical needs
Or perhaps confiscated by caring state officials
Corn teeth rattle in the face of the interrogating wind
Hand-hurled insults at the dunes’ feverish knife edges
Sand-blasting skin burnt umber and amber return
Confessions fall unbidden from the lip of the storm
Strangers loom rigging in the azure haze horizon

And the prow of their boat hits the wet sand silent
Beneath the crash of the waves on the sentinel reef
Smuggled bouquets of seaweed and dead coral swinging
On the arm of this parabolic and pissed-off muse
Whose head full of haloes and hard-on dead-lines
Demands to be rescued from the sleeping undergrowth
The grey cursed sky and serrated shoreline agree
To split the difference while flesh still remains

Here on the headland of hate stick-scratched in the sand
Hallowed ground is hailed slandered and deranged
Hermit crabs scuttle on the dotted line foaming
Detailed design for the sea’s edge stitch hemmed

No scared crows or sacred cows to tin the morning hope
No kidding crop circling alien ambivalent and aching
The cultivation of need hangs on the arm of the thrasher
A child gazes up at your hook-and-eye tweed-chested jacket
You hiss through those teeth scaring pale moon face
Breathless as stitches entwined in a forgotten blue day
Your hands hold nothing but the waters of time
Bartering days between hell and high waterline

For who would till this barren and saline finger
What woodenhead cryptic and contrary soul
With driftwood face and charcoal eyes
Fleshed from the nightmares of children and dogs
Would populate this isthmus of buried memories
Rotten and raw with the taste of love lost
In the sand that blows from a waning moon
A pedigree for the damned, the sowing too soon?


Title from one of those excellent episodes of Aeon Flux

12 comments:

Candie said...

Ah Pisces touch!Dark beauties.

Punch said...

On the arm of this parabolic and pissed-off muse.

All in all a Very well written poem. I have only one comment, speaking on behalf of one's muse, " we don't get pissed-off. maybe angry, like when our fragile link to this plane flushes away a parabloic arm while pissing on a brilliant mood."

James Higham said...

And the prow of their boat hits the wet sand silent
Beneath the crash of the waves on the sentinel reef...

Oh yes!

Garth said...

Candie: Oi! beauté sombre.

Punch: One's muse can speak for one's self - mine is, by default, pissed-off and cantankerous.

James: your taste is [as usual] impeccable :D

human being said...

sacred are only these words
that paint darkness
on a black canvas
helping us to find
the sun...


a great poem!

the muse is not pissed off... this is just the accumulation of electrons before a tempest... it's natural...


i should thank you dear new friend for visiting and following me... thus letting me know you and your world... each new friend is a new window helping us know the world in a new perspective...

and this window... wow!!!

the walking man said...

Is this how a pissed off muse writes an ode to loves lost? The imagery is lush and vibrant in the atonal way that resonates of no hope less ne knows that from the decay comes the beauty.

Garth said...

human being: that is beautiful, did you write it? Thanks for visiting (and following) - glad you enjoyed.

walking man: I am not a big fan of the 'muse' thing since it attaches a sacred source to the process of creating. The process (for me) does not stem from any mystical entity but rather an accumulation of gathered information spewed out with a creative intent and a mindset that prefers the road less travelled.
You 'love lost' interpretation is interesting - I had not realised that that shone through. Thank you.

human being said...

those lines were inspired by your work... can i claim total ownership?
surely not...


your process of 'accumulating plus a creative intent' resembles the bee's honey making... kind of magic... alchemy...

my process is like the work of a diapason (a tuning fork)..
or like when two waves of the same wavelenght meet...

what i write may come to me through a resonating work but most of the times it comes through the resonating 'events'... what 'happens' to me...

:)

Garth said...

Human Being: The tuning fork is an excellent analogy - music opens the doors to the unconscious in the same way as perfume may offer a worm-hole to the past :)

Tom said...

nice visual of the hermit crabs moving along the beach...i can see it, can hear it, can smell it...wish i was there.

Anonymous said...

"Confessions fall unbidden from the lip of the storm"~~~oh yes indeed~~~

Laura Tattoo said...

wowza, bébé. i wub it. and tu es frère à moi, pense-moi! check out june 1 post: almost a bit synthesis: crow and sparrow: a winter's tale: http://moineauenfrance.blogspot.com/2009/06/crow-and-sparrow-winters-tale.html

Bookshop

Buy this book on Lulu. Kindle Version
Kindle Version
© Garth Erickson. Powered by Blogger.

Followers

Page Ranking Tool
Creative Commons License