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Open Poetry #31
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Wasteland (complete)
| Open Poetry #31 |
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Wasteland (complete) |
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wranx Member Elite
since 2002-06-07
Posts 3689Moved from a shack to a barn 
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i Bukkake She lies fitful atop her own rough altar of unrealized promise Struggling against the restraints of amity against the constraints of verity And yet eagerly accepting her self-imposed penance To endure each outpour elicited by and deposited upon her countenance Each surge of wantonness and desire avarice and rancor pools and swirls Fashioning the strumpet mask she wears into her banishment ii The Barrens Exiled in the Hinterlands for the sins of the father She builds her lean-tos beside streams flowing nowhere Lost and abandoned she drums out her secrets into the night and hears, only echoes Untrusting and aloof she now pounds her laundry upon uncaring stones Wandering alone from camp to camp warming herself with prurient fires When she visited my own I watched the flicker of flame dance her face, both Cherub and Whore As her eyes followed the spiraling sparks I could see within them an abysmal depth holding exquisite sadness Then, cloaked once again in her brocaded doubt she slipped away back into the Wasteland Where, I'll see her tracks and traces And hear her plaintive wails As she goes about beating the bulrushes In search of her Deliverer iii The Trail Sitting Staring Into my dying fire I see her Following restive behind his decrepit wagon Marking time by the protesting groans of the trundling dray as it trembles beneath its burden of false promise On its endless journey toward dissolute pledge I see her stop now and again To scratch out her yearning on cavewall and crag or score bitter anguish upon her breasts and her thighs I watch as she wanders from his prescribed path to make her temporary temples Washing the shame from her face combing sins from her hair Donning the crimsoned robes an obscuring mantle for a priestess of love And warming herself burning the faggots of bundled affection Then, once again, falling in line behind her betrothed Tethered by the threads of fraying hope bound with the intricate knots of mistrust Making simple meals from what she can scavenge or from the bones that he throws her Walking deeper into the wasteland counting the steps Through catching briar and tripping bramble taking her farther from her heinous angel She begins to regret blurring her tracks so that no one can follow nor let her find her way back I see the bright diamonds fall from her eyes to the dust on the ground Glint for a moment then become trampled into the mud iv Dreams At the end of each gray sameness She sleeps in the masters bed a rough pallet of unkempt emotion She lies in restive repose seeking solace in dreams Where she is a princess A band of braided prayer studded with sparkled pleas is her diadem Once again pristine Gone, are the scars that mar and her plague of small hurts Dreams in which she dances alone in the great hall of all that might have been Tapestried in panels of woven wishes Dancing through the clatter of bones left by those that sought her deliverance Paper-white ossuary gourds roll about, then stare with muted mocking through empty sockets and lipless grins As her glide and pirouette give way to feverish whirling and frenetic flail dizzying herself in celebration of a freedom merely guessed at Breathless and spent she gathers the rubble together and settles herself to sleep into the nest of bones to drift away once more Into that same gray sameness v. Gnomen On one forked foray from what was familiar she chanced upon a creature shorter than need be Clad in the plain cloth of poverty misfortune visible through the tears Taking a roadside liberty he was passing his niter through a root-like obscenity The stream dampening the dirt The scene dampening her She noted it odd to suffer the sweep of arousal from the visage before her This gnarl of a man bent to a weight unseen leathered and hoary But with Jasper for eyes as sharp and clean as crystal misfortune visible in his tears vi The Gate As the myriad pilgrim paths converge with each other like the braiding of a rope The destination becomes clearer No longer just a dark regularity blanketed in the haze of dawn The sun rises and burns the veil away to reveal the great gate of a lonely outpost Looming in its weighty welcome Thoughts of adventure play about her eyes and her dark compel plays coy at the corners of her mouth With the prospect of passing through into something new To once again stroll among a populace perchance to find an angel less grievous Or just a man that wouldn’t look too deeply if only for awhile vii The Bazaar At the marketplace she is swallowed even as she enters Drawn into the core of it she succumbs to its spirit And wastes, not a moment sampling the various fruits that she finds She’ll taste the musky flesh of those from the warmer climes ignoring the sticky drip that travels her chin She’ll savor the sharp acrid sting of the Northerland offerings reveling in the terse sour shudder a most bitter pleasure Discover fabrics in colors and prints scarcely remembered In textures only dreamt of She’ll don a brides’ lace meant to be worn but once And try on the silks smooth and sweet as a virginal sigh But, hasn’t the resource to retain even the simple rough broadcloth that savages the skin and abuses the nipples viii The Garden Still she finds she has no escape from her evil attachment Her sponsor even decorated as he is with the Cuckold’s horns he will not release her No way out save the path that takes her heavy-lidded into sanctuary And so she’ll take respite again in the garden behind her eyes Where she drinks of the sun the wind and the rain along with the grape Drifts away in wisps of poppy scented languor Communing with whatever spirit she can steep from deep within the wormwood ix The Castle She is in effect a castle unto herself Surrounded by a seemingly tranquil moat that reflects back blindingly her alabaster façade A bulwark of terrible fictions built block upon block Behind which she keeps hidden the woman she has become while who she hopes to be strokes and soothes the girl she once was The truth of her lies elsewhere in an airless cell deep beneath her keep x In Catacombae She walks down the dark tunnels of time spent wandering the corridors of recall Passing mossy mementos from times past Stored haphazardly jumbled in crèches like shrines to obsolete gods Letting her fingers trail along damp stone as if she were caressing the cheek of a long-dead lover Her splashing footfalls echo in whispers of nearly forgotten voices The stagnant hope she stands in drips through the porous vault pressed like wine from the weight of heavy days Her face shines in a watery waver roundish and waiflike of indeterminate age mouthing silent queries Malformed notions birthed then abandoned Flutter indistinct about her head before flying down the myriad passages In search of a purpose xi Eos I am made to recall one rare morning Her Standing in another reflection brushed by willows Sunlight and water her only raiment efforting to rid herself of the scents we had made I remember seeing with some satisfaction Her look of vexation as she straightened my tangles from her hair and her head And her startled delight when she was surprised by an ovation of birds xii Shamans Shack A collection of sticks and bones from the limbs of many woods many men make up the shack in which she sits Looking Into the oldest face imagined for even a hint as to what tool would be capable of etching lines so fine, so numerous into the mahogany mask that is, Baba Yaga “Tell me witch what of me?” “Though you have sinned in ways, times seven still, you may be redeemed” “Even now you are too proud to recognize that Vanity has blinded you to the refuse you wade through” In coveting what you feel undeserving you have taken too much of what remains” “And it angers you into the madness that drives you to soothe the itch in your spirit with the unceasing sweet scratching of flesh” “Your trail has been hard yet, you’ve taken the easiest of routes for the one you’re allied with provides for existence but, existence is all that he will allow” So says the witch “You once encountered another one you deemed “Angelic” for the message he bore” “And “heinous” in his stricture” So say the doves xiii Rich man, poor man And the old woman said “Even as you follow downcast and headlong his recollection haunts your footsteps as a cur would follow a scent” “His ease in his penury vexes you as does the richness of his manner” “You know that you’ve seen him now and again” “Hidden in an unexpected kindness or a gentle touch” “And once in the eyes of a gnome” xiv The Thief She’d always made her way the way she could From the kindness of strangers or what she could salvage And the deft application of her long pale fingers upon ill-guarded things She would steal with a smile or the pout that purloins Could barter with a promise that was as the air The simplest of ways to supplement her subsistence came to her naturally Yet, she was always poor in the currency of life Until the night she finally decided to steal herself Away xv The Desert The Sun is now her sole companion As she traverses her way through the desert that leads her back Dawn leans against her pointing the way with the shadow she casts Divesting herself of layers she casts off her mantle and the robes that obscure Leaving them to punctuate the sand along with her footprints By midday her sins are drawn from her skin by the sear of the air And travel refreshing in traces down her breasts and her thighs Small Siroccos smooth away her callous polishing her pink Together they travel through an expanse where darkness is found only in the space under stones Dusk finds the Sun compelling her forward to a willowed oasis Where, at last the day is spent xvi Night The coal of evening is set with diamonds and the wind fingers though her hair weaving its signature into knots Silvered scimitars shatter the obsidian sky raining Ebon fragments onto her shoulders crackling echoes throughout the dark Her skin becomes porcelain glazed cold and white as a winter morning shining translucent in the moon She takes my tarred and oiled hand and places it firm upon her longing And it is not smudged, nor is it soiled but merely warmed into its yielding And the night is on… xvii Storm The wind blows swirling about us Maroon and morose Making us turn from the stinging sands of our disparate histories To face a new direction Where chimera hangs low on the horizon like an unformed thought I put my face to the veil of lace that obscures the glimmer that hides in her eyes It comes away shimmering upon my brow and my beard As if I’d walked into the webbing of the most artful spiders And I exhort her to follow through the storm broken night to a place heady and humid Where I can administer my hell-gained proclivities exploring her resilience with benevolent intent Til the night is spent… xviii Rebirth And the day… Finds us huddled naked in the nest of our vestments My mail shirt formed from the many links of countless disappointments And her heavy cloak brocaded with the dark designs of secrets, as yet unspoken Had made our bed As she awoke she sewed her songs of promise into the mists When she stirred she sowed sighs of her longing into the Sedge And I arose to seek the suns solace while stretching to meet it Together, we broke our fast on the spare bread of trust and the clear water of truth Before setting out to spend the day… "In looking Northward, I see a light" |
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| © Copyright 2004 E.F.Rose - All Rights Reserved | |||
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Sunshine
Administrator
Member Empyrean
since 1999-06-25
Posts 63354Listening to every heart |
Somewhere toward the beginning [even though I have seen this in progress] I must have caught my breath...and it's a VERY long read. But not a laborious read. It is wonderful, it's going into my library, and I will look upon it often and pray that someday I will be able to imitate a master story-teller. Isn't that the absolute sign of flattery?  Thank you Wranx... |
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Earth Angel Member Empyrean
since 2002-08-27
Posts 40215Realms of Light |
Stand up and take a bow! Ed, you are to be commended on this captivating saga. It was wonderful to read the whole story from beginning to end.  Love & Light, Linda |
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Martie
Moderator
Member Empyrean
since 1999-09-21
Posts 28049California |
Ed....this is fabulous! I am at a loss for words to tell you the chills I had at the end ...they were because this is so good, so beautifully written! Bravo! |
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Midnitesun
since 2001-05-18
Posts 28647Gaia |
Ed, this one is beyond a doubt my favorite of all time, the best write I'ver ever read here at Pips. It is truly an honor to be on the same board with the gift of a wranx write. This is a masterfully written piece worthy of holding its own front and back cover, illustrated in gold leaf and liquid jewels. BRAVO! You've reached the top of the mountain with this one my friend. |
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Cpat Hair
since 2001-06-05
Posts 11793 |
Need to spend some time with this one bud.. but, on first read, it strikes me as deep..and meaningful in both style and content... I'll applaud you right now for what I see on the surface..and come back later to tell you how I truly appreciate it... nice to see ti all put together too... in stages it read well, in this form it reads better... nice... damned nice.. |
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Dark Angel Member Patricius
since 1999-08-04
Posts 10095 |
A fabulous and captivating read..You're a great story teller Ed. Absolutely magnificent. M  Beauty of the world which is soon to perish has two edges, one of laughter and one of anguish, cutting the heart asunder. |
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Enchantress Member Empyrean
since 2001-08-14
Posts 35113Canada eh. |
When all the superlatives have been used.. may I simply say 'thank you' for this Ed. This is a masterpiece and one of the finest works I have ever read here at Passions! ~Smiles & Hugs, Nancy~
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serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
First I need to thank you for putting it all together for me. There is more to this than meets the eye, and you know I see layered meaning here--this is a spiritual journey, and I find historical impact in the words, as well as personal signifigance for both of us. (I'm blessed with a bit of insight into some of your phrasing by knowing you.) I'm in awe here. This is both reflective and visionary, and the reader would suffer to assume that circles cannot be linear. I'll talk to you later, yeti.   You are scribe, you are mystic, you are poet. I'm blessed to call you friend. |
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vandana
since 1999-10-22
Posts 10463USA |
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Seymour Tabin Member Empyrean
since 1999-07-07
Posts 31720Tamarac Fla |
wranx A remarkable write with many layers and two players. |
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Grover Senior Member
since 2004-01-27
Posts 1967London, ON, Canada |
Worthy of only the best reviews! Indeed, what a superb write! Excellent in every way! Congratulations! Grover. |
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iliana Member Patricius
since 2003-12-05
Posts 13434USA |
Wranx, I am not really good enough to give you effective criticism -- I just have to say what I feel -- this was fabulous! I think this is historic! |
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Cpat Hair
since 2001-06-05
Posts 11793 |
yes, much more than meets the eye..and with a mystical quality as well. Do enjoy this one sir..the layers of possible in the prhasing and words..the story itself one of journey... yep... can honestly say wish I had written this.. but had I..lol.. it would not bear the stamp you so wonderfully endowed it with... your talent. |
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scorpio Member Ascendant
since 2002-10-02
Posts 5178right...there |
I've read this twice Ed. And my sense of awe at what you have created has no limits. believe in what your heart feels... |
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Balladeer
Administrator
Member Empyrean
since 1999-06-05
Posts 25505Ft. Lauderdale, Fl USA |
Ed, I don't feel qualified to go into much depth here but can say that I consider this a true work of art which could be published anywhere. I have seen in other poems of yours you have a unique way of saying simple things hiding so much complexity in just a few words. To me that is free verse at its best. Phrases like "pounds her laundry against uncaring stones.." make me smile with the beauty of the simplicity and yet the complexity of all the meaning contained therein. Too many writers feel thay have to explain everything to the reader. You give the reader credit for the intelligence needed to find the meaning in your words and you say things in a way to get the grey cells activated and headed in, hopefully, the right direction. Just as a preacher can take a small phrase from the Bible and do a two-hour sermon on it, so can one take phrases from your works and do the same. Anyway, I'm rambling here...just wanted you to know that, even though I don't always respond, I read and enjoy your work very much and this compilation is excellent. Best to ya.... |
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wranx Member Elite
since 2002-06-07
Posts 3689Moved from a shack to a barn |
Well, now I'm blushing. And I need to thank the good people that took the time (a LOT of time) to read this thing. It started out as 3 separate writes that seemed to belong together. But they were written out of order. The woman I love pointed out that it needed to be continued to some sort of conclusion, and gifted me with a leather bound journal with handmade pages in which to write into once it was finished. So? Here it is. (I hope you're happy with it Susie (slavedriver!)). I do hope it read well for everyone since I'm long past looking at it objectively. Karilea? I thought I told ya it was all smoke and mirrors. Linda, I'm glad you liked it...Thanks! Kacy, I am flattered, but liquid jewels seems a bit...uhmm....much, eh? (Thanks!) Ron m'friend, I layered as much paint on this thing as I could. Enough perhaps to hide the shaky foundation. *Grin* Maree? You should talk! You are yourself, an amazing teller of tales. Thank you Nancy, for ALL of your support during my stay here...And for this particularly nice comment. M'witch, Be awed only by the length of it *wink* Yeah, there IS a lot goin on in here, more even than the author realizes. And thank you vandana, for the constant and welcomed replies. Sy my friend, I should think that YOU would find your way through the phyllo..Thank you! Grover, you are new to me, and I find your comments always encouraging. I thank you. iliana, YOU are another flatterer...(Thanks) As I told my witch up there, scorpio? be awed only by my perseverence in this. (discipline escapes me) And Thank you, Balladeer, for the constancy of your readership....And for the depth with which you do it! |
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suthern
since 1999-07-29
Posts 20723Louisiana |
This is simply stunning... I only noticed the length when I realized how long it had been since I'd breathed. *S* Excellent work! |
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Ratleader
since 2003-01-23
Posts 7026Visiting Earth on a Guest Pass |
NOW I can come back and say I think this is one of the best, perhaps THE best, piece of poetry I've read here since I joined PIP. Masterful work, Ed! Ed ~~(¸¸¸¸ºº> ~~(¸¸¸¸ºº> ~~(¸¸ ¸¸ºº> ~~~(¸¸ER¸¸ºº> |
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WhileIWasGone Member
since 2002-07-18
Posts 486 |
*sigh* awakened.... Beautiful |
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WhileIWasGone Member
since 2002-07-18
Posts 486 |
...read along with Fur Elise |
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WhileIWasGone Member
since 2002-07-18
Posts 486 |
As I look at a mere sketch ... |
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BluesSerenade Member Patricius
since 2001-10-23
Posts 10549By the Seaside |
Thank goodness for slave drivers, and the likes of Susie~ wranx, this left me tumbling and fumbling over the right words to tell you what it means to read you. Your introspection is like none other~ It's almost spring now, and after reading this, my wish is that it will bloom for you in living color, always~ |
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Rdz9 Member
since 2003-03-16
Posts 142MT, USA |
Amazin.... Nice write. -Rdz One in a sea of millions has the power to change the world... |
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serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
I knew this had strong metaphysical properties, but yikes, the likes of LAZARUS? wow. I'm underwhelmed. (Btw? Once this is printed up proper, you know I need a copy. Thank you suze, too, for being such an obviously loving muse to m'yeti.) |
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Susan Caldwell Member Rara Avis
since 2002-12-27
Posts 8348Florida |
Uh...yes, what everyone else said... I am at a loss for words But I am saving. |
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iliana Member Patricius
since 2003-12-05
Posts 13434USA |
Too good to not expose to others a second time! |
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Sadelite Member Elite
since 2003-10-11
Posts 2519 |
I'm such a novice at reading and writing that I can't claim to know one hundredth of the beauty and depth that's written within your words. However, the richness of language kept me reading and visualizing, amazed at dazzling continuim throughout. (I'm not a very enthusiastic reader-somewhere I lost the boat earlier between college, work, and family. This makes me want to read and read and never stop.) As someone said earlier, it is indeed a privilege walk the blue pages with you. Thank you for all the dedication that went into this. ~Sadelite~ |
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