sat upon the rocky ledge
of a craggy cliff
high above the eternal sea.
The Sea said,
"Those who touch my body
whether cruel or tenderly,
will lose their breath--
lose themselves--
and become a part of me."
Tarot Girl demanded of Manx Man,
to tell her his purpose
hidden behind his questions
set, like faith, before her deck of cards.
The Cards said,
"Those who see my faces
will need a thousand eyes,
a single mouth--
a single heart--
and many flames to make a fire."
Tarot Girl and Manx Man
sat upon the rocky ledge
of a craggy cliff
in the face of a howling wind.
The Wind said,
"Let he who has no tale
kiss her who tells them well;
then throw two birds
into my keeping,
and name one Heaven, the other, Hell."
_____
for dverse poetics--fairy tales
A gorgeous fable with many levels of interpretation left open for imagination to run free and reflect beneath a tree. Wonderfully imaginitive. I enjoyed the way you interspersed the local and the global, the individual and the universal.
ReplyDeleteFabulous, Shay. Makes me want to go play with my Tarot cards. Tee-hee....xoxo
ReplyDeleteFirst, I didn;t think *anyone* remembered Tim Buckley except me--and that song time traveled me years away. I did that first, because the poem is harder to talk about, being the bone-cutting thing it is. Every metaphor in here is double-backed and leads deeper into the self, the inner sea, the cliffs we've wrecked on, the runes we've cast but can't read, and the final, sneakily rhymed lines in the end stanza tie the knot that both can strangle, and force out the sharpest, rightest pair of scissors. (High on life, I must be.)I hope that place you're in has another straitjacket somewhere.
ReplyDeletethe secret of said universe is only to toss one bird in the wind and let it represent both, that was you still have one for dinner...cause a bird in hand is better than 2 in the wind...
ReplyDeleteLet he who has no tale
ReplyDeletekiss her who tells them well...
For me, these are the crucial lines of the poem, and you are certainly a girl who knows how to spin a tale: I was there on the rocks, feeling the spray of the sea.
nice..love the cliff scene especially..and oh that heaven and hell game already starts when he kisses her first...and hope...he did...
ReplyDeleteLove the wind, the craggy cliffs, the tale. Especially enjoyed the final stanza. But, I cant for the life of me figure out what the image is. Please advise:)
ReplyDeleteI love the second stanza! It holds several meaning for me, although perhaps not the one you intended.
ReplyDeleteSherry, the image is a bird!! you know throw the bird...the bird is watching your choices
ReplyDeleteonce upon a polar bear
Oh, NOW I see it is a crow!
ReplyDelete"Let he who has no tale
ReplyDeletekiss her who tells them well;"
That is the awesome!
Solid work! Loved the refrain that tied this thing together, keeping it grounded. This thing screams out to be read!
ReplyDeleteThe Sea said,
ReplyDelete"Those who touch my body
whether cruel or tenderly,
will lose their breath--
lose themselves--
and become a part of me."
OMFG!!! this entire tale gave me chills as i read it {because it is so frigging awesome and amazing and stunning and enchanted me NO end!} ~ exquisitely spun as only you can do, SP! but the verse about the sea struck me the most and did literally take my breath away, Shay!
{damn! give you a day off and you surpass even yourself!}
♥
Yeah, like Hedge said, it's bone-cutting, but young lovers who romance on a cliff over the wind-whipped sea are gonna fall over the edge more than half the times. Rebooting fairy tales with a 21st century heart is necessarily bloody business, though the end is still the same. Your story reminds me of one I posted long ago (to no comment) titled "The Children of Water" -- a hetero tale but it works in any combination of two -- http://blueoran.wordpress.com/2011/01/26/the-children-of-water/
ReplyDeleteI'll shuffle if you deal
ReplyDeleteYou had me at the names Tarot Girl and Manx Man, Shay!
ReplyDelete