God’s Breath of Life…

Vicarious Poet – Heather Mirassou

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This poem is dedicated to a Vermont Poet;

I dedicate this poem to him because  I know he  understands my desire to write poetry – “it is as essential as breathing to me…”

His feedback has given me courage and inspiration to break boundaries and push the envelope to be successful. He is astonishingly humble, honest and compassionate in his assessment of my poetry.

He has helped reinforce the quality of my poetry and inspired me to grow as an aspiring writer and work towards publishing my work in the “literary community.”

Please stop by his website; http://poemshape.wordpress.com.

Be prepared to be tantalized, surprised and amazed by his natural talent as a writer especially as a Literary Genius in Poetry. His poetry and commentary absolutely resonates and is undeniably unforgettable…it is also romantic and witty!

Your voice

A golden spoon

Laden with honey

Dripping languidly

Your tone

A wounded sparrow

Searching for safety

In a bed of soft feathers

Your words

Paint vivid images

With indelible ink

With shades of blue

Your feelings

Naked, pure and free

Pull heart strings

Effortlessly

Heather Mirassou

Mesmerize Me- Heather Mirassou

Your voice, like a river rippling,

waves of goose bumps,

awaken my inner spirit, fill me with delight.

Your gaze, magnetic, blue, moonlight bright,

clear as the evening night,

gently captures my inner light.

Your heart, speaks softly, soulfully,

whispering faithfully, sometimes silently,

but never in spite.

Your touch, captivating, tranquil, slight,

caressing me slowly,

surrounding me with all of your might.

Your smile, brilliant, bright,

tantalizing like a steamy, summer night,

summoning me gently to be your wife.

Heather Mirassou

Afraid of Losing You – Heather Mirassou

FEAR OF LOSING YOU

No longer affectionate, attentive, thoughtful eyes;
instead, an expressionless, invisible, blank stare.

No longer strolling hand-in-hand, carelessly;
instead, walking moonbeams apart, drifting like clouds.

No longer drowning in passionate, lingering kisses;
instead, an obligatory, awkward, fleeting peck.

No longer two hearts bow-tied with strings;
instead, reclusive, lonely hearts, in a noose.

No longer dreaming of a lifetime together;
instead, an uncertain, somber, painful future.

No longer a confident, loving wife;
instead, a heartsick, lonely, aging woman,

Desperately afraid of losing you.

Heather Mirassou

Making Love to a Marlboro – Heather Mirassou

Nearly naked except

A dangling Marlboro cigarette

Expertly stroking his lover

Fingers caress a slender body

Methodically engulfing aroma

The sweet smell of sex

Swollen lips surround

Waves of rapture quiver

Eyelashes and eyeballs flutter

Sinking into oblivion

Head bobbing like a pendulum

Savoring his lust

Inhaling smoke languidly

Sucking every toxin

Heather Mirassou

Monsters – Heather Mirassou

Monsters

I am irrevocably stricken with the lingering raw details of the horrific murders of a mother and her young children that occurred in Oregon in 2001. I have just finished reading an article written by Michael Finkle, formally of the New York Times, “How I convinced a Death-Row Murderer Not to Die.” This Feature article was printed in the December issue of Esquire.  I am visibly shaking and nauseous, tears flooding my cheeks, images of the murders flashing before my eyes.

I am sparing you the extremely gruesome details of this tragic murder that were included in the original article in Esquire. I will only include what I assume a responsible, respectful and compassionate writer and publisher would print for the whole world to read.

Christian Longo strangled his wife, Mary Jane to death while making love to her. He then strangled his two-year-old daughter, Madison, in her sleep. He stuffed their bodies in suitcases and tossed them into an Oregon Bay. He returned home to put his two remaining children ages three and four, Sadie and Zachary securely in their “Kidivan”. He drove them to a nearby bridge where he tied rock-laden socks to their legs and tossed them into chilling water where they drowned to death.

As Longo searches his memory; he describes many of the events with the use of his five senses and his thoughts and feelings as he murderers each family member. He speaks of his reluctance to ask for help and how he did not want to be seen as a failure.  He instead chose to leave “no witnesses of his failure.” As he speaks of the murders of his family and there is not one tear shed or echoes of remorse.

I will forever possess intimate knowledge surrounding the murder of Mary Jane, Sadie, Madison and Zachary Longo. The details were published with no regard to the reader’s age, mental stability or heart condition. I am stunned by the content of this article and how it has affected me; I feel robbed of the little bit of innocence that had existed in the piney area of my soul and emotionally scarred by its contents.

There was no warning or foreword implicating the atrocities or the depth of the details of the murders. I think Esquire and Finkle should have considered whether these details would be too sensitive for the general public. A Reader warning similar to this would have been appropriate:

WARNING: Sordid, horrific details of the murders of Mary Jane Longo and her young children, Sadie, Madison and Zachary are part of this article. Some of these details may be offensive to the reader or inappropriate for anyone under the age of eighteen.

By focusing on the atrocities inflicted on victims by “deranged” offenders, the public may be captivated by the criminals and their crimes. All murders not only destroy the life of the victim, they also destroy the lives of all those who loved that person.  This story further injures the reader by focusing on Longo’s daily living conditions on death-row, his mission while still alive and the writer’s seven year relationship with the murderer.

I wonder if Finkle who bargained with the devil for seven years, sleeps at night without invading nightmares. I used to have hope, that most of mankind was innately good and moral; with this story reverberating in my head, I wonder how many will remain unchanged by this story.

If after reading this essay, you are driven to read “How I convinced a Death-Row Murderer Not to Die”, I recommend extreme caution. I hope you will skip the article and hug your wife, husband, mother, father and children instead.

Heather Mirassou

Oakdale, California

An Aspiring Writer

Your Hands, My Hands – Heather Mirassou

I have waited patiently for this blank, white, piece of paper to fill with words; I eagerly search for ideas and inspiration to write a new poem or story, unlocking the wall of writer’s block that is shut tight in my heart.

The clickity-clack, thump, tap, thump, thump, tap, tap, is the beautiful music my fingertips make when I tap-dance across the keyboard and words soar, like a bald Eagle flying in mid-air. I glance down at my hands and realize I have neglected this part of my body for some time. My fingernails are splattered with old paint and are uneven and jagged. My hands are a shade of rosy pink and have permanent calluses between my two favorite writing fingers. They are dry and slightly rough to touch. They smell like fresh cut garlic and have tiny remnants of dirt under the nail bed. Even with their imperfect shape and wayward condition, they are strong and remain faithful to me. Hands are like fingerprints; a unique, distinctive, incomparable, immortal, identification mark.

My fascination with hands began as I earnestly hung on to my mother’s vivid words, as she described the beauty and essence of hands. She revels in all shapes, colors, sizes, texture, fine lines and spirals of soft hair. She instinctively knows a person by studying their hands, listening carefully for the story they tell. Hands reveal hard work, happiness, sorrow, age, compassion, love, and hardship. She is especially fond of men’s hands; large, long, lean, tan, neatly manicured, graceful and strong. I have the same keen awareness and affection for hands. I too am captivated by their unusual shapes, imperfect lines, dimples, freckles, age spots, and the mountains and valleys of each crook and cranny.

I took the photograph at the exact moment my little sister was born, the clock on the wall reads, 9:52 a.m., on July 20, 1989. The photo zooms in on my father’s exquisitely beautiful hands; long and supple, sun kissed and perfectly manicured. His fingers are strong and solid with soft, wavy, silver wisps of hair. His hands freshly scrubbed, his nails are shaped like a transparent crescent moon. He reaches for his newborn daughter and she instinctively wraps both her tiny, pink fingers around his round thumb. Her pearly white nails cling to safety in this new, unfamiliar world. He smiles from ear to ear and lifts his lovely little girl and places her gently into her mother’s welcoming hands.

The vineyards are alluring and magical; towering green leaf canopies shade the ripening grapes from the steaming sun, a purple rainbow quickly evaporates into the vast blue sky. There is an echo of Mariachi music and the rattling of leaves, reverberating back and forth of the shaking vine. I can see people wagging their arms and tongues in an unknown dialect. Beautiful brown sugar hands with fast, fluttering, fingers cut precisely the bunch of fruit from the vine. Some of their blackened fingers are laced with soggy spider-webs, fresh knife cuts and tiny scars from old, healed wounds. Their strong and tender hands wrought with pain, bear the harsh torture of the summer sun and repetitive motion until harvest is complete.

I learned to harvest grapes at a very young age; tiny, fresh knife cuts on my fingers are evidence of my inexperience. The juice from the grapes runs down my hands like a river, I let out a scream, barely audible, my cuts sting like snake venom. I lick furiously to keep the juice from entering my wounds; the juice tastes better than berry pie or grape jelly. I am stunned by the pain for only a moment and I resume picking grapes. As the sweet smell of grape juice surrounds us; the bees swarm around our heads, I swat the bees swiftly and with a vengeance, protecting my load of grapes.

Running playfully and carelessly through the winery grounds with my brothers, we stop short at the shout of our names. Our winemaker Max, spews warnings with a thick German accent, to young ears, he speaks in riddles.The boy’s backs against the cold cellar wall, with bewildering eyes we gawk; Max cautiously drives the fork-lift into our path, the fork pointing towards us. He lets out a rough grunt, his chubby hands stained purple and worn out leather, pull at my brother’s ears and yank. He paints the safe boundaries with the wave of his hands and tells us if we go out of bounds we could get run-over by the grape hauling trucks. Although he looks like an old ogre or the purple giant, we listen, obey and escape, skipping on our way.

Each year my grandfather would ring in the holidays with a toast of gratitude for each new bountiful harvest. His large, handsome and debonair hands cradled a wine glass like a newborn baby. His heartfelt toast was met with a myriad of colorful, animated hands, large and small. These were the hands that spanned seven generations of his family.In the early afternoons, my grandfather would toil his garden bare-chested, wearing a bikini and barefoot. His hands heavily weathered, wrinkled and cancerous were covered in brown stains and lightly covered in minute pieces of dust from the earth. He would generously gather flowers for his wife with his aging, agile, loving hands.

My uncle had white, chubby hands, laced with red freckles the color of his Irish mother’s hair. His fingers were almost naked except for the short, stocky, white hairs that played peek-a-boo in their lair.I was often entranced by his love affair with an unlit Marlboro Cigarette. His stubby fingers rolled the cigarette up and down between his fingers, caressing the full length of his cigarette, stroking it as if it were his lover’s body. He began to make imaginary love to his cigarette; He raises the stick to his nose, sniffing the tobacco slowly and methodically, savoring his last goodbye. His eyelashes flutter closed, his eyeballs sinking into oblivion, as he moves his curly red head back and forth like a pendulum. He inhales invisible smoke, as slow as an ice glacier, sucking every last toxin, laced leaf.

My mother’s hands are always busy; with the cloak of a writing pen, planting and replanting her garden, crocheting scarves or blankets and creating beautiful needle-point canvases. She cleverly waves her hands in deliberate motions, emphasizing her feelings and speaking with her hands like Helen Keller. Her hands are classic, creamy white, tanned in the summer, splashed with light, brown freckles intertwined with light blond hair. Her fingers are lean with a hint of aging of fine lines of wrinkles. Her fingernails are most often speckled with dirt, sometimes they are bitten to the quick but usually she painstakingly lets them grow, just long enough to apply polish and make them neat and tidy.Her nails look like a tiny window in the country, with bright, white blinds. Even though her hands are small and dainty, they are strong and built to withstand any emergency.

My oldest brother’s hands were always covered with the remnants of his latest genius in mechanics or the result of an experiment gone badly. His hands creamy brown with wisps of blond hair and nails caked with black oil. His fingers have long, deep puffy scars from an accidental explosion; a combination of champagne glass and dry ice tossed into the air causing glass to rain down from the sky, penetrating his fingers and hands with thousands of tiny shards of glass and some of them hitting his main artery. His long, lanky pinky is as crooked as the “yellow brick road” the result of another childhood accident; he spun a full chlorine dispenser in the pool as fast as he could, it gained speed in the water and spun out of control, jumping and snapping his finger, breaking the bone clean.

My youngest brother’s hands are creamy white with a splash of light pink color and rounded. They are of average size, meticulously clean and nails cut to the perfect length. His fingernails are shaped like spring tulips, rising to the sun and are slightly transparent. His fingers have tiny, white, stubby hair that stands at attention and ready to travel. His knuckles are covered with thick, wide, high wrinkle lines, like freshly made snow moguls. On occasion his hands have blisters and calluses from working on his vehicles or fixing and maintaining his home. His hands are respectful and kind and are always willing to lend a helping hand. His hands are a perfect complement to an unfamiliar handshake and easily make someone feel at home.

From the onset, I was attracted to my husband’s hands, they looked an injured soldier returning from war. Two of his right-hand fingers are crooked with scarring white lines running down the center, where his fingers were accidently cut-off and sewed back together. His hands are milky white, his fingers long and skinny like a concert pianist.He is a seasoned electrician and quickly and nimbly puts his wires in place, his fingernails just long enough to help him manipulate the metal electrodes. His fingers twist, yank and screw nuts, bolts and tools with expert dexterity. His hands are kind, gentle and humble; his gloriously long fingertips trace an image on my aging body, his hands hug me tightly and tell me that he loves me and I am safe in his hands.

Each of us has just been handed a gorgeous hunter green, velvet case with a solid gold pen enclosed. My heart is racing, I am having misgivings and want to raise my hands in the air like a red and white race flag and STOP this now! I see my father’s beautiful hands holding the golden pen while he prepares himself to sign on the dotted line, it is standing upright and ready to roll. I sit beside him, holding my hands tightly in a ball, holding my breath, hoping and praying that he sets down the pen and walks away from the table. I see his eyebrows arch and fleeting pain set in his eyes; while he steals a moment from his memories. I notice his pen is upright again; I imagine blood, sweat and tears dripping from his fingertips as he tightens with furor. His right hand shakes and trembles, an invisible moment; he adjusts his aging shoulders and holds his head, high and confidently handwrites his full name, plus middle initial, in indelible ink on the dotted line.

My father’s beautiful, safe, reassuring hands push the stack of papers in front of me; he smiles as if to encourage me; I linger as I secretly bury my precious memories in a locked vault deep in my heart for no one else to see, I hide the key. I handwrite my full name, plus middle initial, in indelible ink on the dotted line. The air was heavy and I am weak and trembling; we had completed our side of the deal. With eyes upon us, we rose on our own two feet and gather enough courage and strength to shake all the respected hands of the other family members who had given us the golden pens.

Shortly thereafter I visited a tattoo artist whose hands held a loud buzzing, machine with color, where he too writes with indelible ink.This is my first time; I’m nervous with sweaty hands but determined to take the black indelible ink back that I signed away, on the dotted line that day. The tattoo artist has copied a bunch of grapes and my signature perfectly. With a mirror he holds his beautiful art, tattooed across the upper side of my right buttock, where it will never be removed or signed away again.

I am a little like a palm reader; but I do not read their future instead I judge a book by its cover. I love hands of any shape and size, color and texture, young or old, man, woman or child. Hands are gentle, loving, compassionate and kind. Hands hold us and heal us when we are sick or in pain. Hands catch us when we fall and hold us when we are sad. Hands lift us up when we are down and push us when we need encouragement. Hands are honest and respectful, animated and colorful, strong and comfortable. Hands are worn, scarred, callused, weathered and blistered. Hands are beautiful in their entirety, a piece of history, a window pane revealing their journey of life and a piece of art adorned.

Sometimes People Come Into Your Life – Author Unknown

Sometimes people come into your life and you know
right away that they were meant to be there, to serve
some sort of purpose, teach you a lesson, or to help
you figure out who you are or who you want to become.

You never know who these people may be – a roommate, a
neighbor, a professor, a friend, a lover, or even a
complete stranger – but when you lock eyes with them,
you know at that very moment they will affect your
life in some profound way.

Sometimes things happen to you that may seem horrible,
painful, and unfair at first, but in reflection you
find that without overcoming those obstacles you would
have never realized your potential, strength,
willpower, or heart.

Illness, injury, love, lost moments of true greatness,
and sheer stupidity all occur to test the limits of
your soul. Without these small tests, whatever they
may be, life would be like a smoothly paved straight
flat road to nowhere. It would be safe and
comfortable, but dull and utterly pointless.

The people you meet who affect your life, and the
success and downfalls you experience, help to create
who you are and who you become. Even the bad
experiences can be learned from. In fact, they are
sometimes the most important ones.

If someone loves you, give love back to them in
whatever way you can, not only because they love you,
but because in a way, they are teaching you to love
and how to open your heart and eyes to things.

If someone hurts you, betrays you, or breaks your
heart, forgive them, for they have helped you learn
about trust and the importance of being cautious to
whom you open your heart.

Make every day count. Appreciate every moment and take
from those moments everything that you possibly can
for you may never be able to experience it again. Talk
to people that you have never talked to before, and
listen to what they have to say.

Let yourself fall in love, break free, and set your
sights high. Hold your head up because you have every
right to. Tell yourself you are a great individual and
believe in yourself, for if you don’t believe in
yourself, it will be hard for others to believe in
you.

You can make anything you wish of your life. Create
your own life and then go out and live it with
absolutely no regrets.

And if you love someone tell them, for you never know
what tomorrow may have in store.

Learn a lesson in life each day that you live! Today
is the tomorrow you were worried about yesterday. Was
it worth it?

author unknown

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• Sometimes People Come Into Your Life – Author Unknown (hmirassou.wordpress.com)

You Raise Me Up

The Definition of Love – Andrew Marvell

My Love is of a birth as rare
As ’tis for object strange and high:
It was begotten by Despair
Upon Impossibility.

Magnanimous Despair alone
Could show me so divine a thing,
Where feeble Hope could ne’er have flown
But vainly flapped its Tinsel wing.

And yet I quickly might arrive
Where my extended soul is fixt,
But Fate does iron wedges drive,
And always crowds itself betwixt.

For Fate with jealous eye does see
Two perfect Loves; nor lets them close:
Their union would her ruin be,
And her tyrannic power depose.

And therefore her decrees of steel
Us as the distant Poles have placed,
(Though Love’s whole World on us doth wheel)
Not by themselves to be embraced.

Unless the giddy Heaven fall,
And Earth some new convulsion tear;
And, us to join, the World should all
Be cramped into a planisphere.

As lines so Loves oblique may well
Themselves in every angle greet:
But ours so truly parallel,
Though infinite can never meet.

Therefore the Love which us doth bind,
But Fate so enviously debars,
Is the conjunction of the Mind,
And opposition of the Stars.

She Walks In Beauty – Lord Byron

She walks in beauty, like the night

Of cloudless climes and starry skies;

And all that’s best of dark and bright

Meet in her aspect and her eyes;

Thus mellowed to that tender light

Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,

Had half impaired the nameless grace

Which waves in every raven tress,

Or softly lightens o’er her face;

Where thoughts serenely sweet express,

How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

And on that cheek, and o’er that brow,

So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,

The smiles that win, the tints that glow,

But tell of days in goodness spent,

A mind at peace with all below,

A heart whose love is innocent!

 

Reflections from Around the World

Love’s Philosophy – Percy Bysshe Shelley

The fountains mingle with the river,
And the rivers with the ocean;
The winds of heaven mix forever
With a sweet emotion;
Nothing in the world is single;
All things by a law divine
In another’s being mingle–
Why not I with thine?

See, the mountains kiss high heaven,
And the waves clasp one another;
No sister flower could be forgiven
If it disdained its brother;
And the sunlight clasps the earth,
And the moonbeams kiss the sea;–
What are all these kissings worth,
If thou kiss not me?

Maya Angelou – Phenomenal Woman

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I’m telling lies.
I say,
It’s in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It’s the fire in my eyes,
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing in my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me.
They try so much
But they can’t touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them
They say they still can’t see.
I say,
It’s in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I’m a woman

Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

Now you understand
Just why my head’s not bowed.
I don’t shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It’s in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
the palm of my hand,
The need of my care,
‘Cause I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

How Do I love Thee? Let Me Count The Ways – Elizabeth Barrett Browning

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of every day’s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right;
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise,
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints -I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life! -and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.

Love To My Husband – Heather Mirassou

I am drawn to you like

The stars to the midnight skies

The Earth to the burning sun

Water to thirsting flowers

I am comfortable with you like

An old pair of boots

A faded pair of jeans

My favorite sweater and scarf

I am at peace with you like

Sitting in a boat in the middle of a lake

Taking a walk in silence in the country

Listening to rain drops fall in the dark of night

I am alive with you like

The laughter that is uncontrollable

The heart that goes thump, thump, thump

Running through wildflowers in the wilderness

Every ounce of my being

Mind, body and soul are riveted by you

I am alive with you, free with you, comfortable with you

I love you

The Invitation by Percy Bysshe Shelley

Best and brightest, come away,

Fairer far than this fair day,

Which, like thee, to those in sorrow

Comes to bid a sweet good-morrow

To the rough year just awake

In its cradle on the brake.

The brightest hour of unborn Spring

Through the Winter wandering,

Found, it seems, the halcyon morn

To hoar February born;

Bending from Heaven, in azure mirth,

It kissed the forehead of the earth,

And smiled upon the silent sea,

And bade the frozen streams be free,

And waked to music all their fountains,

And breathed upon the frozen mountains,

And like a prophetess of May

Strewed flowers upon the barren way,

Making the wintry world appear

Like one on whom thou smilest, dear.

Away, away, from men and towns,

To the wild wood and the downs -

To the silent wilderness

Where the soul need not repress

Its music, lest it should not find

An echo in another’s mind,

While the touch of Nature’s art

Harmonizes heart to heart.

Radiant Sister of the Day

Awake! arise! and come away!

To the wild woods and the plains,

To the pools where winter rains

Image all their roof of leaves,

Where the pine its garland weaves

Of sapless green, and ivy dun,

Round stems that never kiss the sun,

Where the lawns and pastures be

And the sandhills of the sea,

Where the melting hoar-frost wets

The daisy-star that never sets,

And wind-flowers and violets

Which yet join not scent to hue

Crown the pale year weak and new;

When the night is left behind

In the deep east, dim and blind,

And the blue noon is over us,

And the multitudinous

Billows murmur at our feet,

Where the earth and ocean meet,

And all things seem only one

In the universal Sun.

Breath In The Sky

I Kissed You Secretly – Heather Mirassou

Long after we met

Still standing in forever

Our kindred spirits released

Beyond our wildest desires

To find love alone together

For I found you there

In nights glow lights

Full of moon beams

Shed of inhibitions

With no one to see

I kissed you secretly

Under the naked tree

Webbed in shadows

Embraced yet still free

For I found you there

In the warmth of the eve

Without a summer breeze

To be dancing in the droplets

Of Nectar sweet as a honey bee

Subtle light and free

To fly with you in dreams

Relished natures fantasy

Will blush my heart

When our lips touch

For I found you there

Ode to a Woman Gardening – by Pablo Neruda

Yes, I knew that your hands were
a budding sprout, a lily
of silver:
you had something to do
with the soil,
with the flowering of the earth,
but when
I saw you digging, digging,
pushing pebbles apart
and guiding roots
I knew at once,
my farming woman,
that not only
your hands
but your heart
were of earth,
that there
you were
making
your things,
touching
moist
doorways
through which
the seeds circulate.

So in this way
from one plant
to the other
recently
planted one,
with your face
spotted
with a kiss
from the clay,
you went
and came back
flowering,
you went
and from your hand
the stem
of the astromeria
raised its solitary elegance,
the jasmine
adorned
the mist on your brow
with stars of dew and fragrance.

Everything
grew from you
penetrating
into the earth
and becoming
green light,
foliage and power
you communicated
your seeds to it,
my beloved,
red gardening woman:
your hand
on familiar terms
with the earth
and the bright growing
was instantaneous.
Love, thus also
your hand
of water,
your heart of earth,
gave fertility
and strength to my songs
you touch
my chest
while I sleep
and trees blossom
from my dreaming.
I wake up, open my eyes,
and you have
inside me
stars in the shadows
which will rise and shine
in my song.

That’s how it is, gardening woman:
our love is earthly:
your mouth is a plant of light, a corolla,
my heart works among the roots.

 

Mistress

Amorous kisses and tricks

Give way to a strangers desire

The willing mistress

awaits a man for her game

No love need be adorned

Only sinful seduction performed

She captivates and bewitches

Engulfed in her charms

No longer listless and calm

The truth of the immoral act

Haunts them with fear and shame

Their hearts drown as they quickly depart

Heather Mirassou

First Love – John Clare

I ne’er was struck before that hour
With love so sudden and so sweet,
Her face it bloomed like a sweet flower
And stole my heart away complete.
My face turned pale as deadly pale.
My legs refused to walk away,
And when she looked, what could I ail?
My life and all seemed turned to clay.

And then my blood rushed to my face
And took my eyesight quite away,
The trees and bushes round the place
Seemed midnight at noonday.
I could not see a single thing,
Words from my eyes did start –
They spoke as chords do from the string,
And blood burnt round my heart.

Are flowers the winter’s choice?
Is love’s bed always snow?
She seemed to hear my silent voice,
Not love’s appeals to know.
I never saw so sweet a face
As that I stood before.
My heart has left its dwelling-place
And can return no more

A Rose Within

A certain woman planted a rose

and watered it faithfully,

and before it blossomed,

she examined it.

She saw the bud that would soon

blossom and also the thorns.

And she thought,

“How can any beautiful flower

come from a plant burdened with

so many sharp thorns?”

Saddened by this thought,

she neglected to water the rose,

and before it was ready to

bloom, it died.

So it is with many people.

Within every soul there is a rose.

The God-like qualities planted in us

at birth grow amid the thorns of our faults.

Many of us look at ourselves and

see only the thorns, the defects.

We despair, thinking that nothing

good can possibly come from us.

We neglect to water the good within us,

and eventually it dies.

We never realize our potential.

Some people do not see

the rose within themselves;

someone else must show it to them.

One of the greatest gifts a person

can possess is to be able to

reach past the thorns

and find the rose within others.

This is the characteristic of love,

to look at a person, and knowing his faults,

recognize the nobility in his soul,

and help him realize that he can

overcome his faults.

If we show him the rose,

he will conquer the thorns.

Then will he blossom,

blooming forth thirty, sixty,

a hundred-fold as it is given to him.

Our duty in this world is to help others

by showing them their roses

and not their thorns.

Only then can we achieve

the love we should feel for each other;

only then can we bloom in our own garden.

Recognizing Her Own Beauty…

A Prayer For My Daughter – William Butler Yeats

Once more the storm is howling, and half hid
Under this cradle-hood and coverlid
My child sleeps on. There is no obstacle
But Gregory’s wood and one bare hill
Whereby the haystack- and roof-levelling wind,
Bred on the Atlantic, can be stayed;
And for an hour I have walked and prayed
Because of the great gloom that is in my mind.

I have walked and prayed for this young child an hour
And heard the sea-wind scream upon the tower,
And under the arches of the bridge, and scream
In the elms above the flooded stream;
Imagining in excited reverie
That the future years had come,
Dancing to a frenzied drum,
Out of the murderous innocence of the sea.

May she be granted beauty and yet not
Beauty to make a stranger’s eye distraught,
Or hers before a looking-glass, for such,
Being made beautiful overmuch,
Consider beauty a sufficient end,
Lose natural kindness and maybe
The heart-revealing intimacy
That chooses right, and never find a friend.

Helen being chosen found life flat and dull
And later had much trouble from a fool,
While that great Queen, that rose out of the spray,
Being fatherless could have her way
Yet chose a bandy-leggèd smith for man.
It’s certain that fine women eat
A crazy salad with their meat
Whereby the Horn of Plenty is undone.

In courtesy I’d have her chiefly learned;
Hearts are not had as a gift but hearts are earned
By those that are not entirely beautiful;
Yet many, that have played the fool
For beauty’s very self, has charm made wise,
And many a poor man that has roved,
Loved and thought himself beloved,
From a glad kindness cannot take his eyes.

May she become a flourishing hidden tree
That all her thoughts may like the linnet be,
And have no business but dispensing round
Their magnanimities of sound,
Nor but in merriment begin a chase,
Nor but in merriment a quarrel.
O may she live like some green laurel
Rooted in one dear perpetual place.

My mind, because the minds that I have loved,
The sort of beauty that I have approved,
Prosper but little, has dried up of late,
Yet knows that to be choked with hate
May well be of all evil chances chief.
If there’s no hatred in a mind
Assault and battery of the wind
Can never tear the linnet from the leaf.

An intellectual hatred is the worst,
So let her think opinions are accursed.
Have I not seen the loveliest woman born
Out of the mouth of Plenty’s horn,
Because of her opinionated mind
Barter that horn and every good
By quiet natures understood
For an old bellows full of angry wind?

Considering that, all hatred driven hence,
The soul recovers radical innocence
And learns at last that it is self-delighting,
Self-appeasing, self-affrighting,
And that its own sweet will is Heaven’s will;
She can, though every face should scowl
And every windy quarter howl
Or every bellows burst, be happy still.

And may her bridegroom bring her to a house
Where all’s accustomed, ceremonious;
For arrogance and hatred are the wares
Peddled in the thoroughfares.
How but in custom and in ceremony
Are innocence and beauty born?
Ceremony’s a name for the rich horn,
And custom for the spreading laurel tree.