Write from the place that is raw
from the night when you lost your skin.
Write of the time in the war-torn city
when your heart was a quivering bird in your palm
and the blood pool kept filling, and you knew
no doctor could heal this wound
though the world would end if you failed
to keep the wounded lover alive for three days more.
Write from the night you wished yourself dead
and spirit flew from your heart, winged by your desire,
down to the lightless lands of the dead
that no one escapes without help.
Write from the day when, incredibly,
there was enough of you topside
to bribe the ferryman with the ribcage boat
and carry home the part of you that married Death.
and spirit flew from your heart, winged by your desire,
down to the lightless lands of the dead
that no one escapes without help.
Write from the day when, incredibly,
there was enough of you topside
to bribe the ferryman with the ribcage boat
and carry home the part of you that married Death.
Remember the promises you made her:
"You'll never be hurt again." "Every day you'll make poetry."
Write from the night you could not keep those promises
and had to hold the young lover in you by force,
rough as a jailer's armlock, soft as lambskin,
when she thought the one you were losing now
was the one she lost before. And when your heart
breaks again, hold her fast, willing a greater power
to embrace and join you, and write from that.
Dip your pen in the blood pool. This is the time for red ink.
Comments on my recent post "Ready to Paint it Red" lead me to re-post this poem, written in 2011 and included in my collection Here, Everything is Dreaming.
"Deer Sacrifice" (c) Robert Moss
25 comments:
Magnificent! Beautiful! This morning as I open the door, indeed my heart is a quivering bird in my hands. And I am reminded of a sparrow that only last week gave its life's blood to strongly remind me that it is essential to fly above the obstacles. So I raise my hands and my heart spreads her wings to fly higher. Still, my heart needs support from the one beyond all names and those blessed emmisaries who will come to our assistance. In three more days I'll know if some of us have been successful in keeping a particular lifegiving pathway open.
I am grateful for your passionate poetry.
Thank you so much for these stirring words and a powerful weekend, Robert - words to live by, and write from... Greater powers must have conspired to drive the message home, quite literally, when on the way back from Mercy centre we found ourselves startled by a dead deer on the highway, abruptly interrupting my account of a dream at the precise moment when I had unexpectedly found myself in the body of a surgeon rushing through hospital hallways, about to perform open heart surgery.
Gorgeous, and meaningful to me personally. Thanks so much. Diane
Carol - Blessings on your journey. May that Moreness you invoke so beautifully attend and support you on your path of heart.
Savannah - A deer killed on the road always touches my heart, and the synchronicity here is striking. If it were my dream, after all we shared of soul in the training, I would accept that I am being called to practice as a healer for the heart.
Thank you, Diane. Bright blessings for your path.
It's startling to see all these postings from the future! Your post times are at 8:30 or 9:00, and my clock says 8:25! Robert, I am teaching creative nonfiction at the local college this summer, and today's opening write will be fired by a reading of your poem. I better by god see some student pens dipped in red ink!
Sandy - I would love to think that my posts are coming to you from your future. But isn't it possible that my posts are stamped in my East Coast time zone rather than yours? Of course they are also stamped in the Dreamtime, and the time is always Now.
Let us know what happens if you get your students to dip their pens in the pool of the heartblood.
Wondrous words again Robert (and hello to my fellow dreamers commenting...) Happy Lughnassadh to all! When are you going to harvest these for that poetry book?
Justin - Plans are afoot for a first collection of my poems. Thanks for asking.
Hello Robert
Wow this poem has so many one liners that speak to me right now. Sometimes the lines of your poems are as riveting as the mighty "dream fragment" to me.
In Norway I met a woman and her son that I have known for more then 25 years. I have never seen her cry until I asked," so how are you doing with all of this". She kept apologizing for crying and I was thankful to share openly my sadness with her. Norway is my backyard. My child plays strong there, along with a few super woman
characters. Those super woman characters were in a state of shock at all the senseless killing. I had a night of intense dreaming when I was there and was glad to be there. I feel changed from this and even more charged into a challenge of bringing active dream work to my families. I am filled with stories and I suppose that's why I want to be a writer. I suppose my definition of "being a writer" it's about being able to express myself to where I offer that aha shared experience with another human being. I think I am a person driven by challenges and beauty. And life is so beautiful to me. And death holds life's hand.
Patty
A work in progress!
Patty - We are all "works in progress" when not simply "pieces of work" :-) You seem to have gone very deep in your journey to ancestral territory in Norway. Perhaps you will write from that.
Nina - From the blood pool to a path of rose petals sounds like a beautiful itinerary.
love love love the poem. love your blog, robert. namaste!
Thank you, Susan. Bright blessings.
Thank you for the poem. And thanks to all for the comments. And I thank you from my deepest heart for the image - one that feels so personal. One I will treasure. Hope to see some of your personal art work along side of your beautiful poems in your new book of poetry.
Thanks, Irene. I am planning a poetry collection that will include some of my drawings.
Glad I chanced upon your blog Robert!
Love that poem! - and am glad to say that the Healer in me has no choice but write from that RAW place. . .always. . .also.
I'm a RAW blogger and if its OK, I would like to share my most RAW poem which practicaly wrote itself after I found out 'how' Hypatia of Alexandria was murdered.
*
I'm ancient, yet ageless / Source of Life itself / Worshipped under many aspects / Known by many names / A single embodiment of / All goddesses and gods. / As Wrathful Protectress / Like long submerged volcanic fires / Under the Sea. . ./ I, the everlasting Woman erupted / Riding the wave's crest / Enveloped in flames / Vowing to solemly guard the / Evolutionary Current / With a CRY / "I reject the notion that only the male is capable of Divine Revelation!"
Helen (Theofilia)
Hello and Thank You Robert,
I have a guide who comes to me as a buck with large antlers, wings, and a human-like face. Last night he stood next to my bed and I felt his gentleness in the center of my chest. Later I dreamt that I had written the table of contents and the first chapter of a book all in red ink. Then, just now, I found your post. Robert, I'm not sure what any of this means or if I should even look for meaning, but all of it fills me with gladness:-)
Thank you for your life's work. I am going to post this where I write, in the hope that it will be a beacon to beckon me onward and upward.
I was so disappointed that I had to cancel at the last minute the dream workshop in Rye - I hope you come back to this area!
All the best,
Janine
Oh, Robert! I read this after filling a new pen with red ink...!
Thank you,Robert, for being who you are and for the precious messages you bring to humanity!
This poem describes so accurately my life now.It was exactly what I needed to read.
Be blessed! I love you!
Poems from my dreams:
March 1981
Swinging on the chandelier,
The view is perfectly clear.
Screams in the dark.
Hark, I hear a lark.
They strip me of my shell
Skinned alive, I enter hell.
My life pours out in a flood,
Making pools of coagulating blood.
Help me! Help me! I'm stuck,
And shall soon drown, with my luck.
I'm stark raving mad -- My God, sheer terror!
Oh please, please -- I think there's been an error.
March 20, 2000
In a sea so darkly red, souls going down for the last time
Cut on the glittering jagged edges of broken dreams sublime
Nothing to mark their passage and long descent into Hell
But seven bloody hand prints remaining on the wooden shell
The boat still rides the sea in the dawn of early morn
Waiting for the soul whose dreams remain new born
Dreams birthed on hell and pain
Unmasking Heaven once again
11/17/00
RESURRECTION
Great teardrops flowing down the windows
Where they have fallen as the wind blows
Cold, stark, jagged reflections of my pain
Bleed to death, spread asunder by the rain
Each a fragment of a once shining world
Before the sword into my heart was hurled
With a roar of thunder and flash of light
Truth is revealed setting my soul afright
Upon the hilt, no other hand than mine
Afraid to surrender, I crossed the line
Foolish mortal, I have taken my life
And now only I can remove the knife
Had I not doubted you, you would not me
So now I turn my face for you to see
My mask lies tossed upon the muddy ground
The resurrection comes without a sound
Ribbons of Light between your heart and mine
Breathing in life as they shimmer and shine
Within the mists of love a rainbow lies
The shining world reflected in your eyes.
September 6, 2014
It’s here again
The dark wave
I hear the thunder as it comes
Sweeping my feet from under me
Tossing me about with abandon
Drawing me down to an airless space
Suffocating me
Pounding me into the sand and rocks
Bruising and cutting me
The salty water searing my wounds
I am cast upon an insidious edge
Between reality and illusion
Gasping in pain and despair
Terror begins to build
Robbing me of all reason
The undertow grows ever stronger
Straining to loosen my grip
On whatever shred of reality still remains
The roar grows louder
As darkness forces out the light
Insisting on my surrender
To the sadness and loneliness
Of the void in which it seeks
To imprison me
Right now my heart is bleeding profusely and I'm not sure how to stop it.
My poem speaks of my experience - that raw emotion, even of terrible pain or grief or heartbreak, can be harnessed and used for new creation. Some of my best work has been born in this way.
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