At the Stag Tree

 

At the Stag Tree

I am the antlered one.
I raise living bones
as taproots into the sky
to draw down the strength of heaven.

I am sure-footed, potent,
a warrior in love,
with power to read the land,
to see behind me and around me.

I grow my own crown, royal,
magnificent, and have the wisdom
to give up its burden
when the year grows old.

I come here, to the hickory,
to rub out my royalty,
to drop the burden of my crown
and grow again, stronger than before.

September 15, 2018

- lines composed in an exercise to become Animal Speakers in my "Writing as a State of Conscious Dreaming" retreat in the green fairyland of northern Bohemia

Mosswood directions

Mosswood directions

Go to the core of the squeaky avocado

to know why the mermaid keeps tripping

down slimy steps on her fish tail.

Sort out the dad who can't smash a piñata

to help the lost child in the woods come home.

Don't listen to talking heads on any wave.

Join the makeover crew who get people ready

to party by the light of the Moon. 

Place your hands over prints of the ancestors
on the cave wall that yields to your pressure 

and lets you into a world behind the world

or releases into your world, through your touch,

beasts with wings, goddesses with hooves,

the obdurate seed of the soft green earth. 

Stand with the great stump that nurses new life
and say from your belly, “I grow back.”

Remember the spirits love you and will keep
changing their skins until you join their embrace.

- May 20, 2019

In my writing retreats we play a version of my Coincidence Card Game in which we swap stories and images as starter dough. giving each other permission to borrow and adapt whatever we want to play with. This little poem is a hybrid of images shared in the first round of the game in my current retreat at Mosswood Hollow.

Photo of Great Stump by RM

The Rhymer

The Rhymer

I rhyme the days
I assemble what resembles
I am speaker for the Speaking Land
I am the grammarian of epiphany
I am the syn in synchronicity
I am the quick jay that ruffles your hair
I am the fox who puts edge in your mind

I am the code in the tree bark
I find a world in a grain of sand
I make futures in a tea cup
I am the fall of the cards
I am doctor for your poetic health

You are never quite ready for me
I give a tilt to your world
and you feel reality stutter
between what is and what may be
Look for me whenever life rhymes
When the world gets personal
feel me with you, alive and in-person.

- Mosswood Hollow, November 17, 2013

From the Field of Dreams

I often ask members of my playshops and trainings to bring a creative offering to our final session, in any genre that they choose - a story, a poem, an artwork, a script for a playlet or script, a song or a dance. The only condition is that what is shared should come fresh from our adventures together.
    At the close of the five-day adventure I led at the Esalen Institute in Big Sur in November, Karen Muller gifted us with a wonderful poem evoking the experiences of the whole group, including the evening when we shared close encounters with Death. She has given me permission to share it here:

From The Field of Dreams
by Karen Muller

From the field of dreams to a treehouse built with Dad
From herding cats to spider woman's web
We explored other worlds and re-imagined this one.

Weaving our own webs and admiring one another's
We traveled from our humble village, flying
east of the sun and west of the moon
On the wings of a tiger to a beautiful distant star
Only to find it a cold, soulless land of robot people.
If only we can get to the great Oz, maybe he can help us
Because now we understand that
More answers than we imagined are back in Kansas.

Then came the great reckoning
We each carried Death on our left shoulders,
Then found ourselves at death's door
But Cerberus the three headed gatekeeper
Told us about our many errors and the need for reparations
None of us has even come close to using our talents.
Like Icarus, our wax wings melted and we fell into the sea.
We have more to do here in the valley of the shadow of death
Before we meet our rewards.

And now away we go, back from the worlds behind the world
Back to Kansas
Holding fast to the visions of what we need to be and do
We face a new day
Hoping that next time we meet Death
We can say that yes, we had more courage,
Repaired some damage, forgave
Accomplished more of what we came here to do.

Photo: My Esalen balcony by R.M.

Song of the mountain dreamers

On top of this sacred land
my heart sings a new song of remembrance.
White birches in the moonlit woods
hold me and seed me.

Fueled by the garnet fire of the mountain
born in the heart of Deer
protected by Bear
guided by White Wolf
sighted by Hawk and Raven
we lift the veil of the impossible

I see my fears skitter on the skin of the flame
and then fall through, consumed.
I discover my true name
I return to myself
I become the direction I wish to honor
My wishes ride to the sky on a cloud of tobacco.

I find meaning in a stranger’s dream
and let it become my own. We are both healed
and are strangers no more. We are family.
Among these dreamers: support, love, community.
We are wrapped in angels’ wings, protected and guided,
until we find our own wings. Together we fly.

A new family of souls comes together
a family stronger than blood.
Deeper weddings take place here
I lift the veil and kiss the beloved of my soul
I dance with those I love through life and death .
celebrating, mourning, admonishing, loving.

The mountain wind breathes animal spirits
through me, and Wolf Mother enters my heart.
I remember who I am.

In the closing session of our gathering of active dreamers on Gore Mountain last weekend, I asked members of the circle to contribute phrases evoking our shared adventures in healing and transformation, to be woven into a community poem. This is the first version of this group creation.

Grail Night

Knight, you came to this crossing before
bold and green, fired up for the quest,
and did not know that this was always the place:
this stony beach, the crabbers and fishing nets,
the wind-blown houses across the dark waters.
Now you have ridden your horse to the ground
your armor is rusted, your sword crosted with blood,
your hair bleached to bone. You can see now
that no adversary bested you except yourself;
you refused no battle, fled from no fight.
But in your war for the world you forgot
the world-behind-the-world you were fighting for.
You don't like what you see in the mirror of the water.

Plate by plate, iron by iron, chain by chain,
you cast off your armor. This is taking off your skin.
You are so raw a teasing zephyr tears your flesh.
You cling to your sword, but the waves rebuff you.
To make this crossing, you must lay down your arms.
In unsteady hands, you raise the great iron
and bury your pride and your rage in forgiving earth.

Salt eats your flesh. the swell buffets you,
tosses you, hurls you down into stinging sand.
When you come up gasping, black birds batter you
and you know that furies you aroused have found you.
Is it death you have come to meet at this water gate?
You swirl into blackness. When the swirling stops
you are flat on the far shore, looking up at her lovely face.
"I called you in dreams," she reminds you
with only the edge of reproach. "But year after year
you would not listen. And still, you are here."

In a cathedral room, open to the heavens,
you are washed with light. You remember the quest.
Can the Grail be here? You range through the house
seeking, only to return to the great sky-lit space.
She says, "Be still, and open. Stand like a tree,
open like a flower, like a chalice, at your crown."
You remember the crown you once wore
and you let that go, and open. "Drink the light."
You drink deep, and something opens deeper in you
in the cavity of the heart, a cup is filing with light.
Light streams from the heart, pure waterfall, and you know
you have found the Grail, in the one place it can be found.

- Mosswood Hollow, July 15, 2011

Graphic: Sangreal by Arthur Rackham (1917)

Night poems

I

You see a flash of blue in the air at midnight,
that blue, the blue of a kingfisher's wings,
and you take flight from the seen to the unseen.
Poor strategy: the unseen is my home.
You hide from me where I live.















II

When you thought the fire was out
flame leaps from the heart of the wood
so strong you're surprised it is safely contained
in what you expected to be a cold hearth.
There is no smoke detector to warn you
if it were burning out of control.
Know this: tended or untended, the fire lives.
It will consume you. As fire lives in wood
I live in you.