Calliope Rising
Now don’t read me wrong.
For Mnemosyne’s gift I will
make grateful poems, always.
With that, here’s to these old songs
of wet mud and nail. Sunlight
through clear stone, ray’s
castings reverently traced and copied.
Sharpened bone’s patient etch
over and over into hard stone.
Coal and root crushed and laid
on wood, skin and walls throughout
this long drive of language.
The hunt to fill our desire that
we remember ourselves with tools.
However, there is an older script.
Heat wrinkles twist the sky, dance
in air then are erased and left.
Lost in the cracked jaws of the past.
I saw that first calligraphy above
slow swirls of smooth lava. Again
here rising from hard clay, another.
Now it’s too hot to split wood.
Trilliums bow their heavy seed
heads in prayer. I see that clean
familiar writing through a shimmer.
My old dear friend shifts, lifts
turns and points straight at me.
Smile intact singing his new name.
I know that finally – yes – this is home.
10 thoughts on "Calliope Rising"
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From first line to last
this lyric shows how
to make a versed home
This is a beautiful and finely-tuned poem. There are many gorgeous lines. Such as: “Sharpened bone’s patient etch” and “calligraphy above slow swirls of smooth lava.”
heat wrinkles twist the sky. great work.
Absolutely gorgeous. You are ON FIRE!
The first half of “wet mud and nail” leads us from memory into some hot birth of air and into the sky. A flight from “this long drive of language” back to its homeplace. What a reverent journey!
This “leads us from memory into some hot birth of air and into the sky”
Yes ! Thank you 😀
Another name for trillium is birthroot.
love the shift at the older script that leads home. Beautiful
Beautiful, lyric, gorgeous — just wow.
Oooh, I want to reread this one repeatedly to catch some new beautiful thing each time. “The cracked jaws of the past”!
Sharpened bone’s patient etch
over and over into hard stone.
this long drive of language.
Trilliums bow their heavy seed
heads in prayer. I see that clean
familiar writing through a shimmer.
My favorite lines out of your lovely poem. WOW.