Wind Dervishes

A rushing

like water falling

calls me.

I try to face,
and brace against
an animalistic air.

I follow leaves

like dervish dancers

leading flight

from trees

who let go

overnight

Oars

"There comes a time",
said the sage
to the drenched woman,
"to use your arms as oars."

"When the mother of all
storms surges its
crushing waves,
pounding and plowing
across the bow,
and tears through sails
as through your lungs,
and against your ribs
like spars,
it's time to reach
your arms as oars.

Your oars are
smooth and broad,
oak old and oak hard,
polished by oil,
smoothed by sweat,
and molded by toil.

They will guide the bow,
align the sheer,
override the surf,
undermine the tempests,
and hold
the old boat
afloat."

WEATHERING THE STORM

Wind pushes loose bodies around, and through them
we are space
Rain blankets down, running rivulets through
we are water
Waxing gibbous moon, one eye open in view
we are light





(funny how life changes make unseen storms in a potentially tranquil world)

Moonless shadows fall

on straight stone paths in stillness

beyond briared woods.

Rory hit the wall with a silence,
like the sound a skull drum shakes.
Rory felt like a clay pot
crumbled before it bakes,
in oven-hot hands that
burn til they ache.
Rory lost grip, felt as brittle sticks
snapping beneath tines of a rake,
without an ounce, an inch,
a peck, a pinch it might take
to understand how
an olive-pit breaks.

serendipity in a paradox #12

Change

Caught in

autumnal

incessant

hazey heat

reflections,

the first storm

urges

before it

a windforce-cold

sand-bit feel.

Dearest low 

barometric

dive

lifts me

from my seat.

See, there

blown

upon gusts

three turkey vultures

play with it's force,

bringing my eyes

winging

out of my head

so my heart

can watch the leaves

change.

making rope

We held each end, spread

five times the need apart, handles 

smooth and firm, twine doubly doubled

rat-tails, porcine bristled, porcupine fine.

Twisting, taught, tonal, tight,

you held firm, leaned against its pull,

I spun the handle, and wound it round,

tough, alive, coiled and stretched the spring.

Preconceived, at the cusp of curling,

a third hand becomes anchor, midway holding 

half of each snaking together, weaving one wound braid.

Capable of unraveling, we hold onto the knot.

(I have learned to make rope from twine. The process becomes magic in the hands of boys, with a t-shaped dowel and nail tool, spinning the twine tightly until it folds upon itself in a coiled rope. 

I am learning to keep a relationship from unraveling, like a rope maker, we need to tie up loose ends)

divining pool

Pool viewing:

smooth surfaced, obscuring depths,

images reflected, mixing into water,

fluid yielded, encompassing forms,

surface roiled, dispersing views,

for a cool drought,  quenching relief.

Three-quarter moon

The three-quarter moon turned away from me tonight,
her full lips set, jaw edged tight,
war-paint eyes turned to the right,
the three-quarter moon cut shadows with light.

The three-quarter moon
took away the stars,
took away the sea,
took away the clouds,
for a two-toned realm of fog
and isles,
above the horizon line,
hills underfoot,
one step
from the sky,
alabaster lit.

Indian Summer

Apple jelly, wood cutting,

pear pie, windows shutting.

Arms of grapevines growing mounds

arching greens upon the ground.

Buckeyes fruit, late and sallow,

leaves dropping first to fall.

Thick and prickly flesh rises

to night’s sightless icy breezes.

Sun hides, static, pallid

within a seamless, cloudless pall.

The Mother’s hills are

thinned and brown

where soles of summer

have worn her down.

Don’t, yet, give in to the cold.

Don’t, yet, let it take hold.

Put the woolen sweater back.

Rest sandaled feet in the Mother’s talc.

Open the window,

wrap in Her afgan,

draw heated breath

with every the pass of the fan.

Crickets still summon

honeysuckle's song

for Indian Summer

just 
around the corner. 


                         

Serendipity in a Paradox, cont.

Broken Glass

The pan shattered,
from oven to stovetop
who knew the burner was hot?
Rich chocolate creamy brownies
smelling acrid,
suddenly exploded
all over her
all over her feet
all over the kitchen
all into tears.
Shards of glinting needles
and burned cake
picked, wiped,
swept, hunted.

What a relief
for once,
something
tangible
to fix.

but if your heart flutters

But if only your heart became wings

transparently suspending the hummingbird,

but if only your heart became a moth

springing upon a chaotic meandering,

but if only your heart became eyelashes

tapping views into thoughts into view again,

but if only your heart became a leaf-

flag signaling autumn upon a twig,

but if only your heart became a candle flame

to strobe past visions of night,

but if only your heart became a bow

percussing trills to poetic strings,

but if only your heart became fingers

straining for increments of strength,

but if only your heart became a curtain

laced for the gazing wind,

but if your beat became only a flutter

we would hold it in our hands forever.

-for Robin, may your great heart beat strong.

DGG 8-24-11
photo: h.g. giese

guess again

Hitch a hike

lift with praise

pick a penny

reap a raise

what am I?

Point the finger

judge the sucker

name the owner

be the mother

what am I?

Flip this member

from a pocket

the longer the better

this bird will say f...orget-it.

what am I?

slip the band

onto the fourth one of the hand

but make the world understand

you aren't owned by any man

what am I?

the fifth is the grip

if too loose, it spills lids

if painful it will slip

or get hooked on a lip

what am I?

Shaking a fist

busting meat to the bone

cracking knuckles in a scrape?

...an open palm

can give

or own...

This is a photo of therapeutic silver rings, used to improve alignment and function and  prevent further deformity in fingers damaged by arthritis.  Look up: "Silver Ring Splints" online.

Serendipity in a paradox #11

Out of darkness          into light

Before the dawn,

the land is void

shifting between chasm

snd cliff face.

From undifferentiated darkness

a vaporlit film forms

in the vanishing points:

sourceless, pervasive.

Sensing massiveness

evolving: 

onyx edges

cut the firmament.

Moving into emerging

valleys, vales and voids:

envision indefinite shapes

into illuminated forms.

Hills metamorphosis

into volumes

to touch

and circumscribe.

The pearling vault

extrudes greens below

transposing

illusions of black.

Flushed-tinged

cheeky clouds

blush to barely touch

the unseen sun.

Facing the evanescent

blooming dawn

gives the most brilliant

gift of sight.

Another take on the theme, it is always darkest before the dawn. May you find Serendipity when it comes your way

Wordless Weds is my Tues Toes

I finally feels like summer here on the central coast of California, a noontime walk with a friend became a drenching sauna......Oh, and yeah, then there was the Green Man in the lawn....................

Serendipity in a paradox 10

Slight of Hands

Hands unpeeled by cancer scars

and wrought in knots, still knit wool scarves.

Healed too small, fingertips drop beam and ball,

but open the door, lift a child off the floor.

Puppet hand turns a toddler's bedlam

to Sherry Lewis's voice, transfixing lambs.

Nails are lengthened, painted, adorned,

until one's missed, then it's hardly ignored.

Her core radiates from her palm

to wick cold sweat like lavender balm.

His hands, broad as a pillow's spread,

can trace each hair upon a head.

Some injuries are losses, some are gifts. One door closes and another one opens.  I treat hands after injury or surgery at my work.  Until you can't use your hand, you don't realize what it does. A large proportion of your sensory brain and muscle control centers are dedicated to the hands and thumbs. Your hands have more bones than your back. Would you see a general orthopedic surgeon to operate on your back? No. But how many people go to a generalist when the hand is severely severed or broken?  The therapy following is equally complex, handled best by a Certified Hand Therapist with experience.

We learn to value what we have/had after it is taken away or damaged........
 May you recognize serendipity when it comes your way.

sunday 160, when the moon hits your eye

       Open the orbs, howl with the owl, hold the bones, pound the drone, oscillate outside upon onyx loam, observe halos, owe the original olden opal, honor the moon.

photo: H.G.Giese

( This is a poem in exactly 160 characters, spaces included. Try it yourself and post on Sunday.  Visit the host with the most 160 tales on his blog, Monkey Man, at  http://petzoldspracticalprose.blogspot.com/2011/08/sunday-160-wish-upon-star.html
and let us know about yours!)

Serendipity in a paradox # 9

Give me a full moon:


New moon, fresh sky, meteors flash to the naked eye.

Crescent sickle, piercing slate, a hanging handle to galaxy's gate.

Dark-masked half-moons, denying hidden blues.

Gibbous waxing full and ripe, fruit of loin and rounding high.

Ah, the moon's full-faced and seasoned, alive and vivid with clarity and reason.

(The moon is full tonight, unfortunately blocking the meteor shower view with its light.  There is beauty in a night with no moon, the crescent can be startlingly sharp and star-catching, the half-moon can change it's face, the full moon lights the night world, but obscures the milky way.

   So, enjoy all the stages of moon-viewing.)  

Which moon moves you the most?  Why?

serendipity in a paradox 8.

From above
is a sentinel's sight

from within
it's burning bright,

from the wind
driving arrow-like

to the heart
diving fast as light

to embrace
talon tight,

grounding spirals
landing upright

a supportive friend
with a falcon's might.




This was a California Red Tail Hawk, the largest local predatory bird.  On the coastline, the Peregrine falcon is it's counterpart.  This juvenile hawk tried to fly in the window at my clinic.  He spent the following hour sitting outside, stunned by the window glass.  He kept a close eye on us, but didn't retreat when we came up to him.  He just watched us move behind the glass, baffled. (eventually he flew away)

Serendipity in a paradox # 7.

What you get from assuming:

Like holding your breath

when you’re about to get wet

Like wanting a prize

you know you won’t get

Like scooting out backwards

from under a bed

Like straining your eyes

in a cave full of webs

Like slapping a face

with pain and regret

Like losing the memory

of someone you’ve met

May you recognize serendipity when it comes your way.

Wordless Weds is my: Tuesday Toes

May you recognize serendipity when it comes your way.

serendipity in a paradox 6.

Only after one's fed,

satiated enough

to be free of

the cavernous

starvation,

can one think about

feeding another, and

preparing the next meal.










What makes you feel satiated?

serendipity in a paradox 5.

If you hear only one sound, without the image, can you hear the dichotomy within it, and love it for both:

purring and the mewing
rustling and the digging
blowing and sussurant
rumbling and hissing
rasping and tenor
guttural sighing.



(I've been studying a sound I love, and trying to describe it.  Without success, I can only draw analogies.  Isn't that why we write poetry?)

Can you guess, or create your own images to go with these sounds?  I know what mine are, what are yours?

serendipity in a paradox 4.

I walked with the moon tonight

a gold sickle:

sharp and bright.

She cradled his head

darkened, faceless

and dead, 

400-billion 

milkyway

suns shone instead.

Wordless Weds. = Tues. Toes

Serendipity in a Paradox,  3.

Grounded in bronze, 

stillness is an art

I think.

(Rodin's Thinker's Feet, Philadelphia)

Serendipity in a paradox 2.

Their cars passed in the driveway,

one window rolled down

one window, broken, rolled up.

The doors remained closed.

The Hubble deep space telescope is looking at galaxies forming.  "Dark energy", unseen, might hold pre-galaxy gasses in a "web", visible only by the pattern displayed by the spaces between the molecules.......

yet we cannot see that our spirits interact across spaces?  

May you recognize Serendipity when it comes your way......

Mindfulness

Serendipity in a paradox 1. :

Feet are buried in the mud, enabling us

to peer closely at the lotus petals.

"If we are thinking only of the cup of tea that awaits us, we are incapable of realizing the miracle of life while standing at the sink

-actually incapable of living one minute of life."

(-paraphrased from the teachings of Thich Nhat Hahn) 

(photo: 2008, Mineral King backpack trip to glacial-fed Monarch Lakes

Time out of mind

Slam the car door, leave the house behind.

Leave the job filled with injured limbs.

Double and triple check

the odometer gauge and the second hands.

Push a safe pace through the fog,

to breach the clear coastal sky,

to bona fide, heart-pounding evidence:

I breathe, I have arrived.

I’ll hike a new trail, void of ravens,

under heavens, immensely blue.

Time out, silent with herons:

my sanctified time with the truth.

The glorious green and the changing wind

brought anew, the smell of the sea.

But I’ll give them away, to you this time,

today, it’s too much for me.

For when angels ride the skies

to uplift and give you peace,

they’ll show you heaven on earth, 

and pull you out of your shoes in pieces.

I’m falling down, just looking around.

I must be out of my mind.

Every step feels like I’m rushing in,

and I do fear what I’ll find.

I need a time-out

just for the day,

but it’s never out of my mind:

Time’s too short for all I want,

and I don’t know what I’ll find.



(This is an old poem, resurfacing for me as a priority.  I have a new goal, serious exploration of meditation.  Anyone know of  an authentic class near Central California?

Mind over matter. Inner Peace. Oneness with the Universal source of Love. Whatever you want to call it.....

what brings you peace?....)

Sea-ing You

Waves retreat, darkly deep, 

drawing me in, like eyes, 

beyond foam green 

beyond blue light

beyond churning life.

Silky soft voices

susurrant highs, like gulls,

blending undertones,

like resonating

waters turning sand.

Reassuring,

like rocking in cradling arms

or like hands reaching forth,

as recurring rows

of white, line upon line. 

Immersion

is a wave crashing gasp

of requisite awe.

Momentarily, a touch of an ocean

is enough.

Dianne Gross-Giese, 1-2010/7-2011

Briefly back to blogging, after a grueling work schedule, wrestling with the economic downturn.  A forced vacation after appendectomy had awakened my muses.

Chthonian Skin

If I could touch you now,

I’d touch your face,

find your cheek

pressed into a plum

when you smile

so softly.

The scent

the soft brush

the round curves

the raised coat

of your skin.

My skin crawls,

seeking touch.

To turn it off is futile.

Never turning the key - IS the key.

Mindfulness in the moment -Is the lock.

So lock it.

How can a hunger start so softly,

and reach so deeply,

through the surface of a well?

Foreign and unformed:

hidden

in chthonian skin.



But feeding or fasting,

will it abate,

negate

or satiate?


To live with crawling skin,

a hungry well,

takes an open heart:

Touch my heart, to quiet my head,

perhaps then I can think myself fed,

and lay my skin to rest

upon the memory of your chest.



.(Chthonic: of or relating to the underworld in pre-Apollonian religion, from earth-based religions.)

why write?

To bring darkness to light

and put to rest the night

to focus youth's might

to make beauty bright

to bring form to sight


to set a wrong right

to charge a fight



to propel flight

to seek a height

to burn a blight

to open insight

(Missing my Muse, I had to turn off the angry tapes running in my head.  One way I do this is to explore the wilderness.  How do you find your muse?)

Anger is only...

a momentum you feel

on the last straight spoke

of a broken wheel.

a tool to dispel

the rain hitting level

under the umbrella.



a pill to make you ill

when hard feelings

can’t get their fill.

an interim storm

of desert grit

to keep words warm.

an instant switch

to start a charge

with a hurl of spit.

a shocking drug

you shouldn’t share

off the chopping block.

How do you deal with anger?  What makes you incessantly angry?  hmmmmm.........I could go on and on and on, why don't you?

Wordless Weds. = Tuesday Toes

One foot in front of the other....     standing on rocky ground all we can do is move forward one step at a time.

Spring weather has hit central California!  Time to enjoy it, today!

Photo: H.G.Giese

Flash 55 Friday

Five O’clock P.M. Release

Submerged in the quiet

of the humming fans,

the impatient clocks,

the papered dins,



Let go of edicts,

unclutched handles,

passing breaths,

unloosed grins.

The pulse buffets

as the mind expands.

Embodiment molts.

The view spins.

Cued by the respite

from hands and sands,

swaddle the soul

to refill it again.



Drug free,(except for carafes of coffee), and alcohol free, a queer let-down occurs at the end of the day.  Triggered by hypoglycemia, fatigue, solitude from a very public job, or rare isolation, the feeling is heady and disorienting at the same time.  (nursing mothers, think of the "let down" sensation)  I decided to stop fighting it and honor it with a sigh, a nap, a tear, and a poem.
This is a poem in exactly 55 words.  If you write flash-fiction or poetry in 55 words, post on Friday and let your flasher with the fastest 55's know, Mr. Knowitall, HERE



Wordless Weds. = Tuesday toes in Calif?

see prior post about alienation in Spring.....

Lost Spring

Strewn

sprouts

in loam

of tiny green

mounds…

Sheets

of linen

hung in clouds…

Shrouds

of light

beyond

near sight...

Recall a lust

held in trust.

Winter lingers, a liar

to a Spring of

Saint Elmo’s fire.



I have a sense of alienation this Spring, as though nothing will ever be the same.  Winter is lingering much longer than usual in central California, with rainstorms reminiscent of the Pacific northwest. This shot was from our usually barren front acre, during a freak hailstorm last month.  It was followed by an even rarer snowstorm the following week, tricking the flowers and trees to retreat into dormancy even longer.

sunday 160: life's minutiae

Hospital monitors don’t soothe a newborn cry.Mothers don’t cry at dinner tables.Loud drunks don’t listen.Did postpartum depression have an evolutionary purpose?

 

(This is a flash fiction in exactly 160 characters, including spaces.  I took liberty with the spaces between the sentences for a better rhythm in the grammar. For more fascinating stories and poems visit the host with the minute 160, Monkey Man HERE .Try one yourself, and let us know!)

Tuesday Toes = Wordless Weds in Philly

In my muse's absence, I revert to my version of Wordless Wednesday: Tuesday Toes. 

Where have YOUR toes been?

Today I actually have a gift from my travels to Philadelphia.  I thought of my friends in blogland as I snapped this shot outside the Sheraton Hotel downtown. Of course the highlights of the trip: friends, the Rodin sculptures, and Hand Surgery/Rehabilitation Symposium.  (this was street art, emerging from the sidewalk and walls like the "Gates of Hell")

Toe photography began when early travels took me to New York.  I was newly married, headed for a college buddy's wedding in New Jersey.  I had not traveled out of California. Tired of the familiar profile shot for perspective in the forground, my buddy Kim and I began to shoot my foot with famous landmarks.  So what next?  Sisterhood of the traveling feet?

In Rodin's Hands

When I miss you,

I miss your hands to curl
my heart into.

-bluegrass blues on mandolin.
-drawing designs for a higher view.
-reconstructing tools into instruments.
-cuddling cat fur.
-morphing into tighter spots.

-compressing into vicelike strength.

-spreading a pyramid of support.
-pressing flesh with delicate fasciculations.
-articulating to tap, trace, scrape, slide or ruffle.

I miss inter-lacing through the windows of our souls.

Missing someone can take all shapes, forms and feelings.  What do you notice most when you miss someone?

 This poem is generated from a trip to Philadelphia, and the Rodin museum.  Before I spent 4 days studying hand surgery and rehabilitation, I spent 1 1/2 hours circling the bronze figures of hands, feet, nudes and faces at The Rodin Museum. 












This is what I miss.....

between the first and the last

Harmonic murmering - swinging open the doors
Soft eyes - in the vortex of the windstorm
Steady gaze - held in a familiar hammock
Slow motion blink - film strip strobing by
Upturned corners - grinning over and over inside
Inhale the scent - to lift a balloon above the sky


Owed to my teachers: of yoga, friendship, and love.

peel me an onion Friday 55

I’m static, frantic,
magnetic, shielding
shards of heart
with recycled refuse
            (just onion tears)
We’re refusing reclusion
collecting letters
upon utterances
unpeeling splices
           (over onion tears)
Our juices rise
like pungent repellant
solely with olfaction
flavors are favored
          (taste onion tears)
He’s spreading splines
ribs of mine
are tearing free
revealing me
          (in onion tears)




sometimes communication is hard.  sometimes assumptions are easier. sometimes solitude is safer.  but always, always, open honest communication is really living.

This is a poem in exactly 55 words.  To visit the host with the most, Mr. Knowitall, look HERE . Post a Flash Fiction in 55 words exactly on Friday and let him know it all!

Schmallentines

I think that I shall never see

a love as true as we now need.

What truth be known
is perceived by each own.

What I may need now
will change the morrow.

Actions speak louder true,
than words silenced, though due.

If I see eye, touch hand, hear breath,
I’ll love truly until death.

take a bite

sharply pierce the rind
gently ease the zest
from the membrane.

stab it open
feel the sting, the spray,
the cutting scent.

if sweet or sour,
it's yours to discover,
but a bite is required.

share it
with me
entirely.
  

I am reading The Four Agreements, by Don Miguel Ruiz.  If you have read it, please share your reaction.  If you have not, there are four codes of conduct explored.  Stemming from ancient Mexico's Toltec teachings they are:  Always do your best, Don't take anything personally, Don't make assumptions, Be impeccable with your word.

have a fruitful day, Dianne

sunday 160, re-ride and rewrite relationships

Buccal bugged, butt bumped, bone droned, toe tingled, face braced, eye dried, lung fumed, ear jeered, ankle jangled, skin numbing, heart starting, nerve-verve.

This is a poem in exactly 160 characters, spaces included.  If you want to read more or try the challenge, post on Sunday and let Monkey Man, our host for this event, know  HERE .   

After 24.5 years of marraige, baggage too heavy to carry, and children almost flown the coop, I decided to review and renew my spousal relationship.  My spouse builds motorized bicycles for the past 5 years but I never took on the 30 mph ride.  (I prefer the silent, clean but sweaty type.)  ....I'm finding out I didn't know what I was missing............in more ways than one, WOW.

Groundhog Day, half way to spring

half shadows sharpen

greening paths disappearing,

step attentively

post traumatic stress

Sleeping, demon slain?
She screamed in the dream, awoke,
to own it again.











Some of us have recurring fears, resentments, triggers that threaten our inner joy.  Peace with ourselves may be elusive, and fleeting.  I am learning to face, name, depersonalize and let go of past wrongs.  However, the power we give the inner life of our minds and souls work on.  A nightmare awoke me this morning, reliving a current anxiety with the roles reversed, at which point I realized all the characters in the dream were elements of myself...............
Peace, 

(image: google. Edvard Munch The Scream)

endover epitaph

How do we roll over?

Is this the end?

Is it over?

How to say it all

in one day:

in the darkness

where we only feign sleep

How the coffee tastes
better before
they get up

How cold, her egg
his cereal

their bagels

How the words choked off:
Please look over the choices
keeping us safe

How the rain on the car

or the sun on the walk
seemed unending

How the motocross racer
with the most wins, passed,
rolling end-overs

Endlessly.



In honor of those who truly take risks, do their best, fight the odds to win, and love their careers, families and friends. 
In honor of Nathan Woods, who died this week in a practice jump before the World Off Road Championship Series in Calif.  He won the WORCS twice, over all other riders. He wore the tatoo of a photograph of his infant son's face on his forearm. His wife and two young sons are in my prayers. Photo: courtesy of google

conciousness

Sunset at shoreline
roaring even after dark
sunrise's story.

pathfinding

How long does it take to find a path to travel?


1) Pick a destination: forward.

2) Obtain a roadmap: experiences vs. unknowns.

3) Choose routes: 70 mph?, Yosemite and Grand Canyon?, visits to kindergarten buddy and sisters?, downhill and straight highways?, rocky, wet, overgrown, unmaintained? known roads and pre-mapped courses?

4) Organize gear: money, map, car, bike, foot, phone, bedding, food, water, friend.

5) Take action: take a step.

…….. 1)  Choose a Destination:
                                                                          now

Photo: J.T.Giese

Winter Ripe

Persimmon branches

honey heavy, suspended.

Turning brown untouched.