TOFINO BOUND!

tofinoaccommodation.com

tourismtofino.com

Wild Woman is hopping a bus today, kids. I'm off to Tofino for a couple of days, to attend a wonderful event. CBC Radio's beloved Stuart Mclean of Vinyl Cafe is performing live in the little old Clayoquot Theatre, where I saw some of the best theatre of my life, written and produced by locals, in the years when I lived there. I am so excited. I have seen him live one other time, in a larger venue. But to see it at home, in such a small cozy setting, is going to be very special. 

If anyone would like to listen to one of the humorous and heartwarming stories he is noted for, here is the link. While I'm there, I wont make it to the beach as I wont have wheels. But there is the beautiful harbor, Meares Island, and my beloved little village centre, where I can wander happily and feast my eyes.

See you Sunday afternoon, when I get back. Have a great weekend!

This is what I feel like right now:

google image, photographer unknown

Off the Deep End

There goes Wild Woman,

off the deep end again,

muttering to herself,

slapping herself upside the head,

clucking at the imperturbable sky,
hands to brow, distressed,
moaning "why, oh why, oh why, 
dear God, oh why?"

Another Mountie gunned down,

another dog chained outdoors at 36 below,

his beseeching face, no rescue at hand,

so much injustice -
so painful, knowing what I know.

They're shooting wolves from helicopters

to "save the caribou", who are dying 
through loss of habitat

because of us. 

The vicious cycle goes on and on,

because it always has been thus:

raping and pillaging, greed and power,

smug rationalizing, politics-speak,
a civilization in denial

while the world implodes,

hour by hour.

Wild Woman's brain goes weak
at the knees
and that's before we even talk about
the bees.
There are solutions,
that the powers that be 
refuse to seek.
The situation need not
be so impossibly bleak.

How hang onto hope,

when the  planet itself

is at the end of its rope?

The coasts will one day soon 
be washed away,

but no one acts because 
it's not happening today.

After the tears, there is nothing 
left to do

but find something to cackle about 
- or, even better, two.

for Susan's prompt at Mid Week Motif: the place humor has in my life. It is what saves me, kids.I resonate with one of the quotes accompanying this prompt: "If we couldnt laugh, we'd all go insane" by Robert Frost.

Truly, I am not as desperate as this poem indicates - my sense of humor does keep me afloat - sometimes just barely!

OF SHAMANS AND HOOTY-OWLS

The shaman walks the medicine way

leaving no footprints.

The cry of the owl bids you follow.

Take up your staff, wrap up well in your cloak,

for the night is cold and the fog will poke 

its chilly fingers

into every exposed inch of human skin,

seeking to steal some warmth

for itself.

Hush! for there be spirits here.

If you listen, you will hear

the heartbeat of an ancient cedar.

In its bark is the memory

of who you were a thousand years ago,

when it and you and the land 

were young.

In the night sky

is written the promise

of who you are becoming

a thousand years from now.

Gaze well, and remember,

so when at last you meet, 

you will recognize yourself.

There are dreamers, and there are

the ones being dreamed.

Awaken!

The journey of transformation

is the shedding of the false self

- the one who meets the world -

and the stripping away of everything

that is not essence, joy, wonderment,

trust and awe.

Peace

is knowing

all is as it is meant to be.

All we need do

is Surrender.

The mystical hooting of the owl

bids us safe passage

through this eery midnight world.

Hasten, for the shaman guide's cloak

is already swirling 

with the swiftness

of his being gone.

One from 2013, my friends, posted here for the Poetry Pantry at Poets United. Wishing you all a wonderful weekend.

Grey

Greyness seeps from winter sky in rivulets

that slide off the rooftops, down the windowpane,

puddle in the sodden fields,

become small fast-moving creeks 

in the roadside ditches. 

The landscape is fog-shrouded, opaque,

a study in grisaille.*

Silvery sleek shapes are slipping in and out

at the edge of the forest,

elusive as  love among the lonely-hearted:             

wet winter wolves  among the misty trees.

Clouds hang wetly

half-way down the mountain,

as if they have forgotten how to climb.

Grey landscape, grey skies, grey world.

I'd walk underneath those dripping trees,

turn my face up to the sky,

but you're not here.

*grisaille - a painting executed entirely in grey scale values.

On Attire

pinterest.com

My sense of fashion has been, at best, mixed,
jeans and wolf t-shirts, running shoes, frizzy hair.
Looks I admire tend to the wild side:
dreads, long gray pony tails and beards on men, 
on aging women that certain look that sets us apart 
from the sweater-set crowd with their blue tidy hair:
kinda hippy and free, unconventional,
still Being Who We Are.
As we pass, we exchange smiles,
and toss our manes.

I met an old hippy over in Coombs.
We recognized each other by our hair,
both long and frizzy. He told me
in Haight-Ashbury, back in the day,
he wore Puss In Boots leather boots, 
with buckles, right up to his thighs.
Those were the good old days.

I so admired them, back then,
those paisley/patchouli hippies on Fourth Avenue,
so serenely living outside all the rules,
while I lived my cramped, married-woman existence
just one block down. 
But soon enough, I was free,
chewed my leg off to escape the trap,
bought my first pair of jeans,
grew my hair long,
began to live.

My running shoes carried me far,
through ten years in Tofino,
among other refugees from the 60's,
heart and hair equally wild,
completely whole,
drenched in joy and sea-spray.

Now I consort with trees, wolves,  
druids and dying things.
I drape myself in old man's beard,
wear moss slippers and clothing made of bark.
As Old Woman of the Woods, I come into my own,
talk to owls and decorate my hair 
only with feathers.


For Susan's prompt at Mid Week Motif: Fashion
I poached the old hippy in Coombs from a much earlier poem. He still looks way cool!

To My Fellow Dreamer

image by Totomai Martinez

Who are you, fellow dreamer,

whose windows I watch 

wink on and off each day?

How is life for you, on the sixth floor, 

Apartment 601-A ?

Behind every window lies a story,

yours as wondrous as the next.

I'm watching life pass by below,

gaze across at all the lives I imagine

but can never know.

In one square, I see a young man, 

gaunt and ill,

who seems to be saying goodbye

while living still.

A child's head peers out

at strange hours, in another.

I fret, wondering why
I never see her mother.

I dream romance in a young girl's rooms, 

before the hurting starts.

In another, a mid-life woman

explores the broken edges

of her heart.

Each of us, in our small rooms,

is ever drawn towards the light:

watch morning tiptoe across the sky,

dusk draw back its skirts

at night.

We watch it all, with fascination 

and not a little wonder.

I imagine, behind each golden square,

a rich story to plunder!

Mary's prompt at dVerse is to write to the photos of Totomai Martinez, a wildly talented photographer, presently living in Japan.

The Art of Dreaming Tigers

image from the Tigers in Crisis website

for Kerry's prompt at Toads : In Other Words - to substitute key words in a title. I chose The ____ of Dreaming________ and tigers popped into my head. 

Place your tiger peacefully

at the edge of a pond,

so he can drink easily.

Let his stomach be full from whatever small creature

became his supper.

This will help him relax.

Let there be no roadways or poachers

within a thousand miles.

Bring his mate close by; let them watch

their cubs leaping and tussling in the grass.

Let him lay his head down, close his eyes,

and sleep without fear.

Let his dreams be all of sunny days 

and no humans, anywhere.

As this is a dream,

may his family thrive and multiply.

All tigers will birth and raise their families.

They will never be shot, starved

or driven from their lands.

We will dream us a world

where there are four thousand tigers, 

instead of four hundred.

Since this is a dream,

let's put intelligent people 

in charge of the world,

who will protect all wildlife 

and the earth's fragile eco-system

of which, we are only so slowly beginning 

to understand,

we are a part.

At some point, you may lose track of

whether you are dreaming this tiger,

or the tiger is dreaming you.

He is beautiful.

It works out,

either way.

Notes: from Tigers In Crisis

almost all Siberian tigers (350 - 450 in total) live in southeastern Russia
- former range included China, Korea and Mongolia

13 feet long, up to  700 pounds

an endangered species (like just about every other wild creature)

poached for fur and body parts, to be used in Chinese medicine
(even though this is now unlawful in China)

because a single tiger can bring up to $50,000 on the international market, the practice continues

for the ones who escape the hunters, habitat loss accounts for further decimation of their numbers, like other endangered species

logging - both legal and illegal - encroaches and divides their habitat, separating them from each other, and making it easier for poachers to access them