Stuck on a Reef in the Tunnel of Love

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I got stuck on a reef in the tunnel of love,

and this is why love didn't last.          

             So busy bailing, love blew right past,               .

stuck on a reef in the tunnel of love.

Charted my way in by the North Star's glow,

but lost my way when the light dimmed low.

Got stuck on a reef in the tunnel of love,

                         and this is why love didnt last.                                                      

                                                          

[I tried my hand at a triolet, 

I dont think I've quite caught on yet.]

The fair Hannah at Real Toads has issued us a challenge: to write about the tunnel of love. The photo she provided is of train tracks going into a tunnel but to me the tunnel of love is always in water, the lovers in a small boat. I vaguely remember some amusement ride, one time, like that, when I was much much younger. Or perhaps it was a dream.

Crone Crunchy

There is a flock of mourning doves

living in our yard - so lovely

When one grows older,

and is still breathing,

every day

is a good day!

No Goodbyes

I always knew your leaving

would bring heartache.

I grieved two years

before you even died.

I didnt half know

the abyss

you'd leave behind you,

or that I'd never

find a way

to say 

goodbye.

I miss you

every day

and every moment.

It makes me cry,

still, when I say your name.

Forever and forever

I will miss you,

and I refuse

to ever

say the word

Goodbye.

The prompt at Poetry Jam this week is Goodbye. This popped into my head in response. Of course it made me cry. Over at Cressida's blog, she wrote about another big black dog. Her poem, too, made me cry, so my eyes are awash this morning, at the thought of those big, devoted and departed hearts.

Wild Woman On Freedom

Crone with Cane, Pointing the Way

As you know,

Wild Woman has

quite a lot to say

about freedom.

Likely because she had to 

claw her way out of bondage

more than once

in order to find it.

She'll spare you the details:

the abuse,

the alcoholic conman

who burned down her store,

the emotional attraction

to emotionally unavailable men.

Suffice it to say,

Wild Woman's spirit

has always retreated

and walled itself off

during trauma,

thus permitting

her naturally optimistic nature,

(and her cackle),

to surface and resurface

after each

devastating debacle.

They sang "Freedom's 

just another word

for nothing left to lose"

and they were right

about the "nothing".

But the regaining

of solitude,

and peace,

and no more drama

is a freedom

beyond price.

Peacefulness

is Wild Woman's

pearl of pearls.

At Poets United's Verse First today, Kim has set us another inspiring prompt : to say what freedom means to us. Toni Morrison's quote is given: "the function of freedom is to free someone else." This must be why Wild Woman writes : having been through the fire, she hopes to help her younger sisters make their own escapes.

Revelation

Chopping the carrots,

laughing and chatting with

my new best friend,

I suddenly realized :

I am standing beside

a man,

and, for the first time, ever,

I feel safe.

At Real Toads, Mama Zen would like us to think of the safest place we've ever been, and write about it in 53 words or less. My mind zipped right to this moment. 

After walking through the Siberian wasteland of the heart, which had been  traumatized and then abused for three decades, I had walked in the door of the coffeehouse and found Home. 

Brock Tully (now a sought after motivational speaker and founder of the World Kindness movement in Vancouver, B.C.), and the wonderful alternative folk who frequented Brock and Friends, accepted me with warmth. They loved me gently until I was ready to love myself. My life turned onto a kinder, gentler path because of them. It was one of the most significant turnings of my life. My most cherished friends date from those days in the early 80's, when I finally found the members of my tribe.

Loving the World

changeyourworld.com

Kids, I am sheer exhaustion from head to toe right now, and was wondering what to share with you, but not a Thought would Think. Came across this wonderful poem by Wendell Berry, and decided to post it for you till the sludge lifts in my brain.

Love This Miraculous World

Our understandable wish
to preserve the planet
must somehow be 
reduced 
to the scale of our
competence.
Love is never abstract.
It does not adhere 
to the universe
or the planet
or the nation
or the institution
or the profession,
but to the singular
sparrows of the street,
the lilies of the field,
"the least of these
my brethren".
Love this miraculous world
that we did not make,
that is a gift to us.

-Wendell Berry

Have a great day, kids!

A Windigo Wind

*Windigo, Who Punishes Excess

shenandoahfilms.com

A Windigo wind blows across the land,

warning us that we have been taking

more than we need,

and putting nothing back.

It is trying to tell us

we need to go back

to the Old Times,

when man and nature

lived in harmony,

and no action was taken

without consideration for 

the seventh generation.

A big black wolf is wandering

through my dreams and through my heart,

wolf spirit,

Windigo of the wolf clan,

howling a lament

at the destruction

of his habitat,

the starvation of his young,

the extinction

of his tribe.

I am swimming a wide river,

farther than I have

the strength to go,

when, under me,

lifts the body of a great turtle

who supports me to

the farther shore.

I am lost at sea in a thick fog

and cannot find home

when a pod of killer whales,

sensing my distress telepathically,

encircles my boat

and guides me to shore,

to my own dock,

then glides silently

into the night
and away.

Nature tries to help us.

Creatures show us the way.

But in our noise and clamor,

in the tumult of our souls,

we cannot hear them.

The forest is deep and dark,

and there are spirits here.

I look, and look again,

and all the trees are rearranged.

Shapeshifters, shadows,

flit from tree to tree, 

and a mournful  Windigo wind

sings through the branches.

Owl, Oracle, Guardian,

protect me as I go.

* In the film connected to the picture, The Great Wind, Windigo, punishes a young man for his greed, for wanting more than he needs. Wikipedia describes a Windigo as a legend of the Algonquin people, a cannabalistic spirit that can possess humans in times of famine and is to be guarded against. 

The event with the killer whales really happened to a woman I met once who lives among the whales in Simoon Sound. Alexandra Morton has dedicated her life to the well being of the whales and, more recently,  to raising the alarm about the endangered salmon habitat in her area.