I'm tired of waking up with the sun.
I want to rise with the moon,
Feel her alabaster blush
Wash over me.
I want to wake to the trillions of
Diamonds embroidered,
By the most nimble fingers,
Into the onyx tapestry of the universe.
I want to sigh at the sight of its vastness
And contemplate my own insignificance.
I want the darkness to shroud me
In a personal inky cocoon
As I stretch my arms from east to west
Like I could pick up the sky
To carry with me when I feel alone.
I want to sit in a bath of cold starlight
And dream of people I've never met.
They would whisper me tales of their time in this world,
Would lay them like a patchwork quilt
Across my mind.
And I would keep them there to comfort me
Because everyone's stories seem sweeter than mine.
House by the Sea - DATE?
A girl scrambles down a scree covered cliff. The sharp costal grass cuts into her palms as she slips and slides over the gray stones. It's too foggy to see what's at the bottom of the cliff but if she stops for a moment she can hear the distant crash and roar of a cold ocean.
She doesn't think about where she's going, just that she must get there soon. The fog settles thickly around her like a damp blanket. It fills her lungs and clouds her eyes. A faint light flickering through the haze pulls her forward. She takes step after step, clinging to the merest tufts of grass. Knees bumping into loose stones sending them cascading into the waves far below.
She takes a leap of faith toward the light. Her feet hit something that starts to give way. She finds herself rolling down a cold sand dune. When she stops she lays in the coolness of a thousand crushed boulders and stares up into the immensity of the sky. Needlepoints in the onyx tapestry of the night that bathe the world in cold, silver light.
She gathers herself up and makes her way though the dunes and reeds that grow among them towards the light. As she nears it she can hear merry voices singing and instruments being played. Hear the prance of feet spraying sand and the crackle of a fire. Closer yet and she can smell the smoke, the salty, hollow scent of driftwood and something else, something sweeter. Once she reaches the top of the last dune she can finally see it; a small bond fire surrounded by a small group of people. The flames illuminate a pale stucco cottage with seashells pressed into the walls. It rises tall and luminous, glowing in the combined light of the fire, moon, and stars. Behind the house and all around is the crashing roar of endless sea. The girl slides down the dune and makes her way towards the fire and music. As she nears she can see that as the company dance around the fire they toss pages of a book into the curling flames. As they spot her they each give a cry of greeting but do not stop their dance. The girl hesitates, unsure of what to do next. Whatever force had been dragging her forward had left her and all that remained was a hollow place quickly filling up with questions. It dawns on her for the first time that she doesn't know why she's here. The cold sand pricks her bare feet and a cool breeze blowing from the sea teases her face with a salty kiss that flushes her cheeks. A woman who sits on a salt bleached log rocking to the melody gestures for her to join. The girl approaches, careful to not interrupt the revelers in their dance. She sits herself on the log and the woman offers her a blanket. As she sits and watches smokes curls itself around her, unfurling in her nose and coiling around her hair.
The complex dance continues, a stomp and a clap here, a twist and a twirl there. Weaving in and out of each other in a perpetual spiral around the fire. Book pages glide in and out of them like flower petals catching fire and shooting like rockets into the sky before burning out. The girl watches swaying in time with the hypnotic rhythm of the music. Her eyes feel glazed over and dry from the fire, her feet feel heavy and slightly sore from plodding through the sand. She feels her head nodding slowly lower as the darkness and dimply flickering light of the fire lull her into a sort of trance. As her eyes close questions start to flash across her eyelids. What am I doing here? Where am I? How did I get here? Who am I? She shakes herself out of the stupor and sits up. The woman next to her watches with polite amusement as if she could read her confused mind. Just as quickly as each question appears the seemingly obvious answer for each disappears until she is left without an answer even to the last question. Name, she thinks, what is my name? The music rises to a crescendo. She feels a word perching on the tip of her tongue. Its shape is familiar but before she can wrap her mouth around it, it leaps off into the night just as the last page of the book explodes into sparks in the dark sky. The girl furrows her brow, name name, name she thinks but no name is coming. No names.
Her mind is empty.
The girl looks up at the vastness of the inky sky just as one of the brightest stars begins to fall leaving a trail of stardust in its wake. Make a wish, she thinks. But with a blank mind there is nothing left to wish for. Just as she is about to speak up the woman next to her produces another leather bound book, it's pages yellowed, but only at the edges. She hands it to one of the dancers who have never ceased their movement. The music becomes louder and suddenly pages are gliding and fluttering again sending puffs of ash and smoke into the air. The girl looks back up into the sky to see the falling star land and explode in a shower of golden light mingled with mist somewhere near where she came from. Something feels peculiar about this, she has a feeling shooting stars aren’t supposed to land but no one else seems the least bit phased.
Nothing changes for a while, the dancers dance, the pages burn, and the music plays. Then, something does change. A boy. Walking cautious just as the girl had done. Comes to the fire, driven, like the girl, to the light in the sea of darkness. He sits and everything goes on. Always onward. When the last page expands into the blackened sky everything stops. A tall but graceful man walks forward to the two empty children. "Names?" They both slowly shake foggy heads, heavy, like in a dream. A white toothed smile expands in the darkness. "What a good place to start. Names, the only one word that fully describes who you are, without it, who are you? Without a name you can be anything, be infinite, be free. Freedom from a name is sparing your neck from the chain of life.”
"How do you get rid of a name?" To curious eyes in the dark. Another white toothed smile.
"You release it, like a puff of smoke back to whence it came." The girl looks at the fire, the last few sparks twirl like ballerinas up and away. Wild. Free. "Let us celebrate the new, forget the old. Here we move onward, always onward.” The music starts, more delicately this time. Each string carefully chosen to ring out across the night, like the sea plucking its story on the pebbles.
“Please, where is here?”
“You will understand when it is right for you to. You already know, you have been making your way here all your life, you just have to ask your soul.” Pulling her to her feet the man leads the girl in the dance. Each step sprays cold, smooth pebbles, each breath laced with smoke, each glance glowing with fire, each sound echoing with the ocean. As she dances her hollow self starts to fill. Her mind is soothed, her body is fulfilled, her soul opens. With a final stomp and shout and thrum she stops, her heart light and feet numb. A rough, warm hand leads her towards the cottage. The House by the Sea. "Come, someone has been waiting for you." Walking past the sand dunes and reed, firelight receding behind illuminating her back and casting tall, infinite shadows. The girl spots a patch of earth through the sand, in it is growing bushes of white roses and rows of raspberries. Then she is at the door, lifting a small metal latch, opening the door. Inside everything is aglow with moonlight. The whitewashed walls glow brightly while the dark wooden beams are a black ribcage stretched across the ceiling. To the left is a narrow but long room with windows looking out to the murky blackness of the ocean. In the corner, by the windows, against the wall, sitting in a delicate white rocking chair is a woman with skin like almond milk. A face plucked from the fogginess of infancy, a picture on the mantelpiece. Her grandmother. She runs towards her embrace, ready to be held by arms long since stilled in our world. They are warm, she knows she’s found home.
Where I Belong - DATE?
I am hardly overwhelmed
By the dark of the Morning
or the glow of the Night.
Whether it is the Sun or the Moon
Whispering their sweet rhapsody
Into the majestic heavens
I find infinite quiet
In each wild moment
Knowing that I have a place
Here below the gleaming stars
And undulating clouds.
With my feet in the earth
And my arms outstretched
Embracing the Sky–
I belong.
Lightning - DATE?
If the Sky darkens with dystopian drapes
Let lavender ribbons of Rain cry down.
Let the Earth be purged.
Let the crisp stationary be splattered.
Let mountains be eroded down to their core,
and let the mighty tors be swallowed in roiling rivers.
But do not let the murky shadow
lurk above our heads
Whose foreboding presence silences
Life and burdens the Mind.
Instead have the heat of Life
And Death’s austere perfume meet in the halls of high Heaven.
Let their fray be displayed
as the bolts of white light
That saturate us with dismay
or unalloyed delight.
In the Mean Time - DATE?
Let’s huddle on the beach and listen to the waves tousle the shore, continuing to be faithful even though the sand pushes them away at every attempted kiss.
Let’s run through a hundred dandelions and make a thousand wishes.
Let’s put flowers on someone’s grave so they can continue to be beautiful.
Let’s look at the world through a kaleidoscope making the ordinary extraordinary.
Let’s take each others hands and find the bravery to loose sight of the shore so we can cross the ocean.
Let’s live without insecurity by not comparing our behind the scenes to other people’s highlight reel.
Let’s be the two little nuts that held our ground so we could become mighty oaks. Let’s not wait for the storm to be over, instead let’s tap dance with the rain.
Let’s pursue happiness for the journey, not for the destination.
Let’s turn our ‘can’t’s into ‘can’s and our dreams into plans.
Let’s not count the days, let’s make the days count.
Let’s live a life of ‘oh well’s instead of ‘what if’s.
Let’s be the change we want to see.
Let’s believe that we will do whatever we were made to do.
Cosmic Latte - DATE?
The anachronism of my existence plays on the lips of the world like a kiss.
It tingles and tantalizes, eliciting illicit pleasure that ooze from the cracks in
the Delphic construct of the cosmos.
An idiomatic expression taken literally, spoken by a curled tongue, a rhetorical
question unable to inspire thought.
The unadulterated passion of Life strokes the frigid perfume of Death as they
lay tangled in the profane webs of evolutional matrimony.
Whilst we sit and ponder our own insignificance, in the cosmic latte of the
unknown void, a tall spoon stirs together another swirl of life leaving us feeling
explicably trivial.
On a small planet in a small solar system revolving around a small star on the
outer arm of an inconsequential galaxy do not linger on your misfortune;
marvel instead at the sheer miracle of your creation. The odds were and never
will be in your favor on a planet where your very presence is superfluous.
Ponder your insignificance and wonder at the spoon that stirred you into
existence.
My Name - DATE?
My name is as unique as a spark that flies from a hot forge. It dazzles as bright as a star but for just a moment, before burning out. It is the number five, chubby but stretched out. A deep dark red coated in a fine soot. A light blue hazy with silver fog. It is the sound of a soloist playing a foreign instrument, low and high mixed together into a melancholy lozenge used for sore throats.
It floated around out there, somewhere, collecting meanings until I snatched it and presented it to my Mom. I feed it with knowledge and creativity afraid that it will leave me. Empty.
I was named for myself, and to be yourself is the greatest challenge of all. There are no old foot holds in the climb to individuality. If you fall you will land in the sticky bog of normalcy. The risk of not being able to get back up again looming over.
It was made up. An idea that grew, pushed it’s way from the back of someone’s mind before falling out of their mouth and landing with a thud. It picked itself up and dusted off the dirt but was still dented, misshapen.
When people are told my name first comes the look. The contemplation. They taste the bitter sweet of the lozenge before spitting it out, “What a name.” Unusual, idiosyncratic, awkward, homely. A name. I don’t know what people think.
Some find it hard to understand, a type jargon. For others my name is a simple elaborate dance of letters, a clap and a stomp, a twirl and a bow. It means fire and safety. Emberleigh.
Everywhere I find a new version of my name spilling out of people’s mouth, like tar. It sticks to their mouths and clogs their tongue. Befuddled apologies and requests for reiteration. Each mistake sits like an ember, burning with embarrassment until I wave it away. “I’m used to it,” I say.
I have always been the odd one. My name makes it even more obvious. N. That is the letter of our family. Nathan, Ebn, Lumin, Erin...Emberleigh. It breaks the flow. Muddies the water. Ember, Em, it doesn’t matter how you put it. It’s always wrong. Somehow.
Despite it all I am my name. Or at least, I feel like my name. However if I were to change it I would go for something fragrant. Something that rolls off the tongue like honey. A jasmine breeze in the summer, desert wind, tropical blue. Rich and elegant.
Storm Child
Once, there was a small house in the forest. It was covered in moss and made of old wood. You’d never see anyone go in or out and all was quiet in the clearing in which it sat. The only sign that anyone lived there was a thick plume of smoke that rose from a stone chimney. Wind blew the trees around the clearing making the leaves fall and trees swish but the house stayed silent. If you’d looked through the thick glass windows you’d have seen a cosy room with a warm sofa and a rocking chair, a small table, and book shelf, all lit by the glow of an orange fire. You would have seen the old rocking chair moving slowly back and forth but no one sitting in it. But there was someone there. It was old Mother Storm knitting a cloud blanket for her Storm Child asleep up stairs. If you’d have kept watching you’d have seen the wind outside die down and all become perfectly still. The old wooden door would have quietly blown open and shut again. What you would not be able to see was Father Storm slowly trudge in, looking weathered after another long day of storm making. You would not see him kiss his wife on the cheek. You would not see him slowly climb the stairs and open the door to his Storm Child’s room. You would not see him quietly cross the carpeted floor to plant a breathy kiss on the top of his Child’s head and gently lay the new cloud blanket over the Child before releasing the old one back out the window. You wouldn’t be able to see it but that was what he did, every night. Until one night.
Two children were lost in the forest, a brother and sister. By chance they stumbled upon the clearing. They were cold and hungry and when they saw the smoke curling out of the cabin they decided to go see if they could sit by a fire and possibly get something to eat. As they approached they saw a curious thing– a small cloud slowly floating out of an upstairs window. There was a tree nearby so they climbed it wanting to see what was upstairs. As they peaked into the window, clinging to the tree, they saw a bed covered by a cloud that slowly rose and fell as if someone was sleeping under it. Being curious children they climbed in through the window. At once the Storm Child woke up but, of course, they couldn’t see. “Who are you?” the Storm Child asked. The children weren’t scared so they answered.
“My names is Anger and this is my sister Hate. Who are you?”
“I am the Storm Child, what are you doing in my bedroom?”
“We got lost and saw you house.”
“There was a cloud coming out your window,” added Hate.
“That was last night’s blanket,” explained the Storm Child.
“You sleep with a cloud?”
“Yes, of course, would you like to feel this one?” The children got up and touched the cloud being held out to them by invisible hands.
“So soft,” giggled Anger. !
“Like a marshmallow,” said Hate.
“Don’t you have parents who will be worried about you?”
! “No,” said Hate, “our parents are stuck in a box somewhere.”
“I’m sorry.”
“That’s all right,” said Anger cheerfully, “we live with our Aunt Envy.”
“But we ran away,” said Hate.
“Why?” Asked the Storm Child.
“Because it’s our birthday tomorrow,” sighed Hate.
“And we have to start working on our birthday,” explained Anger.
“What do you have to do?”
“Bring Hate and Anger to the world,” said Hate.
“What does that mean?” Asked the Storm Child.
“That’s the problem,” said Anger, “we don’t know yet.”
“I suppose we’ll have to make it up as we go along,” shrugged Hate.
“But that’s why we ran away, because we don’t want to grow up and have to work.”
“It sounds hard,” said the Storm Child who would also one day have to take over for Father Storm. “I don’t want to grow up either.”
“We should run away together!” Said Hate and Anger excitedly. The Storm Child agreed and threw off the cloud blanket.
The three climbed back out the window, down the tree and made their way back towards the woods. But the Storm Child wasn’t supposed to leave the clearing and as soon as the three stepped out of the clearing the Storm Child scattered into millions pieces. Before the children knew what happened a gust of wind took the pieces and scattered them all about the world. A few pieces swirled into the hair of the boy and girl and their minds became stormy and they shouted with Anger and Hate at each other before storming off. They went home to their Auntie and the next day, on their birthday, they indeed went out into the world and spread their Hate and Anger fueled by the Storm Child. As other pieces of the Storm Child settled about the Earth they landed on people. From then on those people carried the pieces inside them. But a piece of a Storm is not something for a human to have and it clouded their minds and gusted coldly into their hearts. And because Anger and Hate were the first to feel that way, the feelings were named after them. Of course the next day Mother and Father Storm found their Child was gone and were heart broken. They abandoned their cosy home to look for their lost Child. So when you hear the wind raging about your house or rain pelting your windows, it’s Father and Mother Storm searching, calling, and crying for their Storm Child. But you can help; when the weather turns mean out and you feel stormy inside step outside, under the rough sky and take three, long, deep, breaths. Breath out you Hate and Anger. You will feel a weight leave your chest, that’s your bit of Storm Child escaping, it doesn’t want to be inside of you anymore than you want it. Send it up into the wind and back to its parents where it belongs.
Down Deep
The night revolves like a kaleidoscope
Making the ordinary Extraordinary.
I have sunk down deep
So the moonlight cannot reach me.
I sit suspended in a palpable pain
So coarse it becomes my pleasure.
It lulls me into a sickening sleep
Full of nightmares that eat away at my mind.
My pain drowns me
Like a rock tied to my heart.
A painful tugging that rips me apart.
I have scissors in my hand that I could easily use
To cut myself free
but instead I use their sharp
To bring more pain to me
So I can stay in the dark.
The truth is l'm scared
Scared of what would happen
If I floated up to the silvery glow
And let myself be illuminated.
I fear I would loose who I am
Because in the pain, in the dark
there's no one to impress and
No one to pretend for
In the pain, in the dark
You Are Who You Are
And who I am is not what You think
Last Breath ~ Ode
A gulp a gasp or a sigh
Pleading for more time
Or surrendering to the dark
To struggle or to resign.
A ragged breath or one of peace,
A happy end or a sad beginning.
In the end the choice is yours,
Will you depart ruefully, or leave winning.
It says a lot about someone
Their last of last, the finale
What they might be wondering
What hopes they might have rallied.
It starts and ends with a breath
Opposite doorways that make a whole
One lifetime to complete the circle
One clap in the dance of the soul.
I Am From
I am from adventure, exploration
Heat and grass.
From the blistering summer sun,
Cracked earth and a splintery wooden porch.
I am from dried grass in my field
And collecting bugs in jam jars.
I am from questions, wood smoke, yarrow,
From a snow covered ground and lady bug plants.
I am from imagination
And hours spent under a porch.
I am from the pumpkin’ and tadpoles.
Love and hate, and a hide away.
I am from dusty arenas and horses.
From swaying forests that go on and on.
I am from bodacious, wilderness, the untamed
And plains of nothingness.
I am from daydreams and no T.V.
From pie, sitting alone, Santa Anna’s
And sunrooms.
I am from layered bloomers, Cuyamaca Lake,
Hikes and climbing boulders.
I am from stickers in a drawer, Summer Dog
And fairy pancakes for a circle.
I am from Quartz, tree climbing,
And hours spent in the dirt.
I am from magic, make believe and water.
I am from unknowing, new family,
And culture.
From traveling the world, castles,
Millions of gardens,
And natural wonders.
I am from Christmas, Thanksgiving,
And homemade Hallow’eens.
From meditation, quiet, and inner peace.
From the theory learn fast,
Understand more, sand paper letters,
Animals and respect.
I am from paint and a chisel,
“Up On the Roof”,
And nailing stump.
I am from The Ranch, late nights and
Business calls.
From parks, museums,
And antique Japanese stuff.
I am from sun, San Diego, and the beach.
From surf comps, sand, pools and tandem.
I am from Spanish, Horatio,
And goldfish.
I am from spicy, plain, and piles.
From crunch, fresh cut carrots, and salad.
I am from tastes, picky to perfection and
New flavors,
From free range chicken, Mexican rice and fajitas.
I am from fud, toad food, and Fred.
I am from cold nights, long days, wet muddy fields
From apples thrown from a window.
I am from pelting rain, the earthy smell of dirt and rot,
From green and hedged lanes.
I am from endless fields, amazing sunsets
And hidden beaches.
From Blackpool Sands, pubs, trees
And the Dart.
I am from dripping leaves, moss
And seasons.
I am from the moors, warm rooms,
And ironing beads.
From radiators and the gurgles,
From smelly pens, jet lag
And story tapes.
I am from the Dawn Treader, Pippin and Tom.
From trampolines, seed-copters, war memorials,
And slow worms.
I am from Ballet, Dartmouth baked beans on toast,
And prawn and cocktail.
I am from muddy walks, farm roads, and headlands.
From tea shops, Dartmoor ponies, B & B’s
And from heather, gorse, and bracken.
I am from the earth, connecting
In every way I can.
A leaf collection, broken porcelain,
A pound found,
Under a rainbow.
Everything everywhere I am connected.
A twin in a Berber village,
My mark on a distant mountain pine.
I have roots everywhere.
A million faces of family
And friends,
That fade with time and then
Reappear with provoked memories
And déja vu.
Only to fade away into
The corner of my mind.
A thousand summer days,
that dissipate into
The tapestry of my life.
Emily's Guided Meditation
This is the introduction....
You are walking through a garden
With flowers of all kinds around you
There are clouds above
And green grass beneath
Big trees surround the edge of the garden
There are no paths
Just grass
It starts to rain
Very lightly
You see a gently flowing stream
With lilies and stepping stones
You run towards it
You start to cross on the stepping stones
Then you see your reflection in the water
You see a tired, and troubled face looking back at you.
You decide to jump in
You don't bother to take your clothes off
The water is surprisingly warm
A frog jumps on your head
Then you go underwater
Schools of silver fish swim past
A little fishy swims right up to you
It gives a few happy bubbles
Then swims away
The water is deeper than you thought
You swim to the bottom without needing air
There is no mud
Just a few pebbles
Then you see the stepping stones
They are not stepping stones
They are pillars
Of a great underwater city
Then you notice
How many things and people
Are like the underwater city
You can only see the top
You do not know what is beneath
You swim around for a while
Then you come up
And walk over to one of the trees
And pluck a ruby red apple
The rain has started to stop
When you are full
You take one last look around
Then jump on a cloud
You sail away
Past the moon and the stars
Into a happy beginning.
