Saturday, May 28, 2005

Tangential Relativism: A Haiku Cycle

One: In the abandoned forecourt
of the unmade kings.

To each of us, there
are new purposes revealed:
seek, find, change, rebuild.

It foreshadows—the
gap between “is” and wishes
broad as old roads lost.

To hands upon the
wheel, we sing these things quiet
like hymns to pale stone.

Cracked and faded now,
all new darkness baked sterile
'neath sand, forgetting.

“This was,” we tell them,
turning hands below
ungiving faucets.

Two: Those lands considered
holy by our ancestors.

Dry land grows bearded,
sage green upon the red clay,
wind takes thought skyward.

High upon the air
with dark wings and slow vectors,
reaching past our hills.

Into the land of
sacred mountains, dry forests
under blue shadows.

His eyes, wolf yellow,
telling no lies as he runs
the ghost town's main street.

The noises of what
was carry no power now--
healed with broken glass.

Three: In the years of our
badger vision

If there is yet snow
in the warm seasons of the
earth: pray, dance, look east.

Places where we came
from, blood upon the heather,
words in the old tongue.

Breath comes in chill gasps
in meadows so high and pale
with impending fall.

Hands roughened by work
upon the fertile soil,
we become mighty.

Cold comes, the fourth age
of our spirit years, making
us dream like badgers.

On the earth, we call
this mountain home kindest of
all, these crags our land.

Built of stone, this place
will be forgotten, but that
is our own weakness.

All that has been done,
our scars and scratches on the
earth are testaments.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

All of your work inspires awe. This one is especially moving.

Risu said...

Once again I am stunned by your ability to use words in such a way that makes the reader truly believe that the poem was accompanied by vivid visuals. I remember SEEING and HEARING the words, but not reading them.

Anonymous said...

Firehawk,

I lay this humble offering (sort of a dead rat actually) within easy reach of your razor sharp talons:

Hawk Circle high above
The dragon eats it's own tail
Rat hides, waits patently

I didn't find the exercise of writing a Haiku anything like popcorn – it was very easy to stop after just one. My mind is way too linear for such acrobatics.

Your free form work is beautiful but sometimes a bit too big and troubling for me to deal with using my limited vocabulary. Putting words to complex emotions is not one of my talents. So I can't always leave evidence in my wake.

I enjoyed your Haiku cycle. Thanks

Mushster said...

Once again your writing has calmed my tumultuous mind. Thankyou.

Bill said...

Man, how you manage to string these words together, and with such consistently good results is inspiring!

Kudos on yet another moving piece!!

Patrick M. Tracy said...

Thanks, Everyone.

I appreciate you all.

Braleigh,

Glad you were able to get the sound and vision out of these. I always hope for the immersive experience that goes beyond just words on the page/screen.

Swiftboat,

I'd say it was better than a dead rat. I think that the haiku for is great for its compression of language. It keeps my big words in check a bit, maybe. As far as writing them, I think that the first few attempts are the hardest. You get more comfortable as you go, and the rhythm of the 5/7/5 syllable count gets more natural.

Mushter,

I've seen that your world has been fraught with upset and disappointment lately. I'm sorry about that. I hope you have better times in the future. Glad to be able to calm you down. Look for more in this vein soon.

Bill,

It really feels easy to keep coming back and writing when I have all this positive feedback!

--Look for another one tomorrow or the next day, folks. Again, thanks for coming by.

Spirit Of Owl said...

Reading this, I find myself carried on a rhythmic ride, and I'm captured by the imagery. Particularly, "His eyes, wolf yellow" speaks to me, at least, of some ferral being who is surviving an unforgiving urban world. Scars and scratches, indeed. Thank you for your poem.

Patrick M. Tracy said...

Spirit of Owl,

Thanks for your comment. I've seen you around at Braleigh's site, and I'm honored that you paid me a visit. Though perhaps left unsaid in this one, I see it as a post apocalyptic vision of sorts, when humanity is reduced once more to the tribe of wanderers, touching the leviathan's bones of their past as they search for a place to dig in and exist.

Ken,

I can always rely on you to appreciate the subtler moments and images. I'm willing to wait on whatever pace you can maintain, in terms of looking in on my poetry. There's no pressure. I'm just posting them as they become available.

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