Author: miguel

As the heat of August afternoons
invaded your home above the
trees in this Mediterranean
port, we opened the windows, like
sails to catch a breeze, any
slip of wind, to comfort you.

From the street below us, the
sad sound of an accordion
floated up like a prayer, but
you, in your skirt of
fire, couldn’t hear it.

(Anyway, it was just another
prayer, like all of ours and
all of yours, none of which
were ever answered.)

It’s Winter now with
ice and snowdrifts
here in this mountain
village far from
your empty
bed on the other
side of this world.

I wanted to be with
you when you
left us, to be in the
crowd on the
platform waving and
crying as your
train pulled away with
the sound of our tears
growing fainter every
second until you could
barely see us anymore as
you passed into the white
silence with only the
comfort of knowing how
much we still see you,
still moving in the
empty spaces in
which you used
to bring your
light into our lives.

© J.M. Keating 2021

Raven rides the windy winter sky searching for a place to rest.

Below him underneath a cape of snow the forest sleeps in silence.

He sees a single leafless oak in the middle of a meadow at the

edge of the wood and thinks he hears the sound of a piano.

In a veil of whirling snow, he drops out of the clouds to settle on

a branch and watches with intense curiosity a man and woman dancing around the tree to the sound of music they think only they can hear.

The sound is tinny and archaic, like a waltz played in a music hall

in Paris by Ravel or Debussy in the weeks before the hollow drumbeats

of the First Great War.

 

the ribbon of the river becomes a ribbon of butterflies

 

the crust of ice on the lake buckles and cracks and

islands of ice the size of freight cars break apart from

the mother continent of winter and begin to flow south towards the sun.

being rapped out with tiny mallets on ice sickles

Her eyes are closed as her partner lifts her off the ground as if she weighed no more than an armful of leaves, but she smiles when he bends over her sleeping form to unbutton her blouse with his lips

Raven wonders at the strangeness of humans as he watches

Raven rides the wide windy sky searching for a place to rest.

It’s twilight and the Cat is tired. She and Raven played all day

in the wide, windy sky and danced the rumba in the treetops.

He tucks her into bed with a blanket he has made of leaves

and wants to sing a lullaby, but is afraid because his

voice sounds rough and raspy.

And yet when he begins to sing

Slumber my darling

Your Raven is near

Guarding your dreams

From terror and fear….

even the mice and the crickets of the forest become silent.

The Cat is too sleepy to understand his words.

She feels instead a longing in his voice.

And as she falls into her world of dreams,

his song coils around her in a ribbon of

saffron-colored petals.

©2010 J.M. Keating