art – Page 9 – One Woman's Quest

Soul Pulls

“What in your life is calling you, when all the noise is silenced,
the meetings adjourned…the lists laid aside,
and the wild iris blooms by itself in the dark forest…
what still pulls on your soul? “
– Rumi

I dwell in silence
meetings adjourned
list groceries

Former self faded
sorrowful shadow
definition slipped

I am the wild iris
pushing forward
in darkness, unseen

In contemplation
future doors heavy
snowy the path

If I follow light
I find promise
a verdant valley

I am guided
no destination
only presence

Physical constraints
merely distraction
I am the message

Light, shepherd
dreamer, woman
warrior, goddess

My soul pulls
invites passage
I am ready.

(Written in response to my weekly challenge – opening quotation. After meditating on Rumi’s words the image emerged and later this poem.)

My ARt, Another’s Words

inkblots mutate
 to form pictures,
 alphabets,
 stories
 I did not create

***

decorated trees
 sway to songs 
 emanating from
 masked lips
 imagining smiles
 that reach
 twinkling toes and 
 luminous tips 

(Words are from Reena's Exploration challenge.  Art my own.)

Solitude (3)

Solitude.
I dream of
panoramic
silence –
breathtaking
boundless
sanctity.

Solitude.
Wrapped in separateness
cardboard walls fallen
curling corners of instability –
no refuge in stillness.

Solitude.
Smothering starkness
madness reverberating
canyons of aloneness
overbearing.

Solitude.
Persevere
regale moments
feathered encounters
faces on screens
tenderness
in voices.

Solitude.
Grace finds me
mercy lifts soul
possibility
opens the door
panoramic.

(This is a rewrite of an older poem, last appearing here in August, 2018. I submit it for Reena’s Exploration challenge #163. Please visit her post for a most inspiring video. Art my own.)

Erasable

Paper me over
with carnal designs, I am
hourglass losing
myself in the shift – pencil
sketches facing erasure.

(Tuesdays I borrow from Twitter @Vjknutson. Art mine)

Frames

Picture-perfect life
who doesn’t aspire?

I’ve reframed the image
time and time again

Searched for definition
in 5′ x 7′ then 8′ x 10′

But a creative soul
cannot be confined

frames now accents
for the life that flows.

For Reena’s Exploration Challenge #159. Images mine.

Secret Keepers

(Disclaimer: I am submitting this poem for Reena’s Exploration challenge: horror. The poem arose from a nightmare, and my be triggering for some readers.)

They always take the back roads,
virginal snow-covered lanes
lined with trees: pastoral views

Unmarked routes, out of sight,
use the innocence of landscape
to blot out their dark intentions

Pristine picture perfect scenes
lull the unsuspecting; breath-
taking vistas: secret keepers

The roads still exist in my dreams
the trees like soldiers, stiff and stark
stripped of their magical allure, now

guard the memories, painted red
with loss of purity; I had not
guessed the danger of woods

child mind incapable of conceiving
what wolves roamed in nature
the blood of their victims crimson

stains forever etched in silhouette
the shrillness of their screams
now silent echoes in the night.

(Secret Keepers first appeared here September of 2016. Art my own.)

Tree of Life

Drawn to trees
ink chasing lines
yearning for definition

How to capture
strength…beauty…
such profound calm

Even as the regal Walnut
towers over this place
she dwells within me

I know
I feel her
she seeks expression

My Tree of Life.

(In Response to Eugi’s Weekly prompt: Tree of Life. I have been obsessed with drawing trees. The featured image is the beginning of a series that keeps drawing me in. Others in the series below.)