Toads In Tandem: The Oak in Autumn

I could have never imagined even in my wildest dreams to be paired with Fireblossom! I still remember our conversation where the two of us decided to collaborate next year; and then Kerry discovering our shared enthusiasm and giving us the opportunity to appear in October! Needless to say we were absolutely delighted! 

We decided to let our love of nature guide us through our collaborative effort and here is what we came up with. Hope you guys like our poem.

The Oak in Autumn

Lovers and lunatics favor the oak.

Say anything--the oak will still be there,

With its odd-shaped leaves, inconstant as smoke

At their edge, but shy to leave the branch bare.

The thing that enchants, is what’s not shown there,

The mystery of a season--or a smile;

Madly bold or nightjar soft--autumn’s wile.

Oh how can I sleep with leaves all around, 

Wavering to gold from adumbral red.

Your touch imprinted on sensual ground, 

As lips opened amorously and pledged--

Of love being gentle and yet strongest thread. 

At length you had observed most conscious flame,

Erratic and bright as I called your name.

The oak is always last to lose its leaves,

Standing unchanged as if it didn't know

Of nature altered in you and in me;

Disbelieving of first November snow.

And so, I wonder if you really know

How hard it is for me to understand

Why you still smile but then withdraw your hand.

It’s undoubtedly an autumnal day, 

As moody-sweet as words we scarcely spoke. 

Can you feel sombre wind and twilight grey

Round and round the irrepressible oak--

As such reminiscence from slumber woke

Your resolve unchanging has deeper pierced 

A reckless heart hidden in rhyme and verse.

 Source

The form we chose is called Rhyme Royal which is a stanza of seven 10-syllable lines. It was popularized by Geoffrey Chaucer and termed as 'royal' because of its imitator, James I of Scotland, who had employed the form in his own verse. The rhyme scheme is: ababbcc

I remember feeling both nervous and excited as the weeks passed by, and how Shay's fiery attitude and good humor led us along the way. Thank you Shay for being such a wonderful writing partner and Kerry once again, for assigning such a lovely project to us.

 ***

Toads in Tandem: Creature Comforts

Image copyrighted Isadora Gruye Photography

Greetings Toads,

Kim and Izy are here to unleash our Toads in Tandem piece for 2017.  We can’t wait for you to read it. But first, a few words of introduction.

Kim says - The only signs I was aware of, regarding distance in miles and culture between Izy and me, were one or two phrases or spellings. Not knowing much about her, I decided to look up Izy on the Internet and was impressed by her poetic activity, which was somewhat daunting. However, once we got going, it was more like working with a version of myself in a different universe and we riffed on each others’ ideas and fragments with ease.

Izy says - I was so excited when Kim was announced as my toad in Tandem. I  loved the idea of working with a poet whose style is different than my own. Where I tend to be stark and obscure, Kim is color and concrete. When I want to burn the page down, Kim brings beautiful form and word architecture. I gotta say, I was so impressed with how fearless Kim is in her writing.Thanks so much for the tango, Kim!!!!

Toads in Tandem bonus: we’ve included audio files of each of us reading the poem in full. If you have a few moments, you can listen to how each of us chose into interpret and read each line a little differently! Also....our accents!!!!

Creature Comforts

Your lover drapes me on your shoulders,

sunlight strays through crinkled linen,

tickles your unblemished skin.

I protect your sensitivity,

remind you of marmalade

and flyover territory:

fat ants marching on clothes lines

hung tight between windows uncleaned

and chipped by gossip houndstooth.

I am imbued with pepper scent of grass cut

before the heat,

before the thick of summer

leaned over the typewriter

to ash its cigar across the whole of July.

You had me on loan

the day autumn mist rolled in,

shrouded everything,

left cold droplets in your hair

and smeared its sheen on bare skin.

Now you touch my woollen fibres

to your nose, inhale the scent

and I’m matted with tears.

There is a silence so quiet,

it cuts sharply.

The cables are knit so tightly

breathing becomes labored

in the lemon dusk.

Have the signals got crossed?

Is there no one poised and ready

to decipher these dashes and pauses?

Tomorrow, newspaper ink will be thin

and wash away in street puddles.

And here, the coffee stains on my cuff

will sing boldly on their own.

Winter rattles dust

from window panes,

and you still bring me to bed,

despite my jersey stretched nine years thin

and twisted torn at the hem.

The flat scent of last night’s fire

falls on cold sheets,

falls on your cold, freckled knees.

You sweat through the night,

happily cocooned

in your empty bed,

dreaming of a lover’s gift

infused with perfume, the bottle lit

by flames and fairy lights.

Faces merge in shadow,

bask in afterglow,

buffeted by music -

an old long-playing record

by a favourite band

crackles on the deck.

When the spring breeze coaxes

leaves to bud and rain

lifts worms to the sidewalk

to bake on the concrete,

you pull me over your feet.

You stomp proudly through mud

and dropped blossoms,

each step a drum beat

louder than you ever imagined.

Your toes curl and flex against the solidity

of our rubber-soled security,

a comfortable pairing against puddles

and slippery situations –

galoshes for all seasons.

Virgo's Beatitudes

Today's in tandem poem is written by Angie Walker and Susie Clevenger. Angie and I came late to the pairing and virtually had no background on one another other than our poetry shared through the garden. After a few questions about ideas and the mutual agreement it would be without rhyme (big sigh of relief on my part) we found inspiration from a quote by Henry Rollins. We were quite amazed how quickly it came together. It appears September's Virgo was happy to be our muse. 

"We know that in September, we will wander through the warm winds of summer's wreckage. We will welcome summer's ghost." ~ Henry Rollins

there should be romance
in the ghost leaves of summer,
their drought scarred palms lifted
to capture Aphrodite's sigh

suspended from the umber pause
between changing seasons, Virgo
speaks beatitudes from her book
of sun inked memoirs

blessed be

the dreamers,

the visionaries

who pull light from blind mist,

conjurers with ink and paint,

bold stargazers of the night walk

blessed be
the poetry lovers
who steal pink skies
and stop sleuthing them
when it's no longer July forever
noses back to grindstone for at least 3 weeks

blessed be
the blood September can't stop letting
while she re-members
her bodiful heedless ventures,
her saturated sweetnesses,
seamless heat, sea to foam

blessed be
the exalted mother May I's,
the steamy air of Aphrodite
with pomegranates jewels
positioned on her tongue just
so it comes as a relief to get plucked

blessed be
don't you think at all?
behold the gods
in their Grecian white robes
and concur they look much less
like whores in brighter bridal months?

blessed be
a cousin's view
through the back door glass
of broken light where St. Michael
keeps on reciting what he's recited so well
through corsets with full-on lips

blessed be
the give-up of playful rain,
the build-up to "give up
on all other worlds
except for the one to which,
and for which you know you belong"

blessed be
the marked apparitions,
the calendar numbers circled in red
underlined and scribbled beneath,
"protect my soul 'neath thy wing,
with the shade of thy wing protect."

Anima and Animus, from Dream to Flesh

If you could read the thoughts of your wickedest Dream, what would your Dream write about you? We pondered the question, with all the seriousness it deserved (we infiltrated our Dreams’ journals), and present to you the findings:

Whisking delicate

tea into a heady froth

to delight my love,

my bliss is found inside her

enjoyment of my strivings.

I read her soul bright

while feasting on all her dark.

She writes me real…

at midnight, her wild tongue dreams

me alive, tasting her mine.

She gifts me with flesh

substantial enough to touch

past imagined boundaries.

The only reality I want

is the one that she creates.

When morn devours night,

the moon and I yearn for her

soul dancing in mine:

Anima and Animus

as mind in flesh, me in her.

I wish my name on

your lips, under the sunlight,

a dream crafted real—

I will spell ink into flesh,

“Words be dreams and dreams be words.”

the process…

- At first, we were going to craft a poem inspired by the art of writing and the current socio-political madness. But the pain was much too deep and dark and, well… too much. So, we switched to a topic we both love and that often brings us much pleasure *cough*: dreams. We played around with the dream and dreamer shown in Jorge Luis Borges’ “The Circular Ruins”, danced with Jung’s Anima and Animus, and dressed the whole thing up in tanka. 

- We each wrote two stanzas—imagining our speakers exchanging adventures at a dream bar (dream bars are real, really). We wrote the last stanza together, on the phone, serenaded by much squealing. We hope you enjoy the result as much as we delighted in the process.

Magaly and Rommy *still squealing*

the song: “When I Dream at Night”, by Mark Anthony
the visual art: “Hidden Intentions”, by Ana Fagarazzi

Exploring Eternity, In Tandem with Paul and Sherry

Greetings, friends! It is Paul Scribbles and Sherry Blue Sky here, presenting our poem in tandem. When our names were first paired, I was intrigued. Paul and I didn’t know each other well, and our styles are very different. I expected our exercise would be interesting, but I think we were both somewhat astonished at how easily it came together, and the direction it took. We plunged deep.

The tandem idea was always interesting to me and Sherry sent an email that landed when I was delivering a training program in Kuala Lumpur. Sherry and I had not had much contact other than poem comments and so this was a blind date of sorts. There followed a short email conversation and finally after some gentle nudging I sat down to write when I landed back in the UK. I was jet lagged and unsure about how to proceed so I began where I was. In the dark.

The beginning was open enough that it left me a lot of scope for a reply. And then the poem just took off.

We enjoyed this exercise so much that, once we reached what we thought was the end of the poem, we continued the conversation a bit further in Part II.  We offer the result to you in hopes you enjoy it.

Paul Dear Photography

ETERNITY’S FACE

Into the dark I move.
Arms out, eyes blind for now.
Feeling for the way ahead
with feet and with hands.

Use caution, wayfarer.
This way, there be dragons.
Who sent you journeying?
What is it that you seek?
Do you have a question for

Wild Woman of the woods?

My senses are my caution

and dragons I have met and slayed.

I answered my own call

and so seek only truth.

This question I ask of you.

What is it makes you wild?

It is the song of the sea,

the howl of a wolf, the way a tree

tells herself to me.

It's the beat of the drum, 

my heart's answering thrum.

It's the ancestors speaking

inside of me.

How does the land speak to you,

fellow pilgrim?

What secrets whisper to you

on the wind?

This land speaks to me with a voice

older than time itself.

An elemental whisper of the aes sidhe

carries itself within my soul

and sings to me of the temporal nature

of things.

I walk here now in the green.

I will also be gone

and only an echo remain.

What lies beyond oh wild woman?

I have peeked up and over

the brow of the hill

on the way to Eternity.

The ancients, ululating

a welcome song,

beckoned me with gnarled fingers.

I tried not to see.

There was a barren desert beyond,

and a river.

I heard the ferryman paddling

around the bend,

singing as he came for me.

Then I came back into my body.

Not time yet. Not yet.

Then it comes clear, my task

and the source of my beckoning.

I am to walk beyond the veil

into the land of my ancestors.

Into the ferryman's boat must I go

and across the great river,

and you, wild woman of the woods,

you must guide me there.

Death is that river, turbulent,

catching us up and

roaring us through rock-walled chasms,

green with weeping.

It plunges us into the maelstrom,

dashing us onto the rocks

so eagles may feed.

It swirls us 'round, then settles us,

lighter, and relieved of our earthly burden,

in peaceful ponds along the shore,

where coyote and wolf

may find us.

I will meet you there at twilight

on the last day.

Well met it is then and will be on that last day.

I am all swept up in that turbulence now.

Those eddies spin me beyond any idea of retreat.

So it is then that I must loosen this blanket of life,

so that in death I may come to the answer I seek,

that final truth which calls me across the waters,

and it is the knowing that I must die and relinquish all

which bears me forward to face my own face, born and dead.

Part II

I am dead. It is done.

I have crossed over the water’s threshold.

Life exists only on a distant shore now

and here a dark unknown surrounds me.

My faith was strong enough to leap but

now my heart crumbles and I am alone

with this void, this fear and an echo of my life.

Silent tears call out in vain. Where now?

Traveler, when there is no path,

the Way is the path.

Turn your face towards the void;

seek a glimmer of light.

In trust, we walked our earthly shore,

and now our quest is to discover

something More.

  

These words torment my mind.

Zen circles that spin me endlessly.

The void is all there is.

How can I face all ways at once?

My faith is lost and with it all trust.

Damned I am to dwell in darkness.

If the way is the path then my path

is to nowhere. I am lost.

Traveler, you are All Soul now.

Spirit sees in all directions

and will find its way.

Listen into the Wind.

Somewhere, there is an opening.

When you find it, you must enter,

for there is no going back.

Then darkness is my opening

and in that I now see the light.

I am made of nothing and of everything.

I am the wind and the space

into which it must blow.

I am the question and the answer.

I am life and death.

That one face, born and dead.

Paul Dear Photography

Paul: I was happy to begin the tandem poem as I tend to work very often from a place of ‘not knowing’ what is going to come when I write. Beginning felt natural. Then it was really just a statement of where I was in the process. In the Dark.

Sherry: When I received your first stanza, it left me wide open to respond and, instantly, the words began to flow. My Wild Woman persona showed up right on time, and began to speak. I just stepped out of the way.

Paul: Here the door opens to the poem. Now I’m on a journey and am quizzed about my motivation. In response I have to learn more about this Wild Woman. Who she is and what she is made of? Her answers evoke myth in me and ancestral voices. I mention the ‘aes sidhe’ who I have encountered in Irish mythology (my own heritage). This ancient race and our connection to the Earth are interwoven into my own story and so the idea brews now in my head of the ‘otherside,' the land beneath the sidhe, the otherworld. So I ask that question at the end of the stanza.

Sherry: I am of Irish heritage as well. Your reference to the “ancestral voices” spoke to me. That question was a great hook for me, as I have contemplated death and eternity many times in my work these recent years, when time is ever more finite. It was a pivotal question in the direction the poem took. Wild Woman was in full roar now, and I waited with anticipation to see what your character would say, and how she would respond. For it was clearly Wild Woman at the keyboard, and not me. Smiles.

Paul: It gets interesting here because the response lines up with the feeling that had been evoked in me earlier, and I now see that a threshold is present and must be crossed.

Sherry: Paul, I am curious about your closing line in Part I, the “facing your own face, born and dead”. Can you explain a bit about that?

Paul: Sometimes when I write a line I have no idea what it fully means. It just sounds or feels right. Later meaning may come. With this line that was very much the same. I remember thinking 'what do I really mean here?' Then you actually asked me!

After some thought and a little exploration of a few myths that were brought into a more conscious view, I think that this line for me is looking at the idea of Katabasis.

Born is where I am at this point....at the threshold....Dead is where I must go to find 'that other', be it a person or, as it turns out, an ‘awareness’.

Sherry: It reminds me of the Buddhist teachings about our “original face”, the one we had before we were born. I assume this is the face we reclaim after death, the Soul-face or Being that is our eternal essence, in life and in death, throughout our many lives.

It was with astonishment that I watched this poem become a journey into death and beyond. It was quite magical. It soon seemed necessary to both of us to continue with a Part II. One cannot leave a journey incomplete.

Paul: I agree with Sherry. Part II wrote itself out of need. The whole process of exploring the unknown only to discover we were looking at life and death was incredible. The writing of the poem mirrored the journey we wrote about. For me, in the context of the final piece, death was a liberation, complete and total, and whilst we talked about a possible part III, a return of some kind, I felt that the final stanza was final and Sherry concurred. There was nowhere to return from...or to.

Paul, this has been a most awesome and amazing journey. Thank you!

I am in complete agreement, Sherry. This has been a most enjoyable experience. I’m very happy with what we have created.

We hope you enjoyed this exploration of Eternity’s Face, Toad friends. We certainly enjoyed putting it together for you.