The Blue Vineyard Of Voo Shining Stone: LET ME NOT AS OTHER MEN

The Blue Vineyard Of Voo Shining Stone: LET ME NOT AS OTHER MEN: Let Me Not As Other Men Let me not as other men, Turn my face from hurt From beggars with their empty hands, D...

The Hunter and The Hunted

 

The Hunter and The Hunted



My skin is different from yours                                               
It glows in moonlight
And burns in noon day brightness;
And yours is brown and burnished and beautiful
(Even to the eyes of the vanquished.)

How many moons I have been enslaved,
I do not know
I am a servant here with gold pierced ears
And I never learned to read the scrolls
Not written on men’s hearts.

Your people take joy
In hunting the proud and free,
Of which I am a daughter
Though underneath the pinpoint of your stare,
I clinch my fists and keep my face downcast.

But in my soul,
I know you know
That I am running free beyond this desert,
Climbing mountains and wading streams
And fleeing from your dark and hungry eyes.

Silken veils and chains of silver,
They cannot make me cower at your feet
The voices of my fathers call out in my dreaming
Warn me of the darkness 
Of your rivers and desires.

And yet, sometimes,
When moonlight falls,
And midnight breezes play their songs,
The harshness of the desert fades
And this cool oasis bids me stay.

But my heart is hard of hearing
And though it sways me,
I will not bend or break my vows
And so I serve you and I curse you
Through many watches of the sun and stars.

You walk alone tonight beside the river
Behind the rushes, I watch you go
Into the trees with their black blankets
You’re just a man, I see, without your armor
How tall, yet small and lonely you seem to me.

Running now with feet of fire,
I hide in shadow as I pursue your presence
Stalking you as you walk in night shade, unaware
Seeking what my soul seeks
With cold, unfeeling steel clutched in my hand.

Hunting you,
I think how good it feels to run,
How sweet the night tastes on my homesick tongue,
How the tyranny of your beautiful people
Has spoiled the ancient purity of mine.

I will show no mercy (for none have you shown me)
Even as I danced for you in firelight,
Fed you from my fingertips in starlight
Toiled for you a thousand dawns of daylight
And never knew the tender touch of love.

Rising with the midnight moon,
A cry of anguish, startling as a storm
Keens and wails and stops me in my tracks,
Shakes me to the core in heart confusion,
Drops me to my knees upon the ground.

You lift your hands to Deity I know not
In a language I have not yet mastered,
And barely understand
Beyond the no’s and yes’s of my slave’s commandments
(For obedience cares not if you comprehend).

In breathless wonderment, we listen,
The Deity, the silent sky and I
To mournful pleas to be released from torment,
From longings of a heart, broken and torn
More puzzling still: My name upon your lips.

I can wait no longer, this I reckon
For soon your weakness will pass
And the man be gone and the tyrant arise
And I will be his slave forever
If freedom is my fortune, I will find it in your death.

Your head turns as I rush at you,
The silver blade gleaming, and a heart that pounds
With blood and fury and a thing so strange
That it trembles my upraised and uncertain hand
Glowing in moonlight as it falls upon your face.

You do not move, I do not move
And time stands still between us
A cry issues from a mouth and I swear I know not whose
The hunter and the hunted, caught in traps that they have laid,
I stand a victor looking down


Into your brown and hopeful eyes.

©by Voo
March 23, 09
2:20 a.m. © 2009
face by Mark

By The Rivers Dark by Leonard Cohen

 the song that inspired this poem............

The Blue Vineyard Of Voo Shining Stone: DANCING LIKE DELILAH

The Blue Vineyard Of Voo Shining Stone: DANCING LIKE DELILAH: Dancing like Delilah Dancing like Delilah danced In robes of silken red As she swirled to charm the secrets Out of...

Man With A Hat

Man  With  A  Hat

Hat on heart, he stands there looking lonely

Gazing into my eyes and through them past my soul

Toward some unknown inferno

Blazing quietly in a distant void

Now his forehead creases and his eyebrow lifts

And he smiles a tiny smile which makes me squirm, 

Not knowing if it is for me or for the girl

From yesterday who still lives in his mind

Man with a hat, simple, yet debonair, wistful as a child

And deep as Rodin's Thinker

Always he will live on my living room wall

In the gold gilded frame over the ancient piano

Looking at me with his melancholy face

And the hat that another woman gave him

But always knowing, both of us

That it was my camera and my love

That took the picture.

©by Voo

To Leonard

                                                 I'm Your Man

                                           by the late great Leonard Cohen

The Rain Man And The Moon

 

The Rain Man and the Moon

He stands in twilight, dreaming now

Of all he could have been

The hero rushing toward the foe

Like an eagle on the wind.

He tastes the sweetness, bitter tinged

Of life and love and loss

The pile of treasures in his heart

Grown higher with each toss.

He thinks about the eagerness

He felt to tackle such

Before he knew the false from true

Before he knew too much.

When every day was holiday

And every night was bliss

When love would fall there at his call

In a lovely stranger's kiss.

Round every corner, beckoned

Adventures for his soul

Searching high and low and far

For glitter and for gold.

Till thieves broke in and robbed him

Took eagerness and bliss

Bound him in his own gold chains

And left him lost like this.

But he has one, last precious gift

That can't be lost or taken

He holds it there, this gift so rare

In a soul that feels forsaken.

The Rain Man reaches out his hand

Beholds the moon up high

Begs for rain on parched dry land

With teardrops in his eyes.

The moon looks down from heaven

Beholds the Rain Man's pleas

Sends a message to the clouds

As the man falls to his knees.

The thunder wakes in fury

The lightning lifts her face

The rain falls round the Rain Man's feet

And he thanks the sky for grace.

So little now, does he have left

This gift, this wondrous thing

To make it rain, to ease the pain

Still makes his sad heart sing.

He stands in moonlight, smiling now

When the storm has passed and flown

Shining in the moon's embrace

Till the lonely night has gone.

©by Voo Shining Stone

May 03, 08

7:16 p.m.

*thanks Mark C. for your face above*

Gains and Losses

Gains and Losses

In the game of life, we lose a lot

Much more than we gain

And spend half our time out of our minds

And the other, half insane.

Our columns add up in tiny measures

But the minus columns are long

We hum our tunes about the moon

And never learn the song.

We walk the streets with solemn feet

And pass people we could love

But we don't have the time, we are so blind

To needs we don't think of.

Stock markets rise, stock markets fall

And we throw our money down

And riches lose or poverty gain

We swagger like a clown.

He who dies with the most toys wins

The saying goes today

But the winner loses all the same

When he throws his friends away.

And lovers come and lovers go

And people pass from Earth

And living flows so very slow

Between the death and birth.

We poets write in dark of night

Our prose for other's hearts

We see the love that others share

And of which we have no part.

And after death our fame may rise

And our verses published be

But the adoration given then

Our eyes will never see.

For poets only feel the losses

The suffering and pain

We do not know the face of love

Or blessings ever gain.

But if Heaven waits beyond the veil

As a reward for our trust

Then all our losses will fade away

And blow away like dust.

Perhaps this life was never meant

To be a poet's paradise

But through the preaching of our prose

Save other men from vice.

I cannot say, I do not know

I only know I yearn

To lose the losses and gain the gains

And to share what I have learned.

©by Voo 

Jan 6, 05