Volcano

Travelling Questions&Answers in Wilds/WaterWays

Day One - West of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.
Crow

Unfurling the red.

A gentle snap.

You ‘re at the well.

Are you awake?

Forget, let all drop, abandon shyness.

Water pours through gravel and heat waves.

From a distant swing

the call squeaks a vibrating past memory.

Are you thirsty?

The crows remain.

Follow father’s black blood line

back to grandmother.

Past the pass,

behind the Crow,

where mountain lions cross

and mushrooms flourish.

Not time to mine the black coal

or mime false black diamonds of youth.

Let sweet mists disappear the dams

and resevoirs of Old Man River.

Leave behind the glorious foothills

of Pincher Creek and Head Smashed In.

Tradition longs for past wanderings.

Pass the past,

behind the Crow,

where mountain lions crossed

and mushrooms flourished.

Yes I am awake.

Yes I am thirsty.

The delicate doe stretches

beginning her solitary twilight foraging.

Day Two - West of Calagary, Alberta.
BearVoice

The voice stands wrapped & quivering.

The milky Bow River washes orange.

Fast fed from glacial run-off,

after a night of thunder and sheets of rain,

the feet warm the ice cold current

waving east.

Tiny strawberries clothe the path to the water.

Three cricket exo-skeletons close in the eye.

A delicate flower disppears soundlessly into the forest

where mirrored orange traces rise in lush poppy hearts.

Shiny black bear halts all in her path.

The cub blissful and gentle protected sniffs.

I’ve seen this bear once briefly before dusk

running the waves amoung heavy snowed cedars

dripping wet on a brilliant morning in Manning Park.

No need for food.

Nourishment is found.

Thank you for the chantrelles.

What do you want to know?

The old goat

on the craggy rock ledge

moves his head abruptly.

Despite blended grey silver grey

allows himself to be seen.

What do you know?

What do you know?

I ask silently.

Don’t tell me stranger.

I know you as mountain creature.

What do you know?

The stellar jay startles me and laughs,

beak stuffed full of bread decoying from tree to tree.

“No such thing as a free meal!”

Raven screams oracles into the tropical green.

Visit the temple of accumulated fragrance.

Share place with water striders and dragonflies

as they float and skim the surface.

Skunk cabbage pods leave drum mallets.

Elderberries intoxicate beckoning into a world of black mystery.

I step high to the west

wanting to soar high.

Higher.

High to tighten the green.

She can’t be lost.

The grizzly leaves teeth markers.

The old ways are practiced.

We have much higher to go and even further

to descend into the night.

Dark spirit catcher and wind

bring mystery eyes and sleep.

Fly high.

Day Three: Cultus Lake, British Columbia.
EagleEye

The jay vanishes letting me know I am watched.

Gold plunges the lake by ancient cedar’s dangling tips.

I linger on the rock washed edge.

Footstepping warm water.

Three tiny steamlets empty shock cold,

below the surface.

Still wind over the lake.

Eye: (soundlessly) Do you see me?

The musican’s hand touches the edge of a volcano.

Rumbles, shakes and eruptions belch green yellow.

Funnels and lightning everywhere.

Volcano lady pointed up to three volcanoes in a line.

He ran and ran and ran into the storm along the shore.

Three unseen though visible light paintings remain.

Eye: (sighing) Do you remember me?

The actor feels his pulse

detecting no movement.

Undresses under the ancient cedar.

The temptation is to seek advice

from the dangling branches.

Lake listen to the coffin or canoe.

Leave a bundle in the damp, crowded air.

Wade in marking place.

Something stirs in the calm.

Just for a moment gliding under the skin.

Lurking. Algae grab and pull.

Suddenly the body washes ashore

like a massive log we name driftwood.

Flee over small, sharp, broken, black gravel.

Run. Shiver. Dress. Morning passes. Leaf falls.

Eagle Eye: (blinks) . . .

Wren or was it the Robin who smiled at the story

of the falling and rising mists over Cultis Lake.

The eye blinked.

“Yes, the eagle blinks spaces which enter other worlds.”

When I first came, that night a year ago, the blue heron

stood majestic, inscrutable and respectful.

Then lifted into graceful flight over the furious water.

Your brooding is known.

Day 4 - Vancouver Island, British Columbia

SalmonRun

Snaps alive in salty wind. Orange jelly eggs.

On the beach.

Breathe the waves.

Turn back and listen to the roar.

Run the washed, pebble strewn coast line.

Wash inside. Wash outside. Touch nothing. Build endurance.

Sweep west and east and west again. Listen. Take time.

Dance the spine, backbone of invisible cities.

A bright sunflower brilliant light shines.

A place comes.

Smile. You are invisible.

It is good to be strong.

Prepare to cross over. Other worlds wait.

At the portal offer seven salmon berries.

They are bitter this early summer.

The night brought apocalyptic dreams of vast

technological landscapes, desolate cities,

wireless power poles crossing endless empty

asphalt highways and wind catchers

stagnant standing the propellors still.

I awake heart racing - need water.

Surging waves leap the sky.

Gravel chatters in cold rain.

Stagger out, shake off the wetness.

It is written: “ripple, eddie, chops & swells washouts and turbulence

some holes are ‘keepers’, they won’t let you in.”

The ravens grumble.

“Yes you can see.

Yes you have remembered.

Can you face the face.”

Interlude/The Snake

A wrapped staff pokes and prods. Checking for support.

Gathering shells, sea weed and rings for unknown reasons.

The ever present bear lumbers about at a good distance.

The blue opens and behind the face of the rock wall,

algae stalagites drip porous green on slimy rock.

Sunlight dances to the music of the tidal pools.

Other worldly craters and black lava like embedded

chunks, perfectly shaped balls, form a crude circle.

The wrist wrapping, snapping colours of blue, yellow and green

tame nothing but excite the spirit. A grey spotted sea lion lazily

approaches.

Pause.

Long green grass floats. The snake splashes a rainbow mist.

The undulations peel away skin to the silent ullalations.

The watersheds beckon. Be careful of the trickster squalls.

Fall into tidewater. The shells break. Departing soaked the

whipping mist and cold rain chills to the bone. Sea pups wave

goodbye. Touch the purple sea urchin. Let the stars recognize

the depth. One door is all you need to enter

Travelling Questions&Answers in Wilds/WaterWays

Day 5: Juan de Fuca Straight

Fire Bathes Furiously Red in Golden Waves

Flee down, run down, secret down

with heel heavy haste

through deep forest brocade

into the open ocean

carying and calling fire and light.

The sun raises steam

anticipating a wild entry.

Light curls at the edge of the waves,

foetus listening to the dawn and the deep

and the distant whale song of a mothers womb.

Fire faces Ocean

Mediate the directions,

stretch full the circle,

signal the infinte waves.

The beacon revolves

in sunless noon day and black night.

A still point on an endless wave beaten coast.

Fire meets Ocean.

Dip to bring red brown sea weed into the air.

This healing colour casts a ceremonial bronze invitation.

Wave catcher rolls low, rolls with, rolls to peeks of passion.

Stance must be altered.

Lift

be strong

supported and free.

Dive

harpoon like

spearing golden waves

clutching emptiness.

Curl

wash, wash, wash

take leave.

The sun questions

“Did you enter the ocean brown to be healed?”

It is a time of healing.

Fire enters Ocean.

The return of the Snake.

Three slither for cover

startled from sunning.

On snake point

the living shed skin

and turn to rich blue.

Ocean.

Travelling Questions&Answers in Wilds/WaterWays

Afterword

The Temple

The old one sings.

The old wanderer,

on the edge

of civilization,

leans against

an oriental vase

and sings in solitude

outside of time.

The seer

on the stone

sings from the

other world.

Sings a

flamed song

with authority

of mind

and memory

about regeneration.

Sings a song of sight.

The cascading white

baby’s breath,

the dried miniture

red roses,

and the two

tall peacock

feathers

listen.

Bathe seven times

at the threshold.

Sleep. Awake.

Sleep. Awake.

Step internal

into the external

beyond.

The dead escape

through the jade disc.

See the middle,

immanental,

transcend

the precise

empty

prescence.

A sudden revelation.

Do not forget

the beginning.

No violence.

No birth passages.

No pregnant potentiality.

No fertile gateway.

No map.

Do not travel north

to property woman,

known by her

curly grey hair,

who promises riches

if only you hear

her child cry.

Remember

the warning.

Bear trap

off the trail.

Silence pours

between the verses.

Flowing, glowing, blowing.

The sparks of light within

may be fanned into flame

flame into fire

fire into star

a star closer into sun

& the sun

moves behind

the mountain.

The palm

transforms

the silence

clapping,

clapping,

clapping.

Listen.

The staff

taps searching

for words,

deeds and

utterances.

The rod

pierces

the darkness

to set

in order.

Enter.

Travelling Questions&Answers in Wilds/WaterWays

Coda

. . .written just before it is too dark to see. . .

Five flames surround

the white umbrella.

A twilight wind rustling sky.

A calm surrounds the fingers

which hold a sphere.

A green world.

Toss, turn, bob and bounce.

We shape the world consistantly.

Call a star and it appears even though

there all the time, brighter and brighter strong

minding the eye into the night - goodnight.

Image seer boy draws a volcano.

The spoken for voice speaks like a true little cat.

Sad to leave, to let go, wipe the tears, turn, go - we never leave.

Umbrella in the sky points to the dipper.

Cables converge. Long ago another boy

made a telescope to track Galelio’s moons.

Grind, polish, measure the shallow concave mirror as the father watches.

Focal point over thirty years away.

Reflect Self. Good Night.

Light morning brings fresh water.

The rushing water challenges night dreams

into full daylight smothing ruffled feathers.

Relentless journey through prone silence

into walking the vocabulary.

Needful stretch. How to meet the night?

The painful questions scratch.

The itch begs action not answers.

Thoughtful sun brightens and warms.

Take care.

Good Night.