INVISIBLE FLAME
Her house looks virtuous.
Flowers like
butterflies
hover over clay pots
on the front porch.
An orange cat gazes
out
a window besieged with
ivy
bearing white stars.
I ring the doorbell.
Inside, a dog goes
wild
but when I enter, she
raises
a paw. We shake hands.
The woman who lives
here
loves the sea. She has
found
amber in her wood
floors
the kitchen is tiled
in aqua and coral.
Home as an oasis
of filtered sunlight,
an escape from the endless
tunnels of hospital
work.
After supper, she sits
at the slender
virginals.
Sixteenth century
sound
fills the house.
The gentle-faced
beagle
leans against her leg.
She rescues beagles
for the same reason
scientists seek them:
their trust and patience.
‘Let me see the way
things are,’
is her Celtic prayer.
She views the present
through history, and
so
is aware that the
peace
of her neighbourhood is
fragile.
Her green eyes are
shaded
by the future she sees
in history.
You can no more change
the future, she says,
than you can alter the
past.
She’s vaguely aware
of a history her cells
guard.
In her dreams, stones
are hurled at her and
she
has to flee her amber
oasis.
Her long hair is red
the tradition is
ancient.
She does not linger
on the front porch.
Unseen eyes are
connected
to unknown desires.
Inside the house she
sings
to an invisible flame.
LATE NIGHT RADIO
to my favourite radio station
and everyone listening,
all of us in the dark
in unknown places
reaching out
you may be driving
along the highway
that seems to go on
forever
or calling from some
cabin
hidden in the Rockies
you may be stretched
out
on your bed in the
motel
along the way to
destiny
or you may be in a
mansion
where the only Other
is the live-in
housekeeper,
maybe you are pacing
the floor
while your family
dreams
you with worries
for your country
and the planet
you who feel closer
to space aliens
than to your new neighbours
you who want to escape
the
spiralling-down-present
you who fear the
future
you who love this
earth
who rescue those in
distress
you whose song
floats across the
desert –
you have a family
you don’t know –
we are everywhere
listening to your breathing
hearing the unspoken
we are stepping
between you and the void
here’s a hand – take it—
to steady us both.
NIGHT TRAVEL
We are the silent ones
outside your sympathy
we dress to a
different code
our speech evades your
rules
the graveyard shift
was made for us
we do the dirty work
your comfort requires
our hands are rough
you call us trash
we fight the wars
you pretend to protest
we are the useless old
muted by your drugs
the unvisited patients
you let die in the
hospital
we are the ones
choking
in your wombs as you
gas us
we have x-ray vision
we see what you can’t
we make no excuses
we expect no justice
your words sear our
skins
and thin our bones
we no longer listen
as you talk, talk,
talk…
we prefer dancing
and we do it furiously
no words is our bond
we pledge by the stars
we are the silent ones
we travel by night.
NOTICE
I’m no longer a human being
not that I minded
being one
but have merely moved
on
or out, not sure which
I don’t shop
don’t do bars or
concert halls
no musical beds for me
no corporate
smorgasbord
no activists’
accusations
no stealing from
others
no admiring the
leader’s mask
or watching wannabes
compete
for power over me
no giving them money
for more guns than
they know
what to
do with
don’t care who did
what to whom
as an excuse to do it
to a third party
I won’t cage life that
flies, swims
likes to
explore
needs its family and
some territory
and I won’t pay others
to do it
for me
I think we’ve reached
our quota
of bulldozing other
creatures’ homes
not interested in spiritual
face-lifts --
an increasingly big business
I’m out of here
the humanity part
not leaving though
love this planet too
much
even some humans
I’ll hang around
mingle just as if I’m
human
FOLLOWING THE SUN
As you flee
and if you haven’t yet
you will
one thing or another
the mess you made of
your life
some illness the
doctor
will only make worse
gangs ruling your back
alleys
a government following
your private words
and diagnosing your
thoughts
armed military units,
faces
obscured, going door
to door
yes, you will try to
escape
our lot here
searching for the
Garden
which we dream about
or perhaps remember
flowers outside our window
light dancing in our
path
songbirds healing
secret wounds
the Garden located
somewhere
west of where you live
and that’s where you
head
following the sun
going over the edge
in order to start
anew.
Lilija Valis, author of Freedom on the Fault Line, has lived on three continents, during times of war and peace, riots, demonstrations and festivals. She
has been published in literary and e-zine magazines and nine anthologies. Before the COVID pandemic, she read her work solo or with one or two musicians in bistros, at various literary, musical, dance and political/philosophical events, as well as in run-down theatres and private homes, in Vancouver and the United States. She has performed with a group at two Vancouver Fringe Festivals and, as one of the winners, at San Francisco’s Artist Embassy International Dancing Poetry Festival at the California Palace of the Legion of Honor. She has two CDs out, one solo and the other with two musicians
Web
presence:www.lilijavalis.com
http://pursuitofmisery.wordpress.com
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