Butterfly Dance

Butterfly Dance – Digital Photo Art “Butterfly Me” by V. Castellanos

I watch the mangrove’s dance in the dark,
Graceful hands of green, wax leaves, feet of rough gray bark.
I hear the waves beneath them, play a merry, rippled tune.
It was written on the night sky, by the white stars and the moon.

I smell the jasmine floating perfume, hear night-purple flowers call,
Walk with flickering mists of stars, and watch the fire flies fall.
I wander deep in shadowed jungles, under silver-blue moonbeams,
And, caress the hearts of pink hibiscus, swimming in their dreams.

The Gods of Earth are singing songs.  They ring out from afar.
They cross the mangrove sheltered night, and reach me on my star.
They call me to the forest, where the shadowed leaves were born,
They sing like mellow music from a silver, sea-shell horn.

They call me to the whispering trees, to where the moon rides low,
Across the midnight jungle, lit by the moon flower’s glow,
The echoes ricochet back, from the swollen, rising moon,
To reach me, in my jungle dream, or writing sea-sand rune.

They find me with the butterflies, with tiger wings of black and yellow,

Drifting in the river’s mist, through ‘glades perfumed and mellow,
Drifting, everywhere, entranced, I’m a marionette of the moonbeam’s shine.
I am dancing with the far flung stars, and I’m drunk on moonlight wine.

The Scarab’s Carousel

“The Scarab’s Carousel” Artist Unknown

The great, fat, scarab beetle,
Is rolling through the desert.
She imagines that her faience self,
Is burning in the sun;
Burning in the clamour,
Burning in the blue,
Of ancient Pharaoh’s painted eye,
In stones, and bones of sealed up tombs,
In jewels, and jars and sealed up rooms,
In winds that blow the sands on high,
And, sweep the broad, Saharan sky.

And, the carousel goes ’round and ’round.
The music does not stop.

There is ageless dust on angel’s feet,
The phases of the moon repeat.
The seasons of the sun return,
The sands and the sky and the white stars burn.

Lacquered blue shines the scarab sky.
The carousel horse rolls a rhinestone eye.
Horse rides up and, horse rides down,
Riders laugh, or cry, or frown.
A life is lost.
A life is found.
And, every life to a horse is bound,
All riding ’round and ’round.

Sunrise up, another day.
Then the sunset horse, rides the other way.
A turn and the fool becomes a king.
A child is born and, the scarabs sing.

Put both your arms ’round the rushing wind.
Kiss your lover and, hug your friend.
Again go up, go down, go ’round,
While angel’s dust falls on the ground.

A comet’s streak, a shooting star,
Turn ’round and wonder why you are.
Reach out to grab the golden ring.
If you win the prize, you’ll have everything,
And, you’ll hear the songs the scarab sings,
Of a million generations,
And, a million other things.

Of eggs and hatchlings,
Carcasses,
Tomorrow and today.
How every morn another comes,
And, someone goes away.
Tomorrow and tomorrow,
And, tomorrow,
And, today.
A million generations,
Each going out to play.

Comes night again,
Again comes day,
Some want to go.
Some want to stay.
And, some may not,
While others may.
This is the song,
This is the way.
And now, there’s nothing left to say.

The carousel keeps going ’round.
The music does not stop.

In the Furthest Reaches

In the Furthest Reaches,
There is a beast with spinning chakras,
Tossed and lost in the sea of time,
Full of fight and lust and light,
Always seeking control,
Bending the world to his will,
In a sea of dust and evergreen.

But, the Furthest Reaches are not,
So far away, today.
They are seeping into the landscape.
They are leaping over moons and meteors.
They are creeping up through the floorboards,
And, there is always something the beast is wanting.

Either God has given us hands,
So we can take what we want,
Or, we have chosen to focus our intentions,
And, have grown them on our own.
Anyway, we have them now,
And, that’s what makes the difference.

I am leaping over moons and meteors.
I have come out of the Netherworld,
Out of the Furthest Reaches,
And, my red and black, internal shadow,
Is seeping out of the underground,
Is leaping out of the abyss of my fear,
Is creeping up through my floorboards.
He is composed of all the energy of fight or flee,
The energy of survival,
The live-or-die energy.
He is my own howling beast,
Who belches anger,
Or, marches to glory.
He is always on my side,
Willing, fast and furious,
To fight every battle,
And, capable of acts more monstrous,
Than I can even imagine.

There is always something my beast is wanting,
And, I am always hungry.
My appetite is for nourishment.
My hunger for reproduction.
My desire is for acquisition,
For territory, for power,
For attention,
Fulfillment,
Sensuality, satisfaction,
Luxury and warmth;
All the reasons for being alive.

Above this, and beyond this, and connected to this,
Looms the inexorable, irrepressible urge to grow,
To take over. To be free. To get whatever I want,
To own, to be in control, to be the king,
With no one, ever, over me,
Neither man, nor nature, nor god.
I want to need neither justification nor judgement.
I want to answer only to myself.
I want to take over the world,
And, to rule, as I see fit, without limitations.
But, boy oh boy,
There had better be some limitations.
Some boundaries. Something that says, Stop,
Ravenous one.
Danger ahead.
This is the edge.
Enter here at your own peril.
This is the point of measurement.
The point of balance.
The point of sanity.
The tug-of-war dividing point, defining who I am.
This is the line between evil and good,
And, sometimes I am on shaking ground.
I don’t always know where I stand,
But, even in confusion,
Even when I am consumed by illusion,
I am always seeking control.

And, I am never at rest.
I have a heartbeat and a breath.
I have a center, an ego, a sun.
I have an internal wind.
A hot, emotionally propelled pulse,
An empathic receptacle,
Around which all of my planets revolve,
A living force field of muscle and nerve,
Of flow and feed,
Of need and greed,
Of sighs and atmospheric exchanges,
An inside-outside connection,
Which ranges,
From air to blood,
From breath to flood,
A rhythm of forward momentum and rest,
A give and take between energy and matter.
A continual transformation between the inert,
And, incredible animation,
As long as we both shall live.

Beyond my being,
I am what I do.
I am everything,
I ever have done or will do.
My fate is written in my hands.
My jaw is ready to shout,
Words clamouring and reaching out.
My web is made of soothing paws,
My web is made of clutching claws,
Grasping, grabbing, getting,
Or, generous gifts and soothing petting.
Arms uplifting, push and pull,
Steal from the world or make it full.

The voice I have says many things.
It screams and whispers, sweetly stings.
Questions, answers and explains,
My thoughts and feelings, losses, gains.

Ideas, ideals and speculations,
Instincts wide and intuitions,
Attitudes and rapt attentions,
Interventions and intentions.

I smell, I taste, I touch,
I feel, inside and out,
I seek to know what it’s all about.
I hear vibrations of the world,
I see the light of the universe.
I think about everything,
Upside down,
Inside out,
And, in reverse.

But, what, I ask you, would I be,
Without my fuming, lotus flower,
Floating in the sunlight,
Above my mystic, mental tower,
Anchored in the mud and mire,
In the deepest depths of me,
At the bottom of my sea?
This is my connection,
To the network of the universe,
Glorious gift or rageing curse,
To everything beyond my being,
Beyond my breath, beyond my seeing,
To the nebulous realms that blooms and booms,
Beyond what I know as reality,
To the network of dreams,
And, the whirlwinds of imagination,
And, to the inexplicable, universal consciousness.

All this is not for nothing.
I have not left my star,
And, come this far,
Out of the Netherworld,
Out of the Furthest Reaches,
With all these gifts,
Without a reason.
How could anyone believe,
That I am just an accident?

No, I am a beast with spinning chakras,
With hands to make a difference,
Tossed and lost in the sea of time,
Bending the world to my will,
Full of fight and lust and light,
And, always seeking control,
In a sea of dust and evergreen.