Numerology
One is the number, one the start;
The dark beat quickens in the new formed heart.
A new soul lights up the dawning sky,
And self and Self look eye to eye.
Wanderer, always and never alone,
Look to the soul for your only home.
Two is the number, two the sides,
The mirror image with the Self collides.
Gold is the sun, silver the moon,
Double the paths of the partner's rune.
Yin and yang in the heart unfold;
The scales may tilt but the balance holds.
Three is the number, three the odds,
The magic, the charm, the names of the gods.
The third face lifts the steel to the kill
As we bow our souls to the Triple will.
Knowledge comes from the unseen sea,
And time and tide will hold the key.
Four is the number, four the square,
The drumbeats measure in the frosty air.
Straight is the rudder, steady the helm;
From the tiniest seed grows the giant elm.
Earth, air, water, and fire to burn,
Time rolls on as the seasons turn.
Five is the number, five the fall,
The Horned God dances to the wild wind's call.
Five the rays on man and star
And no one knows where the sea dreams are.
The ships sail in bearing life's bright song,
And the wheel of fortune rolls the world along.
Six is the number, six the flow;
The river runs on where the heart should go.
The artist's hands, skill without peace,
Mold the senses into a masterpiece.
In love and harmony find your charms,
And take the shamrocks from a lover's arms.
Seven the number, seven the blade,
Rend the veil and the mystery fades.
Feel no content with what is known
Relativity is the philosopher's stone.
Gods are made of many things;
From microchips to faerie rings.
Eight the number, eight the stride,
The earthly hearts through the rich fields ride.
Forward the step, ambition the mood,
The builder of empires in solitude broods.
Life will spring from the warmth of home,
Anchored firm in the mountain's stone.
Nine is the number, nine the world,
Valiant the banners of glory unfurled.
Compassion and mercy will heal the rift,
For a helping hand is the greatest gift.
The Muses dance in a spiral ring;
From the spiral dance all life must spring.
Ten is the number, ten the fight,
The atom shatters in a blade of light.
The man star glistens on throat and brow
As man's hands reach for his ancient vow.
Far from the pull of earth's warm cry,
Steel and fire tear a hole in the sky.
Eleven the number, eleven the wheel,
Inspiration can wound or heal.
Chameleon change of soul and form,
The gypsy's laugh echoes through the storm.
Tools can be life or death in the hand
Against time and tide no soul can stand.
Twelve the number, twelve the last,
Ruler of future, present and past.
Twelve the fates in the wheel of the sky;
The chains of loss are wings to fly.
Twelve watchers for the king's last call,
The zenith and the final fall.
Thirteen the number, thirteen the center,
The dark place that you fear to enter.
The cauldron womb you fear to see,
The gift that does not come for free.
The moons float by in splendor fey,
We must live the cycle or be swept away.
Hymn to Nuit
O Nuit
Lady of the overarching sky
Lady whose mantle of peace enfolds us each night
Lady whose sparkling jewels show us without fail
There is light in darkness
There is hope in sorrow
There is a reason
and a way.
Mountain God
He who stands tall
He who rises above the others
With a cool head, clear vision
And roots buried deep,
He who trails the forest from his shoulders like a cloak,
He whose strength is forever,
He who holds always
The high ground
He is who I seek.
-RKaldera1999
Maiden Song
March gales April rainbow
I am the horizon's clarity
and the winged one's eye
breath indrawn in anticipation
hair whipping wild
May sunlight June bonfire
I am the inspiration of imagination
and the goad of curiosity
electric passion beneath the ribs
cat dancer in the coals
March storm April dew
I am sensitive as a lotus
and sparkling as a fountain
cool laughter bubbles up inside
wading in the rushes
May clover June narcissus
I am the spring blossom
and the summer's fruit
ankle-deep in sun-warmed loam
and the green-scented grasses
I laugh, I scream in delight
I am the boundaries of my universe
am I not my own most wonderful creation?
I will grow and change and die
and at this moment I do not care
come know me
come dance with me
we will adorn each other with flowers
leap bonfires
make love to autumn leaves
& throw snowballs
to topple the defenses of dignity and pride
we will play practical jokes
collect acorns
weep unabashed
& giggle unafraid
come be my friend
before you are lost
to yourself.
-Rkaldera 1996
Mothering
Canto I
flap flap smoky wings against the moon
moths in my mouth, snatched from their circling
of the fizzing blue light at the Randell's silent farm
sparrows and robins are so lucky hatchlings snuggled
sleeping beneath pinfeathers my little ones wake at night
- squawk, howl, gaping maws of hunger -
swoop, squeak, one less mouse in the world
if this doesn't shut them up!....
wheel hoot back to my ravenous nestlings
three long miles, as the crow flies.
Canto II
Without me
no seed grows
no milk flows
no honey in the hive.
Without my touch
no sweet exchange of breath between plant and animal
no safe nest from which to try your fledgling span
no one to miss you when you go
Without the part of you
that is me
your children run out without their shoes
your lover forgets breakfast and will never stop smoking
and those homeless people
will sit on curbs forever
And all I ask is that you reflect to me
what I have given to you....
I held you through your bad dreams
washed your torn and muddied bluejeans
shared my ice cream when the other kids picked on you
I made your azaleas bloom
sympathized with your frustrations
and returned your wallet when you dropped it on the bus
I helped you remember that word
you almost lost down the bathroom drain
and nurture it into a song.
I put into your neighbor's trash can
the exact cable you needed.
I gave you courage to reach out
and make connections that stay.
And all I ask is that you reflect to others
what I have given to you.
I made you a world full of everything
you could possibly need.
I gave you the freedom
to make a grand and glorious mess of it all.
And should that mess prove fatal,
I will even clean up after you
down to that last bit of styrofoam
and radioactive waste.
I will be mother to the cockroaches
if you will not have me.
Such is the prerogative
of a mother's love.
Raven Kaldera 1992
(Many stories have been written about the myth of Hades and Persephone. The newer, classical stories have her being raped and abducted, but the older stories say she heard the ghosts whispering and went down of her own free will; Hades let her in, but on the condition she would marry him and be his queen. I wanted to show this more ancient and original version, since we as pagans should go willingly to our own underworlds, not be dragged there kicking and screaming like the hordes of the unaware. I also wanted to speak a voice which is almost never heard, since he too deserves to tell his story.)
Springing Up
The sun blinds me
as it seeps down through this door
to the upper world, the brown fields waiting
in hushed anticipation for your touch
the snow will melt beneath your steps
tender green uncurling from your footprints
and I will not be there
to see it.
(I had a pomegranate tree,
nothing would it bear
but a love deeper than the ocean
and a fate I could not share....)
I seduced you in darkness
stole you from your life and duties
and the truth was, no matter what they say
in shocked whispers on Olympus
you did not give even a token resistance...
I lavished my wealth on you
decorated you with gems and cobwebs
crossed my fingers that they could make you forget
the living garlands of the upper world.
(...the Queen of Earth's daughter
came to be with me
and all for the sake
of the ghosts she could not see.)
But your mother and mine
are not friends; she went before the Lords
of fate and begged for your return.
You were borne for this destiny, to be the wind
of change that blows fine and free into wintered lives
of spring storm and the green scent of wet earth
of rebirth
how could I possibly hope
to stop the turning of the seasons?
And she from whose dark womb I had sprung stood by
and did not interfere.
Did she choose you for my bride
arrange the marriage
send me to ravish you
only to teach me loss and humility?
I told myself the bargain,
if not fair,
was at least necessary.....
You told me it was not forever,
you did not understand
that in order to live in some state other than
constant aching anticipation
I must live as if it was.......
The sun blinds me
as I watched you ascend to the new dawn
your destiny draws you out
while mine clutches at the hem of my robe, whispering
whispering like dry bones
rubbing together
that kindle only dark fire
and I did not know how much
pain would lance me
seeing you run as joyfully back to her
(that goddess who bore you
and gave you your name)
as once you had run joyfully into my arms,
my hands black with the soot of a thousand cremations
your hair something of sunrise and something of clay
and something of waving poppy blooms
and maybe you waved back once
at the threshold of dawn
and maybe you did not - I will never know
because the sun had blinded me
or had it just been tears............
-RKaldera 1997
(The myth of Ariadne is another that has strongly affected my life. Ariadne, daughter of Minos, King of Crete, is promised in infancy to the god Dionysus, the cross-dressing “womanly one”, god of wine and altered states. Although she is portrayed in later myths as a mere mortal woman, earlier myths show her as a goddess, the Cretan Lady wreathed in serpents. However, at one point she betrays her family, home, and destiny to follow a mortal hero, Theseus, who abandons her as soon as he discovers that she is more than a simple princess. She is dumped on Naxos, where Dionysus comes and claims her, and they have one of the very few happy marriages among divinities in the classical Greek world. I am drawn to the power of the labyrinth as a symbol and always have been. Also, I am all too familiar with the trap of abandoning one’s true destiny in order to chase after an unsuitable lover who will only dump you eventually anyway. These next two poems are for Her.)
Labyrinth
Turn, turn, turn again,
do you know where you walk
do you know if the footsteps in the dust
below you are those of some
fellow traveler
who emerged victorious
or who never made it out
or perhaps they are your own tracks
as you blindly repeat your circuit
don't look down
don't look ahead
keep your hand on that string
that leads back to Her....
She is your only hope of understanding.
-Rkaldera 1999
Ariadne's Wedding
It is not true, what they said of me
that I was a mere mortal woman
surprised out of my sleep by a wandering god
who claimed me as his own.
It is truth that I was abandoned,
here on this hither shore,
but I knew it would happen.
For I am no mere mortal
and he knew it, he of the man's flesh and man's dreams
who wooed me from my labyrinth to be his muse.
No mere mortal woman can be a man's muse
but no mere mortal man can bear the touch
of a goddess made flesh and stay mortal for long.
It was doomed and I knew it,
but I still cried there on the beach
kneeling in the sea wrack as his ship slowly retreated towards the far horizon
and I wept for all doomed lovers, not just myself alone.
The sea birds dipped and swooped, mocked me with their cries
until I fled back to the dark place
where I knew I was always welcome
for there are many doors to the labyrinth
even on Naxos.
It is not true, what they said of me,
no sleeping on the beach to be surprised
for long years passed in silence on that island
while I kept my vigil-
yes, some part of me smelled sweet wine
even a thousand miles away.
Things happen in their own time-
centuries in Hades' kingdom have taught me that at least.
And I waited for the season of grapevines
knowing that the crown I wear like a star
would someday draw to me the one whose strong and graceful hands
had first placed it on my head
in a dark dream of musk and ivy and whispers.
And today when I awoke ivy was twining
about all the trees as if by magic
and wolves and panthers lay in stupors
about the forest
it is not true, what they say of me, that I did not know.
And the grass is green, so green beneath my feet
and the wind from the sea is half salt
and half sweet wine
and besides that green-twined ship full of screaming Maenads
pulling into the harbor
was a sight that could be seen even from my mountain.
I wonder how many sailors
my love drove mad and pitched into the sea
in order to obtain our wedding barge.
Such bloodthirstiness endears me-
after all we gods are accustomed to sacrifice...
As I walk slowly down the mountain to our meeting place
in my Cretan finery of bronze and gold
scented with the incense of a thousand dark rituals
and my battered sandals
I think of my love, with the flowing hair Pentheus mocked
and laughing eyes and half-crazy smile,
slight as a dancer but deceptively strong,
wild as a hawk and sure-footed as a goat
man enough to startle and woman enough to love-
so different from every mortal
I have guided and comforted all my life.
Enough to make even the daughter of the underworld laugh
with delight and long to dance.
There will be no stately wedding party
but a wild rush of Maenads
no blushing retreat to the bridal chamber
but a lusty tumble on the thick moss
no vows exchanged
for we already know we are each others'.
I have been among mortals for too long,
my loins ache for the touch of a divine lover.
And I think also of Persephone,
torn from her life by a father's secret dealings,
Demeter, raped by all her brothers,
Amphitrite, putting up with Poseidon's rages,
Aphrodite mourning her dead mortal boys,
Helen fought over like a dog-pack with a bone,
Clytemnestra betrayed over and over by father, husband, son,
and Hera, bound irrevocably to her god-husband
who makes her the most miserable....
all the sisters that have come after me
into a world that has only one use for women
and I think, this is the true madness
that my god-lover is one of the few not touched by
and I think to myself
as the harbor comes in view
and one distant purple-clad figure turns to see me
how very much luckier I am.
-Raven Kaldera 9/7/92
(In September of the year 1999, I married Bella, who is now my wife. I had just gotten a gender change from female to male, and I was getting legally married again, this time as the bridegroom and not the bride. It felt pretty strange, although we knew it was right - we’d been together for 7 years and were still deeply in love. However, while we were planning the wedding, Hera, the volatile Greek goddess of marriage, kept calling me to talk to her. Since I’d reviled and rejected her while I lived as a woman, I felt even more uncomfortable about facing her now as a man, but She would not be denied. Strangely enough, She seemed less forbidding now that I was on the other side of the equation. I wrote this poem as tribute for Her, and She approved in spite of the ambivalence that it expresses, and blessed our union. Sometimes I think the gods are perfectly happy with any kind of tribute, even if it is suspicious, or fearful, or even negative. They just want acknowledgement of their power, whatever it inspires. Thank you, Lady.)
For Hera
Lady, I am getting married
This autumn, we will stand
Before the people and swear oaths
And you will watch, and laugh at me
That I ever scorned you, ever thought
To flee your sphere. I followed wilder gods
Whose thoughts did not range past a day, a month,
Perhaps a year, for such bonds as you bank on
Seemed more chains to me than webs of love.
I'd seen how you'd treated my companions
Of childhood, sitting on your couch
With your prim pursed glance, your pride
In your stubborn faithfulness,
Your bitter vengeance wreaked on the wrong targets -
The battered wives, the hangdog husbands,
The obsessed and their restraining orders, the children
Cowering from the rage in the next room, these
I laid at your doorstep, horror in my heart -
I would not be loved for what I had sacrificed.
And yet here I am, reluctantly
Burning much-grudged incense at your altar
Glancing from side to side, as if afraid
That someone might see me kneeling for Hera,
Great Lady of Heaven, Queen of all the gods,
Revered by all in ancient times,
Whose juno lives in every woman - you deserve better,
Lady, than my awkward suspicion.
I ask you, choking out the words,
For that gift you give above reproach -
To live in love with one who loves you
All the days of your lives on the earth.
Say you believe in Hera, you fool,
Say
I do.
-RKaldera 1999
(The next poem is written for Tlazolteotl, the Aztec Eater of Filth. She tears your fears and negative thoughts from you and devours them whether you will or no; she is related in spirit to great Kali Ma who devours her own children. I honor all the devouring goddesses and their terrible necessity.)
Eater of Filth
Let me feed on you
on your pain
on your gloom
let me suck it down until you are emptied
and I am drunk with it
I will dance crazed while you lie bleeding
betrayed, too weak to rise
you are my food
you are my fountain
you knew what I was when you went with me
and someday you'll thank me
but not today....
-RKaldera 1997
|
|