Ouroboros~

~eternal cycles~

In a gondola between sliding honeycomb cradles of worlds

the not quite man lowered his massive head

against the stained glass prisms of my brow

dipped his antlers into the liquid cadence of my ambitions

 

"Do you still play with French vowels against the dips of your tongue?" he asked

 

and I leaned into him with my diamond skin

firefly hair

kissed his question out of the golden meat of his wonderful pout

and swallowed him down into my sleeping glass belly

giving birth to myself

inside a looking glass that held the moon between her thighs

in silver gilded edges;

I dared heaven to intervene

but the skies were silent

 

On a mountain top drenched with a river of daisies and violets

I unmasked the alluring foundations of a romantic fragrance crushed

against the broken side of a woman who brooded over the thick marmalade

of a wish spread rich across fresh baked croissants

as I reached to braid and unbraid her hair of grass and reed

 

" Do you still unflex out of your pupils into scales and charms that bind Little Red's  wrists to your mornings over lattes in the sunshine dipped in dew?" she asked

 

and I leaned  back away from her hillock hips

adjusted my alloy sunglasses

and took the molecular structure of the season

to reconstruct the blurred longing

sentence by sentence into brandished shine

as I dipped my naked toes into her streams

and split my wrists into spirals against her grave;

I dared the hero to dismount his charismatic ideals

but he averted his shame and played at being deaf

 

I was content to roam the old worlds of Jerusalem and curl around my own mystique

but Lilith unfolded herself from the blue sky

came to play her breeze across my papyrus skin

to eat each inkwell of prayer off my spine

and from the bend of my hips

she whisked me out of melancholy ruins into her Hummer

to race the desert roads to Ashdod

 

"Do you still have tendencies to shift the mitochondria just that tiny step past human? Do you still turn inside and outside in, do you still touch those fine lips to Adam's reveries?  Do you still self consume winding around your own belly until you are no more than a wispy dandelion fluff caught in a child's hands who makes a wish you never grant?" she asked

 

and I fell into the rhythmic patterns of her evolutionary charms

followed her trail along Sderot Moshe Dayan to the sands

at a curve of the Mediterranean where she caught my hand

laughing

to pull me from my thighs and flip me over into scales and tail lashing

against the edge of blue waters;

she turned into an owl

and flew off giggling

 

 

At the edge of the ocean waves lapped against the pearls filling my mouth

Mordecai unwound himself from sea foam

he pulled my jeweled scales off my memories one by one

and bent to lap the cream pearls off my tongue

 

"Have you had enough of deities, have you had enough of scars?" he asked

 

his eyes were the color of obsidian

my heart drank at the fountain of his incredible stance as he pulled me from my serpent

ate me off the pages off a mythological painting

and took me for a ride in his black Mercedes to Jerusalem

where we fell through Legend on a tenuous screen at Malcha Mall

 

"You know, I am not your Esther and that I am destined to end my life for the sake of art." I whispered to him in the darkness of mind

 

and he laughed over popcorn drenched with butter

 

"You're Ourobos, which means you are the ultimate recreative force and metamorphosis in action.  The seraphs are envious." he winked

 

I curled my tail around his ankle

and licked the salt an butter off his fingertips

daring to pour starlight from my eyes

and weep gems from my mouth

in that theater in the bejeweled shell of a moment

where the snake could take a breath

and unwind

 

 

copyright:1st printing  1986 MythZine/vssmd

copyright:2nd printing 2009 vssmd/pa.inc.

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

 

 

excerpt from

 

 

 

 

 

Author's Note

~primordial unity related to something existing in or persisting from the beginning with such force or qualities it cannot be extinguished~ The Ouroboros~
my first introduction to the concept and mediation on Ouroboros came from the quilt grandmare made for my crib when I was an infant~ maturing through the years I would sit and trace snake swallowing her own tale~ thinking many thoughts~ =)~

Reviews

[Moonflower]

This was captivating. Full of exquisite imagery and metaphor. I loved these lines......I was content to roam the old worlds of Jerusalem and curl around my own mystique
but Lilith unfolded herself from the blue sky
came to play her breeze across my papyrus skin
to eat each inkwell of prayer off my spine

and from the bend of my hips
she whisked me out of melancholy ruins into her Hummer
to race the desert roads to Ashdod.

[David W Moore III]

Man, The last thing I read tonight and it's got to be a doozie! I don't know where to start with this. The imagery is captivating and convoluted (like the snake). I think I need a week to ponder this before I have a handle on it. I love it!

[Aven]

You could sell poems by the box, whatever comes out you know it's good, cos it's Selene. :)

[Pax Analog]

I want to see an animation of this and your other surreal psychotropic dream rides. Hot drug -- makes me want to eat you. Take that anyway you want.

I'm reminded of Ken Wilber's Up from Eden, one of his early books on a living archeology of consciousness, building on the pioneering work of Jean Gebser. Wilber and Gebser continue to be important to me, as backbone templates for integral studies and practice. The nonpareil value of such praxis is bridges built to Zen epiphany, a means to actually contribute to raising the consensus reality plateau, rather than highlight reel peak experiences only, that, wonderful as they are, come crashing back down to a ramshackle mythic-rational Matrix known as the reality "norm."

The Ouroboros, the serpent eating its own tail, summons the Archaic root structure, in Gebser's The Ever-Present Origin mutational schema which runs Archaic-Magic-Mythic-Mental-Integral/Aperspectival. This is the coiled mute summation of all potential, a zero-dimensional Edenic consciousness. It also recalls the coiled Kundalini yogic force, and reminds one that the Gnostics, being inveterate inverse parabolists, considered the serpent in the Garden of Eden to be the initiator of awareness, not a "tempter," and the "God" of the Garden was Jehovah, false-god Demiurge bully-boy, so of course the process of waking up had to begin. . .

Your poem makes a dizzying number of rich allusions, no doubt based on your combination of improv skill and mythic-historical reading. A rich, profound, wild piece that bears rereading. You're a naked wonder of wilderness mind, beauty, and you remain the primary reason I tilt toward using PublishAmerica, despite other reservations. Our souls are birds-of-a-free-feather. Your personal note on Ouroboros stemming from a quilt made by your "grandmare" carries the appropriate air of mythic enchantment.

The closing lines bring the shimmering wild serpentine ride all back home:

"You're Ourobos, which means you are the ultimate recreative force and metamorphosis in action. The seraphs are envious." he winked.

I curled my tail around his ankle

and licked the salt an butter off his fingertips

daring to pour starlight from my eyes

and weep gems from my mouth

in that theater in the bejeweled shell of a moment

where the snake could take a breath

and unwind

[Bard Constantine]

What worlds you wander, what oddly twisted paths you transverse... the quicksilver liquid imaginings that drift lazily from your fingertips can boggle even the most ancient of children... once again I delight to float down the fiery river of your words...

[spiralchild]

what a nice introduction to this website; this is the first thing i've ever read on writer's cafe. to put it bluntly, this is a f*****g beautiful poem. :-) the first four lines latch onto the reader's attention with clawed digits and drag it deep into the abysmal nexus of your imagination; a necessity in poetry, yet ironically, often times a rarity in poetry. i love the intricate ancient mythological references and connotations in this piece, so eloquently weaved into a delectable fabric of surreal reverie-bound visions. i can almost hear the way you would most likely recite it aloud. very good job, looking forward to reading more from you.

[Peter Joseph Swanson]

I love your stuff!

[Maurice]

Your words are enchanting as you unfurl a scenario rich with vibrant images and tell a story that is truly captivating. Definitely 100.

[dovetailer]

I marvel at your gift to absrb the reality around you and spin it into a mythological fabric you drape us in...To understand all you write would be to understand everything you have felt...endured...dreamed...to actually reside in those places where you flee to be...
you have not lost the little girl in all your pleasure...all your pain...
you fled to your world you created to survive the storms...and we are blessed because you share it with us in your writing...
we may not comprehend all you share, but we do comprehend the beauty of your soul...it is rich and gleams and too enthralling to keep from staring in disbelief...

[FireWoman]

Mythos woven through the DNA, mixed with inquisitive mind bubbles, shaken with carbonated intellect and topped with a spin. I know there are things that are as powerful as to never die and I count on that. Gorgeous flow of words!

[Brad]

a tale from the ancients of your past...a buttery tale of nonchalance...is there some darkness in the dreams we're given by our elders? one wonders....