after Gustav Klimt’s “Tragedie”
even now beneath
the stony gray mask of control
I feel it growing
a shimmering flower of purest gold
the naked truth
*
To sign up for the class that inspired this poem (and yesterday’s, too)–it’s not too late!–see below. Though the three-week class began last Friday, you could watch the recording of the first class and join us for the next two sessions.
Love, Sex, Death and Everything: A Creativity Playshop with Gustav Klimt
Nov. 3, 10, 17, 11a.m. -1 p.m. MST
Three weeks of exploring what lurks in the depths of humanity. Each class consists of a deep Jungian-oriented dive into music and myths behind Klimt’s images led by Kayleen Asbo, interwoven with Rosemerry leading an exploration of mortality, passion, terror and beauty in your own creative writing practice. For more information and to register, visit here.
Posts Tagged ‘mask’
Perhaps Inevitable
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged ekphrasis, hiding, klimt, mask, revelation, vulnerability on November 5, 2023| 4 Comments »
Inside It All
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged atoms, connection, mask, separation on August 7, 2023| 11 Comments »
Beneath the masks, beneath the names,
beneath ideals, beneath the shoulds
is a thrumming, ecstatic atomic swirl,
unseen and omnipresent, inescapable
and holy—a divine blurring of being,
a realm of charge and energy—
most of it empty space. Sometimes,
I remember this. Perhaps walking
in the woods or standing in the midst
of a city’s whir, perhaps working in the kitchen
or singing in a choir, I remember
who we really are, remember
not with mind but with being,
and I’m lost in it, found in it,
alive in the cloud of it, astonished
with the sacred design of it,
elegant soup of it,
elemental swirl of it all.
How is it I sometimes
see only woman, man,
cottonwood, spider, self, other,
other, other, other?
We walk this journey
of separation together.
Oh being who is lonely,
who is holy, remember?
Beyond Conversation
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged connection, conversation, heart, hiding, language, mask on August 7, 2023| 17 Comments »
There was a time I believed
we need to tell each other who we are
so you can know me, so I can know you.
Now, I see how words, too,
can be like little masks, little disguises
we can use to hide.
I don’t want to hide anymore.
I want to find the most naked words—
words with no ribbons, no sparkle,
no paint—and speak in the barest
of tongues. I want to speak with you
blood to blood, breath to breath,
grief to grief, fear to fear.
I want to know you and be known
by whatever it is that resonates
inside the words—
a raw and vibrant IS, IS, IS
that pulses between us
like a common heartbeat—
the way two living heart cells
from two different people,
when placed together in a petri dish,
will find a shared rhythm
and sustain it. This is how
I want to meet you—
two silences becoming one silence,
infinite beings, one life.
On Halloween
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Audrey Hepburn, halloween, mask, movie, self on November 1, 2022| 4 Comments »
I wake up as myself, but by 8:15 a.m.,
I am wearing a long black dress and long black gloves,
strings of pearls and my long brown hair piled high.
Once again, I am Holly Golightly, spontaneous and flirty,
eccentric and ambitious. How easily I slip into her world.
How quickly I start calling everyone darling.
How instantly I feel doe-eyed and feminine.
Though I am graying. Though I am no longer reed-like
or innocent. Though in real life I only wear yoga pants
and no one would call me glamorous.
How is it that forty years after I first met her
in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, I still fall in love with her?
Confident, yet fragile. Elegant, yet humble.
I balance my long black cigarette holder in my hand
and take a long drag of the fake cigarette—
but it’s life I’m pulling deep into my lungs
getting buzzed on blue sky and white snow.
By noon, I have no idea who I am.
By midnight, though I am in yoga pants again,
the credits have yet to roll.
Just After I Told Someone I Felt Quite Fine
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged identity, mask, poem, poetry, release on June 30, 2015| 1 Comment »
I had worn it so long, that mask,
I didn’t notice it no longer fit.
In fact, I didn’t notice I wore it at all.
Every day I woke up wearing the mask.
I wore it all day, then returned to bed wearing
the mask. I don’t even remember putting it on,
what, was it as a child? Slowly, we come
to take habit as truth. Besides, on the outside,
it was pretty enough. Placid and happy.
It was only today I noticed how on the inside,
the mask had hair of snakes, how I was being
surely turned to stone. I did not want
to break the mask. I did not know
what the face beneath it might be.
I was afraid to not like what I saw.
There is a call to be ruthless, our hands
rising to do what must be done,
though some voice we thought
was our own shouts at us to stop.
And there is another voice. Perhaps
you’ve heard it, too. I notice
it’s easier to hear it when the mask
isn’t covering my ears. It’s strange
today to walk down the street.
I don’t know what I might say.
I don’t know what I might do.
One Beat
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged intimacy, love, mask, poem, poetry on October 14, 2013| 4 Comments »
Take
it off.
The hat.
The jeans.
The shoes.
The shirt.
The missing
rings.
Take off
the watch.
Let down
the hair.
Remove
the public
sparkle
from
the eyes.
Let slip
the beaded
shawl
of shoulds,
the tired
scarves
of worry.
Lonesome
glove
of shame
that still
remains,
thin gloss
of why,
let’s
lose them.
Almost
naked
now my
love, please
touch me
slow
before
we put
it all
back
on.
Getting to What’s Underneath
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged falling apart, mask, poem, poetry, uncertainty on May 1, 2013| 2 Comments »
A tiny screw,
a tiny screw
beneath the butts
and cheat grass stems
and fallen in
between the rocks,
a tiny screw,
a tiny screw,
you almost missed it,
didn’t you, and what
did it hold together?
The sharp end broken,
useless now. Was
it mine? How
many lives does it
take to unscrew the
light? We are all
falling apart. In our wake,
we leave hundreds,
thousands of invisible
screws—in our lawns,
in our beds, between
our car seats, in thin
alleys, on stages,
beneath the fridge.
We are all trying
to pretend we can hold it
together. Next time, maybe
you’ll notice them,
not the millions of screws
we’re constantly stepping over, but
these holes that get harder
to hide from ourselves,
from each other.
What Doesn’t Change
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged I Cried for You, loss of self, mask, poem, poetry, spirit on March 27, 2013| 2 Comments »
Even while she is singing,
her mask comes off—the cheeks,
the brow, the lips still moving
even after they’ve been discarded
on the tray beside the brown hair.
Beneath that face, another face.
Its lips sing the same quiet song.
The mirror is not surprised.
Into the new face, the scalpel slips
and the next layer pulls away.
Eyebrows, nose bridge, chin, jaw.
And the lips keep singing
as they away they fall.
The woman is no less herself.
She is not who she thought
she was. She is being sung.
The mirror lets slip
the passing layers.
I Used to Blame You for not Seeing Me
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged being seen, hiding, intimacy, mask, poem, tanka on August 11, 2012| 9 Comments »
with one hand
I wave for you
to see me
with the other
I retie my mask