winter solstice—yule 2021

the shortest day is swallowed by the longest night

and though the time is festive we can close the darkness out in sleep

until we rise again to greet the waking light

*

last night’s cold moon is waning gibbous and the town shines bright

and while the spreading mist and frost grow thick and deep

the shortest day is swallowed by the longest night

*

we walk this world we wish for warmth and all that’s pleasing to our sight

but nightmare deepfake monsters of perverted dreams disturb us in our sleep

until we rise again to greet the waking light

*

O pity our poor planet filled with foolish deathly viral agents mired in their own shite

they rave and squall around our godforsaken earth and even as we weep

the shortest day is swallowed by the longest night

*

but there’s a ruthless aimless tenderness in nature’s creatures and in you that rare delight

we find when we’re alert to each mere moment whose uniqueness we can keep

until we rise again and greet the waking light

*

now in the southern hemisphere the sun shines at her height

but we are locked in dark and where the shadows creep

the shortest day is swallowed by the longest night

until we rise again and greet the lengthening light.

*

**

*

freddie omm

she lifts her veil: a vision – three rondelets

 

I was in the Musée d’Orsay last week and took this picture of a striking sculpture by Barrias (Nature Revealing Herself to Science).

(From this angle her limpid marble eyes have a disconcertingly full, yet vacant look, brimming compassion yet somehow indifferent – although that may be a fanciful not to say pretentious notion…)

Coincidentally, I have been working on a poem called She Lifts Her Veil.

It consists of three rondelets – a charming medieval French lyric form.

The subject of the poem isn’t medieval exactly nor is it really about the grand Victorian personification of Nature Unveiling Herself to Science. It’s more about modern men and women and how they see each other:

 

she lifts her veil –
a vision: blank, dilating eyes,
she lifts her veil.

you breathe, the smell of her inhale,
flushed lips mouth fire – as flames chastise
brazen flashing immodesties –
she lifts her veil:

*

they see her face –
fragrant and nude, beyond the pale:
they see her face

itching to put her in her place –
frustration makes them bluster, flail,
so helpless – lewd and sexed and frail –
they see her face:

*

she drops her veil
lets it float, fall, fade where it lies…
she drops her veil

to speak her peace – a piece of tale
embodies what she prophesies,
when in the mirror of our eyes
she drops her veil.


freddie omm, spring 2012