LAVENDER

A mind is a ray of light running to the sea; an arch of wood upon which birds rest.

Minds roam the ocean's crest, sit as antlers upon a beach, watch eddies of water trap themselves in the sand.

And minds are in anything but a state of rest--they violate physics, make mockery of other bodies not in ready motion.

I have seen a mind enclosed above fresh air and sunshine, frolicking on its own strength, the elasticity of its thought la.s.soing all the stars a.s.sembled.

Golden points of light caught in this sand with an oval sun marching blue legions across the sky bring more harmony than all the stars a.s.sembled.

Admiral. Fakir. Harem. They are all here as is batik, geisha, sarong, teak and gingham. I have seen them in quiet pools near the atolls.

Rapture is a word to be eaten with persimmon and pears.

The closed wood. Copse and fragrant bush. White mare alone in a green-studded pasture aback groves and groves of pleasant trees. Bright insects making a curry of the forest floor with leaves as trinkets bartered to the wind.

And the endless sky overturned like a bowl across the horizon.

Water and air, the two chief elements in a brisk compound with earth and fire.

The land itself nursing a presence by the sea as a lizard might devour a fly on a bough above a tree.

Then there are the granaries of this empire, the washed up logs darting into footprints from the inlets. A white sand making its presence felt like a tireless magician. Green strands of the cuc.u.mber bush big with melon, a mother with expectant child hushed and sitting by a clearing.

"The waters of the stream please me more than the sea,"

coconut groves with hand-me-down messages for the ages.

Strands among weeds, wine bottles as ferrymen ready for circ.u.mnavigation around islands crisscrossing bucolic charts.

And everywhere reefs and coral and sugarbush fish darting between the sieve of land breaking bread with sea; exchanging colours from many coloured coats.

Kangaroo, koala, tepee, bayou hula, lei.

Sights which gallop against the senses, act as brigands to mature reason. Faraway in the mountain fastness of the mind, alpine meadows look out upon further marvels, exchange cocoa for quinine, adjust the mind as a stirrup before a long, night ride.

The shaman with a hammock in his catamaran dolefully accepts the waves as the skin must a tatoo.

The lovely collision of sound with twilight on fragrant sea-grape, the hush of storm clouds preparing to administer their own bromide of fire before the appearance of a band-aid patch of lightning streaks against the divide.

Perhaps lavender is a language here, the juxtaposition of mind with energy coming to a halt from a brisk canter, then proceeding to nibble a currant from my hand.

THE NECKLACE GARDEN

For my part, I spied red berries on a currant bush lush in August; the canopy of leaves a nesting place for hornets clocking one hundred in & out of their ice-castle hive.

Birds had fled in horror, there was a pallor around the sun and nearby a Hubbard squash grew like Topsy already several baskets in size.

I threatened suicide in this herbivorous garden amid wild canaries and b.u.t.ternuts; my jangled nerves a lobster colour only calmed by more grievously afflicted tobacco hornworms, their skins pierced by the radar alum of wasps.

Transformed into insect angels strumming away the afterlife, they arrived as ghosts to comfort me.

Fresh, spring potatoes grew like serendipity under a pleasant summer sky.

The smell of good earth revived above the saltpetre muddle of the humanoid puzzle.

Later, the night became a lavender cloak, her folds sweet orifices of a pleasure bound woman.

PILLAGE

It's chess of sorts but reeks of you-- the hand carved emerald rook, for one, and so many Black & White squares that tiptoe like many a patio stone between our warring minds.

I think of rollaway mats lepers use to beg on, habitually to die on or marked cards that outside castle walls dicers' oaths must originate from.

I am having trouble keeping the pieces straight.

I mean, you're White & concluded the beginning of the end with first move; still, I'm prepared for nothing short of winning.

Should we discuss this growing stalemate near the Bishop's mitre and exploding gun or against hungry faces of expendable p.a.w.ns raging, as they say, across Seas of Galilee on that first night of Storms?

And, when pressed during attack, is it proper logistics to prepare the drawbridge, fondle another dart for a King's crossbow, then advance at parapets with scalding liquid, the oily spillage of our tongues?

DESIRE

Sleep is a striking woman accosted by various men while in a dance; the warring desires thus present themselves as on a battlefield-- hunger comes arrayed with red plumes to befit his appet.i.tes, sensuality somewhat decked out as a dandy in a mauve waistcoat and, of course, there is Fear, the most thwarted of the suitors, bejewelled with a flashing sabre, rattling it from the tail of his skinny stick horse, the pale charger riding to intercept the beautiful courtesan Sleep bestowing her favours illicitly wherein she would but choose.

PREENING

The sky is red and comes from Montreal-- you lied to me the hemlock of the wind is not this January's but is ringed with steel laughter of another winter.

I saw you wringing sweat from the eyes of the road, lie down take the season's wetness in your mouth, push apart moist dampness 'til one cavity was felled and another opened.

CHANCE UPON

As she's lying there in sherbet panties looking somewhat disaffected, a nez perce expression bordered by sleep, think of the Sultan's regalia his entourage of kings chance upon dark laughter from Saladein's[1] concubines, Nell's[2] white turn of the knee or the pretty bosom of a Confederate officer's belle . . . all satin & lace ...

perhaps, again, the splendid neck of t.i.tian's choicest nude.

To further turn the phrase, ponder a basket of fruit-- the s.e.xual omnipotence of its texture a dreamy sensuality thickened by red Emperor grapes ripened against the elongated nails of a Pompadour's[3] milk white hand.

[1] Richard the Lion Hearted's adversary [2] The Merrie Monarch's favourite mistress [3] Louis xv's courtesan and adviser

LEAF DOCTOR