Women's Christmas

Twenty five years ago
beyond the wedge of winter
there was an early softening,

when the warmth

of a blackened ocean

kissed the rocks

of an ancient coast.

And on the morning

of Nollaig Na Mna
or just before it,

in the brown earth
at the foot of a wall

I was surprised
by a frail yellow thing

against a gush

of dark and calloused green.

That tender whispish first outbreath

of the soft wet ground carried

on its pale, low-sun, filled face
the whole of the spring

and summer flowering that followed.
Untamable thing, plucked,

won't last a hour.

Now: after all this time

the scent of rosemary

I took from your skin

on my hardened hands,

join the primrose,

signaling an end to winter;

frail promises of spring

I would write you poems

a man should not seem desperate

but I would write you poems

I would make you laugh

I would cook you food

and read you stories

and  play songs by Joni Mitchell

where everything is blue.

Ships can pass but

but I know too much

to let one pass

that catches

I will write new poems

maybe in march

as  buds unfold

and winds on beaches

here begin to soften as

gray waters turn blue.

And you change the face

of summer starting and

I dream an end to longing

I look in your eyes

in hope that you are her;

the her I hope can see

inside men who want to look

and wants to meet one.

A her who holds her heavy lust  

In her gentle hands and

the strength of her thighs.

A her who wakes the sun in winter

and holds it back from hell,

who carries the wolf howl

in her smile at autumn,

she that knows the tears of men

are wetter than any other water

on the tip of a finger

that kisses a shoulder

lately bitten.

A woman

that wants

to know