The Death of Ercildoune

I returned to the Eildon tree
No more would lyrics come to me
My trade and craft is sworn away
by Sidhe queen on Lamass day

To roam the earth without good fare
Listening to all others ware
Then finally wither and to die
A pointless bard who cannot lie

Fair price to save a son
who blessed can never be returned
Half human and half Theena shee
But still my son... Forever free

His not to wear the grass-green hose
or lute and sing wherever he goes
My life for a lie... Well, maybe two
Some other child to pay the Devil's due

Still as I sleep against the tree
I dream I'm back under the lea
I rest my head on cloth-of-grass
This once-cursed breath is twice my last

© 2005 Kahdoosch

This is poetry

Who needs words?

A Cloud of Oranges

It was the first time they had seen such a thing
Orange trees, mile after mile
As far as the hills allowed
Not a string bag in sight
No bundles in a hyper-market
Natures own on grand display

She walked up the steep winding road
She didn’t like hills, they tired her
In this heat too…
He called for her to hold back
He just had to do it, couldn’t resist

He scooted up a tree,
legs scrabbling, boughs bending
Right at the top - his prize
The highest orange, he plucked it
fell out of the tree in the process

Got it though, dimpled globe
Small twig attached
Two bright green leaves
He wished they were Emeralds
He ‘legged it’ up the hill
She hadn’t stopped, hadn’t heard him

The breeze that had snatched his words
also snatched his breath, as he laboured after her
Finally, he caught up, wheezing
She turned, saw his broad grin
He handed her the fruit with a flourish
She looked at him as if he was nuts
A ‘playing the silly bugger again’ look

On their next visit
The orchards were in bloom
The world turned into a cloud of orange blossom
They had walked for hours under the canopy
Felt like characters from Fantasia
They returned there often

Years later, many years later
On a black tie day
He entered the bedroom, bereft
Started to empty her bedside cabinet
His hand fell on something in the back of a drawer


A desiccated Orange, twig still attached
A pair of Emerald earrings clipped to the twig
He wished they were leaves
It was hard as a cricket ball, burnt umber with age
She’d gone on ahead, always getting to the pitch
while he was still picking the spin

He touched it to his cheek
Held it to his heart
Lay back on the soft bed
It brought her home to him
He closed his eyes, following
The room filled, with the scent of Neroli.

© 2005 Kahdoosch

This

Fresh as a strawberry
Sharp as a lime
This golden moment
held perfect in time

A fruity companion
so good, so it goes
to sample a bowl
of my love potatoes

A seed replanted
a nurturing food
All that is needed
Continue the brood

Clear as the wind
Startling, like rain
Held perfect in time
to begin time again

© 2005 Kahdoosch

Hinterland

Looking out, over the edge
Puzzling at the curious, cinnabar, sky
Twilight at dawn, wrong, wrong
Topsy-turvy, like a sated bat
dangling over a bloodless sea

Arms folded against the nip
Too much of everything,
wine, song, creativity, too much
We had made ourselves attractive
Out of place here, sentinels at a silent gate

We had summoned something to feed
in this otherworld, this hinterland,
this border of perception
Peering through the silk screen
at another dimension, a different print

“What, on earth, is that”, pointing.
On the roof, a cat
Feral, snarlsome, blood-red maw
Crouched ready to pounce. Muscle-bristled
under ratty, white fur. Knowing

It’s ‘Ginny Gould’ country this, wary.
Protected dwellings and arcane superstition
We should have stayed in the cottage
Things are drawn to power and there
is… Power here. No doubt about that

The whole place is rooted in bone
The calcium of ages, race memory of evolutions
It’s a tundra of extinct species
Fossil-fed heartland
Oh yes! There is power.

This makes the sensitive anxious
We know this place, this crossing point, sense it
feel it, sucking at the sinew of wills
We step inside the ‘cottage on the chalk’
Feline protection offered and accepted

Then later, back in our own world
The world of porcelain eave-cats,
Familiar guardians of folk-lore
Back, where sunrises and roof ornaments
are exactly how they should be, we rest



© 2005 Kahdoosch

A Violin at Auschwitz

He stood in the showers
Rank chamber of notoriety
Cocked his solemn chin, began
Bach’s mighty ‘Chaconne’, a solitary violin
The notes spun from bow and finger
Caressed the slick-sickened walls, soothed

He moved down the corridors
Pied fiddler, musterer of souls
They listened, the music lived, they remembered, they came
Enchanted, by vibrant, commanding cadences, ever more insistent.
Melodies spiraling like a rainbow of fanged butterflies
Shredding the gloom, lifting the doomed.

Once, they had been forced to play this
Play what they loved, whilst their loved ones
splintered their nails in torment
Death livored, nauseated
Harmony had died then even as it was given life
He played their tune, flawlessly, emphatically.

The age-crippled doors swung open
Phrasing quickened, igniting the frost-rimed air
Blistering the cold afternoon
Furrowing into the chill earth
Wrenched a sob from every breathless throat
as realisation set in, this was exorcism

My eyes filled, spellbound
He was setting them free
My God... He was setting them free
He ripped away the horrific bars with pure beauty
They followed, they had no choice
A cacophony of shades, fanned out behind him

Out down the track, barbed-wire corridor, rutted, rusted rails
I tasted salt on my lips
Pearls of silent emotion leaked,
trickled steadily over lash, down cheek
I tasted them all, defiantly, every damn one.
Something inside broke away

‘Arbeit Macht Frei’, Work Brings Freedom
This, once falsely promised, now redeemed, howled
outward. Through hated gate, into the winter hinterland
The music released, the fallen, the memories
He tore it all from the jealous clutches of despair
lanced the atrocity with tempered sound

This isn’t merely music, not at all
It isn’t barefaced, unadulterated, humanity
This transcends. The past existing in the present
It is the voice of the shepherd
The song of seraphim
It demands to be followed

As I write, a single tear falls unashamedly
onto the verse, blurs a word, pools
I fancy I can see, in its reflection,
millions of upturned faces
Once dour, tortured, faces, faces that can finally smile
And sink, at last, into the dampening paper, heading home.


© 2005 Kahdoosch

Our Speaker Tonight

The Speaker stood then held her ground
All the others flapped around
Fluttering like tiny birds
None of them had heard a word

A clamour rose, a mighty din
As many voices fought to win
a silence left for words to fill
The Speaker, on her ground, stood still

A warble climbed above the rest
Shrill and thin, but sounding best
" I'm sorry, could you please repeat?"
The Speaker looked down at her feet

She did not know what caused the fuss
Her lips were sealed, the problem thus
She had not caused this wild refute
She could not speak, she was a mute

She only stood because she thought
with shouts we pay for nothing bought
This room's for speakers… She'd perceived
The odd one out, she'd stood to leave

© 2005 Kahdoosch

Temptation

Leaning over, she kissed me on the lips
I never saw it coming, over the cup, between sips
'I'll bet that surprised you', she offered
It had, but I'd liked it though. Cap Doffed
Forever a winning tactic during scrabble
We'd given up keeping score, just dabbled
Moving onward, passing, biding, time-wasting
Wine and Chesterfields on tongues, tasting
Until later, as the latch snicked into it's keep
Two integrities intact, happily alone to sleep

© 2005 Kahdoosch