Dark of Five
Invitation
in the dark of five in the afternoon
I have no fear of death
just a fear that putting it in words
becomes an invocation
to what needs no invitation
Contemplation
duende knows no time
no clock no light
nothing is needed
nothing is sacred
diversion is sacramental worship
as long as there is no need to focus
there is no need to fear
there is nothing to push away
the duende brings its own ripe red bite
the edges are crisp clear
you are just wretched rat shit
hoping that you have a way out
there is no need to escape
there no where to go
where the black ribbon won’t tie you
cannot define you but will end you
no need for need
all will be hidden revealed discarded
Avocation
my fear is that only in death
will I be discovered
that the vast treasure I contain
will only spill forth
like gold nuggets hidden under my skin
when death slices that thin membrane
to send them raining ringing like love
Consternation
in the dark of five
do I dare invoke duende
while I sit at my window
the fade of an ice etched day
the mortal cold of that snap grip
dances between dust flashes
the empty air ghost filled
Invocation
I call upon the balsam east
rising hope’s dream language
to assuage pain it can never cure
I call upon the spruce south
the scald of blooded lusts
words tossed to defend portents
all that has passed and will come
I call upon the Douglas west
a sense of past to build on
recall the many who have stood here
to evoke from you a shared memory
our separate histories that
understand pine but see a different box
I call upon the evergreen north
the clarity of moon on brittle snow
the gash of revenge regret atonement
join with the strength from below
the earth that holds divines the future
it has the silence of the sky above
the sun to reflect on us
who count on words to illuminate
what turns out not to be seeable
in the dark of five in the afternoon
Several people have asked me about this piece. I thinks it’s a good one to end the year of Wednesday’s with. We are in a time when it is the Dark of Five O’Clock. As well this is the ‘dead’ of winter and the piece deals with death. It is an older piece written with the clear influence of Federico García Lorca. Ive read bios, have a fat collected works – fat with English on side & Spanish on the other. I read it every other year.
The title comes form one his better known pieces “Five in the Afternoon” His line goes: It was five of a dark afternoon! The line was more a prompt which took me in many directions as opposed to an homage to Lorca but something in which I tried to capture his poetic essence. It started as a series of random images – not in the order here. I wrote them over a couple of weeks as well.
Some of it is a contemplation on the nature of fame, creativity & mortality. Lorca was well-respected in his time but not financial successful. His sexuality & the culture pressures around otherness shaped much of his voice, though at least one biographer call it his “tragic flaw.’ Fuck – it was his culture’s (& many other culture’s) response to otherness that is the tragic flaw.
There is also a reflection on the notion of ‘as ye think, so shall it be’ So to think of death is to invite it? to rush it? To write about makes those thoughts more concrete. My fear isn’t of death but that writing about will cause it 🙂
I love some of use of language & images in this & when I perform it speaking lines like ‘ripe red bite’ ‘the black ribbon won’t tie you’ “raining ringing like love’ give me great pleasure. They show some of the Dylan Thomas influence on my writing. As I edited it for flow I broke it into sections then titled the sections. The Consternation section, for me, is magical in the clearness of the image & the power of the subtext.
Lorca often wrote about his cultural folk lore so the final section is pure Canadiana. I have participated in various ceremonies that call on the power of the directions . a ceremony that runs through Native North American & South American tribes, as does appear in Wiccan traditions as well. After I was done I did some research on the trees for each direction, the assignment is mine though. Then I wrap it up with the image that started the piece.
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