LOOK AWAY

One long fluid day

Flowing and leaking and seeping

Across my thoughts and through them

I have stared so far and long

Into books

Out windows

Into Mirrors

Out of things to stare at

And it blurs the

Obvious do what I may

Do what it takes

To stay

Sane

At least for today

If my mind could

jump into itself

so fast that I would

barely catch a piece

of me

there might be what is left

and it might be enough

To make it until the end

of the day

Sore eyes

From staring

Sore heart from looking away

Catherine MacAdam

FIGS

a freshly ripened august fig

bitten soft and rosy flesh
fills a soul to the end of self
and then continues filling more
he wonders when imaginings
could stretch as far
as all of that
and sees his own reflection
in the juices running past
his more
events have not been kind of late
there are no
cookies on his plate
and writing into morning hours
is hungry bruising lonesome time 

then there is the carpet ride
of when the story falls in line
he sails above his other life
but still
the carpet
always downs
as do figs
and words’ imaginings
coughing on the perfect
juice of figs and all his plans
he reaches for another one
he finds another word for more
pull me out he whispers loud
bring me to that ecstasy
when plates and words
are all but one
simple magic
written down

Catherine MacAdam

CHANGING PLACE

              

                  I
                
A basket or bowl
with love overflowing
Lavender from endless fields
And carved into a sandy floor
All the left unsaid betweens

You know
The things unsaid and wanting still

They linger
As petals sticking
To a silken stocking
Velveting roses
Releasing them and us


                 II  

Fill this bowl with all
The longing for another day
To make it what 
It could have been
Fresh and sweet
As morning cream

But do not weep

Beneath the unturned stems
And fronds of palm
And glistening stone
The fullness overflows
With fruit and hope's imaginings
A place that wants to fill itself

                  
                  III

She did not go to be away
She just was gone
She just was going all the way
Not home
Not yet

I nourished her with bowls
of love and comforting

These bowls stand there
Awaiting her

As do I

And she will fill her own beliefs
And drink her fill contentedly
From bowls of sacred choosing

Hers
Not mine



Catherine MacAdam
         

She said, “the wolf will come…he will…the wolf will come…” and it was intended as a threat. And the wind blew and she said, “Hear him? He is coming…” 

I knew it was only the wind. At three years old I knew this but I believed her about the wolf as well. I stood at the screen door smelling the storm to come and watched and waited. I believed he would come. I watched and watched for him in the blowing wind that howled her words. So cold she was.

And then one hot August night…when no one thought of him at all and not even me I looked into a window and he filled its pane. He came. My wolf, my side, my teaching stone. I was only four and filled with fear but I did not look away. His hot eyes beckoned. And I stood for many hours after that watching and waiting for his return. Until we left.

I did not see him for years again. I know he has always been with me. My soldier guide. My warrior heart.

Pretty Hannah came to my daughter when she was four. Just as full and fiercely came to guard her path. And shine light even in the light itself. Pretty Hannah, the Tiger Brave, who even now, is by her side.

We are bound by our own purpose and theirs. Chosen and guarded. And making our way through the wind. No matter what the others say.

Catherine

Standing in the knowing light
Moths prepare a hatching feast
Drinking in my cornered lips
The tears that dress my unbelief

I did not know this day would come
And yet...I did and stayed in clothes
Where stains like shadows do not show
To fool my vain imaginings

The moths are eating secretly
Just in time to see your face
A glimmer of disgusted days
You also did not show me these

Its true I did not want to see
And yet...I did and slipped beneath
The brilliant knife these lies prepared
The moths are hatched and gathering

C. MacAdam

Summer Haiku

High sun sprays the earth

Long warm days of the August moon

Children run outside

                                                                     C. MacAdam

THE GYPSY GRASS

You asked me for a story – and I just do not have that many 

stories left. They fell into a cooling pot of yesteryears and best 

just left and then I remembered – there is one story I would like 

to tell. The story of the Gypsy Grass. The softest greenest place 

to go is just inside the Gypsy Grass. The bears and frogs  are 

resting now and we can walk and feel the spell that is the waiting 

Gypsy Grass.   

      
     A long time ago before the time of shoes and clanging bells we 

still knew the silence of being alone with another heart. Take my 

hand and we will go and listen to a song of grass and greenest 

brown and morning scent. The closest place between the last 

most tender memory the earth would ever weave is waiting in the 

grass and love of child and earth and gentle beast.   

     
     If I could sing a song to you this would be what I would choose. 

I would brush your skin with truth and I would sing to you of days 

that we have yet to celebrate and memories we have yet to 

make. I would hum against your cheek a song of shell and 

evergreen. You could close your eyes and see the light 

that shows where we will meet.  

     
     And all around the Gypsy Grass is waiting for your heart to 

meet a vision of what you have dreamed and ever after you will 

know - some things are real because of you and they are called the 

sacred truth.  

      
     The bears and frogs are stirring now because they want to 

honour you. I can hear you in the grass. And I can feel your 

longing reach and when you capture what you need only then to 

set it free, we will plant our harmony and paint a song 

remembering and we will lay our kisses down upon  the 

fragrant Gypsy Grass. 

Catherine MacAdam

Spider Fly

Spider waits beneath my mirror

I lean in close

And look at lines around my eyes

And then – she jumps and so do I

Glad I am that she’s still here

I do get rid of spiders, but not all of them

There are a few of them around my place

I like them

This one underneath my mirror watches me

Her legs are long and she loves to eat

Something I have never seen

She eats privately, beneath my mirror

Her web is there but barely seen

I have to come in close to look

And then – she jumps and so do I

I am glad for what she eats, whatever that may be

Carefully I brush my hair and watch the mirror

Inside, outside, underneath

And as I brush I also stare

I am getting older now

How long I wonder will I be this face

It seems that I am changing fast

And then – I jump and so does she

Our daily play of symmetry

One day she will stretch her legs

Across her silken web of days

And I will stretch into myself

And leave these lines and legs behind

And she and I will finally fly…

Catherine MacAdam

Summer Haiku

Summer smooths whispered

Days of light and fan blown breeze

Cat sleeps on the ledge

C. MacAdam 

haiku poetry cat summer writing

Morning Walking

I pull my 

socks like mitts

Over clean rows 

of morning feet

I pull my 

socks over all that comes

The road is hard

My socks 

are soft 

I pull them tight

Up around my strength

To keep it warm and ready

For the day 

I pull my socks

And find no 

holes and 

pull them tight

I find a place to 

touch my feet

Against the ground

The floor beneath my socks

I find a place to 

stand in socks

And walk in socks

Between 

my feet and what

The day has 

warned and sneaked

I pull my socks around

My feet I find my ground

I move my feet

Catherine MacAdam

SaveSave

Apple Sauce

Perhaps this is the place the

Apples broke and

Spread their mushy

Hopefulness

and seeds

Between the juicy

Fallowing

Where

Nothing would grow

but weeds 

Until the rolling under

of a sour bite

untasted

Gave way to

lick a moment there

And breath

From where

There was no claim

Came a calvary

of sweet relief

And left her stronger 

Even so

the sour had left

A bittterness

Too deep for what we say

Can be

And still the apples

Left their mark

A brown and rigid apple stain

Altogether not alone but

Not a place

To wait or stay

Catherine MacAdam

Dream

She whisker purrs 

in the darkest night 

her sun song dream 

of being held in its heat 

on the window sil when morning comes… #Iovemycat

Catherine MacAdam

Warmly slipped past

A cool deceit

That slinks and covers

I was found by heavy hearted memories

And long held truths

Now boxed away

Expired

C. MacAdam

Stain

Stain

She is not broken in the ordinary sense

In piles of dirty dishes days

But broken as a light no longer framed

Scattered dying  in forest rows

This is not garbage you understand

But a catalogue of what was not

Consummated

We left those days

Drifting close in tangled drops

Her stench

Forever fragranced in the leaves

Of books and storms and confidence men

Yellowed in the corners

Marshland hides a lot of sin

Curling round its burdock stains

She sat with the ducks

And they -  

Walked on

Nothing was the same again

Ever

Catherine MacAdam

Briefly following the words that are not there and the feelings that are not emotions to search out a poem in between its freshest self...

Gathering Stones

The stones are smart
They gravel the road

And float the rocky parts
Travelling along
Holding their own

I love the smoothness of the stones
Their cool and blueness
I love the stones

Every day brings its roads

I have found a way
To gather stones
And keep them for my  
Travelling 
To help me
Hold my own

I hold the hearts of many stones

Close where they
Can hold me back

I love the trueness of the stones

They travel too
They are a part of us

Singing silent songs
Stones floating stones

By Catherine MacAdam

AWAY

I know we live our own lives and our children are born to do the same. I also agonize for her to be okay when I fear that she is not. Her life is hers to live. And she is very far away.


So try this on for size
In the middle of the
unwashed views
just in front of my
hopes for you
I always hold them just this close
I always hold them in my hands
like the smallest little hummer bird
that cannot ever stay
but always lights a moment
and I look at these
days of flying time
and close my eyes

So fast it always seems to leave
As does she
What matters in the after
places of how I live with what
we've said and done
Complete sentences are so overrated
They are not salvation
So here is what I stretch into
instead of falling on my face
I find a place between my self
And watch the play
And watch the dancing words perform
Something that's not quite a song
But dance they do
I hold my tongue
And whisper out inside my head
Spell it; not straight out
From where I stand
it looks safe and far

I have a child who is very far away
and not safe 
I could not keep her safe
I could not keep her dreams alive

by Catherine MacAdam