Rena Goodfriend
Musings on a Starlit Mug
to the luminaries that light the dark sky
You know,
the picture I sent you,
of the whale tail starlit mug
glistering as a luminescent empyrean November twilight sky,
the one cast in hues of eerie crepuscular dimming of day.
Deep grey, solemn, reverie like flush,
specks of nebular lurid copper gold,
that shimmer only under a lunar light.
Rendered with a discerning iphone camera lens,
not, all-seeing,sharp sighted, as the seeing human eye can be.
In dank, darkness,
guileless, uncontrived, naivety of the nascent dappled dawn,
scintillant sparks of liquefying moon beams harvested
just for the parturition of the deepest venous crackling glaze.
So, you may clasp it, touch it, grasp it
through silent, steady abysmal subterranean fissures,
as daybreak extrudes through
the long distant fading of the the brilliant nocturnal asterisms.
The rich, ardent, solid blueness
permeating prehensile phalangeal bone grasping.
Preempted with a caution
that a photo could do no justice to this or any moment.
Knowing that, you may never soak up
the deep sanguine marrow tinged receptacle
encased in my clay cold finger tips.
Clutching the slight curvature handle of the whale tail,
reminded of supple, subtle, sublime light reflected
on the wet submerging, gliding, silvery, glistening whale back
on that crisp November seacoast autumnal hour,
stepping into that shop of earth thrown pots in sea abundant Maine that day.
With sea salt sprays of air
slightly crusted on salt chapped lips,
seeking a foothold to alight upon,
searching for a sanctuary, yet to be unveiled.
The jagged dense ebony of the tectonic craggy rocks,
with ancient oceanic crashing of waves, just, near,
contemplations of a place akin to home.
Engulfing hands, chilled, yet soothed
around the glove smooth surface
of the bluest veined whale tail vessel ever yet to be held.
Stroking the bulging, brimming, concavity of whale belly
teeming with blood air
bearing for that fugacious moment,
the residual vespers fading in the recondite gestation of dawn.
The cerulean firmament, gravid galaxy
full of effervescing stars,
as one gazes on any star strewn night sky.
And the sweeping of the whale spine arching
over frothy waves, as it rolls, glissades,
slips through pelagic foamy furling of sea, sky, space.
It was not the resplendence of the glaze,
that of course, could not be seen or known
in a fleeting captured image in time.
Nor does a photo truly tell the story
of the meanderings of the labyrinthian searchings of one's seeking soul,
as in truth,
I could only truly see right then.
And after all,
is a matter of a self procured wonderment of the astonishing.
Or,
was it
the awe in seeing the evanescent fractured light cascading,
over the vague blueness in the fading gloaming dissolving.
Or,
perhaps,
it was
simply the sylph like yielding
of any ordinary morning as it begins anew
across the boundlessness of any starlit life.
Not about the mug, really.
Not about the scintillating whale tail and its spinnings.
But about the muchness,
the prodigiousness
of it all.
Rena Goodfriend is a poet, mother, friend, doctor, yoga practitioner, and photographer attempting to attend to and cherish that which is always about us and astonishes us over and over again in being alive. This is her first published work.
Return to July 2013 Edition
to the luminaries that light the dark sky
You know,
the picture I sent you,
of the whale tail starlit mug
glistering as a luminescent empyrean November twilight sky,
the one cast in hues of eerie crepuscular dimming of day.
Deep grey, solemn, reverie like flush,
specks of nebular lurid copper gold,
that shimmer only under a lunar light.
Rendered with a discerning iphone camera lens,
not, all-seeing,sharp sighted, as the seeing human eye can be.
In dank, darkness,
guileless, uncontrived, naivety of the nascent dappled dawn,
scintillant sparks of liquefying moon beams harvested
just for the parturition of the deepest venous crackling glaze.
So, you may clasp it, touch it, grasp it
through silent, steady abysmal subterranean fissures,
as daybreak extrudes through
the long distant fading of the the brilliant nocturnal asterisms.
The rich, ardent, solid blueness
permeating prehensile phalangeal bone grasping.
Preempted with a caution
that a photo could do no justice to this or any moment.
Knowing that, you may never soak up
the deep sanguine marrow tinged receptacle
encased in my clay cold finger tips.
Clutching the slight curvature handle of the whale tail,
reminded of supple, subtle, sublime light reflected
on the wet submerging, gliding, silvery, glistening whale back
on that crisp November seacoast autumnal hour,
stepping into that shop of earth thrown pots in sea abundant Maine that day.
With sea salt sprays of air
slightly crusted on salt chapped lips,
seeking a foothold to alight upon,
searching for a sanctuary, yet to be unveiled.
The jagged dense ebony of the tectonic craggy rocks,
with ancient oceanic crashing of waves, just, near,
contemplations of a place akin to home.
Engulfing hands, chilled, yet soothed
around the glove smooth surface
of the bluest veined whale tail vessel ever yet to be held.
Stroking the bulging, brimming, concavity of whale belly
teeming with blood air
bearing for that fugacious moment,
the residual vespers fading in the recondite gestation of dawn.
The cerulean firmament, gravid galaxy
full of effervescing stars,
as one gazes on any star strewn night sky.
And the sweeping of the whale spine arching
over frothy waves, as it rolls, glissades,
slips through pelagic foamy furling of sea, sky, space.
It was not the resplendence of the glaze,
that of course, could not be seen or known
in a fleeting captured image in time.
Nor does a photo truly tell the story
of the meanderings of the labyrinthian searchings of one's seeking soul,
as in truth,
I could only truly see right then.
And after all,
is a matter of a self procured wonderment of the astonishing.
Or,
was it
the awe in seeing the evanescent fractured light cascading,
over the vague blueness in the fading gloaming dissolving.
Or,
perhaps,
it was
simply the sylph like yielding
of any ordinary morning as it begins anew
across the boundlessness of any starlit life.
Not about the mug, really.
Not about the scintillating whale tail and its spinnings.
But about the muchness,
the prodigiousness
of it all.
Rena Goodfriend is a poet, mother, friend, doctor, yoga practitioner, and photographer attempting to attend to and cherish that which is always about us and astonishes us over and over again in being alive. This is her first published work.
Return to July 2013 Edition