The Return
© Marie Bortolotto 2024
It is rumoured that the Crone of Lughnasa returned from
a perilous voyage into the bowels of the netherworld with
a mere handful of unsprouted seeds,
which she promptly cultivated into a voluminous oration
of sounds -- but only those with ears listened.
The rest preferred watching seductive, less sonorous sirens
on their fallow screens of light.
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Vessels of Remembrance
© Marie Bortolotto 2024
Hungry ghosts:
unsettled dust
from the past,
they who consume
life
and suckle rivers
dry --
the wise potter
learns
to exhume
vessels of remembrance
from the remains
of yesterday's clay.
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Poetic Sketch
© Marie Bortolotto 2024
morning
walking
walking
urban traffic
walking
walking
urban construction
walking
walking
urban Babel
walking
walking
urban clouds
of Dust
walking
walking
I take shelter
under a canopy
of Songbirds
in
Spring
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Poetic Sketches
© Marie Bortolotto 2024
an
old
woman's
cane
taps out
a rhythmic lament
on
the
sidewalk
of impermanence
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| Marie Bortolotto |
Possibilities
© Marie Bortolotto 2024
Your gift rests
with the Page of Cups,
a lowly
tarot
messenger.
What will you make of it?
Such a long journey
home
drifting
in
streams
of
marauding
crocodiles,
you wash-up,
suddenly,
on
a
sandbank
of
honey.
Sit
and
feast.
Don''t rush!
Write
sonnets
to
invisible
lovers.
Allow
time
to swallow you
whole
into
a new
landscape
of possibilities.
from Daughters of Emptiness: Poems of Chinese Buddhist Nuns
Living in Seclusion, Sitting in Silence
Living in seclusion, one can simply do as one
pleases,
With a single text, one can forget oneself for
a while.
The daylight hours—how much time is there
really?
Why then do I not exert myself?
Although the ancients are long gone,
their wisdom must still be grasped.
From the empty eaves, water keeps on
dripping,
From the censer, ashes fall marking the time.
This mood always brings me great pleasure,
As with both hands, I clasp my book tightly.
What a pity it is that ordinary people of the world
know not this intimacy with the words of
the wise!
Composting a Life
© Marie Bortolotto 2024
Without warning
the tower
toppled
brick
upon
brick
helter-skelter
mirrored
by stars
in
the
midnight
sky.
Ruins
for
desert
scavengers
and
archeologists
of memory
who dig
sift
puzzle
over
bones
of
dead
voices
beneath
the goddess
of the sun's
luminous gaze:
she
who
waits
for you --
she
who
sees
through
the succulent lips
of
your
thorny
cacti
into
the fungal-rich soils
of
your
buried
Aliveness.
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| Marie Bortolotto |
That Wondrous Star
She is that bright and wondrous star
forever raised above the great wide sea
of this world, sparkling with merit,
a shining guide.
O voyager, whoever you may be,
when you find yourself in stormy seas
in danger of foundering in the tempests
and far from land, lest you sink and drown,
fix your eyes on this bright star; call out to her
Follow her and you will never lose your way.
Appeal to her and you will never lose hope.
Think of her always and you will never stray.
With her holding you, you cannot fall.
With her protection, you cannot fear.
When she leads, you cannot tire.
With her grace you will come safely
through to journey’s end.
Then you will know for yourself
why she bears the name “Star of the Sea.”
Saint Bernard of Clairvaux (1090 – 1153)
