Prior to an exploration of the subconscious
The apprehension
of ghoulish things
transpiring, burgeoning like dandelions
perennial like bamboo.
Kindred
Allow me to unravel
upon you – words eluding
the eel-sweeping snarl
the lily-reeds knot lined, not alone
the fine entanglements inside
the cadence of my heart’s disclosure, falter
My finger-tips oscillating like nine dancers in a field
attempting intricacy, intimacy
unfurling whirling, wispy distances, dancing
like thin gypsy thieves[i] under the stars
Allow me to unravel
you who may decipher
tussling lingual cryptography
you scavenger
tumbling through water
my words fragment, fracture
letters unite to capture!
Allow me to unravel amid the unconscious tides
wading through the drifters
inquiring after you
quick flickers flash
grant them gather,
long-limbed insect, agile escapee
you, jet-black
it’s you in that faint shadow? surely
Allow me
black peppercorns waltzing through the lines
ideal to tantalise a blooming self
but no longer desired
the milk-crate days retired
the vine-flowers dried
you who will decode me
a soul-mate
a counterpart
quixotic
narcotic
finite vacuities
no peppercorn trees, please
appeal the lily-reeds
unravelling between
you and me.
Petals and blades
There are qualities
I’ve discovered, in the creeping weeds
coiling like smoke, winding
through natives monumentally beautiful
peeling as I move to reveal
a quiet wilderness
are fickle stringencies
that the glades reach relentlessly
that this is a convoluted terrain
where a weed is not a wicked thing
Moving from signpost to fleck
no ambit or sketch
through a web of antithesis, luminous
and blackened at once;
there are no designs
Still there are intrinsic divisions
in chaos
the absence of paltry analysis
the moral core
eyeballs
in glassy tear-drops of rain
gawking lucent;
monstrous oysters splaying silvery skies
life rearranging, paralysed
fangs flaying the backdrop
suspended in gum-string
hanging from vine-swinging yesterdays
where I have already been
Discovery though, lies in the fine points
countless eye-lids flutter
lashing the mire, but only some
in aqua pura, most recoiling
amaurotic or with some kind of malady
of the mind
Scattering seeds as I step
I notice them flourishing behind, tie-ing
my yesterdays, ribboning
along wiry trees
and gathering together that which is dark
and light
(a tear leaves a wound)
Removing battered combat-boots
I tread the wilderness bare-soled
one must realise the delicacy of weeds
to survive in this landscape.
Kelly Olander
Kelly Rae Olander is an Australian poet and fiction writer. She uses poetry as a platform to express her neurosis, obsessions and epiphanies.