Gothic pieces

i.

Change of seasons
in the wonder garden,
a delicacy of wind
& light.

Jostle of leaves thru which
thin rays entwine
to make a wreath of green
& white.

Ivy clings to walls.
One idles in the shadows,
scratching intellections,
delineations of feelings,
reflections, images:

A maiden from an opening
in the stone
in elegant distress
extends her arms;

her mouth, a cherry-red
oval cut
in alabaster: she
pleads thru history

for her savior, who
is ambling among woodlands;
tall in Faery-land,
stout in armor,
warrior.


ii.

Are there among these ruins,
amid the ivied bases of foundations,
signs or indications of living blood?
of course, the insistent flora thrives.

Moons rise cold, the dawns of even;
crescent-eyed guardians of night.
Blue discs masqued in caravans
of slow-moving clouds and mists

that writhe and weave themselves
thru scant-leaved tops of dead trees.
These old symbols live behind my eyes,
images of autumns chill and dying.

The scent of decadence, odor
of leafmould and crack'd stone.
A gate groans on ancient hinges.
Winged silhouettes eclipse the moon.