THE FIREDREAM

(Author's Note: In support of the aspirations
of the Havasupai Indian Nation.)

I feel wild again
like those wild and wooly days
we chased the buffalo
and the nights slept
beneath the stars.

Even,
my heart runs wild-
wild with hot emotions
of tomorrow's deadly hunt
and challenge to live.

Within the campfire
resides abandon
recounting
the path lost yet still worn,
the mixed metaphors
hovelled in ash-

The winds of gathering strength,
the quiet of calm surrender;
The tempest of violent flame,
the hush of dying embers;
The mover of earth's destruction,
the maker of new existence.

And awakens the firedream.

Wild with imaginings-
visions
of the Great Spirits
who make talk
above the mounds
they lie.
When one day
I, too, shall hunt
the great buffalo
of the sky.

And fearless
will I be, upon
the broad wings
of the bright and shiney bird
who nests on the dark
clouds of night
streaked
from the deep
like a fallen star.

"COURAGE IN THIS LIFE IS
GREATNESS IN THE NEXT."

For now,
I must cherish
the sayings
of the Great Fathers
as I cherish
the warmth of the campfire
that keeps my heart
alight, and dream
on morning's fresh odors-
wildflowers drenched
in gouts of dew.

Conserving
all other wild feelings
when face to face
with the buffalo-
face to face
with the will
and courage
to live.

Copyright 2010 Francis Don Daniels.
All Rights Reserved.

A POEM FROM MY POCKET

I wait for you
where the sun sleeps
and the moon laughs
at the night stars
trying
to out do each other.

In the soft sunlight
of the morning
when tulips waken
from winter sleep.

In the glistening dew
that bathes their faces
and with fantasies
blushes their cheeks.

In the living drift
of pollen and bloom
pronouncing
the season of creation,
I wait for you.

With spotted-winged monarchs
drunk like gods on nectar
making rounds
garden to garden.

With the ebony twilight
tucking in the sun
from a day of summer work,
prompting the night jasmine
to let out its charm,
until, the sun yawns
stretching itself out
across the broad sky-
I wait for you.

By golden fields
brindled in cocks of hay
for four-legged dwellers
where it is home.

By the trelliswork
sloping along the lane
and towards the stream,
the leaves rust and gold
soon to shrivel and die.

By the gathered vintage
marvelous to the eyes
and joyous in the stomping,
but pricking to the mind,
I wait for you.

Beneath the naked trees,
the bare fields,
the sulking sun
who barely whispers hello.

Beneath the smile
the frown that grows
with each chilling frost
and each swing of snow.

Beneath the quilts
pied with tulips and hyacinths
made with a mother's love
though warm-
I am cold-

On the porch
of far away places,
in the window
of imagination,
at the door
opening
to the soul-
to go with you
through the seasons
of dreams.
~~
Copyright 2010 Francis Don Daniels.
All Rights Reserved.