April is National Poetry Month.  NaPoWriMo is the invitation to write a poem a day.  Thirty days, thirty poems.  The prompt for today is as follows:

Our prompt for today (again — totally optional!) is a little odd, but here goes. Recently, I read an article about the Scottish science fiction writer Iain M. Banks. His books often have spaceships in them. And those spaceships have extremely odd, poetic names. Like:

Prosthetic Conscience

Irregular Apocalypse

Unfortunate Conflict of Interest

Gunboat Diplomat

Very Little Gravitas Indeed

A Series of Unlikely Explanations

Just Another Victim of the Ambient Morality

Jaundiced Outlook

Frank Exchange of Views

Milky Way over Cascades Wilderness by Dave Morrow–Facebook

Tea Time:  Saucers Over Scotland

A Frank Exchange of Views

 

First light reminds her to find bed,

to let the electric cauldron simmer while the calico cat

curls around her head

but this April dawn comes with birds’ warning.

 

She gazes down to scry.

A roaring mist spirals.  She sees

beyond the Milky Way,

the image pounding in and out of focus.

A waft of heather and she wonders who wanders now

in the meadow below,

still caught in the glamour of the spinning orb

above the spicy brew.

 

The calico cat bats her skirts and leaps to the sill

mewling that she follow.  She turns.

Uncanny light, not sun driven, fills her pale eyes.

She pushes herself to the window ledge,

teeters, then balances and peers beyond the heath.

 

The blare of a bagpipe— ol’ McMillan at it again—

but the glow pulls her like a bee, fragile on a flower’s promise.

She follows the shadow of calico cat,

the scent of herb.

 

The mothercraft spins, verbain and comfrey flying

like Brighit’s confetti.

As the great ship settles to earth, the tiny cauldron cloud abandoned

flutters into another dimension.

 

Spinning fractals  grab her breath, pierce her heart.

Still she moves in trance, barefeet on slick grass,

feet knowing the path, heart only hoping the source.

 

A figure of light, tall, broad of shoulder and familiar of stance.

Whatever drumbeat is her heart,  she must follow.

Dim memories move like ghosts about the meadow.

He materializes, sharp of feature and youthful as her lips recall.

Her own, withered now, still lust for the scent of him.

 

I’ve changed my point of view, he says.

Of course, you have.  That’s what seventy seven years will do, Frank,

her crone mouth speaks.

Still, I return to you.  As he had promised, she thinks.

I am not as you remember but welcome home.

 

The dawn flares to midday as they embrace.

The calico cat twines their ankles.

He leaves by starlight.