Till tenderness

A pantoum prompted by a creative lantern jam

Image generated and digitally retouched in Photoshop by author, using multiple prompts culled from the poem

Who tends to Gaia’s gardens in the umbilical stillness of dawn?
Not we who traipse the traceless landscapes of daily shame
Masquerading repressed steps on the standpat(h) of self-effacement
As timeworn wilds of unrepentant wisdom meet thistly resistance

Not we who traipse the traceless landscapes of daily shame
Afraid to lose pace in the wake of barefaced waste-making
As timeworn wilds of unrepentant wisdom meet thistly resistance
Tickled by glimmers of listening to inner wishes for kinship

Afraid to lose pace in the wake of barefaced waste-making
The stewards of soil and sea bury their fountainheads underground
Tickled by glimmers of listening to inner wishes for kinship
While grafted to the last capital faction sowing mind-field distraction

The stewards of soil and sea bury their fountainheads underground
Masquerading repressed steps on the standpat(h) of self-effacement
While grafted to the last capital faction sowing mind-field distraction
Who tends to Gaia’s gardens in the umbilical stillness of dawn

—
Special thanks to Lisette Murphy for always inspiring creativity and different ways of being and doing