Exile in the Dreamtime
In exile at the end of summer
Barren bleached and stark
By blood-red dust anointed
Upon a bed of ragged bark
She sleeps beside the fire-gum
And walks into a dream.
She wanders granite valleys
Scales cliffs of somber firs
Chasing down the edge of winter
Upon a path of ice-carved earth
Until, beneath a sky of lead,
He comes to her, dream-blessed.
Man of her spring-time self
Sweet as rose-spun cedar
Iridescent in his arms she blossoms
Into daffodils and lily song
Man of her endless mourning
All forgiveness and silken fire.
She dreams in fragrances and flowers
She wakes to dust and stone
She is his lover in a fallen constellation
She is ten thousand miles alone.
© 2004 J.L.Stanley
