Wading in
The water cold
Around my knees, my thighs, my waist
Cloth floats around my body
Paler waves of white cotton
Undulate like the delicate fins
Of passing fish
Heart thunders against the cage
Of my chest
From somewhere a voice
Pushes me forward, deeper
Stones and sand hold my feet
From the floor of the sea
I cannot see below
Not yet
Only the horizon
And the rising sun

Wading in, light jumps
Through the waves
Children chasing themselves
Random and free
Like the seemingly chaotic
Flight of a butterfly
Caught in the slightest breeze
I am up to my neck now
Moving further
Arms stretched out
Below the surface
To keep my balance

My mind screams to hesitate
As the darkness looms
Through the clear water
My toes dig in as the edge
Pulls me nearer
Closer still with each
Half step now
Inching inching inching
There is no one left
To do this
To step out from the shifting sand
No one left to guide
To hold my hand
To assure me
To push me
Over
No blame
Only mine
Only mind
Only me now
In this expanse of sea
Left here to
Spread myself
My self
Outward
In this light

~

13.06.06
Leigh-Anne Tyson

I felt the words catch in my throat
Clamoring to be first
And yet somehow stopped
In a spiraled gate – unspoken

Behind the soft light of the fading day
I find myself speechless
Torn between the words I want to say
And wanting to say nothing

Voice – unused with no way
To be truly heard
Unsure and retreating
In silence there is safety

Pages unwritten lay before my hands
Ink safe stored within the case
Fingers idle, thoughts rampant
Heart on fire

The hours march by my head
Pressed again upon the glass
Looking outward
Memories pulling backward

Eyes closed or open
This ache will not leave
I will be empty in this place
No apology can fill this whole

Inside
Outside

The moon, unknown mystery
Waiting to be solved
All of this I throw to you
Throw up and out of me

Nothing is as it feels
The ocean breathes
The waves move
Flow forward, return
To the centre
And again

Forgive me

~

13.06.06
Leigh-Anne Tyson

To spend the last few hours
Of light, my love
At the feet of another day
Is a kind of privilege
That is not lost on me
I have spoken of You here
In poems and fragments of thought
Spun out of the deepest part of my soul
Like opening my hands
To release a thousand butterflies
I have watched my words
My feelings, my heart take to the sky
In erratic flight
Beyond me
Beyond the paper upon which I’ve written
Beyond my control, my will
Where they land, how they are heard
These seemingly random threads
Has little I realize, if anything
To do with me –
I wish that it did
Even for the smallest of moments
If I could guarantee
The direction of the wind and its clarity
That these words would reach You
To tell you I have found the strongest reflection of You
Within
For that moment – my one and only wish is this
That you would know
How much I love you
Even now, just as the words
Leave my fingers
I know it can never be
Now, with the shadows growing longer
And the water in the fountain sings quietly at my elbow
– the poplar leaves rush like waves through the wind
And carry with them the sound of an invisible sea
The evening lifts me to the sky
Will it ever be enough …. Just to love you
The question weighs heavily on me
Even though I have failed in so many lifetimes to be heard
Even though I know it cannot be
Even if the knowing exists in a place where words will never reach
Tonight, in this fading summer light
I say to you once more
The simplest words I know
I love you

~

14.06.06
Leigh-Anne Tyson

Fractured light
falling across my hands
through the hanging crystal
half-open, the window catches
the breeze caresses me
somewhere the sky builds
the winds announce distant arrival
of another storm
now as I sit to watch the horizon
where blue sky reaches down
to kiss the land
I will rest in the sunlight
the time will come soon enough
to move inside

~

17.06.06
Leigh-Anne Tyson

Under these stones and moss
Looking for lost and forgotten
Things
Undefined by a name
And yet imprinted
On my waking mind all the same

Turn this one over
Sparkling in the half light
The world below disturbed
By this abrupt change
Effort proven fruitless

No reward
Just another emptied stone

You life are waiting for what?
An invitation in gold?
Well yes that would be very nice
Don’t you think?

Look this other stone has sunk
So deeply in the warm soft soil
Cupped so lovingly in the belly
Of the earth –
Do you dare to pluck it out?

Where is the boundary of the forest
That gives way to the meadow, to
The mountains, to the sea?
Where is the line ? is there one?

What of this gaping hole
A mouth attached to an even
Hungrier soul waiting to be fed
Now that you managed
To pry away another stone
You had no business touching…

Life – time to let go now
Of the rope
you have been taunting
Yourself with
Leave the stones and moss
Where they lay
Let go and live.

~

Leigh Tyson
22.06.06

It is the words that stick in my mind
With the notes intertwined
Another thought trailing through
Attached to my heel like a piece of toilet paper
Embarrassing – yes
And yet still unnoticed at first

Why did you find your way a thread
That has woven itself into the very core of me
It isn’t the rush of memory and ideas that
Blow passed me like a sudden gust of wind
Taking my skirt and pressing it against the skin
Of my bare legs threatening to expose
Everything
It isn’t the sudden loss of breath
Realizing that it is not only this moment
But every moment leading up to now
That brings me to say to you
Yes, things are not right since I left and
Never again will be
That my life – such that it is
Is incomplete and empty now
And that whole
Will find no filler
I won’t allow it
I would rather be empty
Empty than fill it with something,
Someone else

You song, I blame you for this
Though it is the pain that I need to carry
With me for each of my remaining days
I won’t forgo the consequence
Really though, I love you song
For opening my heart again
When I have refused so long
To bare it again
However scarred
In the dress of notes and letters
And harmonies
My soul sang along
and wept
For three minutes and 28 seconds
and beyond the wall of time

~

24.06.06
Leigh-Anne Tyson

The Seventh Leaf

Petals of the lotus bloom
Unfold, warmed by the sun
Nothing hidden
Pushing upward
Through the mud
And still water
Broad leaves wide open
Like palms
Upturned to the sky
Cradling the morning dew
Like jewels
Unaided
While the dragonflies
Dip and skim
Across the water’s serene face

~

We don’t begin our lives as the bloom, but as the sleeping seed in the mud – deep beneath the surface, waiting for the right moment to reach out, to grow and unfold. We are born with everything we need to live our lives completely – these words and ideas have been written over and over before for thousands of years, in hundreds of different languages and forms. The irony of course is that it isn’t until we, as an individual, start to really experience this in an authentic way that we are able to deeply understand what it means. We don’t begin with the task completed, knowing all of the right tools for us to use in order to unlock the truth within ourselves, but we begin to learn from the moment that we are born. The tools that we learn to use are unique to each of us. What works in my life, for example – the accumulation of ideas and experiences from my own life are unique to me – I can’t be living someone else’s life, no more than anyone else can live mine. This is not to say that there are not similarities between people – we count on those similarities to remind us that we are never alone.

In any given pond, a few dozen to a few hundred lotus plants can live and bloom. The mechanics of a pond system are complex, and a pond will only be able to sustain a certain amount of wildlife, floral and fauna and aquatic life in order to remain healthy and vibrant. All the lotus live and bloom together, each part of the same family, sharing characteristics and growth processes that are similar if not in some cases identical. Each in turn has functional part of the ecosystem in which they live, and are intimately connected. Like each lotus, we are part of the whole – perfect in our own birth, waiting to bloom from the depths of the mud to be an effortless part of the whole.

Imagine the lotus we are has seven petals or leaves. When the first petal unfolds, the core is still tightly wrapped in petals and husk – almost entirely protected and concealed from the outside world. In the right circumstances, with the sun to warm the broad leaves to aid in the generation of the necessary food for the entire plant to live, with the right amount of nutrients in the soil, the right temperature and finally the right amount of time, the lotus bloom begins to unfold more and more.

The second petal opens just wide enough for the dragonfly to rest on its delicate edge. The third petal opens the bloom even further allowing the rain to collect in its soft curves. The fourth petal opens to be kissed by the warm summer breezes that are gently rocking this newborn in its invisible arms. The opening of the fifth petal brings a new kind of confidence to the bloom – a curiosity about the world, a yearning to know more. The sixth petal, and perhaps the most dangerous of moments, reveals almost completely now the centre of the lotus – the precious seed pod of the full lotus bloom. The thirst for understanding the surrounding world can be so overwhelming during this time, despite the fullness of the bloom, and having almost reached the pinnacle of its life before beginning to decline again for another season. There is a fragility in the opening of the sixth petal that is often overlooked, taken for granted or simply ignored in this rush to reach the zenith. But, it is in the final petal, when every part of the lotus bloom is exposed finally that the lotus is completely know for what it is. The seventh petal is captured in a perfect moment, where the bloom moves in harmony with every other breeze, every flap of wing, every raindrop, every ray of sunshine and every kiss of moonlight. This is why the lotus grows up from the mud – for the seventh leaf to unfold.

~

born of someone else’s dream – a thought
with strong wings that flew
flew from the most beautiful of souls
to my quiet ears
I was like the ground
Filled with rain after the storm
The seed long since planted
Found its feet deep below
Born and left sleeping
Until now

~
12.07.06
Leigh-Anne Tyson

Oh, in this dying light
I am lost
The sun makes the shadows
Sharper and I –
I am simply caught between them
How is it that my life
Cannot be forfeit
Or at least shoulder the burden
There are so many suffering
And yet my shoulders
Can’t hold enough
I would kiss your lips and
Raise you up
Let you soak in the rays of the sun
One last time before you leave
I would bleed for you
If it would give you more time
With your children
With those who loved you
More than life itself
I would die for you
If it would give you one more day
To say goodbye and make amends
If
The dreaded and strangling stated
That pulls you tears you
Tears me into two
Separate and yet whole in the same
Breath
Please
Yes I am pleading now
In the darkness unspoken
Wordless and divine
Please
In this passing let you go
In the arms of love and light
To guide you
Through everything
That is to come

~

21.05.06
Leigh-Anne Tyson

Again
Torn between
The leaving and staying
The left behind and going forward
Letting go
Letting me
Go
What breath is left
And can this end now
With the passing of the breath
From hear to well beyond
I am sorry I was not a better daughter
A better sister, a better mother
A better person, a better friend
To make you proud
It is the child in me crying out now
To hold you and hear you say
Maybe for the first time
That it will all be ok
But in this silence
The sense has flown
With the sun
as night descends over us
If I can’t stop your pain,
Ease your way
If I can’t do this one thing for you
Then I am useless
How to let you go
To carry on with the next day and the next?
To wake and rise with the sun
And carry out my day
Each step through it knowing
That you
You do not know
When the last
Breath will come
True you say, no one knows
I do not
Though in quiet moments
I know just as well as you do
When that time is for myself
But you know that in the time
When the wings begin to unfold
In that time when the pain of birth, rebirth
Is almost too much
I will never
Never
Leave your side

~

21.05.06
Leigh-Anne Tyson

This is the word
This
Not that or my finger pointing
But this
The smallest detail is the whole
And I – I am left numbed
In the recognition
Of myself
In the dew drop
This is the heart
That broke
This
And that is the wing
That it flew
On and please
Please don’t tell me
Again
It was me who broke it
Who ran and crashed
Into the wall
No
This is the eye
That saw the blazing
Fire beyond
My own sight
The path that wove
Its way through the swamps
And deep forests
Please don’t let me
Fall into the dark waters
If I lean over too far
To see my own reflection
This is the mind
That gave up and
Left
Chose the lone road
Not knowing where it is going
And I want to know
I want to feel
And see
And love
That is the dream
That gives me
Hope

~

16.05.06
Leigh-Anne Tyson

II

This moment
This face
This heart
Undone
Wandering

Practice folding
The butterfly

Unfolding to

Let it fly
Open wing
Open palm
Open heart
Freedom, hope, faith
Still planted
In the soles of my feet
Even when tears
Fall
Outstretched
Stretched thin
Green eyes grey
Find the way home
Find the way
Home
Again
Unfolding folding
Rising falling
Dying being
Born
now

~

16.05.06

Leigh-Anne Tyson

night fills with questions
no answers held
in the asking
threads left
untied
untried
through this naked
reflection
who thinks better
than the mirror
itself?

~

14.05.06
Leigh-Anne Tyson