Songbook II

[Dandeli]

This life, once my own,                                              

                                       This heart once found itself without a home,

Adrift on the briny sea, vessel destined to sink with no eulogy,                        

               But on the way toward sea's brink, I found some things before destined sink,      

A few treasures across the course, of which weighted my vessel and slowed it's course,

She, who found this lost heart, and gave it a means to tie itself to present day.

     

  

Yet promises did not tether it so firmly that it would avoid ill-advised foray,

For she who delved into ocean deep did follow that heart's whim true,                        

                                   Absconding from her wayward brethren to chase desire's rue,

Each sorrow I feel is cold and steep like wintry snow and sleet,                    

            Each heart's pulse and frost-borne fire threatens to drag me deep,

     

  

       And thus, accept I shall, this life is not quite my own,                   

   In need of an anchor, so that those I love are at day's end the last sight stowed,

This set of two lungs still within me breathing for hearth and home,                                

                      For their love, by their decree. For her love, by her decree.

I will give this life, the one you so own,                        

                In life first, until death last.

      

 

  

Winter's breath preserve me,                                    

So I can reach kind Spring.           

                                       A thousand promises sing,

                    To which I owe in life.

   

Farewell, yesteryear's strife.

 

[Dandeli]

  
O' Commander, O' Commander, steering through bleakest frost,                     

          Fervent ardor flavoured night's cold chill, burning zeal sailing aloft,

         In a wearied trek through snow-clad plains, you would steer the world to conform,

In the silent, frozen world, never did you veer from chosen path, be it warm or forlorn,             
   

  

Staying true to all you were in body and spirit, staying true to every fervid breath,               

                            It is with a cold sullenness I confess, oft does it send me into duress,

That I will always pale next to your worst, and remain miles adrift from your best,                    

               Threads were frayed, the days grew further apart, and t'was soon I stopped visiting your nest,
 

 

                 Left I am with this sunken shape of a shadow, a final confrontation 'neath the bloodied moon,                  

                                               Shaking limbs, weary breath, your heart spent - all of it given, not a drop left,

So now I pray quietly that you may yet be at rest, even if it forces me to quietly recognise..                  

                .. I was too late, forced to wander with this weary guilt, neverendingly spiralling clockwise.

 

  

"If you die, I die."

Words said, but at what cost?

Too late to take them back, now all is lost.

[Dandeli]

(This page has been scribbled out?!)

[Dandeli]

  

  

Felt it back then, I did in the den of the maker who lost her way,    

            A little crow's croons, a silent brood, lamenting with no parlay,

  Not long did it last, cast soon to the past, once again stowed away,      

But by the tick of fate, t'would seem it would return, rising from it's lay,     

   Unfurling a memory, long and winding, reminding me of colder days,

   

  

What is it all for? Why do we go on? A conundrum that sees me deign!     

          Stilling this heart, slow but replete, worrying about all come what may,

At some point it stops, not daring to bother, driving me largely insane,        

          The valleys will move, kingdoms will fall, even if one might save the day,

But isn't it foolish? Aren't you content? Why is it right now it overspills?       

  

   

        Screams shrill, bloodied, bruised, bitten - I saw it all, what a ruse!

Wintry attrition is stifling and sad, yet there lay even loss in Spring,     

            Am I apart of this? This delicate picture, shifting out of my grasp?

Fickle, answers wrested from my hands, now a wish not to outlast,

Where this sight falters, amiss as it might be, I wish to say:

I want to take it into my hands; the sway of fate, and the bleak day.

     

Yet there is a little bird, a silent song,

Singing now, with no parlay:

     

You know that is wrong,

You know that is wasteful!

    

Accept it all,

Come what may!

 

[Dandeli]

"..."

  
 


"..."

  

 

"....................................."

 

[Dandeli]

        

         
                 I had liked to think you were stitched and sewn of that same cloth,                       

             An arachnid lost and, you, the venerated, old spirit from stars aloft,

Alertly watchful of the little folk, so in love with verdant nature's design,        

    Your protection vast and tempestuous, never allowing cruelty's chime,

           

       

Now as the ashen air comes to lay, desolation's song echoing in the air,      

        Roots spindle, spiral and sow something cherished in a worn, wearied dare,

        Appreciation for all you are; light that pierced through the tenebrous odds,              

        And a deep, bottomless thanks; you had reminded me, dear Canopy, why it is I run and slog,        

             
 
         

Saving me from a baleful storm that saw all colour snuffed out like lamplight,

  .. I will remember when you shot up tower-tall, sending my mind to sleep,             

               A vivid miracle so pure, which caused this saddened heart to jump and leap,
  .. may we meet again on one of life's odd, unassuming pleats.       
          
       

 

But for now my throat is burning,

And I dearly wish to sleep.

 

[Dandeli]

I pale to you, o' one of ocean blue, 

Comely, measured, polished, yet how I rue,

Unlike your heart welcoming mine shirks many in it's slew,

Radiant yet unbecoming; I am a darker shade of blue,

These thoughts so easily befouled, fell to taint,

This doubt cascades down, down, deeper,

So does this agony fail to meet her,

This dull, greyed face.

  

  

There crows the hen,

Do I befit the hymn of the heart you sang back then?

This throat smoulders with fire, it scorches deep and leaves a mark,

But perhaps the bloodied phlegm is tailor-made, a match for a traitorous heart,

You would have waged war with world's whims, weathered storm aloud,

For your cherished, precious other; they who is owed all your sound,

And yet I sever these ties so callously, tearing back the knot,

   

 

Slipping through fingers             

              

                                  as though a   

  

          feather-light weight,

  

easily forgot.                              

  

 

Might it be I wear the clothes,

Of someone I am not?

 

I shall go to sleep,                           

 

                       Yet forget it all I shall not.

[Dandeli]

  

find me again in a place where it's dark,                                         
bring it all to gather, bring light to hark,                                            
then watch it not matter; within lies sin,                                            
by all inclinations, you and i shan't win,                                            
  
let the carpet roll, smile down the hall,
then in the next breath i'll moan, drawl,
kick up bunting, tiredness traces a face,
with each chance given, trust is effaced,
  
the tablecloth tattered, curtains defaced,                                            
i see it in your expression,                                            
i see it quietly in mine,                                            
  
i'm not allowed to dance again,
but i'll find the time

[Dandeli]

(a fish out of water)
 
On a bygone day on bygone shores,

Miss Mnemosyne shared with me a tale!

  

It was about a woman anchored to the waves of fate's indifference and cruelty both,
A woman who ran away from her children and drowned to reach her father,

Her name was writ by the serpent: Leucothea, it was!

  

The progenitor of my people.

A people I would never truly know!

  

At the bottom of some damp well, the knell of despair echoed from it's floor,

And with so little left to descend, why not simply reach up and grasp to the pail's frayed rope?

Oft some threads would break away, crumple, but with an ardent tug, there it was; place and purpose.

  

Her!

  

She was my meaning; she was that which I wanted to bring a morsel of joy,

Her children were her light, her everything, and thus I wished to protect them so,

Yet there was the dark; her hubris and her sorrow bottomless like the sea,

It was like staring into frigid waters; I saw my reflection staring back at me!

  

A stupid heart replete of hope battered into silence by the weight of it's own yearning,

A stupid soul fated to be drawn toward the desolate sea of salted grief,

Stupidly weeping, lamenting, regretting, regretting,
Stupidly lost, never sure.

  
Never right!
    

   
I do not seem to have                                  

                             the right songs anymore!

  

  

What a miserable bard!

   

           

(.. I once told the handless Mister Nirav I would lend him a hand ..)

[Dandeli]

I found the song,
                    I found it,
    
                                                                         ''MEL IT WAS REALLY GOOD.''
  
I found the tune,          
It was not,     
  
''Lift your chin up a little, child!''                                                                         
   
the right one.

(.. what use is being a Songstress if you're tone deaf?!)