“I tell you, there are more worlds,
and more doors to them,
than you will think of in many years!”

― George MacDonald, Lilith, 1895

i. Theme

Art, she dances alone,
 the world her loneliness at partner,
  crowds sometimes near,
   something watching,
    often not—

Art, she remembers,
 by glints & melodies,
  moves the world moves her,
   moves near, move away,
    down & up & out—

Art, she reaches,
 to a like or novel touch,
  for a taste like breathlessness,
   a scent her bones know better
    than her reck—

Art, she loves chocolate & kisses
 & rusted skylines,
  & ideas of loving new & ancient,
   burst of wild clock!
    & slow . . . to . . . no . . . time—

Art, she lives & mourns & bores
 & wants & sexes & rolls & jumps
  & skies & seas & a Rainbow Wheel
   stretching far—

Art, & I love you.
Art, & I dance you.
Art, & you spit me, & smile.
Art & you gesture me near,
 nearer, a breath’s closest . . .
Art, you gesture me on!

* * * * * *

ii. Cackle

Long before men, & down below sight,
 there is green. Webs upon web,
before story, before song,
 veining down through the living world,
there is green. World by light, a combustion
 to glory, now mixed with Sea water, there is music,
there is life, there is green.

All unitive to grow, to flourish & bloom,
 feed to flourish, feed to bloom,
live forever without end, there is green,
 there is music. A kind of hmmm
through all, wherefrom comfort, wherefrom healing,
 wherefrom a unitive of many, behold it!

Things change, tides combust, now Islands
 emerge. Land becomes, a Woods rises,
of birch & oak & pine, & a hundred hundred
 other kinds, new to light, ancient its web,
down deeper than the Wide Wide Sea.
 Down to the very Heart of the World,
feel its green, feel its hmmming.

The hmmming throughout the One Woods,
 throughout the Wide Wide Sea,
throughout all that emerges, yet one.
 From the outmost leaf on a stormy day,
from snaggle of sun & surf where many lay,
 from the winking starlight of many paths &
places come to here, there is a merry cackle.

The green now wishes to play. Spread a natural
 theater upon the world, of mountains,
deserts, beaches far below the Sea.
 The green must turn on the One Woods,
to a thousand colors & nuts & fruits.
 The green shall as ever still hmmm back to
its unitive way, & now a merry cackle, & play,
 & hmmm new ever on!

Then, before days named, & years counted,
 before wished for soon & sad yearned
back when, before time itself quicks & slows,
 come a novel thing in that blue blue sky,
come a thing of men, not yet dreamed,
 from a some time far on.

A Blue Suitcase falls to the Wide Wide Sea,
 with a great ker-splash!

And things change, they don’t undo.
And tides they combust, every beautiful day.
And the green hmmms, & very merry cackles.
And the time is now to play!

* * * * * *

iii. From the Heart of the World

And things change, they don’t undo,
And tides they combust, every beautiful day,
And the Heart of the World beats through time,
And the Heart of many Worlds beat-beats,
And the Heart of many Worlds beat-beats,
 beat-beats, drumming a deep path to follow,
  & a deep hmmm to sing along—

And now come a merry cackle’s wish for play,
And now come a merry cackle’s wish to dance too,
And now the merry cackles up an Imp,
 come in a stone bucket of deep earth,
  drawn by a rainbow-braided thread
 from the beat-beating Heart of the World,
  arrived to the Beach that braids
 many worlds, where they cross, what they share.

And the Imp digs up from the stone bucket,
 her wide-eyed look at the endless Beach lain
by the shore of the Deeper Deeper Sea.
 She cackles merry & now speaks a word: “Ké?”

“Ké!” says Abraham, the Ancient Sea Turtle,
 holding the end of the rainbow-braided thread.
Smiling. She’s arrived.

* * * * * *

iv. Braided Worlds

Abe the Ancient Sea Turtle tends
 the merry Imp on the endless Beach lain
  by the Deeper Deeper Sea.

A hollowed tooth in his jaw he’s kept
 for her, for her rests & listens
  between cackling plays.

He tells of what he knows, remembers,
 misses. His beach once full, merry
  as a thousand cackling Imps.

She listens, as an Imp would,
 by sideways moments, kisses on his
  ancient cheek, when they hmmm the night.

 “There are many worlds,
 braided ever among each other,
& many paths among them to be found.
 By the Dreaming is the path,
an indigo trace the thread through.

“By the Dreaming, greater dance!
By the Dreaming, greater play!
By the Dreaming, many friends to know!
Do you wish to know the Dreaming?”

The Imp hopped up on Abe’s craggy nose,
 cackled merry & cried, “Ké!”

* * * * * *

v. The Dreaming

The merry Imp rested in the hollow tooth
 of Abe the Ancient Sea Turtle’s jaw.
They hmmm’d together far down below
 the full moon, endless jangle of stars.
Together they played the endless Dreaming
 into what if? what else? what possible?
& more, from their Beach, the Sea,
 the beautiful green far above them.

They ranged wild throughout the
 One Woods, carrying their stone bucket
of deep earth, stuff of the Imp, maybe
 long ago stuff of Abe himself.
From this shared earth stirred through
 the Dreaming forms, shapes, beings,
nudged a little more, & nudged a little more,
 till they were of the Dreaming,
  & a little more now too.

Abe nodded his dear little friend,
 parted her in a clearing of full moonlight.
“Stir them all to wake now.”
“Ké?”
“Ké!” Merry cackles, & he was gone.

* * * * * *

vi. Stir

Creatures, clustered, stir to wake.
To listen. Jangling leaves. Dancing surf.
Sniff the chill air. Feel its cool tremble.
Reach out a paw, touch twice, one to another.
Taste the subtle drift of the light when
 all open their eyes to see!

A new world to abide. Now they know two.
The Dreamland, their home, their very root stuff.
And this new world to wonder:
What if? What else? What possible?

The merry Imp skitters the One Woods,
summoning all the Creatures to new dance! new play!
So much to know. To learn. To remember.
To sometimes forget & start again.

Now stirred to wake, new world to know,
 still hmmming from Dreamland, learning
  to braid them together.

And a hmmming elsewhere now too.
 A need, it calls? A need to come?
  Someone needs them to come?

* * * * * *

vii. Gate-Keeper

He was called the Gate-Keeper, no longer
 quite a man. A film-maker with his tripod,
a traveler through many worlds. Tall & crooked,
 like a windblown tree. A low-drooping hat long-furred
his head, the rags & cloths & pockets tattooed
 down his torso, arrive to ancient boots of
vines & stones, feather-quiet to stalk, clatter-wild
 to scare away.

Creatures drawn to his hmmming but not for aid.
 He hmmm’d as he filmed the One Woods,
& they neared in shadows to sniff & watch.
 His tripod could bend low as a graceful leg,
reach high, like on wings. Creatures neared,
 so curious, so he laughed, like an echo’s
echo, & invited them with an open hand
 to join his game.

Sometimes he folded his tripod like
 an ancient walking stick of White Oak,
& traveled near endless these ancient
 One Woods. Now sleeping in clearings,
Many Creatures clustered close. Knee-high
 Giraffes & Bears, Pups & Kits, many others.
They would travel on in Dreamland, him looking,
 ever looking, for the way down.

He filmed the White Tiger. He filmed the tan Fox.
He filmed the grey Hedgedyhog, & his White Bunny companion.
He filmed many, echo’s echoes, till one day
 he drew near an Imp. She echoed his laugh,
  & more of her own. The calm skies shuddered
   to play, the air braided close, she skittered far,
    & he chased.

Down stone steps, now an endless Beach.
His rags of many worlds flew from him,
 he chased with but low-drooping hat, tripod,
  boots of vines & stones.

To film. To learn. To know.

The Ancient Sea Turtle seeming mile high before him.
A Gate-Keeper, too, what his ken yearned to know.

* * * * * *

viii. The Great Filld

The Gate-Keeper speaks:

“It was the buzz I knew in my
 home world, one I left hardly more than
  a boy, something to lure me away & out,
   always away & out.

“I barely knew what to know then,
 but fear, hunger, anguished movement.
  I was less a unique boy than
   another hungry mouth.

“But the buzz meant to lure me away
 & out to the White Woods, one I knew
  as a boy, told never to venture them
   alone. Enemies, worse, within them.

“As I grew, I realized how little I had,
 how little I was, but a burden in
  a hard time. What could enemies
   do to me? What take from my empty hands?

“I left the encampment before
 dawn, took nothing but the clothes on me
  & the old hat on my head. Followed
   the buzz freely out & away.

“Once in the White Woods, free
 of all that, the buzz became
  a hmmm to me. I heard it clearly
   among the trees, lower too, somehow.

“I heard it in myself & followed it
 with wonder, no hunger, no fear, no guilt
  for needing because small, followed
   it wondering & humble.

“It brought me, like a kind hand to
 a needful soul, to a great, vast
  Filld, with many more chances now
   to choose out & away myself.

“Then began my travels, ever wondering
 & humble, following the hmmm,
  unknowing if any could hear
   what I heard or if, somehow,
I was Gate-Keeper for these
  beautiful magicks I found that day
   in that great, vast Filld.”

* * * * * *

ix. Refugee

The Gate-Keeper continues:

“I became a refugee, a traveler, by many braided paths,
 to many braided worlds, letting the hmmm
  lure on & in, & out & away. My own people
   were refugees too, the spaceship half-buried
     in their ground what I knew
      of history & origins.

“But I carried with me something of my own,
 something the buzz, then the hmmm had found in me.
  Maybe just fertile ground, but with it a will
    to know,
     to endure,
       to prosper.

“I was a boy still, curious to trouble, light-footed to flee.
 By frequent hunger became a thief in the many camps
   I traveled through. By thievery collected bruises
    & beatings more often than bread.
      I needed a plan.

“One village I traveled was famed afar for
 its Ancienne Coffeehouse. A place friendly to
   travelers, refugees, both of which I was by choice.
     Penniless, I pushed through its massive,
       ancient door of White Birch.

“The hmmm had led me here, me now wanting more
 than just the freedom of escape. I wanted to arrive,
   not so much to a place as to myself.
    Sat in an old armchair, in a deep corner,
      sunk in & waited.

“The air was close in there, warm, comforting,
 a contrast to the winter’s ice snarl outside.
  Thick with conversation in many kinds of tongues.
    Safe. A safe place for traveling refugees,
      like me.

“Closed my eyes, began to hmmm
  my question, feeling along for the pattern,
   maybe for the narrative.
    My words now to sum my
      what now to do? gropings then.

“By answer, another hmmm joined me & mine.”

* * * * * *

x. Tripod

The Gate-Keeper continues:

“Neither man nor Creature nor
 Beast. Leaning against the wall
  next to my armchair. What
   coming clearer to mine eye as
  I leaned more of me close to know.
 My hmmm dwindled by still-clumsy
study, & twas gone. Never was. Never was!

“Closed my eyes again. Hmmming now
 like a bared whisper. A question. A greeting.
  Teach me to see you. Teach me to know.

“Something, a tremble. I flinch. Never was.

“Again. Too breathless, I steady. Hmmm
 softly, but less so. Asking, but offering too.
  I’ll share what I have, foolish &
   glinty both. Hmmm. Share my will

to know to endure to prosper

“Tall. Thin. Wooden. White Birch?
 My hands unclench in my lap,
  fall wide open, soft, soft,
   will you help me know wherefrom
    the many worlds? Will you help me
 know myself? Will you be gentle
to my green youth, hard against my fears?

“Never was. Never was. Never was.

“But maybe. What in any world does
 not curious over other? I let myself
  be brushed, stroked, sniffed,
 sung in testing fragments. Let, let,
 then let some more. Then tis done.
My eyes open, plainly, what to see?

“A kind of mechanism on three long
 legs. A sort of crank attached. Not
  inert as though merely crafted.
 Uncertain too, feeling along for
 the pattern in too, maybe the narrative.
Releases something long darkly held,
 to my gentle grasp, close study.

“We both seem to wonder—
      what is this world?
      what am I in it?
      will you help me seek?   

“We stay in grasp of one another,
 in that obscure armchair corner
  of the Ancienne Coffeehouse, long,
   long, safe there. Different
  kinds of breathing, hmmming, closer,
 now straying. This puzzle will be
 ever in solving, new love, old love,
blooms reaching for the sun, nestling
 in the stars. Now a happy, shapeless plan.
  Now a beginning.”

* * * * * *

xi. Beach of Many Worlds, Part 1

The Gate-Keeper concludes:

“My friend & I now bound as one,
 yet I knew not what we had for
  our hungry cause. Me in my rags
   of many worlds, yet often these
  my only pillow & blanket to sleep by.
 And my friend? What magickal kind
was he? I gently studied him further.

“My friend’s crank I turned slowly,
 wzzzzing sound by my efforts,
  yet lessing each time till no more.
   Exhaling relief? More turns
  produced a quiet hmmming like
 I had long followed. Twas music
we shared now, more pleasure together.

“My friend’s head seemed to have a
 strange lens of glass to look through,
  near molded like a face, inviting
   one close, yet soft to the touch,
    like a welcome to a variety of faces
   to press near, regard this lens’s
  view? I leaned close to try but
 twas like peering into a muddy pool,
ill made to see well & reck well one’s seeing.

“Then I tried looking close & turning
 the crank. Wonders! With a steady
  turning, what beyond in this half-lit
   room became clear, even clearer
    than by plain seeing. Together,
   my friend & I saw more, saw better.
  The wall opposite my armchair showed
 the olden beauty of its wood. The earthen
floor seemed to pulse with the power below.

“I stood up. Something now. We’d come
 here for this, whatever why or how.
  We thanked for this gift by now
   striding on together. I leaned
    into my friend & rotated his
   head around, to see what drew
  us next. Nothing lured back toward
 the entrance. But further in, ahh.
What? There? Let’s follow!

“As though years-long traveling companions,
 I began to hurry deeper into the
  Ancienne Coffeehouse. And my friend,
   ah, subtly shifted in form to catch
  my hand & become my sort of, ah,
 walking stick? Twisted & tucked
neatly to this task. We now hurried.

“But, too soon, we arrived suddenly not
 to new wonders to know, but a back wall.
  Solid as a sober no. I just stood there,
   no oath quite apt enough to swear.
  Unnoticing my friend untwisting
 from my grasp &, ah, setting up
before me? Urged to look again!

“Twas indeed back wall as much as
 twas indeed not. My friend’s lens
  showed beautiful White Woods before us,
   running ever on. What then?
    Climb through the lens itself & pull
   my friend behind me? I stood on
  there like thinking, but not. Finally,
sat down heavily in another armchair,
 my friend twisting in a new way
  into my grasp. A lovely brown
   blanket, wordlessly soft, decorated
    with countless brown & black bears,
wrapped in & around us, as though the idea
 I sought if my mind opened wide enough—

“I slept. We slept. Awoke in dreaming
 to this same place, seeming same problem.
  But the handsome bears now one & all
   gazed me back to that wall,
    to the open pores of its living surface.
   Would you will passage, ask kindly.
  Then a hmmming so low & sweet,
 we all drifted as light dancing on water.
I asked, & thanked, & praised, & vowed me
 kindly, one & all.
   
“Stood later, & beheld the wall’s
 gift, the Bear Blanket’s gift, of White Woods
  ever on & on! My friend & I strode
   on, leaving & keeping love for
    this aid. For a long while, what
   glinty magicks I had far espied
  kept far. Through my friend’s lens,
 I knew we were chasing them true.
Not arriving well. I wore. I wearied.”

“Ké?” cries the muffled glee of the
 Imp peaceably resting in Abe’s jaw.

The Gate-Keeper smiles. “Twas your friend
 showed me how. Let me & my friend
  catch a distant twinkle of her. Then
   catch it a little closer. But then a kind
    of stall. A game? I fooled useless
   for the next move. I studied & studied,
  cranked & cranked.”

Pauses. Mulls how to tell next.

“I gave up. A little bit at a time.
 My mind began to linger more
  & more on the beauty I saw,
   & less on what eluded us.
    I allowed myself to eat
   the mushrooms I saw all over,
  drink the clear water in streams
 we came to. Slept where the evening
landed us, & let dreams come what would.

Then one evening I was watching
 the blown beauty of the stars above
  through my friend’s lens, feeling
   I was closer to them this way,
    my heart could see them better,
   & I fell into sleeping with my
  friend in grasp. I turned the crank
 to see better as I always did but then—

“just per chance—

“I turned the crank the other
 way, toward me, & the view
  reversed its course. Crank & crank,
   & I was following back along
    our travels.

“My friend was remembering for us,
 our every step. I was wondered.
  Upon waking, the same try
   worked as well. What meant this?
    Magick in an unknown tongue
   till one chance day we saw your
  little friend at a distance & I
happened to reverse my crank then.”

The Gate-Keeper laughs, a clumsy,
 glorious, wondering thing.

“I thought I was seeing her nearer us
 a few moments ago, yet away from
  my friend’s lens, there she was!”

The Imp muffled cackles wildly.

“I drew her close to us, for a curious
 look at her merry eyes, smile wider
  than day. She was pleased with
    our game again, but I did not
  think others played as she did.”

The Gate-Keeper looked fondly at
 Abe & his friend safe in jaw.

“I closed my eyes. I rose up for
 view best I could my story.
  The suffering place I came from,
   that I had long left. My travels
    since, by braided paths, troubles
     I’d tangled in like a talent.
    Showed her discovering the gift
   of my friend, the question
  we chased. Wherefrom the many worlds?
 My words ran low & I began to hmmm
as I never had before—

“My self now just two hands—
My two hands open for answers—
My two hands open for help—

“I disappeared a long while
 into the hmmming prayer—
Gone ever on till the feeling of soft paws
 & kind eyes gently tugging me back,
  back to my body, back to this place,
   back to waking. Now eyes open to see.
  Many many beautiful Creatures arrayed
near me, shy & sniffing, welcoming me at last.

* * * * * *

xii. Beach of Many Worlds, Part 2

“It was a secret place I found,
 beneath a battered stone bridge,
a fair distance from our settlement.”

Gate-Keeper pauses. Reaches back, hard,
 for it. “A refuge. A remake. A re-invention.”

Another pause. Then: “To remember anything
 is an easy slide into many others. But this needs
my telling, now, to all of you. Insists my recall.

“I was unloved in that unhappy, grey place.
 Twice more curled into myself, an unknowing,
unhappy fist of a boy. Fed & kept reluctantly
 among my clan, shared by everyone
like a chore all resented.

“My habit of forgetting began then, losing
 time, names & faces. They were not cruel to me,
but indifferent. They suffered this grey world,
 but not with me. Whichever camp I stayed,
I was a stray from somewhere else, not a name
 to learn, a face to know better; just a mouth
to feed, a corner to sleep. My shapeless hat
 tossed outside on the morning I was to go.

“My temperament then was not one to brood
 slowly the why of such things. Instead, I took to walking
my days, knowing that somehow, one day, I’d not return.
 I was not one of them, & they were not of me.
I just needed a friend to conspire by, learn of.
 So I walked, always looking, always looking.

“So I walked my days far as daylight
 would allow. This grey world all I knew,
but better I’m sure than most of my clan.
 Its roads hardly scars in its hard earth,
went nowhere fast & far, their common sense to it.
 Yet walking felt good to my restless legs,
something more than where to mattered in it.

“I filled up my knapsack ever heavier
 with stolen water, nuts, & fruits,
now also walking by evening’s grey too,
 never dark beyond my legs’ daring, &
them ever more so. I had to arrive.

“The scar of a road I’d often followed,
 now further than before, smoothed awhile,
dark, hard, then shattered beyond all passage.
 I looked about me, endless fields of grey grass,
ever the grey sky above, the greying beat
 of my heart & breath, maybe first despaired,
wondered maybe to cease, & what then?—

“Water. Hearing water. Weird music to me!
 Stumbled & hurried on toward it, & the broken road
led to an ancient stone bridge. Below it,
 a barest of streams flowed. I stumbled down
the grey hill of tall grass to come to a place
 of rest below. A rocky hill on each side
of the water, kept shaded, kept secret,
 by the old stone bridge above.

“This became my home, stretches as long
 as my food would last. Mastered dancing
stones across the water, shouting wild!
 Then listened with all of me, more than
I’d known I had, to hark back of what this world
 once was. But little. Nothing.

“The settlement was an old ragged
 dream I knew again when I needed.
The only food I’d ever seen was from
 the crashed spaceship we’d come in.
After awhile, I no longer had to steal.
 My knapsack was agreeably filled that
I would the sooner be back along my way.
 Nobody asked where.

“Then the afternoon my dancing stone
 near hits something new on the other
  side of the water. Something large. What?

I splashed my way over there, never
 before had thought to. It was near
the hill’s top, half hid in grey weeds.
 Beheld this large, strange, made thing.
Unbroken, unruined. Old but together.
 I tried to lift it up & nearly ruined it then.

“But I carried it safely at a slow stagger
 through the shallow water to where I would
often nestle among several large rocks. Gently,
 thoroughly, inspected my prize. Though its body
seemed solid enough, its . . . face? . . . seemed fragile.

“Was it dead? Why did I think it had
 ever lived? So hungry my need for a friend?”

The Creatures strewn about me & those
 in my grasp sniff twice when I am too long silent.
They listen with an attention to my words
 nearly like magick. This peaceful clearing in these
beautiful White Woods is very far from where I tell of.
 My new friend rests comfortably nearby,
more sensible for my long travels, I suppose.

How long have we been here with these
 lovely Creatures? There is no time here,
not as people-folks count it up, & then
 count it down again. Some of my story I feel
like we shared in dreaming, as what is here
 & what was there cluster through &
through as we do.

We sit together on my rocky hill
 below that bridge, & I show them
my different tries to know this new being.
 The White Bunny with her intense, kind eyes,
& her dearest Hedgedyhog friend, grey but
 not like that lost world. Small, pretty Giraffes,
like a charming bouquet. Shiny-eyed Fox & Owl
 & Leopard. We hmmm together to bring
Dreamland more alight, invite & allure
 many more along my story.

I touched & turned this new friend’s knobs & dials,
 reminding of what I saw on that
crashed spaceship during my early
 raids for food. No response. My friend’s
face remained blank.

They encourage me keep trying, & then,
 just for a moment, an image bursts
upon his face!

“Then, as quick, the image was gone.
 Like it had never been. A flicker,
then down to a white dot, took ever
 & ever for it to go. It did.”

The Creatures tender me closer, deep hmmming
 to my sad, remembering heart.

I smile, or try to. “I stared, ‘like I had
 a mouth fulla flies,’ that old saying
I learned much later. Fit me well in that moment.
 I tried the knobs & dials in every combination.
Nothing. What had I seen? Where had it gone?

“Days passed. Nothing changed. On one
 reluctant trip back to that settlement,
I overheard the story of a girl & two boys,
 kin, who’d gone missing. Over & over,
the strange phrase, ‘White Woods, White Woods,’
 but I did not know this yet.” A few curious
sniffs. “They were scared of it. Warned each other away.

“Days passed. Nothing changed. Finally,
 sadder than I’d ever been, I carried him
out to the grey field nearby. The one I had
 charged through that first day, & come through
eager countless times since.

No sense of ceremony, or honoring, by symbol
 or gesture, I simply & instinctively built
a kind of stone circle, & set my friend upon
 a large stone in the center. Not a priest
or godd to kneel before, he was simply, simply,
 nearly, my friend. I know better now this
was an ignorant, lonely boy’s idea of a shrine,
 or a graveyard. A kind of goodbye.

“The sun rarely shown full through the grey clouds,
 so my visits to this shrine took on a melancholy,
but comforting familiarity. More often I spent
 my hours here, crawled by night to my old place
among the stones to sleep.

“Then a time I approached, rassling I guess
 you could say with the fragments I’d learned
back at the settlement of the White Woods.
 Dangerous. Murderous. Foul. I was near
at my friend’s shrine when I heard sounds!
 Saw pictures on his face! How?

“It was sunny that day. For hours. Its warmth
 & light, I guessed, awaked my friend from
deep sleep? I clumsied myself onto a stone seat
 to watch.”

It is deep night now. Full Moon still climbing
 the tall birches & oaks & pines here. As I am quiet
awhile, the Creatures begin to hmmm, near &
 far, some, then many more, then countless.
Medicine in this music, sustenance, a magick
 both simple, close, & sweet, & also vast, reaching
far & deep & lasting through the constellation
 of the Many Worlds.

The White Bunny & Hedgedyhog & many others
 lead me & my friend now to a vast bed
of giant Ferns, its very center naturally
 declining into a kind of couch. They notice me
a tureen of soup, its bowl & spoon, as magick
 a taste to my impoverished tongue as those
many days at that shrine were to my heart.

A beautiful green Hummingbird, black & brown &
 cinnamon-furred Bears, small bloo-eyed Kittees
& their dear Friend Fish, so many nuzzle near me
 like I have worth. The hmmm deepens in me,
tugs me in, & in, my story awaits more telling in Dreamland.

But we are not sitting in the shrine now.
 We travel, whole & happy, within his pictures & sound.
All I watched, all I recall, down deep.

A low, sweet song weaves in & out of our travels,
 coming & going like a Mercury’s breeze, & the words
I catch when I can: “Art she dances alone,
 the world her loneliness at partner,
  crowds sometimes near, sometime watching
   often not . . .”

We travel down & down & down, to ancient places,
 become one with the deepest roots of
this green world, our hmmming now carrying us
 deeper, now the green itself, everything
still yet always moving, a deepest dance & praise
 of living—

Now drawn up from that Heart of the World,
 by the beautiful endless decoration that is
her Wide Wide Sea. And up, & up, & up,
 tossed up the Sea’s delightful new Islands,
its vast masque of White Woods—

Something distracts me in my Fern couch,
 a small cackle tis, & a wee little thing gnawing
on my left palm. I am back, at least somewhat.
 Tis the merry little Imp, her crazy laughing eyes
full upon me. “Ké?” she cries. I realize I have not
 told the rest of the story. Herself awaits. I nod.

“I watched for hours,” I resume. “Now knowing
 what I was seeing. Wondered first if what I saw
was inside my friend somehow? But no, no.
 He was showing me other places than I had known.
I cherished my friend & treated him kindly &,
 in turn, he tended me with hope of more.

“I loved the Island I saw on my friend,
 its endless White Woods. I saw Creatures
like all of you,” I smile. Curious sniff or two.

I pause now for a long time. “He was gone.
 One day I came & he was gone. Was I followed?
Had he returned to that beautiful Island?
 I sat there at my empty shrine for many days.
Hunger & thirst, really it was a second despair
 that drove me back to that settlement.
I was more unnoticed, if that was possible.

“They were convinced those evil White Woods
 encroached even closer. I noticed stray twigs
& pretty leaves on the dirt paths between camps.
 None had ever been there before.

“I knew the White Woods was not evil.
I began collecting what leaves & twigs I found,
 filled my knapsack half full of them.
Brought them back to my shrine & decorated
 it with them. Red, orange, brown, yellow
leaves. Twigs criss-crossing them. My heart
 lightened. Grew dark, full Moon above again,
I stayed & stayed.

“Watching the Moon, listening like old,
 for what I yearned to know. I am friend
to all here. Tell me one thing please.

I smile now crazy at the crazy little Imp
 still in my hand. She cackles merrily.
“At first it scared me. I thought I was choking,
 or ill. A . . . um . . . buzzing in me began that night.
Very soft at first, but a little more, &
 a little more.

“I stared at my leafed & twigged shrine,
 remembering my old friend, all he had
showed me, & I decided to find my way
 to those White Woods that terrified my clan.
I was not of them, nor they of me.

“I left my shrine with a kiss from my fingers
 to my heart, & returned a last time
to that settlement. Silent as ever, ignored
 like always, I listened. Their talk at meals,
at fire at night, always turned to the White Woods.

“It was a fair walk in a direction I had never
 taken. The Moon guided my steps that night.
Even their so-called sentries were not that close.
 Across a long grey field I could see it.

“I heard a shout or two as I began my run
 across that field. There was a shout or two
behind me, but no more. The buzzing in me
 was grown up fierce now, tugging me along,
guiding me, guiding me where to enter. Somehow
 this was critical. I ran faster & faster but,
then, very near now, I slowed.

“The buzzing was gone. Like it never twas.
 And I was no longer scared, no longer greying.
I walked calmly, calmly into those White Woods.
 And now I heard newly, high up, deep down,
the hmmm for the first time.”

I gaze with humble love in me at these
 many beautiful Creatures, & this magickal
place. “I was gifted my freedom to leave
 that grey, unloving world. To learn how to know
more, how to endure much, how to prosper.
 I walked that night till I was limping &
exhausted. Found a clearing just like this one.”

I raise to show them my boots made from
 vines & stones. “These saved my feet. Allowed me
to travel far, make my many mistakes, meets
 my new friend there, & now arrive to you.”

Many sniffs, a cackle or two.
We sleep deep & wild together.
In Dreamland, I watch us sleeping on
 my somewhere friend.

These words drift with me to morning’s waking:
Wherefrom these Many Worlds?
What is my place in it to help?

* * *

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