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So it was a rock formed millions and millions of years ago and then ... sometime before the ancient dinosaurs disappeared, a crack(s) formed allowing another material to enter it, become part of it, and form this very specific shape which has waited all of this time for you to find while walking.

Weather mystical or mystery,
it certainly makes you wonder.

I tried to upload the "golgotha" image but I floundered all the way !

Very cool Mat!

Even the texture of the guest rock looks to be different then it's host, something that you could have tucked in your hand and still feel the cross. You captured it's image well in your poem.

Andamooka
felt tip sketch from Mat's rock picture

The man with a star on
his palm digs for opals. He
likes the earth red, the wind
harsh and dry. He can hear
the murmuring echos of
long ago mystics, they're

singing songs about honey
and thirst. He holds his palm to
the moon, measures the
distance between his fingers,
then returns to his search
for a perfect stone.

mat james wrote:My Mystic Night



I spun 'round
raised my arms high
and sighed a lovers call

"ah! the universe and I"

Love this! You have some really beautiful work- strong imagery, accessible, moving! Bravo.

felt tip sketch from Mat's rock picture

Thanks for the poem/sketch Cate. But I liked the other sub-title where you said it was for MatbbgJ .
It felt so good to have someone writing lovely thoughts about Mat, the bellt-button-gazer...and I just love this:

"they're
singing songs about honey
and thirst."

You must be in tune with my thoughts for only a few days ago I was defining my Andamooka experience and those experiences of the people I write about as;

"...the land of hope and honey";

...so how do you think I felt when I read your lines "...songs about honey and thirst." ?
This was a great little moment for me; to be understood and to be appreciated in such a beautiful way; a poem of insight and I suppose a peppering of affection somewhere in that sprinkle of your words and thoughts.
You have seen in that little cross and starry palm more than I understood, you have defined the man I strive to be, in my writing at least and hopefully my life, that seeker of a perfect stone, a flashing and flickering colorful saunter of Hope and affection; so thanks Cate!

Certain "birthday stones/gems" have an associated meaning. Opal is generally aligned with the month of October and the meaning of Hope.
So Opal is the symbol of Hope.
I like that, as my efforts were not wasted on just chasing a pretty stone, but also spent on chasing "Hope".
Hence my thoughts on "...the land of Hope and honey.". My "thirst" for, as you poetically put it, "...the murmuring echos of long ago mystics" .

You and your observations are the "gem" in all this Cate, so thanks to you, caring friend, from the bottom of my mine-shaft!!

MatbbgJ

...and Jess,

Love this! You have some really beautiful work- strong imagery, accessible, moving! Bravo.

thanks for all those lovely compliments. "Bravo" to you for taking the time to saunter in the back of a ute/truck with our motley crew of Lovers of Leonard Cohen.

Yes...All thanks to that genius, that genie in the mix, Leonard Cohen, (and Jarkko and friends) for assisting us to saunter on.

MatbbgJ

Oh, how I loved reading these most recent exchanges of 2014, Cate, mat, and Jess. A wonderful tribute to Mat's find and poem, Cate. Insightful as always
I only want to add that Hope is in itself a kind of thirst, which was my first thought when you brought together Cate's words with yours, Mat.
Beautiful reading, this page. This thread will always be a magnet to me.

You seem to be doing very well, Mat. So happy to see you here.


~ Lizzie

yes, thirst and hope
same poetry!

thanks Lizzy.

MatbbgJ

What a pleasure to see this rusty, old and beautiful thread surface again—with Cate's delicate poem and Mat, Jess and Lizzie's words.

Mat wrote:

Yes...All thanks to that genius, that genie in the mix, Leonard Cohen, (and Jarkko and friends) for assisting us to saunter on.

Yes. Leonard moves in mysterious ways.

xo to all of you

Woops, my mistake!!

I just removed a post I intended for a different thread; "The poetry of ten new songs" thread.
(viewtopic.php?f=10&t=10339)

happy trails .

MatbbgJ

ManicBlack

I squat by the Quarter Moon; I am dark void and I am light, both emanating and reflecting. My mood may be today’s or tomorrow's varied sunshine, or scattered stardust or various moon cycles of the night; from no moon to new moon to full moon; but here, right now, I squat by the Quarter Moon. From here, I know I am both bright and dark, moonlight and stardust void... We are all out there somewhere floating in the flux of void and light and both extremes seem too much and I, I swerve and verge toward unintentional self-destruct…and by chance, by simply landing and squatting here, I comprehend there is nowhere to go; for even in those gongs at either end of that big bang pendulum there can only ever be, light and void. Void and light, light and void…In some shadow, in some dark and hidden place curled up in my fetal position I sink in a black hole of blocked light, yet squatting here, I see clearly the spraying contrasts and there is not, “nothing”; rather there is an absence of visible light from that dark and lost space, way over there. And when I land in that dreaded space I whisper to myself to move position or at least wait: wait till the shadow causing object moves on. And when tumbling in the ashen black; my dark night, it is so hard to still the mind and remember that squatting; in that gong at the pendulum swing of black. Black and beyond, beyond the manic, in a cosmos, of ManicBlack.

I am both dark and bright. We are all out there somewhere floating in the flux of light and void and both extremes seem too much when I verge on self-destruct. But there is only now, here in this nowhere, now here nowhere, now here nowhere throb; nowhere to go but to now and here; This nowhere, yet the memory of a squatting Quarter Moon informs me, even in this deep and darkened gong, at this end of that big bang pendulum, there can only ever be, void and light. And from that shadowy zone of no-hope, that black pit, that dark night of tumbling squatlessness; dilated eyes and dilated mind moan to remember the stillness beyond the thudding dull Mat-black, and then, from one singular emanating thud, perhaps after a sleep, perhaps among a blossom’s view of a cloud or a bird flying by, or an ant on her way; a distant and blurry dying star sheds enough light to move from fetal to sit, from hoplessness to calm, from a mat-black to a surround-sound graying blue, and slowly as a new moon breaks, swinging toward blue and gold on a big-bang manic light of a burning and bothersome star to Sun, the pendulum swing from black to burning bright, in a cosmos, of ManicBlack.

Either end of that tic-toc swing and gong, I burn out and sleep or hang on, remembering, remembering, remembering to wait; for that gentle New Moon’s sway; in a pallet of stars and a welcoming void, until, again; I squat by a Quarter Moon.


MatbbgJ

beautifully written Matt, I really love this piece.

I actually don't know what to say about it other then it feels very true, very visceral - forms very clear strong images in the mind but still remains abstract. I have a feeling that this is the type of poem that sits with you and keeps the back of your mind company for a while.

This takes me on a somewhat pleasant, somewhat disturbing contemplation of death and after-life and afore-life and infinity. Remarkably presented, mat.