Geomythical? Yes this is the name of my first collection of poetry, inspired by my greatest muse, Mother Earth.
I created the word 'Geomythical' from two words 'Geo' or 'Ge' and 'Myth'. The first refers to the Earth and the second refers to a collection or body of legends, stories, forming the mythology of a people. In the process of putting together the poems for this collection I sought to find a name that would grasp the spark in what I was beginning to realise these poems were conveying. The poems in the collection are about my connection with nature, and therefore the Earth, as explored in my own personal experiences and encounters with animals, plants and landscapes. Much of the poems draw on Earth-experiences here where I live in Stroud, and draw even deeper on my own journey from childhood being exposed to the wonder, joy and transformation of nature. She does that, the Earth, she constantly seeks to utterly change the way you look at her world, and I feel my poems are expressive of this impulse of hers, where I find myself entering into a way of seeing that is mythological as counter to mundane. For example the first poem in the collection, 'Cowsaga' was very much brought on by plenty of walks on the high, flat grassy wolds above Stroud where Cows are still brought out by local farmers every spring to freely roam and graze. Meeting the cows in this setting where natures abundance is seen in the wildflowers, in the wildlife such as the sky larks and glow worms; where natures raw vitality is felt in the wide open sky above, and the winds that stampede through the grasses, it feels to me like I am meeting these cows as real cows: with no fences and no corrugated-iron roof barns looming nearby.
I believe for most of us these days our experience of the Earth has become reduced to boxed-in, and pruned-down settings. The less we are experiencing the Earth as something real, alive and unconfined to a category, the more we struggle to make that link with her realm of unfettered being and the more we experience ourselves as a race that is cut-off, isolated, trapped, and doomed. Earth gives us mythology which allows us to come into our spiritual inheritence, where we have a greater-than-physical meaning in this universe and where we are in connection with the potency of all of life's unfolding: where our hearts and the teachings of animals, plants and the land matter.
This collection of poetry can be said to be a work of my own heart, working with the voices of the Earth.
Let the Geomythology flow...
Here are some of the poems in the collection,
Old Apple Tree's Message
I
came to the apple tree,
branching bountifully,
lichen on old, rough bark;
she leaned slightly,
towards me,
to ask:
What does the apple wait for?
I wondered,
I looked up.
There among leaves,
I saw a sweet sphere waiting.
Saintly is the apple,
ignoring gravity,
though ripening in the fall of the year,
when the Earth yawns,
calling life,
to her deep belly.
The apple tree waits,
like Eve,
to be tempted by the earthworm,
every autumn,
to drop her leaves,
and stand naked,
in the frost.
Apple tree waits to surrender innocence;
apples harvested,
brought inside,
by the winter fireside.
Apple tree,
stands with her blossom,
when April,
is seized by joy,
birds sing about a returning sun;
she stands with her budding fruit,
when summer,
is putting hands together,
of newly wedded ones.
The old apple,
now i realise,
she waits for love to be celebrated.
CowSaga
There was Cow.
Whose hooves,
trod the ways,
on grass-sea plain.
Whose horns,
proud grooves,
in the sky.
Upturning,
to cradle sun,
sitting on the flat,
of her skull.
Whose furnace belly,
was fuelled on,
wind-going grass,
ringing wild flower.
She who lowed and loved to sit,
chewing,
steaming,
content.
Whose udders,
ripe with the milk,
that baptised our labours,
and fed the first gods.
Who wandered mighty wanderings,
nourishing herself,
on Earths full girth,
nourishing Her,
on great brown pat.
This was cow:
Earth Wanderer,
Sun Cradler,
Milk bearer,
A saga on four legs
