Folly's Landing
a collection of fables & faerie tales by D. Rae Vanlandingham
Forged
Gobbets of argentine brilliance
Devolve from mutable silver
And hang weightless
Suspended in blue-white flame
An alchemy of transformation
Writ in color and light
A new thing birthed
On a cold and thick-waisted anvil
Takes shape 'neath creation's
Singing hammer
Twisting and bending
Yielding like a lover
To the maker's intent
~D.R.V.
Comes the Rain
Comes the rain and I wake
from dry dreams of greener lands.
Splashing notes—a pattering and
haphazard song, spills in my
half-open window.
Comes the rain and it sings
softly on yellowed grass, plays
a staccato beat on pavement
and broad leaf, trills in hollow
rain gutters.
Comes the rain and I turn
sighing. Seek the grace of its
clean breath on my face. And
imagine a parched Earth doing
much the same.
Comes the rain and She stirs
laughing. Shakes the dust of doldrum
from Her hair, lifts Her face to the
sky. There you are at last She says
and opens Her arms.
~D.R.V.
In Florence, with My Daughter
Leaden clouds let loose a hoard
Of heavy and silver hued droplets
Making darkened windows
Into a watery underworld
Of inverted campaniles and cupolas
In Firenze's storied streets
We sheltered in soaring arches
And canvas covered worlds
Overflowing with silks and linens
With lustrous leather and
Colors too bright for
Sodden skies to ever smother
Wandering with no purpose at all
Practicing our poorly
Accented scusis and grazies
Our quantos? and bellos!
Carefully counting out coins
For small treasures and gifts
Took our turn at il Porcellino's
Wet and burnished snout
Ate gelato in the rain, and
Drunk on sticky sweet Sambuca
Admired how well our
Feet wore Italian leather
~D. R.V.
The Dervish Season
Fall rarely falls. She leaps,
that dervish season—
twirls on legs long and brown,
bangled arms outstretched and
motley skirts flung wide in
one last frantic flurry
before Winter comes, curling
pale fingers around the Earth.
You feel her breath in the air:
a fragile chill
that shatters in full Sun. Inhale
the perfume of her first furious
rain on still-warm pavement.
Evenings she dances
in dusky veils stained violet,
smelling of smoke, cassia, and
lover’s sighs. Gauzy folds conceal
and reveal bare nights
to come. Nights so clear—so
sharp—you could slice yourself
wide open on the edge of a sky
brimming with stars
made drab by her gaudy relics
of gold, of crimson jewels and amber,
heaped in careless glory at your feet.
Fall rarely falls, she leaps.
~D.R.V.
Inheritance
A chipped teapot remains,
and pearl earrings I touch
compulsively whenever
I wear them. Because once,
I almost lost one, and my
heart still hasn’t quite
recovered.
His compass; silver case
matted by a lifetime of use,
a second-hand Menzel’s
Field Guide to the Stars and
Planets, full of notes in a
crabbed hand I’ve known
all my life.
Eyeglasses—lenses still
smudged by his fingerprints.
The wedding band she wore and
a half dozen knitting needles.
A pair of scissors that bring
to mind her hands every time
I use them.
The last birthday card sent to me,
neither of us knowing
it would be the last.
A thousand photographs, at least
twice that many memories, and
a twisted skein of code:
AGTTCAGAACCTGTGAC…
~D.R.V.
Brilliant Advice:
Love more, complain less
Your heart will be lighter.
Just for fun, do at least one thing
The hard way.
Remember that everyone has their own story
And it's nothing like yours.
Life is hard enough, even without all the yelling
So use your inside voices.
No matter who you are or what you do
You are someone's hero. Act like one.
Spend time with 5 year-olds whenever you can
Believe me, they know what's really important.
Let go of things that only
Weigh you down.
Sometimes there are no answers & all we can do
Is hold each other and cry.
Just when you think you've got it all figured out
The rules change. Be flexible.
~D.R.V.