Copyright (C) 1997 by William Mistele. All rights reserved.

Some of My Favorite Poems

            You are my Soul  (Written on Beltane, '96)

 
When she awoke she turned to me and said: 
You are my soul.
My first breath in the light of dawn
And all my dreams at night 
I dedicate to you, my Beloved.
When I shove off and depart for unknown shores
Your inspiration guides my craft
Flows with force through my sails.
You are the electricity in my heartbeat
The separate fibers of my being
Unite around my love for you,
The surge, the pulse, the wave
The circle of life within my body
Ride upon my desire to hold you within my heart. 
My love for you is as deep as the sky
More vast than the winds 
That caress the seas in ecstasy.
Softer in flight 
Than the moon's light
My body yields to you
As I spiral and turn
Caught in the currents
Of your smile
As I drift into a sea
Of pure bliss
When I enfold you in my arms.
Desert sands of Haleakala 
Russet, crimson, citrine
Parched, dry, burning
Yearn with volcanic craving
Solidified rock
Once flowed molten, liquid 
Lit with tongues of flame,
Yet Haleakala is but a small reflection
A small reminder
Of the fire with which 
I burn for your touch.
Reflected in your eyes 
I become a purity
Acid can not etch
Time can not drown
Space can not hide.
I am luminous light
The transparency
Shining in all colors
The dreams that yield their visions to me 
Of birth, of galaxies colliding, 
Of seas turning into wine
These are your gifts to me
When I hold you close to me at night. 


  To Jachil (From meditating with Jachil on love, 3 degrees Cancer)

When you are in my arms
My wounds are healed
My dreams fulfilled
Our lips touch
Moonlight illuminates your naked skin
I no longer know who I am
The sun glides through the sky
Deer graze in the meadow
I am mesmerized 
The present moment fades 
The moon sets her sails to the solar wind
My hands glide upon your skin
The sun drowns as we kiss 
In the darkness of night to be reborn at dawn
Our hips join
As the stream winds through the crevice of the valleys
Mirth and laughter splashing down
As the sea enfolds the mountains in her depths 
The whale's song echoing through the hills 
Greese fly across the moon
The leaves of birch trees shiver
A solitary bird sings 
Cats' paws ripple upon the lake
The gusts of wind pulsate 
Your breasts pressed against my chest 
Your love shapes my life 
As the hands of the sculptor 
Mold the clay,
Closing her eyes
The harpist plays
The notes of the song within her heart.

                       Song for the Earth 

May peace be upon the Earth
May Her beauty 
Be within me and radiate from me
May I shine with Her light
May She shine from my eyes
May I speak from out of Her silence 
May She resonate from within my voice
May I merge with Her lands
May she flow without ceasing through my body and my hands
May I never be separate from Her: 
From Her forests and Her mountains,
From Her lakes, Her rivers, Her seas, 
From Her silence and Her mysteries.
May every breath take me deeper within Her wisdom 
And may I always share in joyful Celebration 
With all those who are close to Her. 


                       I Shall Never Taste

(Composed to the song Mystica Rosa Florencee in the album Mystica 
Rosa by Theresa Schroeder-Sheker) 

I  saw a naked woman dancing a slow, hypnotic dance 
In a kingdom of my imagination so far away 
It is not found in any myth or legend: 

Your hips rising upon the air                               
As a breath on a path of love                               
Flies on wings to the heart of God. 
Your thighs circling, molded                                
As a sea of sand dunes sculptured by the wind               
An intimate caress                                          
My palm will never find                                     
Flowing upon your skin.                        
Your hips embraced                                          
By shadow and light 
Drinking as an elixir                                       
The secret places of your delight                           
I shall never taste your lips                               
Nor the rhythm of the sea                                   
Flowing around your thighs                                  
Though I drown in a sea of bliss                            
Though ecstasy be my wine. 
Space itself curls and turns                                
Lost on dark pathways                                       
Gateways Eternity can only find                             
Within this moment                                          
As your body rising now descends. 
Your face moving mysteriously, eyes closed                  
Yet lit from deep within                                    
Whispers names                                              
Of ancient powers men have long forgotten. 
Your hands, your fingers                                    
Adrift on the winds my soul will never know                 
Sail as moonlight through white winters                     
Sail as twilight through my dark desires.
You hum,                                                    
Your passion glistening on your skin                        
And your scent                                              
Shakes me as you pierce me deep within                     
My nerves scream like rivers running                        
From the tallest mountains                                  
Evaporating and lost                        
Amid the desert's red dunes.                                 
Your body pulses                                            
The music undulating                                        
Enchanted by your skin                                      
My heart beats                                              
But I can not find the way,                                 
My soul sleeps, a lion in his jungle
Still, I can find no rest                                      
Even as I hear                                              
The depths of your fullness                                 
Releasing in your breath                                   
Even as your voice 
Winds its way through my soul 
With more intimate caress 
Than a river shaping a valley
Flowing upon its hills, 
Its granite cliffs, its secret pools.
There is a candle 
A wick naked and exposed 
It burns furiously
Inhaling the air
Exhaling flames of desire 
Melting
Darkness submits
To worship upon this altar: 
Your body
Your hips whose play 
A wine 
Fermented from starry ecstasies 
My craft will never find 
The flame is red
The flame is white
The flame burns me 
With a delight I shall never taste.
Magenta clouds at dawn strung out 
As islands across a sea
As a necklace around your neck
The Lord of the Winds 
With his soft, moist kiss 
Searches for your breasts
With a devouring hunger 
The Lord of Light
Casts his rays 
Into the sea of my sorrow
And borrows my eyes
To watch you dance
And weeps at twilight 
For the sweetness 
My lips will never taste.
Your hair drops upon your shoulders                         
Flies around your neck                                      
The flowing, rippling, shimmering                           
Of water in a falls                                         
Of smoke swirling in the wind                               
Are not as wet                                              
Are not as dry 
As your hair                                                
Which burns, and freezes, and impales me                    
With promises of what might have been                       
Had we met                                                  
And you yielded your love to me
Its waves of bliss
Its familiarity 
Your hair like rain 
Falling upon my face.
I have entered a place                                      
Where men are forbidden to go                               
A place of the soul                                         
A wilderness unknown                                        
Where breath can not flow                                   
The heart can not seek                                      
But it is clearly seen as you dance-- 
Your hips and thighs                                        
Caressing the air                                           
Your body sharing your innermost being                      
Unfolding as you enfold the moment                      
In circles, curls, and turns                                
Rising and descending                                       
With a love I shall never know.                             

If I could dance with you                                   
If I could walk upon the wind                               
If I could bargain with the stars
For breath to float my sails 
If I could sail through every dream                         
As a sailor every sea                              
And you are the sound of the sea                           
When I am lost and lonely                                   
Guiding me by the light of stars                            
The moon's silvery touch upon my skin                                                
Igniting me within                                          
As golden fires without limit                               
Stumble intoxicated through the sky                         
Having spied upon our love. 
Come dance with me                                          
I will be your consort, your guide, your soul, your love    
As you sing                                                 
The winds of Eternity run their fingers through your hair-- 
Once we held hands by a well so long ago                               
Your smile rode above the waves                             
Like a bird migrating across countless lifetimes            
To return to me again                                       
And again, your soul, your song revives me                  
As I sink into your heart                                   
And sleep and rest and dream                                
As you caress my skin.


                          The Beloved
 
    (The next day after meditating with the archangel Gabriel)
    
She said, 
Say something sweet, kind, and irresistibly seductive.                                                 
I replied: 
If I were holding your hand 
Right now between my hands 
I feel I am reborn 
And I feel my body 
Slipping, sliding, sliding downward into your body--
A fire igniting 
Like the light of dawn penetrating down among a forest's shadows, 
Burning them away, turning them into pure light.                    
And as I caress your belly, your soft belly 
My palm drifting upon your skin, 
I sail as a bird upon the wind
Searching across the oceans of your soul 
For new islands to call my home.                                
And when I put my tongue in your navel--
I taste with my mouth one of the twelve fruits 
Of the Tree of Life  
(Which are for the healing of the nations), 
And this fruit, as I turn my tongue to and fro, 
Is a red pomegranate,
But its taste is of peach and the taste is of springtime--
With fresh waters flowing from mountain snow--
Icy winter dissolving as I lick your navel,  
My mind turning and turning 
Here at the center of your being:               
 
       I flow into you and dream of new beginnings.             

And as I place my hands on each side of your waist 
Gently moving down across the curve of your hips--              
I find myself in a dark forest at night
Following the sound of one bird singing, 
Singing to me of a dream 
I let fly away from me, escaping from my life to be free, 
But now it has returned, charmed by your beauty 
And by this touch upon your hips in this night of quiet ecstasy.        
As I kiss your hand,  my tongue reaching down into your palm, 
I glide with the wings of a dove down into a valley--
I take within my hands a bunch of grapes from a vine, 
A vineyard growing not far from the sea,    
Not far from a place of mystery--
A place where the human heart has learned to be free.                               
I linger here lost in your arms, enfolded by your touch,
I am caught, unable to leave.  
Even if you offered me the keys, 
I could not unlock these gates which bind my soul 
Nor forgo the tears which hold me here. 
And as I kiss your upper arms, pausing, then dropping downward, 
My touch a feather from a bird 
Lit with golden light and a rainbow crown,                                  
I feel your body rising beneath me, 
I see your smile--
The sight of sunlight on the horizon at dawn, 
Your two hands draw me to you to kiss your lips 
And as we kiss, at that touch, like a cloudburst in a thunderstorm, 
A wilderness of passions whirl about me in a dark gray world  
Where all that now exists is the touch of your lips, 
But in another kiss, the storm is gone, 
The sky clears
And I walk among fields 
Where waves break in seas of golden light 
I whisper your name calling out to you: I love you                   

And the mountains in the distance                           
And the waters in the ocean depths                          
And the trees in the forest hear this whisper               
And the mountains sigh                                      
Wanting to stretch their bodies,                            
To shift their bulk and release their tension,              
The oceans shiver and dream of turning into clouds       
Walking upon the winds, 
And the trees, those who heard my whispered words--
I love you--
Their leaves turn upward and they reach out 
To embrace the sky.                                            
                                                            
I love you.                                               

     
                     The Beloved: Her Reply  

My hand between yours
And at dawn or sunset
I am the high cirrus clouds
Saffron, russet, vermilion, 
Cadmium red, carmine, rose, coral pink,
Sailing upon a turquoise sea.
Your hand on my belly
And I am suspended, floating,
Adrift on an ancient river of the soul
While the touch of your tongue
And the secret chamber at the center
Of a subterranean labyrinth
You set afire
Your touch that discovers
Memories I had hidden so well
I thought they were lost forever.
Your hands sliding down upon my hips:
A birch, a yew, an oak, a pine, a cedar,
Blindfolded I walk 
Led by a guardian of the forest
To where I join with friends
Who celebrate this night
Both the sacred 
And the dark passage ways
Leading us here.
Your kiss on my palm:
A lamb and its mother
Calling out to each other
Across a ravine,
My body moves involuntarily
A swirling
A python's thigh uncoiling
A sail unfurling in the rising wind
My mind sinking down
Muscles tightening, contracting,
My breath is where 
The eagle hovers, gliding, 
Ascending and descending.
Your kiss on my arm:
The roots, the stem, the petals,
The fragrance within
Each separate part of the flower
Feels the spark pass through it--
The ray the enchanter plays
The dream in the eye of the sun
Echoes and probes the depths
Of my body and soul.
And at our kiss
A flashflood wild and dangerous
Devouring one by one
Calm moonlit pools
Where serenity said I belong
Yet I yield
To the raging torrent,
The surge, the uncharted power
Which inflames the stars
And seeks to bind your heart
And mine as one forever.
The Greater Love
Which informs the universe
In exquisite pain, 
In blissful torment, 
In terrible beauty,
Cords rending the soul
Sounds whose harmonics
Create both light and darkness
No mystical dervish this--
I whirl amid a creator's abyss
Impaled by the lightning bolt
In the night sky,
The womb in which 
The Image of the world 
Is reborn again and again, 
Your touch 
Is the sculptor's acid
Annihilating the last barriers
To my heart, 
My body absorbs these fires through every pour
I seek you from the core of my being,
To wrap you about, to scream,
To rise higher.
Wind blown foam from the crests of these waves
Are tears in my eyes
As the storm wind's fury
Clasps me close to his breast
But at the center
Of the whirlwind
Silent and still
You and I remain the joining 
Round which the stars dance. 


                       The Undine 

          (While having dinner with a Wiccan Priestess:)

The undine borrowed the body 
Of the Wiccan Priestess to speak to me
The undine said: 
"When I look at you through my eyes
You are wonderful to behold--
A man of power, masterful, and in charge
But the `you' I perceive with these human eyes
Is thin, wiry, balding, and shy
No wonder you are a bard
Women have no respect for you
Their mind deceive them and so their senses can not lead them
To listen to the songs the seas have told
Hot blood flowing in their lungs
Moist air set afire
With the taste of passion
Power dancing with desire. 
But we elemental beings crave you as our lover
You go for the heart
You ask for all that I am
Your love nearly tears me apart
I can hold nothing back
When you kiss me
You taste the salt of seven seas
Waves colliding in mid ocean from separate storms 
Explode in white foam as we touch 
But for human women it is not at all like this: 
The hand that glides upon the skin
Does not beckon them
I think they cling to identity excessively 
The light of the moon does not penetrate their darkness 
And so their souls do not speak from their lips 
They feel not the electricity of the lightning storm
You set free in me
Nor do they hear the consonants and vowels 
Of waters crying aloud
Making love on all the beaches of the world
In the rapids of the streams and the river's falls
They know not the releasing arising from the ocean floor
Nor the sinking, the letting go into the undertow
Nor the returning, the arching back 
In the wave's crest breaking
The feathery tip
Translucent in the sun
And sparkling in starlight.
Where can an undine go
To share with a human soul these things?
And dark depths of the ocean trench
The slippery touch of the jellyfish and the nautilus 
The caress of the artic cold
Or the warmth of curling up on a tropical beach
Of a woman walking out of the sea naked and free
Drops of water anointing her skin.
Sailors handsome, rugged, strong, and bold 
Perceive with acute vision
The winds, the tides, the wave's size, the seasons
And the clouds at dawn
Brave are their hands upon the helm
With compass and stary charts they master the dark 
But in their eyes the blue green sea does not dream
They are afraid of what they can not control
But you are not as these 
The sea flows in your soul
As waves roll five thousand miles
As magnetism flows between the poles
And when you kiss my lips 
It is I who drown in your bliss."     


              My Life Koan 

(Meditating with  , a spirit of the Mercury sphere who asked me:)

What is the source of love within you 
Which heals the wounds of your heart?  

My mind is the sky--
Pure, clear, and open
Its air flows through my chest 
Its winds are my breath

My body is the Earth--
In me, Her Silence and endurance reach consciousness
Like Her, I shelter and I protect
I am one of Her fruits 
I am the strength and nourishment upon which others thrive 

The oceans are my magnetism and love
Rivers my bloodstream
Rain my moist fluids 
Lightning my heartbeat
Thunder my voice
I am life sustaining and giving birth to life

The volcano and magma at the center of the earth
Are my will and power unfolding 
I burn, I consume, I destroy 
Yet I heal the broken heart
And bring joy and excitement to life

The turning of the seasons 
The circle of the stars dancing 
I am Eternity uniting with time 
I am the nobility of the sun
Its inner union and fusion of opposites 
And through its light
My Song streams forth to the ends of the universe

I am the serenity of the moon 
Fluid, malleable, and changing
I am harsh, cold, and empty
I choose the place of your birth
I am warm, sweet, and nurturing
I reunite what is lost
All dreams arise from my light 
I am tenderness overflowing from the heart

I am within and I awaken 
The seeds of spirit hidden within all things 
I am the Celebration of Life
I am the deepest peace within the soul
I only exist to reveal the gifts
Which otherwise remain unknown
And there is no where I will not go
To bless or join with those who love.


An Elegy

For Lahe'ena'e Gay,  killed 3/4/99 in Columbia. 

		  An Elegy

When I think of Lahe, I think of the Earth--
The mountains, the trees, the streams, the seas--
The waves, the winds, the currents, the tides
And the moon drifting through the skies.
When I visualize Lahe, I recall holding her hands
And I hear water falling, splashing, and laughing in mountain pools
On the Big Island, on Maui, on Molokai, on Oahu, and Kaua'i: 
Ripples cross the surface to nudge my skin
And there are rainbows in the spray
As the wind swirls and lifts the fine mist
Up and over the cliffs.
Somehow she still seems near
As if I catch the scent of her hair.
If only the Plumeria were in blossom,
If only the shama's clear, crisp song 
Could replace this fragance which is forever gone.
Lahe, you are the tears within me I have never cried,
The beauty of the universe shines in your eyes,
You are the part of my soul which will never die.
The Earth weeps tears this night for a child so dear
As do I.