EAST AND WEST MEET ON SIX LEGS
Littly Lamb bumping hooves over stones
Catching cracked toe on tumbled old bone
Jostled shell unexpected old Turtle in tones
Reminding hungry Littly and Turtley of scone
The Crookeye Shepherd got from the milkmaid in pones.
So weak now the friends edge to another gate
Soon cathing up with FlopEars bending back to a tune
So low and sweet from unknown strait
Flipping critter hearts with cooing croon
So long had Dovey perched on balding pate
Soon shining in early light holding saucy spoon
Now strong from care from unknown keepers
Friends passed through the strange gate that was no more
Now solid stone blocking retreat so no more weepers
Friends could spare for facing morning sun galore
Now critters and folk saw only one trail for leapers
Friends in faith joined by memory of go-tell Babe for more
Oh, east wind, oh rising sun, oh blowing sands did meet
These friends so bound by call to go-tell,go swell
Oh world unknowing of groaning girl and groaning street
These friends had crept along in halting pell mell
Oh alleys and stones and corners and scattering meets
Thse friends so oddly matched yet perfect in Go, Tell!
Now most strange starsong from off blind hills
Swelled all around these friends drawing them on
Now most strange starsong told of humping clumping thrills
Swelled most windy chorus swept from croaking tone
Now most strange to friends o’er blown by Croaker skills
Swelled in knowing hum was knowing of Catty now winged clone.
“Oh, what means those croaks with humpy crowned sixlegged kings?”
Friends flopped and stamped and crooky eyed did inquire.
“Oh, what means following singing star, rushing chorus rings?”
“Friends, oh friends, how meet, how tell such beasty squire?”
Oh, how go, how tell, how love-swell so unknown things?”
Friends stumbled on, friends pushed by Babe in bier.
granbee 
Jan 02, 2012 @ 06:09:57
So beautiful xxx
Jan 02, 2012 @ 07:26:08
Most humble thanks, Willow! Yes, I have always thought there were a LOT more beings involved in that first Christmas and those two years waiting for the Star to lead the Wisemen to Bethlehem!
Jan 02, 2012 @ 06:34:51
Sorry, Rose, I try and try and try – but I am let down by my own idiocy, I just can’t see it.
Jan 02, 2012 @ 07:31:43
Martin, try this: just jot down ONE sentence of what you THINK it means in a comment to one of my posts. Also, you can copy in an email to me. Then I will respond and fill you in, okay? Many others are “getting it”, some even more than I realized myself. And you yourself write many, many lines with multiple layers of meaning in them. So start giving me a little of what you GUESS about one of my posts, okay?
,
Jan 02, 2012 @ 07:36:50
I know what it’s about – the birth of jesus, the travels, the arrival, all the animals etc but what I can’t get my head around is lines like this:
“Jostled shell unexpected old Turtle in tones
Reminding hungry Littly and Turtley of scone
The Crookeye Shepherd got from the milkmaid in pones.”
It just baffles me, Rose – it makes me stupid because I can’t see it, yet I know what the you are saying but just can’t make sense of the words
Jan 02, 2012 @ 07:58:35
Okay, Martin, you are understanding the overall story line. Actually, your feedback is EXTEMELY helpful in self-editing as I incorporate these posts into my book. Regarding the lines you listed in your comment as “baffling”: The lamb tripped on uneven stones in the Roman-built street (they were the only ones building roads with stone blocks in those times). This jostled him up against someone he was not expected: the old Turtle from about 3 weeks ago on my blog. This caused an echoing tone that reverberated through his body, reminding him of his hollow tummy, his hunger. He had only had in about 3 or 4 days a scone baked in pone shapes from a strange milkmaid encountered in the back alleys of Bethlehem after leaving the stable of the Babe’ nativity. The Crookeye Shepherd was the one without eyes (he was a sort-of folk) who had no eyes except the one mounted on the end of his shepherd’s crook. See, Martin, it is necessary to depict these critters and sort-of folk as outcasts, as misfits, to who how beloved they were by the Babe. These misfits were much better bearers of the Good News because they just responded instinctively, irrationally(if you will), to that all-encompassing love. We misfits, we “bent” folk (as Williams of C.S. Lewis/J.R.R. Tolkien buddyship fame described us) are the onlty hands, feet, eyes, voice, nose, tongues of the Babe’s love message to all the world. Try to read this as Cocomino reported he did (he is Japanese and still working on English fluency): he just FELT it. Just read my posts aloud and see how you FEEL as you read them!
Jan 03, 2012 @ 13:03:17
Me thinketh she may well be the spawn of Shakespeare’s mum, compliments of the 21st Century.
Jan 03, 2012 @ 13:21:23
Oh, Tots, would that I WERE! Wow, wouldn’t THAT be a neat trick? Nobody “thinketh” so charmingly as YOU, though, dear Tots!
Jan 02, 2012 @ 08:01:02
Hi Rose! It’s good to be home and reading your wonderful, magical tales! I love this line “Flipping critter hearts with cooing croon!” I am playing catch up, so please bear with me for this upcoming week! But, I do hope you had a wonderful Christmas and I wish you the best and happiest New Year! xx
Jan 02, 2012 @ 08:07:16
Lauren, welcome back! Hope you had truly blessed times while away. Yes, that ine ending with “cooing croon” is a favorite of mine, as well. As you can see from my profile, I am a Byrd! (ha!) I look forward to reading your latest post, but must wait until the morrow when on a computer with better security (this one is not updated at my in-laws, where I had some duties this p.m.) that allows me on your blog (not in a wordpress.com domain). Most joyous New Year wishes for you, filled with peace and love and hope and dreams and laughter and love and peace!
Jan 02, 2012 @ 08:11:00
Awww…Rose, I did miss you and your imagination for a magical language. I had a wonderful time with my family, esp. with my Mom not feeling well. It was good we were all together, since we’re not sure how this year is going to pan out…hugs to you and all of your wishes in return~
Jan 02, 2012 @ 08:14:14
So sorry about your mom. I am lifting her up to the Father’s healing touch in prayer RIGHt NOW. See you tomorrow online, okay?
Jan 02, 2012 @ 08:19:02
Thanks so much, Rose, she’s 90, can you believe it? My Dad is 92, but she’s now slowing down, so she’s lived a long and full life, but it’s still difficult…
Playing blogging catch up is not an easy task and, yes, I’m on and off today and will be on tomorrow, too. I don’t return to work until Tuesday, which is very nice! 🙂
Jan 02, 2012 @ 08:35:29
Lauren, amazing about your folks being that age and doing as well as they are! My great-grandmother (Welsh, of course) passed at 102, walked 3/4 mile the day before she passed, stayed in bed 2 hours that morning past her usual time of arising, apologized for having her coffee brought to her in bed, told those on both sides of her that she was seeing all the ones they all had loved, closed her eyes–that was it! And she had run 2 businesses and ived on her own until she was 99–a lot for me to live up to, huh? Lucky you, still working with “days off”. When you retire and decide to reenter the writing/publishing/PR world, you are never “off”. Somewhere around the world, somebody always needs something–and I LOVE it, am thriving on it! Some retirement! Enjoy your day off, be good to yourself!
Jan 02, 2012 @ 08:58:05
Rose, that is an amazing story about your great-grandmother! At least, she passed in her sleep, peacefully, and seeing all those you all had loved. It brings tears to my eyes…yes, I’m in a job with days off, but it’s a job, not a passion, so enjoy what you’re doing. I’m envious and I long for the day to simply do what I love, rather than what is needed~but, it’s all good and I’m lucky to have a great job! (I had to end this in a happy tone! 🙂 )
Jan 03, 2012 @ 03:47:18
Lauren, glad you have a good job. I was always grateful for good jobs, as well–still have many dear friends from those jobs! As for now, you know what they say: there is no boss as demanding as yourself! Free-lance is more like spree-fance! (See, I just cannot stop with the word-invention!)
Jan 02, 2012 @ 14:14:24
I do love a good fable 🙂
People don’t write enough fables anymore…
Jan 03, 2012 @ 03:48:59
Just call me granbee fanbee fable! In today’s worldwide calamities and insecurities (finally ACKNOWLEDGE insecurities!), I believe we need fables badly. People must be reached at the subconcious level.
Jan 03, 2012 @ 01:55:22
Wonderful Granbee!! (But may I call you Rose? It is such a befitting name for a beautiful poet :-). I would just like to say to Martin that he is not alone in being baffled by some of the words you weave into your intricate tapestries. This is how I read your poetry: I read through once, picking up on lines that delight me or spark a feeling and then I allow it to sink into my unconscious… and I try to ‘feel’ it. Your work, I think, has to be ‘felt’. And then I read it again, matching the words to my feeling. It’s like your words give me the energy and then my mind ‘reads’ the visions. I then perhaps look at the singular lines and ‘work through them’, finding more depth. I think I ‘get it’ most of the time, but whether I do or not, I am delighted by the visions that play through my mind as I read and feel your work – it is just gorgeous!!
Jan 03, 2012 @ 03:50:57
Angela, you just don’t know how it excites my “littly” soul to have you say you “feel” my poems. That is exactly they way they MUST be read. I am aiming word-arrows straight into people’s subconcious! Bless you, dear reader! I value your input highly.
Jan 03, 2012 @ 02:18:58
Dear Rose,
I don’t mean to interrupt your conversation with Angela, but I believe she “said” it beautifully and I, too, feel the same way. There are some words that have “tripped” me up, but I visualize what you’re conveying and it helps make sense. Angela is so right about “feeling” your poetry, so, if Martin is reading this, please know you’re not alone. 🙂 I only wish my brain worked like this, but that is simply not going to happen! 🙂 Additionally, I enjoy the visions and can really see this collection in a book this year! I’m keeping you in my prayers, Rose, for your dream to come to fruition and I thank Angela for her insightful comment~ Hugs!
Jan 03, 2012 @ 03:53:14
So many folks seem to be “getting it” about my adult fable/fairytales/allegorical poems by realizing they are to “feel” them. The heart and soul process truth so much more effectively than our so-called higher coginitive powers! Thanks so much for taking the extra time for this additional feedback. I NEED you guys out there. Hugs back at ya, kiddo!
Jan 03, 2012 @ 05:47:48
Hi Rose,
I’ve nominated you for the Candle Lighter Award,
so please visit my blog for acceptance.
Lauren xx
Happy New Year!
Jan 03, 2012 @ 06:19:35
Coming over right now, Laurenl. Most humble thanks!
Jan 03, 2012 @ 10:18:12
Granbee, thanks for explaining some of your phrases to Martin – I was also having trouble understanding many of them. The story line is clear and I understood that just fine, but as a couple of others have said, it did trip me up in a lot of places. Thanks to Martin for speaking up – I was afraid to admit my “stupidity”!!
The story itself is beautiful! And I agree, our fellow-earth critters (all part of the great web of life) are in some ways more closely connected to the greater cosmic intelligence that fills this universe of ours!
Thank you… and may I also call you Rose? Or Rose Granbee – I like that!!!
Jan 03, 2012 @ 13:19:16
Betty, I am so glad you guys spoke up. This particular post was one I had been ambiguous about for weeks, in anticipation. I finally decided to just go with my gut and put it out there in somewhat mysterious form. I was betting that people online and in person would “get it” on the feeling level but not on the cognitive level. When you are attempting to reach folks in new ways, to get WAY beneath the surface, I guess you have to take risks. As I self-edit for the book, I will likely insert more short narratives between every few poems. And there will be excellent artwork aplenty. I hope you guys will forgive me for bouncing stuff off you like guinea pigs. Thanks so very much for your patience and continued honest feedback. I NEED it!
Jan 03, 2012 @ 13:56:27
Rose! I just read your latest and then read your comments. You know you seem to be creating quite a beehive here. I read a few how you are trying to explain your work. I get the need to do that. As writers we have that instinct to teach. Still, the poem needs to speak for itself. I like your response to Martin that he should read the poem aloud and see how he feels about it. This is all that needs to be said. Not everyone is going to get what we thought we meant. Hell, my best stuff always surprises me later with what I thought I meant. Trust yourself. Trust your stuff. You know what you are doing.
Jan 03, 2012 @ 14:26:23
Peter, your feedback here is what I would have predicted from you. You also write so many lines that must be felt, not over-thought! Thanks for coming to bat for my right to stick to my guns with my message. However, I have also communicated with some ot the other followers commenting here in more extensive, one-on-one ways and felt I should make an exception to my usual rule in this case. And the additional chit-chat with Martin and a couple of others has really fleshed out the bare outlines for the artwork that will appear in the book including all of these adult fairytale poems. See, Peter, I am actually veddy, veddy sneekee,peetee in shaping my self-editing processes.
Jan 03, 2012 @ 20:02:13
That is wonderfully vivid… Great imagery… Stopped by on my way from Poetic Journey’s blog.
♥Happy ♥New ♥Year ♥! 🙂
Jan 04, 2012 @ 06:07:58
Isn’t “journey”, as I call her, just too fab? So pleased you stopped by, and I enjoyed my first visit to your blog today and am following most eagerly. Thank you most humbly for your kind remark. Hope to keep us moving between less and less space between East and West!
Jan 03, 2012 @ 21:34:12
Hi Granbee,
I, too, am greatly helped here by some of the puzzled comments.
I truly love your style of writing but I think I can be too impatient to read and understand immediately, when actually I would get far more from it if I slowly let myself fall into the rhythm and “get used” to how you write naturally and stop trying to force it!! Don’t know if that makes any sense to you; I hope it does 🙂 There is so much detail in your work it is well worth my spending time reading it over and over.
Christine
xx
Jan 04, 2012 @ 06:09:52
Christine, the committment to the messages I feel lead to convey requires that I address the “inner selves” of all you guys. Excuse your higher cognitive powers to “recess” and just BE with my poems. However, I am always more than happy to discuss and discuss and….me being such a chatty ol’ penguiney Byrd!
Jan 04, 2012 @ 17:28:58
Thank you Granbee-
I shall now settle down to your work and just let myself BE!! 🙂
Christine
Jan 04, 2012 @ 17:32:10
Christine, you strike me as such a lovely person, so gifted, all you EVER need to do is just BE!
Jan 03, 2012 @ 21:35:44
enchanted (~_~) just love these stories… I can’t help but feel as though your a master literary novelist/journalist who simply plays on this blog (~_~)
Jan 04, 2012 @ 06:11:11
Art, whoever said Shakepeare was not “playing” (aren’t I just too full of it today? please excuse–I will only turn 65 once, after all!)
Jan 03, 2012 @ 23:55:53
I’m so glad you explain as well, because I was little confuse myself to be honest, but I love it. Your imagination is amazing! God Bless You 🙂
Jan 04, 2012 @ 06:12:06
poeticJ, you have caught me out–I love to mystify and then to chat, chat, chat everyone’s heads off. My gravatar actually IS the real me!
Jan 04, 2012 @ 11:02:06
Dearest Granbee, I see your name is Rose – and what a beautiful befitting name it is!! I also see you have quite a conversation going here! Let me add to it by saying that I approached your poem by reading it loud the first time through… and as for feeling it… my eyes were misty and heart swelled by the time I spoke this lovely passage:
“Oh, east wind, oh rising sun, oh blowing sands did meet
These friends so bound by call to go-tell, go swell
Oh world unknowing of groaning girl and groaning street”
There is a longing and love and bare honesty that moves through your critters. I can feel in your phrases that these creatures really are alive within you when they go to pen (or keyboard).
“Littly Lamb bumping hooves over stones” is generous and sweet… I can totally see a clumsy little lamb “Catching cracked toe on tumbled old bone” and unexpectedly jostling Turtle’s shell…
I, too, had some difficulty working through some of the phrasing in a second, slower reading. During the first, (reading it aloud), I did not… I just let the poem ‘speak,’ and it was delightful… but I was not trying to “get it” all. It spoke to my heart before it spoke to my mind. Some sections stirred me more than others for reason I will have to dig into to find.
I think that the writing style is characteristic of the critters, setting, and tone you have desired to create and sustain through your magical work. I do think it may be difficult for readers who are more comfortable with clarity of speech, and that, too is understandable. More than anything, it may be the intermixing word order that creates pause in the mind. But my hunch is that this is an intentional device and ‘pause’ is the anticipated response.
Did I read in your comments somewhere that you have artwork to accompany your writings?! How lovely!! Will we get a sneak peek? 🙂
Thank you for sharing this bit of beauty from your soul. I look forward to reading more from you!!
Blessings of peace & joy,
Angela
Jan 04, 2012 @ 15:07:52
Angela Marie, You have honored my work by your extensive analysis. I cannot honestly disagree with anything you have said. Yes, I am intentionally leaving some passages to the right side of the brain, excusing the left side to recess! We humans truly mess up when we get analytical. Look at what we have done to the environment, to any attempts for world peace, to multi-faith initiatives. Bless you for your very attentive and caring feedback here.
Jan 04, 2012 @ 19:33:36
Granbee I love your story telling skills,I have followed the stubbed toes the croaks and the hops and skips .. and find your mind a wonderland of imagination that puts Fantasia into the corner… I would love to see a animmated film of these wonderful critters come to life.. For they jump off your page as they come alive in my mind..
Wishing you a VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR Granbee.. May it be full of Love and Blessings of Good Health, and Happiness… along with many mind-filled stories and wonderful posts here at WP in 2012… Love and Hugs… Sue
Jan 05, 2012 @ 02:49:51
Sue, you are not the only one who would love to see an animated film of this series-in-progress! Then I could afford to build our dream-home-in-the mountains and you guys could all come (all expenses paid) for a huge celebration/retreat combo. Sound good?
Jan 04, 2012 @ 23:56:49
Granbee, I would love to suggest to your readers to read your posts aloud…that introduces a whole different element to the understanding. For the words have such movement and yes noises of all types that it comes alive on an even deeper level bypassing our “try to figure it all out” minds. Your words have a movement just like the movement of the travelers. You are truly a gifted weaver of words! And this is a genius piece that flushes all the senses. Thank you so much for sharing.
Jan 05, 2012 @ 02:53:33
My goodness, gracious, heartof, you have my head in the clouds. However, you are totally on target in saying my posts are meant to be read aloud. Remember being read to sleep as a child? Those memories from my own childhood always sit on my “left shoulder” as I write every word of these posts! Little children have much better sense than to try to “figure it out”. They just soak it all up like a sponge and carry it around inside them. I still cry because Pokey LIttle Puppy NEVER made it home to eat his portion of his family’s supper. I am most pleased to brag that I am in my fourth childhood!
Jan 05, 2012 @ 04:24:53
You do have a creative and imaginative way with words and describing things, and you have the capacity to keep it going in your work! If creative words come to me (and that’s a big “if”), they are short, usually in haiku form.
Jan 05, 2012 @ 04:32:38
Fergie, so glad you dropped in again. The discussion on this post has been an unbelievable answer to my prayers to truly engage as many other writers as possible in this adult fairy tale. My prayer-time “leading” to leave some gaps of time between these Epiphany posts is proving to be right-on. It has also allowed me time to find suitable illustrators for the book based on these posts and ones upcoming for several more months, at least. My next post is ready in my head and heart. I may publish it in a few minutes. Praying again about it first. This mission the Father has me on with this series of posts is too important to rush. As far as your own creativity goes, you MUST be kidding, right? Fergie, you are WAY creative!