Cauldron

Cauldron
Boil and
Tumble
Of mist filled
Crater,
Stretches outward
Cloaking
Unknown
Cruel
Dangers

Descending
Into shrouding
Vapors
Of low sunken
Cloud,
Sounds dampened,
Deprived
Senses
Construct
Mysteries

Figures
Materialize and
Darken,
Solidifying their presence
Ahead,
Common, made
Wicked,
Within
Alien
Landscape

Murmurs
Speak softly
Of
Unseen black torments,
Grown
Vivid, perilous,
Born
From
Magnificent
Imaginings

Crashing
Sound, causes
Bolting panic, conquering
Logic,
Racing scramble,
Fleeing
From
Gaining
Terrors

Shale
Kicked away
By
Frantic scrambling feet
Gaining
Abyss’ rim
Sunlight
Evaporating
Foul
Nightmare


Ken Goree


This morning, I was enjoying the dense fog swirling around me as I stood on my back deck.  I sipped at my coffee cup and watched it add its own mists to the morning.  Ducks in the wetlands pounded wings at the water as they, startled by fear of some thing real or imagined, took flight through the trees.  As the day wore on, memory of the morning slipped from my mind.

This evening, while in my writing group, the subject of fog and its beautiful mystery was brought up several times; conversationally in one person’s description of her day, and another time in a poem shared. 

It seemed like a good direction to take, as I sat down to write my poem.  I hadn’t intended to write something that seemed “dark.”  It just evolved that way through my process.  Like many of my poems and stories that have a malevolent presence to them, I don’t think of them that way.  To me, they are a recollection of the wonderful, delicious fright that one can produce with the imagination, especially as a child.  When my writing takes a dark road, I am experiencing my own special brand of nostalgia.