Through the art of poetry,
sound and stone come together:
the music of oral communication and the flesh of written word.
Here are songs for our earth,
the mother body that
keeps us alive.
Environmental Poetry by Erin Rizzato Devlin, Artwork by Emir Elisa.
CRADLE poem by Erin Rizzato Devlin
A mantle of grey sets upon
the ageing day, resting
its heaviness above
the living bodies just
as the dormant, requiring
no greeting nor rise
from the slumbers but
from those who still are moved,
who still must listen
to the sorrowful cry of
the tearing day.
It lets fall into their spirals
the damp reminder of
its truth, caring to instil
into those who still
have not found epilogue
the faint value of
breath; how it kneels
before the spirit's
eternity.
It falls, tapping its song,
announcing its unwillingness
to succumb to the drop;
its premeditated
return to the crib
that awaits beyond
life.
CRADLE by Emir Elisa Rizzato
CONCRETE by Erin Rizzato Devlin
HEATHENS poem by Erin Rizzato Devlin
Eternal silence upon the dawn
of day; the crackling fireplace
at the heart of humanity is
the right to the forest, the freedom
of movement, the great privilege
to share these simple callings
that rush and glare, with
the hasty sight of a hare.
The sleeping bulbs awaken
from a quiet winter of solitude, of
closed windows and solid lights,
trying to grasp what is left of time
when we are not there to tell each
other how white is the day, how
entangled the future's embrace,
how empty is the space.
HARE by Emir Elisa Rizzato
ONE YEAR poem by Erin Rizzato Devlin
The very love of mother earth he craves
to give as he caressed the fields’ ploughed ribs,
he watches spring as children from their cribs
the hope, the seed, the woe, the weed he saves.
Ferocious wheat roars blonde as rain engraves
the endless summer days with basil sprigs,
he holds a handful of the sweetest figs
on leather palms as black and worn as glaves.
As burnt by sun, the last warm days expire
he gathers purple offers from the vine
whilst autumn is preparing to retire.
When hidden gems the winter frosts enshrine
the farmer sits before his sheltered fire,
finds solace in the smell of earth and wine.
[Farewell each dawn to darkest chest he bids,
with labour ends what’s left in moon’s eyelids.]
ROUND WINE by Emir Elisa Rizzato
SAMHUINN, or WOLF MONTH poem by Erin Rizzato Devlin
When the cold slowly descends
with its frigid plumes and
a promise of winter to cleanse
the land, this prepares for
the fruits of a new year, spinning
as a wheel in the distance:
the dark days dim all distraction,
make the boundary between
this world and the other
thin, welcome the warm spirits
walking earthen mounds with
their milk-white feet into place.
The fire burns, crackles
its restless flames, washing
the blemishes of fatigue
off the back of the old year:
moved by the harsh cries
of a hollow stomach,
their morality famished
by hunger and need,
each year three female wolves
descend the hills to scavenge,
to clench their thirst:
every time the glottis of a harp
opens its strings and
vibrates in a crystal voice,
they become women,
hunted by landless men
who slay them with a spear.
When the wolf month falls
out of being,
the wounds open, close
before the warmth touches
the land, awakens its creatures.
WOLF MONTH by Emir Elisa Rizzato
MAMMAL poem by Erin Rizzato Devlin
As antlers, the human carries anguish
and beauty as a crown upon his head;
positions circles of stones to contain
winter’s fire; to build himself a home
on either side of the cold season.
Amongst an inner choir, barbarous to nature
yet her wisest child, he throws twigs and
strings and songs of sadness to build the fire
and blacken the bread and warm the bones
of an existence meaningless and examined.
Inescapably human it is, to live as a burden
on the land, to maim the cities and howl
to the pathetic moon as she looks over and
beyond the shoulders of her naked creatures,
rocks them as children in their oldest days.
Love to death, learn to last of breath
murdered instinct is unkind to least of men:
renouncing plumes and scales for a membrane
of thin skin, the stubborn fears of nature,
cultivated in the intellect, drop as a poisonous fruit.
FAWN by Emir Elisa Rizzato
CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS poem by Erin Rizzato Devlin
In a vision of summer,
a metaphor of living grasps
the mind in its sleep:
the future awakens, rests
its elbows on the gentle
mantle of a slumber, as
a white sheet of ignorance,
an innocent opening of
the soil that cracks open
under the fierce light.
Moving, as the tall and white
and rugged mountains
walk along, the clear back
of Norway lies bare, it is
naked in the freshness of
the morn, the distance of
an eye in wonder: beneath
her, beautiful and heavy,
the wild horses chase
one another, beating their
blithe thumps into the ether.
This project is a collaboration of two sisters (writer and artist) who seek to combine art and politics in the search for truth. Our works have been featured or commissioned by local bodies such as the John Byres Award and SCAAN (Scottish Communities Climate Action Network).
Our main concern are issues of environmental justice and awareness, which we tend to promote as a representation of human values and virtues rather than merely a problem to solve.
