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ALEMBIC
by Holly Tannen
For I am every dead thing
In whom love wrought new Alchimie...
He ruin'd me and I am re-begot
Of absence, darkness, death; things which are not.
          - John Donne

Sit down beside me, my dearest friend
I know we've been growing apart
And how strange I've grown in my nights alone
With the boy with the tortured heart

Like him I'm a wild and a heedless child
Weary of all I know
And I see how you fear I'd leave you here
To follow the boy and go

Clear rushing stream in a willow wood
Mountains agleam with snow
Red burning sand in a barren land
I would follow the boy and go

I've roamed the streets with him stinking drunk
Cried with him when he wept
Trembled in pain at his cold disdain
Feared for him when he slept
     The boy with the tortured heart

Frail as a boat driven out to sea
Pale in the phosphor glow
Longing to rest on the ocean's breast
I would follow the boy and go

Words that come tumbling across a page
Eyes in a photograph
Dream of a mouth laughing on my mouth
And that more ferocious laugh
     And I dream...of that more ferocious laugh

Bid me goodnight then, my dearest friend
And honor our magic art
Tempered and whole, I call back my soul
In this alchemy of the heart
Of the boy

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Practical Alchemy
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Mistress of Folklore
Box 1136
Mendocino, California
95460

Fax 707-937-3055
     Holly Tannen teaches folklore and anthropology, and has lectured on contemporary magic at U.C. Berkeley and at Yale University. Her recordings include "Invocation", "Between the Worlds", and "Rime of the Ancient Matriarch"


Holly's home page :  CDs :  songs :  concerts :  workshops :  vita :  quotes

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HollyTannenLT.gif - 5520 Bytes
Mistress of Folklore
Box 1136
Mendocino, California
95460

Fax 707-937-3055

Michael Potts, webster updated 21 April 2002 : 12:09 Caspar (Pacific) time

All text, translations, and songs copyright © 2002 by Holly Tannen