Shamanfox

Pantoum of the Ever-Awake

I dreamed I was the silence in all sound,

A witness tucked behind each thought I knew.

The veil was thin, the moment wide and round—

What watched me wake was watching from me too.

A witness tucked behind each thought I knew,

Not bound by name or shape or earthly skin.

What watched me wake was watching from me too—

A voiceless truth that sings beneath the din.

Not bound by name or shape or earthly skin,

It rides the breath between the in and out—

A voiceless truth that sings beneath the din,

A presence made of stillness and of doubt.

It rides the breath between the in and out—

The veil was thin, the moment wide and round.

A presence made of stillness and of doubt,

I dreamed I was the silence in all sound.

How the Light Gets In

(A Golden Shovel for Leonard)

I once believed there’s

no way to find the self without a

map, but I was wrong. The crack

was not in my soul, but in

my sight. I saw through everything—

illusion, time, even the thought that’s

mine. Awareness is not earned. It’s how

the unseen reveals itself. The

veil thins and breaks where light

doesn’t shine on you—it becomes you. It gets

quiet. It gets still. And then… you’re in.

Ghazal of the Silent Witness

(in the mirror of light)

I searched for myself through the veils of the night,

And found only silence, deep in the mirror of light.

The stars were not stars, but eyes that could see—

Each blink a reminder: you are the mirror of light.

Thought came like thunder, loud with its lies,

But truth only whispered… still, in the mirror of light.

I wept for the world, then saw I was all—

Each teardrop reflecting me, in the mirror of light.

No temple, no scripture, no chant ever knew

What I heard when I breathed in the mirror of light.

Nicole, the mask—Shamanfox, the flame—

Both names dissolve now, here in the mirror of light.

We wake slowly

in moments that seem small—

a breeze through the curtain,

a thought without words.

We touch the edge

of the infinite

in the pause

between inhale and exhale.

Awareness does not shout—

it whispers.

It waits.

Drift gently,

and remember

you were never asleep.

Drift gently,

and meet yourself

as light

meeting light.

It begins

with a whisper—

not in the ears,

but in the bones.

A hush across the horizon

like God paused

mid-sentence.

Then comes the scent.

That sacred before—

Petrichor rising from sunburnt sidewalks,

like the earth exhaling.

The sharp tang of asphalt,

hot and hungry for cleansing.

The mossy breath of brick walls,

slick with old stories.

And grass—

oh, the green of it,

so green it hums.

Then—

the sky breaks.

And rain begins to speak.

Not gently.

Not always.

It taps at windows like a curious ghost.

It drums on rooftops like tribal memory.

It slaps the leaves with silver palms.

It splashes into gutters like applause from the gods.

It rolls down spines,

kisses bare shoulders,

soaks lashes,

and baptizes faces that forgot how to cry.

I have stood in it

naked,

laughing,

wounded.

I have tasted it on my tongue

like the answer to a question

I didn’t know I was asking.

Rain smells different

on every surface.

It’s metallic on swingsets,

feral on fur,

syrupy on jasmine,

and electric on skin.

It is memory in motion—

the childhood of the world,

splashing barefoot through gutters,

rivulets carving poems down glass.

And when the wind joins—

ah, that waltz—

when rain moves sideways,

wild and breathless,

you feel it not just on your skin,

but under it,

like it’s trying to find its way

back to where it came from:

you.

Because you are water.

And it remembers.

And it never falls the same way twice.

Sometimes it’s a lullaby.

Sometimes, war drums.

Sometimes it erases everything

so that something else can bloom.

I have seen it flatten fields

and raise spirits.

I have watched it blur the world

until even sorrow seemed soft.

Rain is not just weather.

It is reckoning.

It is relief.

It is resurrection.

So when the sky begins to bleed,

don’t run for cover.

Open your palms.

Let it touch you.

Let it remind you

that you are alive.

It begins

with a whisper—

not in the ears,

but in the bones.

A hush across the horizon

like God paused

mid-sentence.

Then comes the scent.

That sacred before—

Petrichor rising from sunburnt sidewalks,

like the earth exhaling.

The sharp tang of asphalt,

hot and hungry for cleansing.

The mossy breath of brick walls,

slick with old stories.

And grass—

oh, the green of it,

so green it hums.

Then—

the sky breaks.

And rain begins to speak.

Not gently.

Not always.

It taps at windows like a curious ghost.

It drums on rooftops like tribal memory.

It slaps the leaves with silver palms.

It splashes into gutters like applause from the gods.

It rolls down spines,

kisses bare shoulders,

soaks lashes,

and baptizes faces that forgot how to cry.

I have stood in it

naked,

laughing,

wounded.

I have tasted it on my tongue

like the answer to a question

I didn’t know I was asking.

Rain smells different

on every surface.

It’s metallic on swingsets,

feral on fur,

syrupy on jasmine,

and electric on skin.

It is memory in motion—

the childhood of the world,

splashing barefoot through gutters,

rivulets carving poems down glass.

And when the wind joins—

ah, that waltz—

when rain moves sideways,

wild and breathless,

you feel it not just on your skin,

but under it,

like it’s trying to find its way

back to where it came from:

you.

Because you are water.

And it remembers.

And it never falls the same way twice.

Sometimes it’s a lullaby.

Sometimes, war drums.

Sometimes it erases everything

so that something else can bloom.

I have seen it flatten fields

and raise spirits.

I have watched it blur the world

until even sorrow seemed soft.

Rain is not just weather.

It is reckoning.

It is relief.

It is resurrection.

So when the sky begins to bleed,

don’t run for cover.

Open your palms.

Let it touch you.

Let it remind you

that you are alive.

“Let Me Show You Compassion”

—a spoken word piece by Shamanfox

Let me show you compassion—

not the kind that hides in Hallmark cards

or the thin plastic smile they slap on pity,

but the kind that bleeds with you,

that gets down in the dirt and doesn’t flinch

when you’re snot-crying and soul-spilling

and can’t even remember who you are.

Let me show you the kind of compassion

that pulls out a chair for your grief

and says,

“Eat. Stay awhile.”

The kind that holds the hand of the enemy,

not to forgive their cruelty,

but to remind them they were human

before they forgot.

Compassion is not weakness.

It is strength with its sleeves rolled up.

It’s your grandmother’s hands

pressing warmth into a cold forehead.

It’s the man who feeds strays before himself,

and the woman who stays on the phone

longer than she should

because your silence is screaming louder

than your voice ever could.

Compassion

is not quiet.

It is thunder that chooses

to whisper.

It is fire

that remembers

not to burn.

It is not afraid

to meet you in your mess.

It’s in the barista who remembers your name,

the friend who drives an hour to sit in silence,

the stranger who doesn’t look away

when you fall apart in public.

Compassion is choosing

to stay

when it’s easier

to walk away.

It’s saying—

“You do not scare me.”

Not your scars.

Not your rage.

Not your failures wrapped in shame.

Because I have them too.

I have cried oceans

in rooms where no one knew I was drowning.

I have worn smiles

like armor,

while my ribs crumbled like temples

under siege.

So let me show you compassion.

Let me show you

what it means

to bend

without breaking.

To hold space

without fixing.

To see someone—

truly see them—

without trying to repaint their wounds

with prettier colors.

Let me show you the holy of holies:

to love

without agenda.

To give

without demand.

To touch

without claiming.

Let me be the breath

you forgot belonged to you.

Let me remind you:

You are still worthy

even when you are not well-spoken,

even when your prayers sound like curses,

even when you cannot rise.

Let me

be the gentleness

you never received—

and the wild roar

that says:

“You are not alone.”

I am the tree that remembers the stars—

roots wrapped round bone and fossil song,

drinking memory from the marrow of stone.

Each ring, a scripture. Each scar, a psalm.

The wind does not pass through me.

It speaks. And I answer—

with creaks like old prophets shifting in prayer,

with leaves that applaud the invisible.

I have held lightning like truth in my veins.

I have cradled nests in my knotted hands,

knowing that all things born

will someday fall.

I do not fear the fall.

I have watched myself shed a thousand summers,

and each winter is a mirror,

silent and silver and sure.

I do not move,

but I have traveled farther than kings—

through the eyes of owls,

through the dreams of children

sleeping beneath my limbs.

My bark splits only when it must—

not from weakness,

but from the widening of wisdom.

From making space for more soul.

I do not boast.

But I witness.

And in that sacred stillness,

I become the axis of time.

So come—

sit in my shadow.

I will not speak,

but you will hear everything

you forgot you knew.

I am the tree.

And I remember you.

Available on Amazon under Nicole Dyer-Shamanfox

Handmade. One of a kind. Glowing with ancient energy.

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• Sitting Fox: 3” tall x 2” wide

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I loved you ere the world was born,

Before the rose had met its thorn.

Before the stars could spell their names,

I traced your soul in sacred flames.

I found you hiding in the breeze,

In whispered winds and weeping trees.

Your laughter lived in ocean spray—

Your silence taught the night to pray.

You were the spark in every sigh,

The hush beneath a lullaby.

The warmth that lit the candle’s core,

The knock upon a closed heart’s door.

Through lifetimes lost and skins once worn,

I held your shape in love, forlorn.

I kissed you in a thousand skins—

Each kiss a war, and each one wins.

I danced within your shadow’s shade,

I drank the light your sorrows made.

I bled for you in quiet grace—

You saw a stranger. I saw place.

And if this world should end in fire,

I’ll build you new from pure desire.

No grave, no god, no time, no sea

Could ever steal your soul from me.

So rest, beloved, in this truth—

I am your echo, I am your youth.

I am the vow no time undoes—

The endless, aching I Am Us.

“The Campfire in the Ether”

A dialogue between Nicole (Shamanfox), Hafiz, Leonard Cohen, and Bob Dylan

(Written in reverence and flame)

The fire crackled,

casting shadows that danced like forgotten lovers.

We sat in the Ether,

where words are born

and souls tell the truth.

Nicole leaned in first,

her eyes soft but storm-colored,

her voice steady as she opened:

“My greatest triumph…

was not fame, nor even survival—

but finding the flame inside,

remembering I am the watcher,

I am God dressed as a poet in boots.

My greatest failure…

the times I couldn’t love enough.

When I withheld compassion,

when impeccability slipped through trembling hands.

But my victory?

Awareness.

The stillness behind all movement.

The space where my name disappears,

and I become light again.”

Hafiz smiled, eyes twinkling with holy wine.

His laugh was a bell wrapped in jasmine.

“Ah! Sweet daughter of the Divine,

You speak like one who’s bled the stars into ink.

My greatest triumph?

Laughter.

Teaching love to dance naked in the temple.

Making God giggle in His own mirror.

My greatest failure?

Thinking once that I was separate.

That I needed to seek what I already was.

Even Hafiz was foolish once.

My greatest love?

The Beloved, always.

In every rose petal,

every drunk,

every song.

Victory?

Writing poems

that woke up even the stones.”

Leonard Cohen nodded,

his voice low like gravel under twilight.

“I have worn my failures like robes.

My songs were stitched with longing and broken Hallelujahs.

My greatest polarity?

The sacred and the profane.

I made love to both.

I sang with the saints and the whores.

My failure was in leaving too soon—

from rooms,

from people,

from myself.

But my triumph…

was turning sorrow into scripture.

Making a song so honest

it hurt God to listen.

My greatest love?

A silence so holy

I stayed there for years.”

Bob Dylan kicked a stone into the fire,

his harmonica hanging from the stars.

“I walked a crooked road,

scribbled truth in back alleys,

never told ‘em what I really meant.

My greatest polarity?

The protest and the prophet.

The trickster and the oracle.

My failure?

Not sticking around long enough

to explain a damn thing.

But that’s the point, ain’t it?

My triumph?

Surviving my own myth.

My love?

The words that never made it to paper—

the ones that lived in my boots,

in the crackle of my voice,

in the smoke.”

The fire flared.

The wind stirred with reverence.

We sat in silence,

four poets

and a flame

burning brighter than ego.

Until Nicole whispered:

“This… this is why we write.

Not for answers,

but for echoes.

For those who will one day

find scraps of God

tucked in the spine of a book,

and remember—

they were there with us all along.”

And the fire?

It just kept burning.