Red Wine of the Week 43

Week 43, 1996 ŠHannu Lehmusvuori

Don Jacobo

A Rioja wine clad in gold, and shining red. Uncorking floods your nostrils with scents. Sips stay alive and continue dark. Bring me any world.

Matter transforms into a spirit, visions conquer, everything is possible, everything can vanish. The truth in wine isn't timeless, it must be enjoyed now.

Don Jacobo Reserva 1991
Rioja, Spain
61,40 FIM
The alchemist Don Jacobo leaned against the heavy oak of his cellar's door. His heart was pounding with expectation, his ears hearing the thunder and explosions behind the door. The powers that were set loose in the deep vaults were developing a new life. Burning arrows crushed into the stone walls. The roots of the ancient rockbed were shaking. The oak behind Don Jacobo's back was trembling as he had awaited all his life - awaited fearing the realisation of his thoughts...

old wizard sleeps under his tree
looking up;
the palms of the tree grow fairies
dancing
dancing heavily.

the wizard splits into all.
rips up like a veil
dances death to life.
strange eyes smiling see death in all.
his lips dripping a saga
the fairies grasp.

the fairies are grasping his hair
the wizard is heavy.
his hands float to waists
wearing down slowing into a dim cradle.

and on the branches:
air carries light pregnant with sound

the earth rolls into itself;

gods are starting to move slowly:
a valley is born
springs are growing, fish fly,
rises reaches up a flower into the slowly moving night
the pulse starts

the wizard sleeps with fairies in his hair
light with tales

his sleep bends, drops on surface
a stone sinks through
hits bottom

Don Jacobo tears himself off the door with reluctance, feeling a pleasure born of a perfect achievement that makes you feel a sinner. With his omnipotence at his feet Don Jacobo saw an olive tree that didn't ask for a place to grow. It was standing against the dark sky as Don Jacobo had known all his life. It's roots were so deep in the earth the Jacobos had inhabited that it had stopped to ask anyone why it had ever come there.