The Beautiful Dragons

About the Book

It is a wonder. The Beautiful Dragons is a powerful narrative on the dark beauty of an affair of the heart. Within these pages, prophetic psalms weave vine like through the flowers of passion and betrayal. The reader, seduced into the poets world of sensual love and spiritual seeking, is left with the unsettled feeling that they are inextricably entwined. Contradictions abound. Intense aloneness occupies an intimate encounter. Universal connection is celebrated in separateness. Convention is dispensed with. Lines are blurred between the human and the divine. This straddling of worlds creates magnetic tension, sometimes drawing close, sometimes repelling, always engaging. The spareness of the form turns up the volume on intense emotion. “My hand moves to your belly where the grail lies buried . . .” Offbeat humor turns up occasionally. “I can’t help it if you don’t have any sense . . .”. Messages delivered in stoical voice are softly shocking. “I have prayed hard for the cutting of your heart . . .” And the cadence is lyrical in the clean, spare way of a windswept beach. “Your arms rose up in wings of fire they reached for me . . . “ Her life as an artist allows visual expression that is heart rending. “I have been down the dark river, where lost angels draw pictures in the sand . . .” She takes you to the dark side of the moon and threatens to hold you there forever, then yanks you into a blazing light of visionary zen-like oneness. The overall effect is haunting.

About the Author

A native Floridian, Marianne Upson is an artist and writer who was raised on the waters of the Atlantic in Ormond Beach. After earning her BFA at the University of Florida, she moved to the heart of Thoroughbred country, Marion County, to become editor of the state racing publication. She now owns an advertising agency in Ocala. This is her first book.