ALL RESPONSES |
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
one morning dove on
the wire above my garden
a dove idea forming high in the thick
morning air
predicated on the other morning
dove not there above my garden
it is mornings like this that are dove
made for two morning doves
their dove tails not yet touching
yet aching to touch, unpunctuated
by the reckless life-duration morning
doves commit to each other
unrestrained and waiting, the morning
dove on the wire above my garden
waits for the weight of the second
morning dove
to touch its wire above my garden |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
One.
You pluralize the subject,
wash it with empathy- make it unite.
One set of bones:
femur, foot and shin
makes a skeleton of love and light.
One glass
to drink the sins we both enflame
an entanglement of liquid bodies
all of the colors and atoms we share.
You pluralize our legs that walk,
our synchrony endures
Two. Never too many days ahead
or behind each other.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
That evening
there was no moon.
Far off in the distance
and behind us, a soft glow
from our hotel room,
so low it could have been
the light of a candle.
But on that dark beach
there was no distinction
between ocean and night sky.
Other than the din of waves,
and the sensation on our skin,
we could have walked
without realizing
right into the swell,
becoming lost
in the rampant surge.
The world had ended.
How easy it would have been
to just lay down and die there.
Instead, we held hands,
strolled the white sand,
as if the last two people alive.
And in the end
what else could we do?
But rest awhile
on that abandoned beach chair,
you lying down,
me sitting on the edge,
crying so quietly no one knew.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
In red-orange days when brains
had no idea but floated free
of explanations in the dance grass
waving our shallow thoughts into
streams of bubbles sent up for fish
to dart through—and edged pinked
thinking nothing standing only where
we dropped not knowing each other—
not caring. It rained. We swallowed
acid plastic poison gas and moved
outside the world of off-red into gin
vodka and vermouth. Clear killers
bleach us white now brittle break still
thoughtless wordless into hands
that carry us too close for comfort
much too dry—then drop us in a tiny
horn of glass as if we belonged to
the species of tourist curiosities.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
L, I’m spelling letters with my hands for the camera,
so when we put them together later, a word forms.
Santa Cruz, O, you tiny, worldly, naïve town. Salt-crusted
carnival, & sea-beast. U—I, bar-hopping, nothing fun.
At the Red Room, plant an unwelcome kiss, S, on our
bartender, and feel like an asshole, leave. Lonely,
with you friend, and, V, empty. Schwilling beer, I, from
abandoned pitchers, roaming tables. Stumble back before
the second L, incomplete. An evening and word cut short.
Sleep rough on the floor, Heavy, rolling booze sleep.
Pictures will show half the city, where we met and lived. |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
Reverand Baaken informed the two-fisted martini fans
that more than your brain gets pickled from swallowing too much
liquid in the form of spirits. As a result Monica said,
"Be a good egg and raise a toast to all God's creatures
before swallowing hard." |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
Click here for the real thing.
K duh dunka Ch, K dunk’a dunk’a Ch (Tsst!), Kduhn duhn ch, K dunk’a dunk ch (Tsst)
Ya mama is funkin
To the beat of the brain that’s
Tired ‘a drownin
But she can’t get a waaay
She’s down at the bottom
At the bottom of the laaake
Way down at the bottom
Where she’s afraid she’s gonna stay, Hey
K ch , K ch, Kchch Tsst
Your brain. Your Brain. Your brain’s on drugs
YaDon’t buy it in a pill, it’s a thang called Love
You dunk it in between
Your private little things
You spill it on the counter
And pour another drink
Your mama likes drankin martinis
She buys them in pairs at the bar
Your mama likes drankin martinis
She just aint gonna make it too far.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
When you find me at the bottom--
When you find the grief sealed shut
as a grave, without shadow
or shine, a place only gods
can touch and leave no trace—
When night steals the kiss
from my lips and the perfume from
my breasts and thighs
and the old aching hunger is put to rest--
When I am empty and silent
as a bell tied to the monk’s
matins clamor while midnight
curves it hands around my neck--
When I am filled with surrender
as infinite as mercy
unfurled like a river
cresting the green banks
of a garlanded summer, will you
come to me, creature and king,
secret and soul, will you whisper
to me all the things I must know,
all that I have been
waiting to hear, will you take me
home and never let go?
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
We float in fresh lake water, stripped
bare to brain, skin and bones hidden
beneath blueberry bushes on shore.
It's cold. Our spinal chords hum tunes
to forget freezing, no stiff tongues
left to sing like loons around us.
With nothing but thought for movement,
we dream ourselves into existence. |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
he doesn’t much care for this habit
hankering after old taboos:
yet again this morning black lifts
and yellow burns through
the slatted Venetian blinds
light melts fog, another night
of drink lingers in pores like paste
cold tide curls in, lapping over
his toes and swollen lips
wrap around his face to quench
parched loneliness like an old
lover drained under a drunken kiss
last night she ran to him, shoes
sinking into his muddy head,
breath a frosted cube
they played freeze tag all night,
only now he can’t find her
and he is afraid he is it forever |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
In all the farewells
in all the airports
all the mornings
In the car on the freeway
going west, coming east
At the blues fest, the symphony
the artists’ quarter
In time past, time lost
the years that will come
In Chiang Rai, Wellington
Athens and Florence
In poetry, in the mountains
in the north, on skis, in boats
In life and fear of death
In the delivery room
on the dock
in the drives to emergency
On the boardwalk
in support
in anger
with attention
Among herons
stalking the river
Frightened by the owl
above us in the woods
moving through
Afraid of that hole in the world
through which what might go does go
wanting some sort of lock
to keep what we love in place
Not finding it
we still live
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
(it's about the booze? an old one, then. nothing new.)
Old devils lurk these winding neural seas;
some synapse forty thousand fathoms deep
unleashes creaking skulls hard bent to lees,
who duck before the scythe’s quick-slewing sweep.
Old ghosts about the crippled yardarm flail
as thinning ribs in abject hunger rake
and tooth the blood dawn sky in ragged sail;
across the deck skeletal waters break.
The sea each rotted timber swells and creaks,
the rigging stripped in violent wind laid low.
The crew lets moan: “It’s been this way for weeks,
With neither help from god, nor from below.”
But yet there’s hope: I’ve sixteen hours left,
To drink – and drink – these goddamned ghosts to death. |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
Amber Eyes
They glinted across the way
Liquid loveliness framed
brows of understanding
plucked beyond necessity
they plainly bespoke
Discernment
Intelligence
Care
Laughter
Love
Ancient secretions
hardened by ages of dry pressure
Drew my attention
Later confirmed my lust
Glinting in sunlight of happy years
But even jewels can change
And refract love's white light
Presently separating the colors
only defects of my gaze
registering on the screen of display
And inside that crystalline beauty
lies a living soul
viewing me
through a lens
darkened by age
clouded by experience
obscured by particles of pollutants
Still
They capture
My heart inside the colors
And I cannot break roygbiv's
bonds of around my core
One cannot truly possess
that which is alive
colors of life
One can only hope their new caretaker
Will not discard them to dirt
Toss them asunder
To be buried by the detritus of the seasons
Instead of being adored by my gaze
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
Call me an American myth
a beauty, asleep, for twenty years
a housewife sweeping
and dusting the ashes
love left behind.
It wouldn’t have mattered
if the witch had told me
the apple was poison
I would have eaten it anyway. Remember
Eve?
Remember the first night
we made love
how the rain pounded the roof,
the windows steamed
and when I wrote your name
next to mine, in the clear glass
you told me
the rain fell like tears.
Just try and tell me
you’re not related to Zeus.
Or Adam. Just try
and tell me our story
doesn’t have
a happy ending.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
First Glass
The settling beer, clear and bitter as life.
The barmaid a little too cute. You are twirling
the tendrils of your hair, sitting in judgement
on the latest guy. Over there
they are chalking up cues, getting set for the next break.
Second Glass
Now these imponderables...
If I think, for a moment, of my first girlfriend
how I used to sit with her while she did her laundry
the smell of the honeysuckle by the door of the house
where she rented a musty room...
Third Glass
You start singing something,
softly. I pick up the tune, make up words for us.
I’m touching your arm. With the other hand I raise
a glass—to you, and Dionysus who gave the gift.
For awhile, we live inside the song. |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
I watch the world recede before me.
Time disappears, space shrinks into a shell,
leaving only what is real where plastic walls
and paper doors once kept us locked away.
The light shining from one sun is enough.
We circle each other, loving
the last two stars alive. |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
In most areas of my life
I've never made pretense
to pretension
but this unsettles
in a way not defined
not refined
what does the glass
remind me of
seventh grade science lab
vivid sections of //tissue once living
now pickled in formaldehyde (or gin)
slivered onto slides tinctured with solutions
I confess this was not
my starting scenario
first thought //testicles
for the delicately inclined//prairie oysters
maybe that's a bull shot
no surely not big enough
I pretend to keep up with
if not most at least a few
pop culture references
//mushrooms no too bumpy
//scotch eggs whatever those might be
plastic explosive //molotov cocktail
left over merchandising from Pinky and the//Brain
fiendishly modeled //play-doh
will someone drink this devilish
concoction or is it a set piece
art precludes artifice artificial artlessness
artichoke no no wrong vegetable
over boiled //cauliflower
ranting and riffing
riffling through
various and sundry beverage add-ins
//plastic "fun" ice cubes not cute enough
Title clues
what to ferret out from "The Two of Us"
my vividly pickled brain
is not up to the
challenge
today
in the end I concede
I have no idea and that
makes me crazy
want to google things
and who has that kind of time
will consider this an essay attempting
the question posed in the glass
More later. . . |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
I sit here on the cusp of day, considering what to do next; perhaps attend
to singing slave-machines, send emails to cubicles containing sleepy minds,
lift a cup of tea to my lips — consciousness begins to throb and pull my gaze
towards windows. To Outside, Others, You. I can feel them intersecting,
some with tight, firm connections, but most don’t even know they’re there,
scattered in the blue ions above. They could be singing, dancing, coupling.
They could know something so far beyond love, that it can be nothing but love.
My heart tells me she is there, forcing blood to extremities and gland.
All I can do is stare at these words as they form, lost in a moment
that could be your wink, or a flood that drowns me in sensuous laughter.
I die smiling, and another day begins. |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
Sunday Morning. Our words are Spring flowers in a cobalt blue vase.
The robins are pecking for strings of Truth in the yard where
we plotted to plant a garden together,
but didn't.
There was too much space or
too many colors arguing their importance
or rain. Either way, you said it was chilly, and Mother's day--
something important like that--so I
stop talking. You walk out
into the cobalt sky.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
At the intersection of Highway 169 and county road 9,
someone found a video of my wedding, the reception,
the ceremonial opening of gifts, and we watched it for eternity.
I, dark-haired, seven years younger. The Lutheran pastor, never tiring
of speech. The little children. We said thank you for each gift as others
looked on adoringly. My wound was salted, rubbed and slowly cooked.
I now know what I've always know, that what is important, is breath.
Lungs full of air. And a mind full of light. |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
shush. night noise
is waking us and you
speak night noise so well.
you are wafer thin
in the dark and intermittent
lightning reminds me how short
of a time these nights are.
i am dreaming of straw
berries and chocolate
and that morning in 1981
you were a sugar cube,
melting in my warm mouth.
we were young, featherlight,
glass birds with no where else
to go, no where else to be
no one thing to think about
except the simple, exquisite
elegance of the letter f. |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
she called me for mother’s day
that mother-less child
i love so much
her life has been an unending tragedy
but she has the wisdom of ancients’
her poetry is mysterious and magical
she told me she isn’t writing anymore
that all it did was make her angry
and she’s not like that
she’s not an angry person
though she has every right to be
life has kicked her in the ass
any way it could
starting with her mother’s suicide
when she was only three
her daddy’s beatings
and a dead baby
we three white oleanders
me
her
and howard
love one another
because we see ourselves
reflected like cracked mirrors
in each other’s souls
we understand our detachments
our rage
like we’re from the same skin and bone
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
I ordered a scotch
with a little bit of ice
So conventional
She sipped adventure
wherever she could find it
This bar was fair game
As you might expect
we found shapes more interesting
than those of glasses |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
Grandpa was in the rafters of the swamped ballroom, slinging darts at lovers as they met each others’ minded views and ate patterns--wrote notational pitter-patters--with their feet dancing in the House on the Rock street of wide hallowed interests; he’s an Old Milwaukee morning and an evening too, with spite-filled shafts brazenly spit toward the middled grafted fingertips of lovers’ lips parting in smiles--he’s an Old World mixed with these miles of the New--here in the VFW of watching, leaning into hearing distance as the lovers’ kisses drain off the evening into glasses of believing;
Was it how he shot the young ones that designed his falling grace? Or was time and place the point of how he feathered his face--nonsense spattered the floor with blood and kisses--leather couches and settees unfilled now that feet were dancing in the crowd; Grandmother knocked his sights just so, so that feathered flights of arrows would miss their mark here in the near dark--she believed in love still; he was a monster; But
her filled glass fury knocked to the floor soon enough, his momentary meanness pushing her out of view, both caught up in what was love--what a chess game of placed blame for two octogenarians to play--love, emotion without shame--here they split the ceiling tiles between them, black and white, no new news to this desire they are feeding; as the music slows to a waltz grandmother and ‘father realize the calm--he signs his life to hers again--what a brief respite for a worn out military evening. |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
Who He Is
He says he never smiles
but gifted me a glimpse anyways
He's been my muse more than once
Though he prefers not to feel
anything at all
I know he does
and that little bit of knowledge
endears me
His voice is two dimensional
and I see the pain
behind those steely walls
I feel the kinship
and how in some ways
we're so much alike
But I'll never deny myself
laughter...
you can't laugh without a smile
We both have our demons
his is in a dark corner punching
at his insides
mine's like an abscess spattered
all over my walls
I'll never ask him to give me
anything he doesn't
want to give
I'll never beg him
to be anything
more or less than who he is |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
I close my eyes and think of
water. Water flowing clear and
clean, the brook, the forest
gilded in daybreak, serene.
Water from an icy spring high in
the Spanish mountain, the road
as heated as a griddle
as we wound our way down
to supper and a bottle of wine. Water
carried away my son, or what was
left of his mortal remains, my hand,
my hindsight too blackened
to know what I was doing in my
humble ritual. The river is flowing,
I sang in the immaculate silence of our
mourning circle. Kaddish suddenly
understood, the need to weave praise or leave
the earth to its wretched toil. I was thirsty
for the sprinkle of water on the brow
from the holy font scummed with marbled
green by the church door. I think of water and
flowering in womb-warmth to be re-
born, the salty return
to innocence if I could but believe
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
I. Thank you
beau sia, for
inspiring me to write
this booty collection
of poems.
I wrote them myself.
kind of.
II. Great Questions
after making love
I was so inspired
to shop
for organic groceries
I asked my sweaty beloved,
“Kelly, wanna go?”
she said, “Sexy,
anything for you!
tomorrow.”
then she farted
for, like, five minutes
romantically.
III. To My Beau
dear beau, today
I think
I can do
you
better
than you.
sincerely signed,
*eh eh heh'em* |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
Like people, they come in all shapes and colors.
Some, collector’s items, princes of the Bierdeckel crowd.
In Munich Biergartens a server pencils a strike
on the Deckel's rim for every beer (each Mass) she serves.
Look around, you’ll see where the heavy drinkers sit.
Their coasters take on the fringe of eyelashes.
He grew up in a Biergarten around Bierdeckel.
He began drinking at the children’s table,
under the flowering chestnuts. His first glass,
a tiny mug of malt. Sweet, dark . Even the foam
he describes lovingly. Thick, white. At age four
he didn’t expect to be served another round.
Round and round. So it goes. The drinker,
after ginny the bottle; the drinker’s partner,
after the drinker, the third blind mouse
brings up the rear, butcher knife in hand.
And was threre ever a round written for beer?
Yes, indeed. Composed without ink or synthesizer,
a song of compulsion: Ninety-nine bottles of fear
on the wall. All ninety-nine we wish would fall
and never be heard again. Not quite Bach, but.. |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
Sit at the kitchen table in the evening,
their are no shades so you will see the dark.
There is a line that bares itself if you will stay
and watch, between the hills and the sky.
There is no change in tone, no difference in shade
or color on either side of the line,
but you will know the hills. They are
covered in falling stars.
Tiny, brilliant orange embers, pinpricks like sparks,
drifting in the smoke of a winter campfire. They are
headlights crawling home over the fields, distant
and small bodies who are warm against the cold,
glowing against the deep blue-black, and shimmering
like light’s reflection on water.
When I paint the night, it is
heavy silver seamed with fire-colored thread.
The line between the hills and sky is there—beyond
the first veil of darkness—if you will look closely.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
Harry and Walter Runtzel were fraternal twins, classmates of mine. Harry was short, with a round face and husky voice; Walter was tall, with a long face. They sat together at a desk right behind me. They pulled my hair and sneaked my pencils, pretended to dip my pigtails in the ink well, which sometimes even had ink in it,
if we were practicing our penmanship.
Miss Meyer was my teacher when I was in fourth grade at Roosevelt School in Mankato, back in 1934, or 35. One day I came in from recess early. Harry and Walter were still outside. The twins had been mean on the playground, calling names, like “poopy pigtail, big butt betty, teacher’s pet.” As I sat down, I noticed a nickel, a shiny five cent piece, on the twins’ desk, in the pencil slot by the inkwell. I took it. To pay for their meanness, I thought.
I knew it was not a good thing to do.
I put the coin in my pocket, but couldn’t stop thinking about it. It felt heavy and round sitting there. Later I gave the coin to Duane Freyberg. When Harry told the teacher his nickel was gone, Duane said, “Betty gave me a nickel.” Everyone stared at me. The teacher asked me to come see her after school. Instead of doing that, I ran home right away at 4:00 when the bell rang.
We lived just across Hubbell Avenue from the school.
The next morning I asked my mother for a nickel. Nickels were hard to come by and I didn’t ask for money often. She gave me the nickel. I told her I needed it for school. I put the nickel on Walter and Harry’s desk. After that, I never heard anything more about it, even from Miss Meyer.
Except that Duane said he bought a pack of gum with the nickel I gave him.
I was cured of stealing. I never again took anyone’s nickel. From that day on, and for a long time, I thought the ten commandments had been written for me – especially the one, I forget just which one—that says, “Thou shalt not steal.”
Harry and Walter moved away that summer.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
I say to you this is a love beyond time
and yet the time we have is precious, beyond
the way we weave in and out of each other’s lives.
I say to you I will love you always and
forever. The stuttering aches of my joints
frighten me. The tic-toc of the clock, the
turning of the page. I cannot prevent it.
Flaming orb of sun
has started to set on our golden
beach and I am chilled.
You say that you know I understand
as you take my hand in yours, closer than
our heart-beats, more distant than planets
orbiting even though the love that shines
on your face is mine to keep.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
(By Britt Fleming and Ama SoHam)
I want to hold you in my arms and take you
to a cabin in the woods, near Canada.
Keep you there for a while, feed you,
give you fresh water and air,
and bathe you in the lake
with my bare hands,
until nothing is left
but your light.
So, you are the Lake I’ve dreamt of!
the one that waits up all night, sometimes shivering.
Beloved, I am ashamed. You have seen tears in my garment
and all this glitter pours out.
My mind is awash with you.
I take deep breaths
and dive.
I will not be gentle with you, but pound
my thick waves, like fists, against you
as if in torment, the bruises painting my story
on your chest. When I see it there, pulsing
with your steady heartbeat and docile eyes
I’ll know it’s safe again, and wail. It is also
heavy-handed to say I’ve been lonely
but I want to be sure, when the water settles
and I’m so exposed, that the one who cleansed me
was not panning for gold.
Your cries are etched onto my skin, I wear your breath
on my lips, every night rolls in streams down my back
like salty rain. Your tongue reaches out to me with a gift,
poised as golden light on the tip, and I take it with mine.
When the shuddering ends, I look down, and find that I am you.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
A pattern made of colored labels
surrounds you.
I look at you, your long, straight neck
willing to accept the heat of my hand,
surrendering to the touch of my fingertips
running up and down your smooth body.
Your mouth is open;
you sparkle in the dim light of this room,
inviting me to you, to drink from the edge of this night,
let myself belong to you, to your heat,
the inebriant flavor you offer
when you offer yourself to my lips.
I want to dive into you,
to the oblivion that is you, but can’t;
my brain gets in the way, soaked,
sparkling like ice cubes in my obfuscated mind,
trying to show me the truth I have become,
the sin you are.
You are not my lover...
I am your slave. |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
It was nice seeing you today.
To lightly kiss your cheek,
gently hug you as if we were good old friends.
No recriminations, no mentioning of the past
in our words, even though I could swear,
I caught the glimmer of an old interest in your eyes.
In the dim light of a movie theater,
we sat, laughed and whispered
as if we never had been one.
We did well. Avoiding the stares that tell too much,
Like our desire for more than the scent coming from your jacket,
and the one coming from my hair.
“It was really nice seeing you.
Give me a call next time you are in town...”
Your fingers holding slightly onto mine,
we promise to meet again, and say goodbye,
and while I walk away, I feel this thing in my throat,
a tight knot as the one I feel in my heart,
but really...
It was nice seeing you again.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
We are Solar-powered Light Beings.
Conscious co-creators hyperdriving particles of passion
into the molecules of poetry causing you
to flouresce. We are Gods of the Dawn
illuminating all dark corners until
each thing dances itself beautiful again
and sacred. We are the Sacrum and the Crown.
If you flip us into the air, there is a 100% probability
you will spontaneously evolve your view
of the North. |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
She smiled he smiled
Two tongues crossed the LP grooves
Of Barry White cliché music
As each made a move toward
The center of the room--
Their arms looked like pythons,
Albino and made up of patterns, and
Into the evening they sang, feet
Padding out beats, they sang
With their blue stalking--liquid, and yet
Rigid in the smallest of moments
As if Gothic ran in their jerking veins;
And little lines of perspiration
Trained after them, whipped and thin,
Almost as thin as their names--
The old country gentleman
In him made a finale of a bow
As the clock on the wall
Chimed out hour after hour, and she
Was into him now, true to him--
But the honor was all mine, sitting
At the side of the room,
Catching her scented perfume in slow waves,
Calmed by the glaze on his stare, sad and sure
That this pair of unknowns would someday disappear |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
you tell me the night
is nothing more
than a thin film
of light. you tell
me to just create.
you tell me living
isn’t real, just a state
of being; that souls
are eyes and eyelashes
are wings. i smell your hair
and as the room fills
with judgment, i realize
the energy collected by sight
is enough for us to sustain. |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
Sitting at the bar by the eastern window
we toasted the eclipse and watched
the moon, smudged silver going in
glittering blue coming out.
As we walked home the curl of surf
sunk in its own deep purple fringe.
Our faces tingled with spray
from that wild tide.
In bed our fingertips testified to magic
as they touched across the sheet.
We could have been any two there
our hands, faces held in mercy
kissed by moon, by wave.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
Your cabin in the woods
lies on a boundary
between two worlds-
One is full of laughter
of young children
learning to canoe,
The other a dark forest
where a hungry bear
waits behind boulders.
The children sleep safely,
and bear is your friend
as long as you throw me scraps. |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
(This is an old poem but I couldn't resist adding it)
I want to say stardust
I want to say gold
I want to say blood that moves the heart
to spin and close
like buds touched by sun’s caress
and folded by evening’s breath
I want to say a dance on river feet
and a walk among cow pastures
I want to say a long slow drink of moonlight
and a breathless kiss dissolving the boundaries
into one unfathomable tear
I want to say we are too precious to be wasted
or torn and tossed away
that SomeOne hears the tiniest prayer
and the smallest dream
I want to say a song that echoes through eternity
to be recited by Angels
I want to say rock and cling
and sand and shimmer
I want to say love
like a bright hot flame
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
We are clouds in a bath.
We are dreams in trouble.
We are false hopes about to be drunk.
We are bleached brains in another dimension.
We are nothing,
there is lack of world in us.
We are everything possible and impossible.
Our presence (Look at us!) makes up for laughter.
Our existence is non-plussing,
no one really knows what we are, yet
we sit here, at the bar, not even thinking,
just floating in everyone's innermost fears. |
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
|
|
I.
When mom offered us
grapefruit juice, then buttermilk,
life was always good,
but the glass,
well, we'd rather have had a different one.
II.
Could you imagine what Ph.es you'd have to mix
to get two substances to dispute space
as vehemently as these two?
What great disagreements can fit
into a space big enough,
small enough, to swallow;
and how delightful
this acrimonious ending
might begin on your tongue.
|
|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
