Feb 25 2014

baby, let me
follow you down

through taproot and tangled tributary
into the dark
cave hollow hole of fortitude
where you hold my broken
and i
offer crooked silence
as ancillary billet
while time marches down the skin
of our guarded intermingled spines
in the guise
of everlasting ants
heaving heavy minutes
on scarab-colored backs

at night
our sighs fill the sky
turning earth into petrified
remembrance
and we spring leaves
from gnarled fingertips
brushing tears from our cheeks
as we whisper dirty jokes
to the moon

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Feb 18 2014

because onions always
make me cry

we do this dance round the kitchen

bouncing off each other like pinballs in a space too small
for one communicating in a language evolved from grunts
and sighs and a pat on the leg that means: excuse me

our life grows from this place and there are always flowers
purchased with food because they offer the same slow
sustenance and this one tiny window does not

reveal as much as it keeps the light out behind
curtain wall curtain and there’s no room for waltzing
but we make do and break our bread in the silence

that falls between now and forever even though
you never like what i cook and i never eat what i
like we never go hungry or further than the living

room with its fire our food a dark chocolate finale
as dishes pile up in the corner crooning leftover notes
of consumption and waiting to be washed while we

do this dance round the kitchen

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Feb 11 2014

the weight of water

is always temporary

like the darkness
you’ve learned
to forgive

dawn is never your saviour
but almost enough
to make you
believe

clean is a fresh white cover
despite the mud
crawling through
what lies beneath

a map of every step
you’ve ever taken

you could be followed

you cannot wash yourself in crystal

you never were pure

this is the way you will melt

a pool of poison
sifting merriment
from bones

this soil contains us

eternity’s sacred measure

gravity’s compression

gleaning diamonds
to atone

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Feb 4 2014

murmuration’s song

i watch the sound of you
make shapes in the enemy of sky
and you shift change until I lose
the voice behind your words

this earth is cold and grey
and i stand motionless
as you scream
your quavering dance
through a wind
filled with knives and
stinging nettles

your flight is the map
of all things living
and i raise my arms

briefly

thinking perhaps i could
cut in
learn to waltz
or at least

follow

but I am no angel and
you have black wings

i have fingers and toes
and this listening heart

and we both know

this is always and never

even as you land
on the corner of my shadow

pecking code and
marking melodies

neither one of us
is free


Dec 14 2013

reverb13: day 14
on giving life a hug

::

This post is part of Reverb 13:

Day 14: What was the best decision you made in 2013?

::

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to choose my focus.

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to accept.

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i no longer feel the need to ask permission.

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Which, by the way, was the title of a poetry collection I submitted to
The Verse on Paper Project, which can be viewed here).
My plan had been to release an expanded print/e-reader version this year,
but then I got sick, and so, hopefully it will happen in 2014.


Nov 26 2013

running through the veins
of illumination

you cannot deny the light

the way it colors everything
with the existence of shadow

i see hope in the mirror
of cracked faces

something deeper than darkness

some glimmer of innocence and
arbitrary renewal

random patterns weaving evidence
of participation

the glow of reverence

your compass leads the way
with no reflection

crazed crackled map
of delicate edges

leading to your last deliverance


Nov 12 2013

you lost your keys and i
fell in love with modigliani

as i stood there waiting in a dust filled corner
smote and smitten with the angle
of a sun designed to rip my heart out
while you cursed and carried on

everything is always locked

but the eyes of this dark-haired girl
in a poster tacked to the blank back wall
her empty stare covering the hole
you drunk-punched open

on a night i will always remember

she knows everything about you
and i can’t read that droll expression
yet if i stand here long enough
in this spot of dancing light

my shadow will become her


Oct 29 2013

there are no absolutes
and lately everything
makes me laugh

but that’s not to say
death isn’t final

and the gold ring on my finger
isn’t valuable

or that some days my eyes aren’t
more emerald than olive

i refuse to be bitter
yet sit here
sipping vinegar

singsonging my way
through another day
of valiant questions and

i’m certain i was meant to be a tree
nothing feeds me like sky

birds are my shelter and
i need roots to hold me

still

even as i crave wind in my hair
and words on my skin

crawling clawing genuflecting
on a surface of no definition

bent broken akimbo
lackadaisical limbs

circling stars in a pattern
of pretty

tracing sibilance
with long bony fingers

through the avarice
of dark’s last answer

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Oct 22 2013

retroactive moon in the
shadow of presumption

this moon keeps showing up everywhere I turn
in my words, my bedroom window,
the music that plays through my dreams

on a good day, i pretend that this means something
a sign of some connection or some secret
between mother nature and myself

on a bad day, i think it means i am obsessed
with things that don’t exist
and just like the gravity that holds me down
there is nothing to be seen but consequence

we don’t float away and therefore, gravity exists
we don’t see a hole in the sky and therefore,
the moon is made of cheese or stardust
or some old man’s twisted smile

i don’t want to hold hands with either
i just want to look up and be glad that magic exists
i want to walk off the edge of a cliff and know that I will fall

but there is no correct answer
your moon is the same as mine and the same
force keeps us earthbound

oh, i know you’d like to offer your own interpretation
you dance and i fly and we pretend again and again
that this is something other than science

and in the end what keeps us grounded
is not the dinners and the datebooks and the deadlines
but the final knowledge that we cannot hide from the moon
nor can we float out into space to offer up a kiss

she will always be there, longer and older and
higher than any one of us or all of us together
at night the tides she pulls run crazy through my body
over shores i cannot cover or expose

she is adversary’s ancient echo
drawing us in and under and over ourselves
nothing trite or romantic or representative
of anything other than existence

the cold hard truth hides in all of us,
lit up and made golden by a sun who knows
little more than violence

this moon is anti matter that matters
more than she will show

rhythm and bone
in sky’s last cradle
hollow heart rocking
to and fro


Oct 15 2013

my ocean is sky and you
are the mountain

water baby
fire girl
the way we fight until
you’ve boiled and i
am smoke and whisper

but that is never
the whole story
this lake is girdled
by fire
warming your center
scorching your shore

and there are times i need
to cool my toes
even as my fingers ruffle
the surface of your silence

we are held together by need
i may rage and you may rise
until we cancel each other out

build a dam and i
will burn you
cross the river
and smother my pride

a forest is built
on ancient couplings
there is no fresh start
blank slate
empty hollow

these seeds were sown
long before we came scrambling
to the surface
birthing tomorrows
blaring tenacity

twins of manifest survival

fueled by oxygen
and undertow

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