Uttered

I had seen in part and that year
    after the snow had fallen,
then melted;
when in
        the dead of night,
        the draught like golden
opened,
                            I awoke and
                                    knew in full,
 the fragrance riding in with force
                                                                   against all aureate
designs.
My resignation came much later,
 stretching in shades,
 as my
sight improved.
 To
      test the

theory,

I offered you a drink.
You indulged and
       returned to self.
In falsetto trill, you willed me gone,
climbed walls like vine, reveling in the
        sugared relish of hovering demise.
You left
                                                    me no choice.
Stories, incomprehensible, tainted vows,
and I
fell into a summer bliss.  I felt
         the revelation first, viewed
         the molting of your words,
 the nothing left, slithering
between the bloom.
The end
                      of secret
                                 things.

Write at the Merge

Longevity

I come to you, bearing tears.
            Take what I
can give - an elegy, gem of genius.  Drink my flame. The waves.
                                 Because when the thunderstorm
  approaches, not a sound is heard here.  The pounding silenced,
we're protected.  I will stay until it slips away.  Above the beams, the
                                limits of all you think you can endure, find me succulent as ever
                                      there was green.  Lean up against my boundaries, budding,
                                                 and wait for the returning point.  Moments, sublime,
                                                                                                                     steam

steady

in rhyme.  Movement twinkles, their rythm, heroic
and the
          eye minds.  Cleaving to the
prophet's words, I understand.  I stand.  Rise, too.
           The sun flies off rooftop now, off blank page,
 shines back
down,
stealing patience from what she's learned of us.
In falling, unrepining heat, we gaze up with gratitude.
                                       This conversation becomes our discipline, pieces of
which, later pierce, dissect the
whole, and I swell beyond, pluck fear like grass, clutch
                                                                              tight
and then release.

The Sunday Whirl

xeric

There was
             something disparate of design in that journey.  The desire hung like holly at Christmas, calling.  I hunkered
                                              down till the
counterfeit heat
       tempted growth but it was never right.
                            Honestly, didn't we try?  And the water, falser, there, less
                                   satiating somehow.

Deprived of bare air, tears held and you hunted,
                                           keen.  How
is
it, I

lessened here?  I dressed warmly for you,  hinted a glow and
                                           asked, finally for
                                                                    return.

Fluxus

I.
Sleep's the only cure for this,
 but
           then again,
this is
when the inspiration
                  sometimes flows. Then every thought
                           is versed, and I'm teaching courses in my
                                                   mind;
 telling how I
suppose song
was
where I learned it first - in reformatted copy-writing.  I
                               stick it out and know when
                                  it ends.  I trudge
                                                 through weeks, it seems, weeds of words, till the
path clears, and I can run.
Patient with
    the repetition, gold with habit.  Nihil ex nihilo.

II.
I return to flow as often as light flies to night.
I banter with right,
        then give up fight, because the
weave of words broods, dripping, before the pour.
                                        I am clutching the gush of usage for lack of better.
                                                                                                            Best
                                                                                                                  to express with elements, the trivial,
            the

revery, the vital yielding fluvius,
            the beast, forever
                                     ravishing in
woods of apperception. Too gentle, and there's a danger
   of duty calling, inciting, iterum, so
                    I outwork all possibilities, let the
                                                              efflorescence, yellow, sacred, lest inspiration bolts,
                                                                    or worse-
I groom the list of helps, begin
     once more and center.  Dealt in waves, I dance with what
                                                    I have.  The healing
canters by, I catch her course. I return to flow.

Three Word Wednesday
                                                                                             

Layers of Whole

Maybe you tried
                  to make your way to me,
 but
                  the road was slanted.

Maybe I was haunted,
 the sky
                  striped in grey warning,
scenery, shaming.
                                                                           Maybe, I'm Remorse you can't
                                                                                                                      restore.
                                                                                                                      Record says,
                                                                                                                                  straight twisted
like a strudel.  Who am I to vie or even wonder
                       when
you're changing daily?
It was a nice performance,
but you
           can't deny,
I'm empty now, abandoned, unsteady as Abele but filling out fast.  Do
                        you recognize me, overgrown, scored in shadows?  With
                                                                                                                               the
slight
switch and the twitch in my gait?  The
  whole convoluted scheme, male by design, a low,
        long song
sounding war,
 but I'm cat-like sly,
purring, plotting,
calculating miles, while you mime care -
face painted
blank as white.
              What did you think?  You could
                                                       camp outside my door till you were
                                                                                                          ready?
Well, I'm in
            my prime - it's time for you to worry it
                               through.
 It flows
                                                  flying and hard now, so come in
                                                                              where it's warm, there's
                                                                                                 a footpath
                                                                                                   for you to follow, or steal away at
night, revenge the prize and
     highest price you'll pay.
Man is the reason and woman the rhyme and you
                                   wormed in and I roamed out.  If you could see me now,
                                                in my purple overcoat, bangles of bracelets, fitting in where
                                                 I didn't want
                                                          to -
it would be good for your head.  I can't make out your difference but your signature
                                                                                                                  scrawl gave away and
slandered how I handle
 my name.  Hung on your handwriting, who's gonna cave?  Soon, I'm
moving, the clouds absorbing sense and the air
       is bland.  We're at the wrap up now.  I am swollen, weighty, and departing.  Find me with your flame.

The Mag
Poetry Jam

Hay Sol

In a corner of my mind, in a
       corner of my life, the spotlight
                                         shines
 on squares of Spanish tile
where we
danced-
or should have.  I drew a picture of it once
 in the beginning
                                                                            but left
out morning
when I should not have.
 The result was a morbid sort of numbed
                                                                       beauty, charcoal dusty, making you believe I wasn't caught.
 I'd have cleaned that
floor, on hands and knees, a little housewife.  I''d have watched that damn movie a million
                                                                                                              more times for that.  The
blue long climb of the tub and the
                               heat of time wiping out days, the sparkle of the
backyard water and the laughter granted.  Breakfast cooking
               when
               we woke
                  (eggs like eyes,
                       saying, rise and shine and your bloody marys, the color of the mulberry pops on our
walks)

and nothing much to do.
       One year my flight delayed and seems the
next year, my life delayed, but even though I missed it then,
                        I know it now.

The Music In It
Carry On Tuesday
                                         

Downfall

Yeah, it's like that, Baby

Our initials carved inside a heart.

For a good time call-

me

Scrawl my name in colors and in loops - big and curved,
                                                                                  declaring.

You heard I was the one.

I'm a train, whizzing past, fast
      and bright
 with wrecked
        notions.

Song lyrics, catchy -
validating

Put
profundity where it doesn't belong -
                  where I can see it -
 say it short and sweet.

....
has a small...

soul.

I'm a building, tall and old and you're
              defacing value.
You're a break I shouldn't take
           and what's that in my pocket?  I'll
                                                             lock it up
                                                                     in lace,
send with love.

It's late - I shouldn't be here.

You've got my number.

dverse

Start from Scratch

I wonder
   who's collecting,
making out.
I'm
 standing, reverent,
 hands held up and offering
 and you're selling down the street.  It's natural as
                                                             the light, but correct me if
                                                                    I'm wrong, but don't actual
                                                                      martyrs die?
  I suppose I failed to
                                                                             tell
you,
how unlike other women I am.  I indulge
but not in sacrifice.
 I'll give freely but won't
               rake in profit.
So, please don't.
 I am tired with none to spare
and the return of
                                       splendor's dimmed.
So, though,
perhaps,
you thought
       this trivial

there's a reality beyond your right and wrong.
         So, we can argue on the tones
           or strands
 but
                that brush you're
                  holding is not a wand. Did
                         I leave a good impression?
                         I'm unfinished, wet,
but that's
 okay.
Throw another coat on before I dry.  I'm thick skinned and structured and I'm tame.
Let
              the bright
 work on me,
                                offset
 where I am dark and withered,
 but don't gut
                                                          my grays.  I know you're
fonder of the breath you've come to know, and I'm sorry
for the wind up,
not to
suit your senses,
but I can't
breathe when it's everyday.  
This
                      is not your way.
 Touch
me.
Feel my skin.  This is
real.
Peel me back, I'm not a replica.  Sit with me a while. Come forth,
                                                                                            forgive me for the wine I
drank in dead of day.
Find me here, circle round, peer into my satin-stained pores.
                                                                                                      The field of flush, the hush of beige,
 design a
concept,
          true.
Mind your manners when you dine with me.  Taste me,
but wipe your mouth when you are done,
stay until I'm finished.
Retouched by a master stroke,
                            still, I'm waiting, under dome of desire and
                                                                 domination of
                                                                 disguise.  I've danced too delicately, consumed,
but now I'm strong and calloused, known by God and self, I'm
              indifferent
                             to your nomination for delegation.
Journeying toward joy, I'm learning freedom and my words,
                                       my truth,
are not a form of subjugation.
 Remove
                                          your interpretation,
 and I'll show you more.

Write at the Merge

                 

Your Spin

Why is the pain always yours -
 or
    his -
 but never mine?  I suppose, because I know too much to
                                                                           wallow.  I'll own my share
 and have
 but I don't hoard, and I'm not accepting this new variety
                      you heap - or hoist.  I've lived a trilogy, not a tragedy and I'm plotting nothing and this is
  not my battle.  In fact,
      today, the wind carries
        caution.
 I've learned to apprehend its coming.  I feel
             the rain in my gut,
 and the air warns of strain, and I'm not restless, and I can't lead the way.
 I'm not persuading, and there is no path.  I just know
                                                                                                                    when to take
cover.
 I won't debate or writhe, prey in terror and in wait.
I'm tall, delaminated, back erect, leaving ruins,
 and the only thing I wonder is how or why I'm here
again, this place so familiar.
 But now, I have reserve of
                          strength
and I don't pine prostration.
My naked heart won't betray me.
What you don't know
is what I know,
 and there's a scent I
follow.
I'm weaving out, past piles
  of cursed pity, and willows cackling as they weep.  One pilgrimage I make, where there are promises of sanity.
                         The candlelight almost got me, the shadows making faces, fooling.
                          This
                               is not a transfer.
Watch me, now, each step, as each trick scurries, hiding.
 They
                                                                              know better.  Swept once under the carpet, for a
moment, bold,
 they best return.
 I'm not in the house keeping
                               business;
 my home's a mess.
                                   So, here's the door.  I'm exiting.  My help is not
your birthright,
so, keep your lack and I'll keep mine.
I bit it
off,
but I'm spitting out.
 I don't
cater any longer to imaginary grace.
                               I've held the root that
                                        spins
                                              straight to
                                                        hell -
and pulled.

The Sunday Whirl
                 

Why

Why this
 every day?  Every way?  Everything. 
Why here and now, then and there?  An
                               addict for the edict, the
                                              regulation and the rules.  The squirm of sense.  The sound of the sometimes rhyme, the slant of the
                               eye.
 The purpose in procrastination or the procrastination in the purpose.  The loyal lines,
              elongated , eloquent. 
               Eternal. 
The education
                                                     in the
                                                             energy created,
 found. 

Examples of exhortation.
 To wrangle with
                                                                                   the

world,
 waste vanity,
watch it
         transform, stare it straight, and curve it into
                 something newer.  Progress requires patience to envision the
                         entire. 
To hope but bend.
                              To exit into yesteryear, time and time again.  To experience precedent events. Unprecedented, too.
                                     Eradicate existing weeds and breed instead, a now enticement.  To
                                                             see again the
                                                                emerald waves where
                                                                        there are
                                                                            calls to ecstasy. To taste. To hide the human, the within, from the human, the without.
 To
                    eclipse the rasp of expression which is mine.
                    Enhance the easy, evaluate
                    each

nuance.
 I can say it with less but I don’t want to.
                 I don’t have to. 
Here. 
                              Here I meld, entranced, benumbed.  Effortlessly, make evident
                                                          the healing,
the effects of expectation.
           Endeavor to take
                          off, to
                                  take in.  An essay on fate, engendering
                                        ending.

Restore the mean, the lean, the state, the slate, redeem embodiment of exchange.  Hush the holler of hell but know it first, to
  emend and edit, melt not in the
  exile, in the sense of the surreal. Nor droop in the enervated slight thrill
                                   of the shrill.  Go ahead, go crazy, find solace in the breeze, gather harmony , create
                  ceremony of resonance. Embrocate with yellow, ecru, like peach exudation, like golden gashes,
                                                                                                                                                         gasping.  Exercise the elements,
ask what’s necessary, what’s present, what’s civilized. Then don’t.  Espy in dreams an empire of enchantment, endear to evolution of revolution, all that’s extraordinary, and magnetic.  Not entertain the masses but illuminate the
                       excellence of madness. Reproduce what’s clear, predict transparent
                                                                                                truth

of there
 of here.
 Tell.
           Enthrall. Write it well.  Enjoin and cleave, then leave.

ABC Wednesday
TS Poetry - Inspired, "Why Poetry?"

Parting

I'm not giving you
                          up;
 I'm  letting you go.
 And I'm trying to
explain the difference,
 and once again,
 I'm getting nothing
                   done.

  I'm trying not
                                   to leave you with claw marks,
 but you're mauled, and
                  my hair is messed like I've been in a bar brawl,
                                                                                      so, I guess the secret's out,
I'm
no good at
               this.  The

sun is
shining an alarm in all its yellow.  The sound of bells surrounds, goad that it's time,
 and I'm stuck inside.

Flexing beneath
                     that first kiss,
 I gave you my fear, abandoned
               apprehension.
 Did you hear me sigh that night,
                               in that place, where all was sacred?  We
                                    hiked on into evening, leaving heat of day, gleaning as we
                                                                                                                         went,
momentum
 from the darker, browner
 prints
 in the
            trail
where the
              recent rain
had marked out simple notions.  The willow
                                                      weeds mourned our descent, and so
                                                                                    did I,
still sated
by the memory and the potion of that earliest taste.  I would not
     trade that
     trace of pearl-
                         like found promise on your tongue.
                                                                    Take away the
                                                                     thrill, the favor and the savor but not
                                                                     the choice, and
                                                                                 I'm sorry now, wading
                                                                                 in the wide wait well of
sacrifice.  Penetrated by the prize, full
        from wine
         ripened in pursuit, so
                                   this pull away like the forced crawl of the
                                                                                 cherished thing now clipped of wings and wasting.
     Scared, I bring an offering - an
        account of all
I'm not.  Hold it tight,
          the

racing.  Have me when I'm grown.

Poetry Jam
We Write Poems

Let's Leave

Life is too short to work so hard,
         so, let's kiss instead.
Make it a marvel.  Reveal
                 to me your secrets through your embrace. Weave a freckled flower through my hair.

Let's get lost in a diner, dance
               on a table, make
                            everybody look,
make everybody
talk.

Let's
               spend all our money up,
stay too long,
laugh too loud,
cause I don't
want
      to miss this.

Pardon my mess;
I'll forgive what you forgot.  Let's be
                          young and love the world today.
                                                                  Throw away
                                                                                    your list of sins and loss.  File them under the who-cares-anyway tab, and
let's find meaning in this moment, not worrying
                   about what's closing in;
search profundity in the seduction of a jukebox.

Your shape and my color, let's blend and spin and mix and match.
Get right out
               of the core of things, decode
by undressing our hearts, play house and nice for now.

Please, take off early.  Let's
                                   leave
now.

Carry On Tuesdays
The Mag

Slipped

We said, we'd like to bathe in the
                                 blue, blue
sea;
swim with dolphins, see the coral.  So we
  went,
we danced,
apricot cordalyne lining a path
for the future,
opened, alone
                                    a bottle of
                                       bubbly, bitter and sweet, under
the highest, hugest moon.
Were there clues beneath our feet?  Gathering in our
 toes?   Were there rumors in the wind?  Were the waves speaking,
                                                                                               keeping time with our throbbing?  Next day, I wore a plume  of posy,
                                                pretended there
was luck in this floral trimming.  That what
we had was rare.

What one incident, word, glance, plucked the hope embedded
                in those
                           easy terms?  Or does joy
                                                    die slowly, June always conceding to an eventual, stipulation of snow?

The thread
in the cross stitch
                           hanging your grandmother
                                gave us held up when we
                                                 did not.  Just a ball dropped;
                                                        one
                                                        of many.  So the knowledge sits tucked
beneath my belt, a threat of the dry throat confession I can't choke
                                                            out and the assembled
court of small town cynics pronounce my guilt of loss.

Sunday Whirl

Above the ruins

Above the ruins of the past, we
  build a monument of all we've learned.  Buried beneath
                              our wisdom,
                                    we've left decaying days.
                                                                       Sturdier than
                                                                         that slab gravel hope, our
intentions slant
but point.  We part the
sky in declaration and clouds pardon our insistence-clearing in absolvance.
Strong to weather, unmoved by either
   rain or rub.  Fragments of
                                 each
 have
formed the irrefrangible and the new has only risen from prior pain.  That which we,
ourselves, are made of.  The flooding gut of springtime
     saturated seeds,

painted grey our walls but not for
                              lack of
loveliness.  The mind's eye still
                             sees within, the
reeds, the palm grass prisms growing, waving on.
Faith
fossilized, we've split where weak
     scarred now with scales for strength, so
                            the future palpitates.
                                             

Carry on Tuesday

Magpie Tales

What is and why

When all is
                  said and done,
poetry will remain. 

 When facts fail and hearts hunger,
poetry will prevail.  

When prose has broken all her promises and nothing’s left of news,
 poetry will awaken.  

She will shine in the measure of a man, whisper,
             words of wisdom,
                    sing songs of truth.
Value seen at last in verse, past madrigal revealed.  

 Rhyme is reason and is more.  

The muse of self
will leave, 

overtaken by eternal form. 

Love found in lyrics, and stretched sonnets of a story we thought we knew
                                                                              will,
 in the end,
create a home.  

Silence but for stanzas, the search begins and in finality of time, poetry will have her say.