Was

I met a man married to the past,
and married him,
and his eyes stayed fixed
on what he thought could not be altered,
and his vision lied,
intercutting
          scenes of glory and grandeur
onto the picture of who he thought he was,
and so the light of sound was always lost on him
and our then now
paraded past
with dull veneer
and what was
       was what
        always glistened.

He had disinfected past.
Hammering with heat
of what he wanted,
he polished into
glint, the pieces,
producing slag.

I tried to introduce him to innovating tincture,
but disenchanted, he staggered back.
I tried to
tantalize him
in sepia flesh
to synchronize with story but I tore softly, over time,
within his grasp.
His fingers moved
as fast as his
lips feeling my
face to find
his own
reflection
and when the mirror finally broke,
the ground beneath us caved.

He took pictures, then,
of self and hung them
through the house-
dust encrusted,
stale art.
I indulged
flat form
but longed
for flesh
and blood.

He was as immovable as his portraits,
unmarred by truth,
and I, too, became
a prisoner
to his nostalgia
until, unpruned, I bloomed like wild lilac
upon his frame and took on exposing tint.
In wistful hope
of integration,
    I tangled
with his guise
but when gallery turned to garden,
he took his shears,
                        and cut.
Released and banished,
I mapped my chance
at cultivation.

I left behind a figment but took
             his ghost
and now I have to squint to see the sky.

The Sunday Whirl

The Mag

Completion

"Words are spoken at considerable cost to me..." -Edward Hoagland

Tonight, away from the euphoria,
       I am waiting.
I am listening for patterns 
in your breathing,
        and needing sleep
to relieve
me of this new, insufferable hush.
I am needing you to break it
like you do
and tell me if my heart
is beating.
I am twisted in this cocoon of sheets
        and crave emergence
 of the morning.
I fear I have driven us away 
  from the day 
           the rain fell through the trees
                    in summer's
                        scenery, licked up
by sun's buttery heat and I touched
you and didn't speak, and everything
       and nothing
was enough.  I fear because now
                       it's winter.
I fear that night creeps in
and my hair turns golden
and your neck is bent
and so I gaze vainly
at my own reflection and I turn away
from you and when I return, you face
                     the wall
and I lie contemplative willing you to feel
               my desire-
be kin to
               my own sonnetist self
and see me as if after
birth, flitting against
                    a crimson backdrop.
See my soul's beauty when
       my body's beauty
drips oil black as Jezebel's
                          eyes,
because only with you am I intact
       and I am still in awe (in fear)
of whole.
Split for years, I don't know
how I managed to survive or live
             at all.
I knew only the echo
following, flickering in the hollow
  of my thought, but I could not
                           believe
and I learned how to weave
                              temptation into
satiety, drawing in only
                  what I did not want-
cunning spider catching fly
                             to pulverize
shed scent and soft-shed
kisses, devour with deceit of tongue,
but you are wingless and your limbs
the muscle of my intent, the strength
by which I grow and tonight, I feel
                                  the amputation
                                                     in
the limp lamp light hampering
the glow of dark's usual clarity
                     and during this sick
paralysis of lips, I am wrestling
  against the 3 A. M. noose,
choked voiceless I can not answer
                                 and when you
give in and up, I am left alone,
        incomplete mind attending to
                       the monsters in my head
and I can not protect you.  My bones
without your frame are flimsy and gray
unwanted space, my skin.  My brain
frays like an old forgotten lover's, aged
          into decay and so now I know
             there are two ways for me to die:
in a fever, leveled beneath your devotion
or by means of this wide chasm, slow
               and tortuous.
Do your dreams, in my absence,
tell you that I'll be okay?  Cure me
with your daring.  Embrace me in
                                my reluctance
to close my eyes, and shuttle me
into your vision so that I can see me
in you.
Enter through me
and make a still life of my pieces.

The Sunday Whirl



         

                        
                                         

"...english isn't a good language
to express emotion through
mostly i imagine because people
try to speak english instead
of trying to speak through it...."

-Nikki Giovanni

We both sat under wing of safety
looked in
and found each other
but              you
ventured out first,
came in to me,
  and now, together, we look
           out,
             
and these days, I can't get my mind
anywhere but                       you
and I don't much care
because
   even when everything else
                                 is shitty,
and I can't pluck
all these flapping words
              for anything
              and the calls come as fast
              as the cliches
              and the tears
surprise me as much as the sight of you
standing, unruffled in the kitchen
   and I'm helpless,
                          so huffy,
                               and my voice
does just what I don't want it to,
                        I know
                        it will
all be better
when you come home.

And I am rushing through the day-
            maybe, for that moment-
doing this
     instead of that-
satisfying what?

Waiting        watched         wavering
between too much
   and too little.

I want to sing,
face you, inch closer.
                                             

I want to see me through your eyes
               see                     you
through
your eyes.
I want to rhyme,
         to invert,
and go out
into the world
              with you like a kitschy
                             love song
chirping in my head,
                     your persuasion perched
                        on my shoulder.
I want you to sweet talk
me out
      of my suspicion and translate
                                all I'm sick
of speaking of.
I want your hands as warm as coffee
in the morning, to stay in bed all day
                                and keep me safe,
                                and to just be me
with you and
        you
be
you.

I'll go in even when I'm afraid,
I'll go in breathing in and out, slow
  like you're standing in our kitchen
                       and I'll nest
where you do
and turn in and out, softened
and turn in and out
what is in and out of me
so I am ready.

Under Cover

"There is something haunting in the light of the moon..." -Joseph Conrad

The moon is pulling waves, even in our bedroom,
tonight, in the middle blue, and I am trying to find
where to talk
from
and my voice.  I rarely speak freely and when
         you look at me, I look away.
I am
trying
to speak from what I know. Simple words
                                     naming happiness or
                                                               sadness.
This is hard because have you noticed it's never
               really fully dark, even at night?  Even
                           under cover
snatched up and around to hide from the breeze
                               or the heat
                               or your eyes?

Under cover of the stars that fall when
obscurity's passion breaks.

I don't know how to unslant
                                     sadness and even less
how to tread
         these tides where my center
bends.

How to say that every single
   other
   other or
nightdayyearlife was a lie and this
  is the truth.

How to unglorify,
             unmuddy
this pastpresentfuture and see
one moment as clay-
just touch
just hold it
               in my hands, squish
               it through
my fingers without some
           grand plan to mold it
                                          into
a gigantic, daunting whole story
paralysis.

I have binged
on words, shoving them
                        into an overpacked
sentiment and then had to lug
     them back home.
I have boxed them neatly, organizing
                      them sterile and tidy.
Square and tight for an overhead bin
      and flight.  I, tonight, can not
                 give them wings but
                              maybe, I can
defer to Angel of One Woman's, All Women's
Blackouts and Clean Sheets
                 and Fire and Hope and Love Affairs
                          and I can ask her,
"Do you know taut pull of moon,
its haunting light(ness)?


Do you know how to speak of one
                     without
                                the other.  Other
without the one?"
Apart from all these words and still pulled
                           everything paired is one.
The moon speaks without
                             words
and I am trying
               to say that (happy or sad) I love you.

The Sunday Whirl

I Wonder

Okay, this was very experimental for me.  Writing in my own voice.  How I might talk.  But it brought out something that I didn't know was there!

I would never feed
the birds. They're gross.
Remind me of the Alfred Hitchcock movie.
You know, The Birds, where the whole point
of the movie was....birds.  Attacking.
Tons of them.
Jenny had a thing with
seagulls.  She'd take tons of pictures of them
when we'd be at the beach.
Chasing, them, practically.
She also used to run into them with her car.
All the time.  I've never really known anyone
else that happened to.
She cried all the time, too.
Was afraid of bees.  Bees made her cry.
Joey, who looked like a tapeworm, made her cry.
I think something else, really, was making her cry.

I never got the bird thing,
just chalked it up to another peculiarity.
It was kind of funny at the time.
She got a huge kick out of the birds
stealing chip bags or any left over food items.
She laughed maybe as much as she cried-
and really, I never understood that, either,
she'd laugh loud.  Silly.
My mom would cringe-
bring it up for years afterward:
"Remember, when you and Jenny
laughed and
laughed about the twins
across the street?"
she'd ask and then sigh.

I don't even know if I'd want
to feed ducks.
They peck and chase and
I think it's the feathers
that gross me out.
Make me think of lice.
I probably would do it for my kids.

I think about Jenny
all the time
and wonder if she's okay.
Any happier.
Her crazy, big smile
and her throwing her head
back and crying and crying
in the schoolyard over Joey.
Her mom's frustration.
My mom's frustration.
I wonder if Jenny still wants kids.

dVerse

The Mag

Adventure

adventures are a funny thing
My prince, my knight,
              easy
              enough to find
riding in to save the day.
like I found you
I the damsel in distress,
           and now every day is an adventure
not knowing I needed you to stay,
us being us
and you refused to leave,
in our mess
armed
and facing fire
of
  fear,
sword in hand, dragon to slay.
                 and chaos
I stood far but still near
wed and woven
not quite sure who was more dangerous-
full family
framed
in the fun
man with sword or beast
of cooking
of lies,
favorite dishes
scorching hot.  But the prince always wins
decorating for the holidays
           the battle, and so the princess.
             hiding sometimes from the allthetime
And I was the fire armed with words
riding the waves
making up the stories and the fairy tales and the horrors
I found us in you a funny thing                
but you did your job so I let down my hair or was swept onto your trusty steed 
                                                              adventure
and we rode off into the sunset
                         
Imaginary garden with real toads

At Home

I made stories up -an entire category of weapons. I felt quite at home in the waging of war.  

I grew up....surprised many.  It seemed the right thing to do.
The objective is connections....Your vision changes....
                            capacity has been destroyed.
I was just a peculiar person.
It
is of course a huge challenge....All the time!
                     All the time!

but

small 
steps
can produce large results.
My mother
would have thought an admirable
                    thing.... a solution to 
                    the whole conflict
and never wavered...
     difficult
but developments are promising...
I talked a little too much, you know...
   agreement was important...
             made more
                    easy...
no...it's done...completely...it was only made up...


Found Poetry from:

Nobel Conversation with Alice Munro  

and

• Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons Award Ceremony Speech (The Nobel Peace Prize)

The Found Poetry Review

Childhood Dreams

They are molding,
                    like greens gone
bad,
mushy as a teen,
like frayed Christmas stockings
long packed away
with decayed faith,
            coddling dust.
They are molding, and any leftover mild
glow culminates
                    as only
memory,
melted opulence
               of youth,
sticky puddle mess
of voice.
The brilliance is gone.

But my cells are collard,
and the same comfort
still nourishes
and they wait
to resonate.

They are molding.  Stale breath
carves out the periphery of now.
Fact is here.  Fiction gone.
Awareness, sliding down
                        like broth.

But....
Trapped, kicking.
Love, kicking.
Fawn or colt, struggling in spring's grass
          of dewy brilliance.

Because the tender bursts forth
like a bubble of gum,
troubling and big,
messy glob of hype
that calms the child within.

And they say this happens
when you get older-
that the pestilence pecks,
mocking,
and I've heard the humming cynicism,
the hidden hive of
                                         feeding lies.

Gone.
The dim glimmer gone.
Now, gone.

But I am seed,
glib
and gliding
up,
up,
dawdling in soil bedding
waiting only to wed
      the ancient sun.

Holed up
by dream hoarders, I am rising,
toward sustenance of sky
bidding me
see
what I am still capable of.

Poetry Jam

What Comes

Blooming books of love and madness
inside the quiet of a purchased afternoon-
interruption pending

like a volcanic explosion
like an unspoken implosion.

You do a bang-up job
brooding a sea
of all you can or cannot yield.

You know what you've taken.
You know how to waken

everything in me you know
and you know how
to call the sun.

You know what matches.
You know what latches

the double doors
of want and need
that still shut tight

against the rock of solid noise
against the lack of bearing poise

that comes from the offering
pried from my prayers

that comes from the taste
that comes from the waste

that comes from leaving
an old life behind

that comes from chasing a sound
that comes with breath not found

that comes like unrelenting ringing-
a demand to which there is no answer

that comes like they are on their way
that comes like they will make you pay

that comes like the nightfall
an acquiescence to the day

that comes and comes
like your sweet concern
that I'm not worthy of

that comes like ray of light
that comes without a fight.

You open all the drawn
words and windows
and reveal the bright.

Last Words

I returned your ring
but kept my vows,
and you did not return,
so now,
I bury letters,
long
and sonnets, parsed
in tomb of what I knew
         of love.
Bones, of which,
dry as the flesh I gave,
imprison past.
I lay to rest
specious sinew,
sepulcher purist spores
and garnish grave
with primrose,
        pomegranate-
                    all
I ever was or gave.
Symbol of all I lost.

To the gods of fable,
I yield both my power
and my weakness,
take back wings.

We drank, together,
poison of denial,
and you slowly drifted off.
Departed, darling,
I became.
So, rest, beloved.
Close eyes
that once imagined
glow of truth.
Flutter, soft,
filmy lids
and cloak
the sparkled lens.
I kiss you
one more time,
         kiss
your swollen lips
  of promise.
While you stare
blindly
     into darkness,
      I rise.
Verbosity of verse
     reverberates,
sobbing wild,
rocking vault
  of marrow
         as I ascend,
but you are deaf,
and I am entering
silence.
Adorned spotless,
my skirt billows
as I mount,
bright as Venus,
break through cruel
                       curve
of opalescence,
shatter
show.
Moon lights course.
Perished,
you can not pursue.
I wield war
               and birth
               and I forgive.

The Sunday Whirl

Love Made New

I will not forget last night.
Not just because
you stood waiting,
quiet-loud,
                     in that
varicolored, woven
                    (what was
that?) shirt or because
                  our smiles
                          met
before our bodies did
      or because when
my words
      wandered wildly,
you not only listened,
but declared that you
had missed
       my periphrastic
             prattle.
Not just because
   of the love made new
   or your hand on my
thigh on the ride home-
      home!
But because
you have given me
my voice back.
Because
our lines together
form a prayer,
                     and because
with you,
   I don't need to speak.

Safe With You

I am anticipating lights, heat. You.
Waiting for descent and your smile.

I  have half terrified myself,

studying secrets, wondering
if I, too, should yield.

I am plotting my next session

with the therapist I don't have.
Revealing fleeting, flitting,

swollen, spinning drifts that

sound like someone else.
Should I mention that

I've been having trouble spelling?

I think of pre-nostalgia
so, of course, you.

But I am safe with you.

Somehow.  And I don't want
to dig for bones.  I just want you.

In Flagrante Delicto

The house
   hums, always loudly now, and I give thanks silently
for this marvel.
We hang with care, the lights, the star, the garland,
        and
        all miraculous offerings.
The house, this year, wrought
                                  with new tradition,
                                                      delicate as your
inflections,
wrapped in wonderment-
the timing,
the season-matching merriment.
We have found decor,
long shelved need, and your desire sparkles
like the brilliance we've been waiting for and I think
                                                       of the antecedent-
                                                            the crisis
before creation- fleeing and fullness-
weary women for centuries after
just looking for a home.
This year, no different,
providence pended, hankering
for mounted wisdom,
      men to guide.
Your pauses
         pound
           out
innuendos,
               splattering a fresco of fiery
hues onto my well
                           laid plans and even so I can't help but feel
                                    indebted.
I have tasted,
           too, the
                      end.
So, this year, I will add deeper
                                               rouges, flame to fire, even as
                                                                            I trim
                                                                              the green.
I will host unspoken words.
I will sip from insight's cup, warm as cider,
because just on the border of close, you have
found me with what
                  is yours,
knife in hand, poised to carve,
but I am
                                   not the truth
server
with intent
              to trounce.
Instead, it is the inevitable
forcing its way out, laborious,
   sticky
and my heart starves, too,
                    though you cannot hear its weak, synonymous
                                                        rhythm through
                                                              the reserve.
See, I have climbed the same stairs to dreaded attic,
             brought back
adornments, holy,
                traveled,
                too, the same dusty road in plight of night, in need
                  of room.
Issued by sovereign call....
depending now
on nothing.

You can have what I cannot give.

The Sunday Whirl