The dust of their coming and going
Sifts down through the years,
Their gravity once knotted fabric to flesh;
Even though they're near,
Just the ashes, are all can impress.
Since time snapped in two between their fingers,
They haven't aged much, except to uncoil,
Unwind branching strands;
Under satin recoil
Beneath brass sheaths, the body banal.
We walk upon the faces of kings, and sleep
High, on the ruined backs of strangers;
All unknowing, how the dust gets laid,
Unaware of the danger-
Every generation becomes the new day.
the bones of the doors in some parallel worlds,
I take hold and swing but then they fall apart,
to fly toward dimensions I never suspected.
the leaves of the heart where you've never trespassed
fold open just like a mechanical clock,
all gears and cylinders driven by time.
it's too late when the bones disperse,
it's too late when the clocks stop talking-
caught in the wake of something immense.
help me wake up, I’ve been sleeping too long.
help me wake up, we’ve been sold for a song.
Earth-shine in your loved one's eyes
Is all you have for memories;
Moonlight died beneath their lids,
When death did his deliveries.
And now the world's a colder place,
Though sun still shines above it,
And moon comes too, and looks upon
The graves, were made with loving.
And though the years will pass the same;
Though weeds and grass obscure it,
Their names on trembling lips will live-
As long as we endure it.
I awake before dawn and call out to the Moon,
But the Moon is missing, she has other duties to attend to.
I sleep fitfully, aware that something is missing.
I awaken at dusk and call to the Sun,
But the Sun is missing, he has other lands to shine upon.
I wake with uncertainty, aware that something is missing.
I wake up in the midlands of night, in the close darkness
And I realize then that there is no longer anybody to call out to;
Whether I sleep or wake again is no longer important.
I send word to the Sun not to awaken me.
I send word to the Moon not to expect me-
I must go where light and darkness can freely mix,
And where things grow, touchless beneath a hidden sky;
Nothing is not there that should be,
Nothing is there that should not be:
And I am my own Moon, mirrored Suns shining from every secret eye.
dragonflies return
to the place where they were born
my humble pond
She lay eyes closed, on gleaming steel,
Summoning every ounce of will;
But was not enough to overcome the drugs
He'd given, with his fateful hug.
She remembered things she thought had gone,
Somewhere broken wings had flown;
Her mind a million miles ahead,
Although her body felt quite dead.
She heard the cart of tools wheeled close,
And with a shudder, knew what those
Things were used for, knew her time
For thinking would too soon unwind.
There was something once she'd read
That she searched for in her head-
A foolproof way to blink your eyes,
Even if you couldn’t cry
Aloud; or twitch your toes beneath,
Though all above, were deep in grief
To tell them that your brain still lived-
And it was just your body, fibbed.
Too late; she heard the scalpel lift-
Felt her hair folded up in clips;
If she could, she would have prayed-
For now her heart was well dismayed-
And then the ruby drops rained down,
Covering white shoes and gowns-
Her pain was met with equal screams,
As she fell down, in darker dreams..
My words are cutting themselves again;
razoring their loosely-sutured syllables,
deep as white-eyed bone.
The suave dipththongs butchered
to the cadence of bloodletting
in hemorrhagic oppositions.
Stapled-closed sentences, smeared with Iodine,
and subcutaneous sentence diagramming
for the retractable scalpel
swiveling along the edge,
of the well serrated cliche.
Once I pressed my wordy flesh
against the wrong side
of a paring knife, while paying no attention
and suddenly,
and without warning
it gave, like an over ripe peach
to the cleaver-
and after that, I was hooked.
Maybe we're words left behind by night,
Beneath bounding silhouettes of guiding stars,
Or waters of memory lapsed into rain;
As mind of man bleeds his dreams into day.
If there opened a window, none can know why-
When breath counts the years, and moments bide time,
For the hidden soul's body must ever grow older-
Another years living, in the sacred bowl smolders.
The offspring of earth, or day-star's bright child,
Dancing on moonbeams in scintillate shoes,
And impassioned questions, from spirit begotten-
Whatever magic made him, the secret’s forgotten.
The mold has been shattered, the bird has flown;
The seed too far from the father’s blown,
But it’s the secret we hold true because
The world's more beautiful now- than it was.
The day is an anvil which beats out the soul
The mettle is forged by the long days of toil
The molds are all filled with the same molten ore
And no part is greater than the strength of its core
If the metal should blister, no working will matter
When struck by the hammer, the piece will soon shatter
If the welds are too shallow the thing will not last
If the mettle is poor it cannot do its task
Though painted or bored, its nature won't alter
If the work ship is true, then it need never falter.
There's an earthy blood-smell to lavender
It surprises you when the nose gets too close
Once you get past the modest skirted blooms
To find the green blood of torn out flower
Fetid black dirt clings to blood ragged roots
Blue-black blood of returning vena cava
Lavender scented babies and lavender tinted men
Planted for eternity underneath fertile soil
And blood-rise suns bake their tender heads
Blood drenched scent tempts the droning insects wing
Their distilled spirits resurrected in hives
Their earthly blood now ours to imbibe.
O deeper sea
That waves restless between us
Engorging and disgorging
The changeling creations
Steep rills and ridges
Making not a dent above
So stays my heart hidden
Hidden in its element
So stays our viscous love
The conjugate of idolatry,
The alchemy of flame,
The Astarte of pure harlotry-
And nomenclature'd name.
The lode-stone of sly coquetry,
The compass-stone of hearth,
The balanced stoichiometry-
Broken waters of birth.
The Vestal of impurity,
The perfidy of shame-
My blood in you runs truer red;
This craving never tames.
To fire and dust, ran my Father’s veins-
His sudden tempers, fast to wain,
Considered judgments, swift but sure;
Against stray pathos, well immured.
Fire and dust, through all his days-
Meanings strict as he would say;
Toward logic, reasoning flowed his mind,
With love, the tension to unwind.
How I miss the fire and dust of him,
And miss the years, now memory’s dim;
As diamonds hide their humbler sides,
Their closed channels, to abide.
When the child cries the mother suffers,
When night comes, the daylight leaves;
When thousands die, the valley grieves-
Cover your dead; for more will always be coming.
When heart calls, there’s a heart must answer,
Though it be a million miles away;
Distance apart can't smile and can't lie-
Cover your dead; for more will always be coming.
The small must always follow the greater,
Hence you see the sun, the moon;
Though closeness makes the heart grow absent-
The dead won't need your silver coin.
I steal the ghosts, from others words;
I lift the toast, things seldom heard-
A breath from one goes out, and then
Another creature breathes it in.
The idea that was dead, in you;
I dig it up, and brush the loose
Debris away, and hang to dry-
To have my way, with words gone by.
Chain the secret gate
Greenest passage to the flowering kiss
Fielding blue dew drops upon bade wood
Be mine where eyes don't lie
Till one is ever and all
The bright dare of a song
Pearl hidden where death won't gaze
By such verse lost and collected anew
Sun singing it's summer love song forever
The indifference of paper kaleidoscopes
touches the afternoon's stained glass.
Scattered bubbles of blood
repeat the vaporous names of rocks.
The world itself wavers between
straying syllables of books.
A blank moment arrives
staring at secrets made visible.
All day is the stillness of
unchanging light around the temple.
Between 'come' and 'go'
the same motionless theater of rest.
Time gobbles up
the elusively throbbing reflections.
Myself the ghostly transparency
made of circular-turning glass.
Sad, beautiful days
Embrace me, from some stranger land
Than told to truth, beneath a sniper's moon.
I must go there to unfold the dawn-
Quickly; before the moon's shadows can find
The red radar beam, that's behind our eyes.
Now longing owns the temporal shell;
There's one name, one lone figure
As distant as the blinking stars.
A gesture may have to speak our words for us;
Or sometimes, only an expression;
Or just the direction we happen to be facing.
In a wider arc, I sense your being
Big as the ocean, deeper than sky;
Your tears the diamonds, questioning why?
Give to me your softer hands,
That sorrow's flames could never bear;
Somewhere above the spreading sun
In waves of peace, I'll find you there.
A severe civility rests within
the soul,
of the broken hearted man.
That burn which test, his fabric's core
has torn
the once strong warp; no more.
His eyes are filled, of far off light;
enough
for only, each sole night.
His words may break in lines, between
the bones,
of the sentence, of his meaning.
Not the whole man, he used to be
for reasons
less obvious, to you and me.
He keeps his grief apart, so he
can bury it
some place, secretly.
And though he never go there again:
his eyes
his loved one's shroud, still rend.
