I thank the sun and the stars every moment
for carrying me wistfully
from cradle to grave.

They want me for the things I said,
all the ***** pictures in their head.

They want me for my sweet kiss goodnight
And beg I stay til morning light

For the smoke I breathe
And the way I leave
And their tongue between my teeth.

Lure me. With the words on your lips,
and your hands on my hips.
And the sultry way you talk,

You **** me with the lust in your glare
the clothes you wear.
The way you watch me walk.

But why not for the things I say,
the prayers I pray,
my eyes when they turn grey.

Want me for my words I write
when I can't sleep at night.

Want me for my dreams, my fears,
my smile after several beers,
the taste of my falling tears.

Love me for the love I share,
my heart, my hair.

Love me for my love, my life,
The way I make you feel.

I need it to be real.

Some days my body is a trophy.
a dusty display in which I placed all recollections
of sorrowful evenings and birds with broken limbs I collected from the porch
Some days my body is a trophy
a tribute to my skin having smoldered
and made stony by fire-polishing
which may have brought on blisters and a chorus of
"i can live, I can live, I can live"'s to erupt at the mere thought of heat.
Some days my body is a trophy
it is for the one who says
"i went so far beyond her expectations that she lost sight of me"
i cant see him, my vision is hazy after spending an eternity with dust on my corneas and curtains drawn across my forehead,
I hid in myself, detaching skin from muscle and using my armor like a blanket in which I could block out the peering eyes of strangers
Some days my body is a trophy, because
instead of cutting away my blanket like I had,
you folded me back into a swan and I was no longer
crumpled rice paper that had been incorrectly origami-ed
by a fat fingered hurrier.
I was an image.
I am  your trophy to the world telling them all
I restored a masterpiece that had been mishandled and cast away
Some days my body is a trophy
That I hold up high
that says
I am worthy
and I will not be left behind

react to the light

collecting birds with broken bones from the porch
and mending them - healed
I lay on the porch and waited
no one came to bind me.

'pale blue book beside my bed.
stop staring
a sinner is as a sinner was and forever will be'
shhh.
'I'll only do it one more time.'
he said
'be careful, mine, small, kind'
'I am no one's but His'
was that a lie?
'it rained last night and i took a walk'
there's another
'and i prayed
"before i wake,
i pray the lord my soul to take"'
it was a fantasy, really.
am i?
'Lord! Hear me!'
but i saw only ran drops and i heard
only thunder
or was it?
~laughter
'pale blue book of mine
he never heard me'
you fell behind the dresser
and I never bother to put you back in your dusty corner.
I put myself in mine

My bones creak like an old house
that has sheltered the darkest memories
a hundred
forlorn people.

I sway in the wind,
groaning, whining,
settling my foundation
in your soft earth.

The sable skies have passed on
and I rest on your shoulder
beneath the sun.
This old house
lays still and peaceful.

Delicate wisps of dream
Float gently toward the ceiling
Fill the cracks
Crevices
Of an empty soul

I am not that
not a storm before sunrise,
awakening the slumbering seaside
with sprays of churning ocean,
watery elemental
breaking against the bluff
with every exhale
- quickened heartbeat -
pounding the shore with
black-water fists
I am not that
the master of nature
calling the mountains to rise
and the rivers to run
Planting my flag
in my earth.
No.

I was strong once.
When I kicked from the womb.
Now I lift my hands
only to be held
by another.

Crooked smiles.
Sinister eyes.
The mirror gazed back
at me.

My lips, my chin,
My hollow cheeks,
Not me at all.

Was this the outside looking in?
My soul beneath the frigid glass?

Putrid air escaped it's lungs
the lingering scent
of a rotted mind.

Choking on the stench
of corrupted thought.

Pounding the glass
with bruised fists and
split knuckles.

And I was on the inside
looking out
while the sickness inside me
walked free.

Cradled by the rock floating round the fire,
nursing the infantile species into god-fearing beings.
evolved from millions of years of careful formulation
discovery of galaxies
exploration of the depths of the sea
and all the fury of nature
scaling mountains and glaciers
drinking from the freshwater spring
trickling down summer's neck.
the domestication of the wild
the birth of nations
and the love of a brother.
We have lived and we have died
here on our Earth.
Must we believe in all our passion
and our funeral ceremonies
to pay respect to the dead,
must we accept the idea
that in all our glory as mankind,
our lives became so insignificant
to others and to the solar system beyond our sunny skies
that life means
nothing?
Have we evolved into the most
complex beings
in known existence
and have we loved with the marrow of our bones
and the iron in our blood
only to die
having never stepped beyond the pavement
to peek at the roses beyond
the garden fence?

Lock the doors,
leave on the light.
Kiss the children,
'Nighty night'

Lie in the sheets,
Don't fall asleep.
Cometh the Devil,
thou soul to reap.

Your sable heart
has long been dead
for the Devil dwells
inside your head.

from a corrosive cloud
i was
a solo interlude in the quiet
where i am liberated
alone
but still so full of sound

I fell away from myself for just a little while.
Creeping through the rye
and sleeping in the foxholes scattered through the hills.
I pushed away the ideas
of satisfaction
and romance.
Wafting through the air,
I was a perfume of the mountains.
Pine and wet earth, I let nature reclaim me
while I waited,
slumbered inside my skin.
When my mind had cleared,
the fog of the valley,
lifted,
a stranger found me sleeping beside the brook.
And with a calloused hand
and a rough voice
he lifted me from the dirt.

A friend for the spring,
possibility lies just over yonder.
Sing with me a while,
while we find our way.

a ghost of a city
a thousand reside
and scream
without voices
'live 10,000 years'
and form walls with
their backs
shrouding the country
that bleeds
but shows no blood

I used to be made of leather
wrinkled and worn,
my seams were torn,
but you,

you sewed me together.


Satin fingers linger on me
oh why can't I be
smooth?

I learned to be rough,
to be enough
oh why can't you be too?

Skinned and *****
and left alone,
I am leather

like you.

Woman, with the six string in your lap,
honey,
make the mountain sing.
Lover, in the sweaty satin sheets,
baby,
show me the good the night does bring.
You stained my skin with delicate song
the caress of your melody urges me on.

She walks alone in auburn light and grace,

A ****** marking painted on her face.

She breaks the gaze upon the somber view,

A lonely figure bathed in golden hue.

The field of grain that slumbers under sky,

it stretches wide, a rolling sea of rye.

Beneath the dripping stars her body sinks,

A soft bed in the dust, her lust, it drinks.

It thirsts on blackened sky and heavy silence,

Her heart, it churns and yearns with such a violence.

The coyotes sing her soundly to her sleep,

She leaves her dreams in seas of rye to keep.

We found the table overcrowded
with empty wine glasses,
smudged with lipstick
and fogged with
mid-sip laughter,

You sat across from me,
staring disinterested
at the bustling table,
a drunken lot of babbling,
over-dressed, under-clothed women.
They were a swarm,
a cluster of buzzing worker bees
enjoying a loose night in a filthy bar.

Like the good lady I am,
I crossed my legs
and watched the purse of your lips
relax
into a grin.
I was ******* down the champagne,
sick with envy for the lipstick
that clung to your pout
and furious at the curtain of caramel hair,
begging my fingers to smooth the knots
and then mess it all up again.

When the table cleared,
and we were left,
calling cabs in the reaches of dawn,
you stole glances at my jewelry
and the jade of my irises.
They absorbed your aura
as you strode clumsily towards the blue taxi,
while I was busy imagining what your name might be
if you thought my dress was pretty,
or if you thought my perfume
would taste like berries
if you kissed it off my neck,
your heels had clacked all the way to the street.
and maybe it was
the curves under your silk purple dress,
or the smell of spilt wine on my black one,
or perhaps a combination of both,
that led to my overactive imagination,
or maybe you put them in my head
when you hesitated at the door of the cab
before beckoning me over
and pulling me in beside you
onto the cold leather
and your lavender fabric
where your perfume permeated the backseat.

It tasted of honey and roses.

We walked through high desert.
High,
and feeling deserted.

We sped down the interstate,
barefoot and dodging oncoming traffic.

I guess it's a miracle we found our way,
never strayed from the path
as it wound through swamp-land and quicksand

And soon we were strutting up the driveway
proud, our mascara running like warpaint
our feet had blistered and cracked.
But still, we arrived.
and still, or journey never came to a close.

After the crippling exhaustion of finding my way
to the threshold of home,
the maps were being drawn all over
so I fed myself with the knowledge of bandaging wounds
and repairing a flat on an empty road.

I will come to terms
and hear-out the voices of ****** and despairing,
who tell me with voices like roadside ditches
that the destination
is to become a memory.

to be a worn out engraving on a marble stone.
to be rotted beneath your feet,
deserted
and maybe high
up in some sort of heaven.

Youth distracted from youth
by ideas of a love
that fuels the sun
and crisps the skin
with yearning,
lust.

You are youth
with future
of seed and rain storms,
soil tilled
by child's play
not by fingers
in hair
wrinkled
bed sheets in your fists.

Embrace the sunrise
and do not rush
the twilight.

I want
But that is greedy

I need
But that is vain

I love
But that is filthy

So I settle

And I am met by an old friend
Disappointment

and his cousin

Mediocrity

And I am unhappy
And they call me names

Like Humble
and Kind
and
a good ******* Samaritan

Because Black is the new blue.
and happiness is the new sin.
and life is the new death.

And you can't let your self live
because life is full of sin.

"And there is no escape but detachment,"

Do yourself a favor and keep scrolling.
Our first snowfall began at 9 a.m. this very morning.

Down came crystal ice, lacy clouds, and with it came the seasonal side of human troubles. I found my self transformed into a filthy romantic, gazing longingly out the window, wrapped in a wool blanket and holding my little brother who smiled at the Frosty the Snowman cartoon on TV. With the cold always comes the chills. The ones that shimmy up your shirt as you stand in the bathroom, trying not to look in the mirror while you undress. The chills that creep into your veins through open wounds and wind themselves around your rib-cage. I couldn't feel the warm air shooting from the vents while I sat beside them. I couldn't taste the Jack-In-The-Box daddy brought home at midnight. He put on an old movie and slowly everyone drifted to sleep. That's when I stole a few hours for myself. Taking my little doe-eyed puppy out into the yard, tossing him into a snowdrift for the first time. He cowered there for a moment, before darting back onto the deck, staring in awe and terror down at the snow. I lit a stolen cigarette and plopped down into the freezing mess.

I had a little too much to eat and felt like sleeping right there in my dampened jeans and Joe's Crab Shack t-shirt. I thought about putting out the Pal-Mal stick and being a straight-laced little girl for the holidays. I thought about the stinging of my latest stress-relief therapy (a bit of a home remedy) and also about Robert Plant's hair. Soon enough, after endless replays of my favorite music videos, my mind had emptied. The frigid air had ****** all my thoughts and memories from my head like a vacuum cleaner. All that remained was a sense of impending doom. A needle in the base of my skull, every nerve-ending in my body was pinched by icy fingers. Someone was calling my name from inside me, My own skin was shifting and rippling over my muscles, trembling and tingling. There was somewhere I had to be, something I should be doing, someone who needed my help. I sat up and looked around the yard, from the chain link fence, to the gorgeous view of the valley and the city *******, to the ugly siding of my manufactured home. My eyes darted back and forth, my puppy, the chicken house, the dead rose bush. I was alone, alone with my dog in a white miracle. Every snowflake looked like a stray bullet, raining down on me from the gods, but kissing my cheeks and melting on my feverish skin. I wished i could fall like that, and drip onto someone's lips or cling to their eyelashes.  But i was here, alone in the darkness with smoke-scented gloves and breath, in a yard of dead grass frozen in a flood.And then I started to cry. I didn't know why, I still have no idea what kind of madness washed over me as I shivered, my *** soaked and my nose running. But I sobbed and sobbed and put my head between my knees. The snow had gathered on the shoulders of my woolen pea-coat and sprinkled down as I shook and gasped, I must have sat there for half an hour, listening to a train go by in the valley, singing to the empty streets, trying to pull myself together. I'm still shivering even sitting here in my warm bed. But at that moment, I was as fragile and fleeting as the very dust that had settled across the entire town.

I managed to dry my eyes and stumble back through the front door tailed by a whimpering brown pup. Everyone, still crashed on the couches and floor, unaware of the scraggly disaster crawling through the living room. The Christmas tree twinkled in the corner and the TV played static. I kissed my baby brother on the forehead and slipped my lighter back into my coat pocket. The season had set in, the snow was here to stay. I was left wondering about the madness of  the season and the sanity of the skies.

Every year,  water freezes mid air and falls onto the earth in heaps of cold white heaven. It's a ******* miracle. It happens every year without fail and yet somehow it surprises and amazes us every time.

I'm circling the foyer and kicking up dust
I don't feel sound
I don't hear solitude
Stop drinking
Stop wasting moments on thoughts on never drawing conclusions
I'm corrosive
When will you finally settle down?  be still and
Wait
No
Who is speaking?
I'm fumbling with the light and Slilping out the door
Is it morning yet?
Keep drinking and I'll let you go
Not missed
A dust cloud follows and
You're wasting no more time
Running from that crooked shadow you carry on behind.

I looked through my window.
I looked into the sun.
I asked her if the shadows
long to feel her scorching tongue.

.
Drinking straight from the bottle and
kissing with the taste of
Jack and Jim
on my lips.
Jose
wanted some, too.
.
You got the leftovers
when I forgot the difference
between you
and that lamp
because you both
kissed me
the same
empty way.

Can
     I sleep beneath the willows in the garden
     In the shade of weeping eaves
You
     Planted deep in soft mulch
     above the hallowed canary grave?
Breathe
     Out  the eerie recollections of
     a marrow chilling orchestra
In
     the confines of
     the white wicker cage.
Song
     I cannot hear
     but I taste in the sap of the willow
As
     it sobs softly
    on my heavy shoulders.
You
    spread a quilt out on the grass
    and whispered to the weeping branches
"Do
     you hear the canary  choir
     ringing through your roots?"
Oxygen
    expired from my lungs
    and I wailed a yellow-bird song.

Our eyes wide open.
Observing the threads between us, holding, binding us up
In warm sheets together.
Arm in arm,
Taking your face near mine,
Our  breath,
The same in my lungs
As out yours.
Dusk peeking through the blinds,
Tucking in behind the hills
Rolling past the window.
We let time
Slip.
Because we knew,
Knew that there was more than breath
Being shared between the pillows.
Though we didn't say it then,
We felt the jolt,
The surge of energy through our organs,
Like the vibrations left wafting in the air after
An orchestra,
We lived briefly in that moment,
And we fell and crashed and burned,
And flung our charred bodies into each other.
In that moment,
Before we finished blinking,
Before your eyelashes parted,
allowing the luminous glow
of what you had felt reflect back
in my eyes,

I knew.

I knew.

When my skin splits in two
I finally feel whole.

winded and chilled.
did your feathers get ruffled
as you flew in from the storm?
molting on my carpet
take a bath, birdy.
cleanse those wings
and wash your bony knees.
I don't want to see those nasty bruises
so cover your skin
and fly away again.
let me see those eyes, birdy.
have you a cold or
did the bitter cold
leave you blind?
better for you,
to see not with eyes but with frail
birdy fingers.
don't hate your world, birdy.
you're no more
no less
than any other ******
who shoves past you in the supermarket.
we all came out of a filthy ******* ******
so climb off your high horse
and get in line.
we're all just waiting around
til someone digs us hole
or lights us on fire.
so birdy,
if you can help it,
don't be a *******.
out you go,
into the cold.
smile birdy,
be glad for the sun in the mornings.

Two smiles and a trigger pull,
momma fell down to her knees.
I got twelve dollars and the gas tanks full.
momma, be at ease.

I took the wind at my back for far too long
with you hanging from my hair,
and now all I know is all but gone,
and the bass in my veins is dragging me back
to that ****** song.

Was there life in those eyes,
could you see through the flies,
in the light of the fire ,
the breath of the liar,
can you tell the naughty
from nice?

Two smiles and a trigger squeeze,
momma is on her knees.
She has a killer son, but a loving one,
her baby is all she sees.
he's headed for hell
with a bullet to sell,
momma, be at ease.

I used to hurl myself at the idea                                  
that your body is a craving,                                        
a fire to be stroked.                                                      
Ne­ver did I feel that heat,                                            
the heat of skin on skin,maybe,
but the "fire in your *****"
"passion in the rippling bodies"
never.
Were my *****'s a little loose?
They all spoke another language
with their hips and lips
and the fingers grasping at the hem of my skirt.
I flicked them away.
Sent them dancing in reverse down my leg
and back to the party.

Forced myself to play into the ****** game
of who done who.
But I never lost a round.
And I never lost my *******, either.
Because once I felt the walls come down
I was a ghost.
I was water,
slipping through your fingers
left nothing but a wet spot on your trousers
and a little annoyance at your dumb luck.

Keeping my flowers on their stems.
I let the hands find me,
call it peer-pressure.

I let Lewis and Clark
explore my terrain.
They both left positive feedback
and told everyone
about their grand adventures
in my mountains and valleys
and swift, coursing rivers.

I was busy playing hide and seek
in the closet
with the boys and girls
and forgot to mention
that all I wanted
were a few kind words
and a hand to hold.

Busy keeping pace with the promiscuity
of my youth
and losing track of those sweet little wisps
of lovers,
fleeting.
Eluding my fingers,
slipping through them
like water,
leaving my eyes a little wet
and the rest of me
damp with a dark shade of gray.

Maybe I am just afraid.

of what?

Of everything.

When we face the gate of fire at the end of our journey,
and the creator beckons us forth,
what enchanting tale shall we regale him of our spell
spent on his land?

We will speak of the wandering souls encountered
on the pathway to the next.
Tell of the ones who abandoned our wreckage
and whisper of those who carried us on.

Weep at the thought of the ones who went early
to dwell in the land of spring.
Recall their ways and faces
and know we shall see them again in time,

Reminisce on the wild and wondrous adventures we had
and beam down on the memories shared.
The Earth still spins without us there
but our mark was left in soft song and kind word.

Whatever lies beyond this life
shall suffice for me.
Forgive my simple mortal mind
and may my soul be free.

And what an awful feeling it is
to be homesick
In your own home.

i made love once
once while I slept,
while i slept off the whiskey
slipped off my clothing and
stepped off the curb.
and awoke to the smell of
something musky
dank - rusty?
i made love once
over the course of a week
i made love to four bottles
and me.

Death is a filthy temptress,
but a beautiful one.
Anyone who disagrees
is either dying,
or in denial.

Death is a filthy temptress,
but a beautiful one.
Anyone who disagrees
is either dying,
or in denial.

I'm getting drunk on lemonade and TV reruns
Watching my cell phone for texts
from people I pretend to like

Staring at the moon
praying one day it might shatter
a thousand shards of stolen light
cutting into my palms.

This has become my life
I sit at home and loathe my day-to-day
but once in a while
I get that little pinch

the twist in my gut that shoves me onward
on towards new ideas
towards new love.

Thats why I am here
Im waiting
Waiting for mystery
a grand adventure

Im waiting for death

Infatuation bought you time
to infiltrate the delicate tubes of her heart and organs
with pretty words
and the stroke of your fingers
dancing along her collar bones.
She was a violin wailing sweetly
in the broken silence,
wisps of your hair in her fist
as you demonstrated to her your lustful
affection.
She clung to you.
knowing she was an instrument,
never admitting to warfare in her blood
that boiled in fervor.
White blood cells facing a legion
of your searing kisses
that swam through her veins
till she bled them out.
Your lips sang in harmony with hers
as they pressed against her neck and shoulders
moving urgently from place to place.
She lie there beneath the weight of your body
seething with guilt
while you thought only of the girl down the lane
whom had never felt your touch.
Uncharted territory , you thought.
And you left.

Our brains are jellied by the surreal.
Wires disconnected, rearranged,
our circuit boards frazzled.
The reflections of human faces and bodies
scrambled signals.
Eyes not looking past the crooked fingers
or freckles.
All you see is the dirt, the rust,
you can hear only the creaking joints,
and the groans of your muscles.
But your audience, your lovers and families,
they don't know about those awful sounds
they only see the flowers, hear the music,
a melody of glowing bare shoulders
and a chest filled with life,
a hundred systems,
working in unison to hold up your head.
I never liked the way my hips stuck out,
my ribs, flesh pulled taught against the bones.
Or my pale skin,
I glow in the sunshine.
Baking soda, salt,
awful tasting elements alone,
but they both get mixed into the batter,
overpowered by golden eggs,
sinful sugars,
and the cake itself,
baking soda and all,
well,
it's ******* delicious.