Walk along the riverbed.
You will come upon a nymph,
Aged and smooth
As a riverstone
Sighing and singing with
The water’s flow
Ask her, “How are you, Nymph?”
And she will
Smile
Up at you and say
“I am but a tired soul
In a tired sea
Of tired souls.”
Her voice the soft bubbling of the river.

Walk among the trees.
You will come upon a dryad,
Ridged and furrowed
As the tree limb
Upon which she sat as she watched
The leaves fall with the autumn breeze
Ask her, “How long have you sat here, Dryad?”
And she will
Gaze
Down at you and say
“I grow and grow old
With the tree.
And the tree has grown tired.”
Her voice the raspy crinkle of the fallen leaves.

Walk amidst the flowers.
You will come upon a deva,
Light and sweet
As the honeysuckle she sat amongst
Watching and humming with
The many bees
Ask her, “Who are you, Deva?”
And she will
Frown
Away from you and say
“We, those of us that
Belong
To this place,
We are Afraid.
And we wish to no longer be Afraid.”
Her voice the wavering stems of delicate flowers.

The nymph chokes on her sisters' remains as
the dryad is cut down and shredded and the deva is
forced into restrained clay pots.

They cannot be freed by one
but by the response
of all.

hopping along the river rocks,
earthblood courses

veins of nature ebb and flow to the
place where it all started

along the coasts and in the middle of nowhere
where my fathers lie

"you are not mine
we are divine,"
they say

there will be better days
although my heart stays

in the bloodwater of the past

the veins keep moving
nature's heart keeps beating

i am still hoping
for better days

the sun still shines
down by the riverside
everything is the same

i am still hoping
for better days

Fickle Silver Maples lie forlorn in the -
stillness of Noon , melancholy belles that change -
their sullen tune by the belated , crosswind steamy Georgia afternoon
Dandelion sprinkled prairie of home , bordered in thick , red clay
trenches , kudzu covered period homesteads , Spring peach
and pecan orchards drenched in wild , unabated orchid and coneflower
Sweetgum cones rattle in nightfalls cooling breeze without respite , riverstone retaining walls , whitewashed barns and gravel drives , Bantam hens perch Live Oak branches along flint , cobblestone pathways

lens is ancient and crusted with a film of
old blood of the skies and
liquidy fragments of soul that fall from eyes
souls that brush up against the glass
again and again:

the woman with hot black nest of hair
and strange greyish (bone grey flesh) that was
my muse in the winter of nineteen
when she swaggered between warm pockets,
smoked in her t-shirt and apron-
blades of wind
carving out of her
a masterpiece

woman with brown brown riverstone
eyes, settled in bruisy crescents. woman
with the stones (petrified ghosts) that
swung heavily from her neck, my muse in the spring
of nineteen in the trees heart wrapped in musky fabric and
feet wrapped in leather. god she was
beautiful:cloaked in the reddened husk
of shrinking sunlight, hands curled around
my every word

muse in the summer of nineteen. man with
ruthless, undefined lips, long body charcoal
smudged by a sweaty thumb edges nonexistent
neverspoke of evil never heard of
the brand of love i made
came and went without a sound-

flock of blackbirds, oceanheave,
death parting her lips

from the windows, a mottled sky,
pink & blue, wraps across the western
hills of the valley. tararuas draped in
clustering dark white fogthrow, and
my heart ticks down hours, a handful
of round dozens, not even that.

the streetlamps flicker up,
a little glistening roll of sparks,
sweet, all at once, and
coat riverstone and the valley
floor and, of course,
tugs at strings. but i haven't
said anythin', just yet.

as typical,
will just disappear; as a
daydream evaporates,
come autumn.