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Michael Lord Sep 20
It was ever your voice, always
That voice,
Soft and gentle, a trickle of freshness
In a dead place,
Soothing as the bag balm Mother
Smoothed on wounded calf legs.
That voice, your voice,
Without words,
even while speaking other words,
Always said to me
I won’t judge you,
I could even love you,
I see you, yes you.

YET

You seemed much to hide,
Holding your schedule askew
From others, which
I often wondered of, yet
Even standing nights before
Your door,
My heart found no Faith
That you lived in love of solitude.
For I, I lived hating my solitude,
A solitude of loneliness.

Thank you sweet Andrea,
For bringing me that saving voice,
For giving me your soft hand.
It felt so right in my hand.
I heard your stories with gratitude.

I see you Andrea, I do.
I see you.
I feel I could love you.
Let me try.
This lovely woman reached out to me in my loneliness and we became very close.
Michael Lord Sep 20
From the void Allah awoke
To sing a single holy note.
His voice gave rise to all vibration,
Spirit song of life’s creation.

La illa ha illah ‘lah
Alhumdulillah Subhanallah

Joined in a Circle we pray his name.
Within the Circle angels the same.
Wingtip to shoulder, shoulder to wing,
Gathered together, together we sing.

Alhumdulillah Subhanallah
La illa ha illa ‘lah

The Sufi heart is a chalice of pain.
Here in secret we hold his flame.
The Sufi heart is a chalice of Love
Filled with baraka from above.

La illa ha illa ‘lah
Alhumdulillah Subhanallah
Sufi zikr
Michael Lord Sep 20
What shall I see?
What now will Beauty be,
Naked,
Garbed no more in words.
Syllables scattered and tossed,
Language now forever lost?
What of my soul, what of me
Searching for meaning never to be.
What shall I see?
Frontal lobe dementia differs greatly from Alzheimer’s.  It is characterized by early loss of language as well as loss of inhibitions, often leading to unusual new behaviors.
Michael Lord Sep 20
Oh God!
**** me!
Why do I never learn?

2:30 in the wee hours,
I am sure sales ended at 2:00.
Oh God!
I need a drink!

I yank open, slam closed
Refrigerator drawers.
I search the closet,
Maybe beneath the towels.


Just a glass of wine
With lunch
I told self.
Now the box lies
Empty, flattened
In my recycling bin.
I open every cabinet,
The frig yet again.
Nothing!
Oh God!
I need a drink!

How much have I
Metabolized?
What proof my blood?
How bad will it get?

6:00am sales resume….
I think.
I can’t go buy alcohol
At 6:00 in the morning.
I’ll be alone in the store.

Can I make it to 10:00?
How bad will it get?
Maybe breakfast at Claire’s,
****** Mary’s.

If only I could sleep!
3am. Wide awake.
**** me!
Oh God!
I need a drink!
A recurring history both recent and old
Michael Lord Sep 20
Evening

Whoops and hollers
Torn from tongue
Were gale flung
Back toward the village

If only soiled laundry
Stained of my poor choices
Whipped from
My clothesline of memories

Homeland of Makah
At nation’s far point
Upon that final ****** of stone
We stood atop its
Plunge into sea

Twilight gripped like
Prayer shawls
We could not hold back
Moon nor stars

Home with wind East
Shabby trailers
Stapled to the earth
Chained dogs
Feral felines
Hulks of auto
Appliances abandoned to rust

East toward the dawn
Sunrise and tide
Westward rolling
Sands swarmed with
Seekers
Out of last of night’s
Shadows seeking treasure
Even a glass Japan net float


Noon

In left hand
The map sketched on
Paper torn from
A patient’s chart

With right
I swung pack over shoulder

A cove held secret
By nailed drift and
Rusted anchor chain
We descended

In high sun
On sands, on blanket spread
In the wind hiss of surf
Naked both
Nancy taught me
Arts of love
I tongued her to screams

Night

The moon
Pulled flame into the sky
The hiss and spit
Of burning cedar
Stars!

With radar and chart
Ships cut the night
To round the point
Into the straight
Tacoma, Seattle still hours off
Firelight said a pilot

Lit with lantern
Our shapes writhed and moaned
Upon the thin tent walls
Only a raccoon to see

I slept the dream of Orca
Half brain
Still upon her skin
Her lips

Toward the morn
I slept the dream of Orca
Michael Lord Sep 19
Much better,
Once old enough to lift split alder
To grandfather’s truck bed,
We were taught to retreat
To deeper woods,
Sit hanging over mossy log,
To wipe with fresh plucked leaf.
But beware the nettle
And devil’s club.
Last month my Library Poets Club chose toilets as the writing topic.  Now that was a topic I could really sink my teeth into.  Oh gross!  Did I really say that? I really enjoyed being in the woods, working along side my grandfather who was much better company than my father.
Michael Lord Sep 19
Have you too
Loved and lost
A woman?

Mine is named Annie.

Can you name
That pain
That never ends?

Mine is named Annie.

Does your heart beat
Still a name?

Mine is named Annie.

Can you name the time
Your life had meaning?

Mine is named Annie.

Does a woman
Wake you from your dreams?

Mine is named Annie.

When you pass into the Light,
Do you wish a love?

Mine is named Annie.
She was the perfect woman for me, a woman I thought only existed in novels. Alas, I could not keep her.  She absolutely shattered my heart.
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