You are not my children,
tender as you are.
You are not my lover,
though you cause my heart to yearn.
You are not my sun,
or my moon,
or my star.

I set you on this rock;
you will not make me burn.

You are simply sticks,
arranged upon the pyre.
You are clever tricks,
though you flaunt my clear desire.
You are not the match,
or the wick,
or the fire.

I set you on this rock;
To see what might transpire.

You will never be a pheasant's egg to be coddled.
You are only this: a calf led to the slaughter.

My son runs, wrapping arms around
my nebulous waist.

"l love you, Mom!"  He squeezes tighter,
as if letting go would be his black hole.

"I love you, too, " I squeeze back, absent mindedly.  (Where is the cream? I need coffee.)

"I love you more!" he breathes, without pause.
He gazes into my eyes,
searching my planets.

"Oh no, that can't be true," I retort.
I forget the coffee, his eyes are starlight.

"I love you to infinity!" he exclaims,
staring harder.

He wants to sail the Milky Way with me.

"Me too," I reply, and remember oxygen tanks.

I'm speaking in light years, and I hope the sound waves will catch up to him.

His face cracks into a million years of forever, before he lets go,
dancing across the universe of our livingroom,
his solar system intact.

At least for now.

this fire breathes
loud inside my head
the clang and crash
of my combustion

trying to douse the flames,

my bucket 'o water
has merely served
to excite the element

groaning breath clamors,

its loud vapor screams
my rapid oxidation

waiting beast
inside my head,
you'll have your
meat soon enough

and i, seared upon
your spit,
once again.


--bruised orange

bring your hammer and mutes.
temper my just intervals and
i'll beat a sweet harmonic series.

stretch my octaves,
correct my dissonance,
fine-tune my enthusiasm,

i'll play you some smooth sounds

slow slips his sighing.

she succors his heart,
her shades of seduction,
his harmonious hearing

her hushed sonata
sighs softly in stillness

quiet quintessence,
he yearns her
melodious marvels

moonlight makes for
merry mischief,
consorted in concert.

quickly comes the crescendo
of their close cadence

luminescence laments
their languid leaving

melancholy moon
shares hushed solitude
in silence, so sweet

--bruised orange

if i could
copy and paste
you into
my book
i would.

i'd lock you
into the pages
between my
covers

bookmarking
your sweetest
lines with my
red silk ribbon

i'd open you up
and read your
darkest secrets
in still of night
by candlelight

and under full
moon's glow, drip
my honey'd words
upon your tender
heart.

oh to copy
and paste
you into
my book

where our love
affair could bloom
in words.

the only place it ever could.


--bruised orange

Dangling sweet ambrosia scents
Repose upon the jasmine bench
Easing sorrowful soughs
Amidst lamented long slipped
Melancholy memories singing
Suserant soliloquies in stillness


--bruised orange

As I wandered the dunes of Evermore,
I sought the golden key of light,
Found you there,
In my darkest night.

Now what dreams, these, that drift at night?
They break my bones, reveal a plight,
As star struck wanderers wove their tales,
And sang songs to one another of purest light,
There slipped a crack through the veil.

I hang my head now,
And sing this sad tale.*  

The purest love, born on high,
Did ring our hearts and bind,
Yet faltered step upon the path
Did lose us on our way.

Dim grew the day,
As secrets held,
And puzzles became the way,
Of reading hearts and asking thoughts,
The clouds began to rain.
  
What love is this that sings my heart,
And draws me ever near?
More than mine to have and hold,
Shame brings me to reveal.
  
Slipped and fell upon gentle trails,
Now this love, how it longs!
I read the struggle in my words,
I hear it in every song.

I sing now, to set it right,
To show I know the truth.
My blood it boils, and face does flush,
Yet cannot keep, the love I feel,
With no place here to rest.

I slipped the path,
I slipped the path,
And broke your dearest trust!
  
Words to find to write this time,
Can not ever tell,
The sorrow I now feel,

In losing you,
In losing true,
Losing, losing you.


I loved you so much,
I wanted to see all of you,
Surround you with my love.

I still do.  
I still do. 

How can this be righted now?
Will there ever be a way?

I wanted to speak honestly,
Not darken all your days.  
Not cloud your brow,
Nor break your heart,
Nor cause you any, smallest pain.  
But could not find a way to dwell,
And keep this in my heart.  

You burst upon me night and day,
I've fallen off the ledge.
Barely breathing from wanting you,
It's time you cast me away.

To keep to true,
Keep for you,
Leave me mine,
Leave me behind.

To say I'm sorry, seems so small,
And doesn't heal a thing at all. 
I didn't know,
I didn't plan,
I did not come to steal.
Nothing I can say at all,
Nothing i can do.  

*Losing true,
Losing true,
Losing, losing you.

i'm reading tea leaves again.
this comes along with counting tiles, i suppose.
conversations carried out to their inevitable conclusion
inside my mind always have the worst endings.

when did i become so insecure?

i'm wondering at this point about the wisdom of wearing
hearts on sleeves and all that jazz. it would be
better for my mental health to be more stone-like.

i am a rock, i am a rock, i am a rock.

too late, i realize,
i am rock candy,
and you have me in hot water.

I am a war torn casualty hopelessly lost in an unfamiliar landscape.
I pick myself out of the rubble of a crumbled existence,
casting aside the well worn masks of my own invisibility.

I am stopped in this breathing place,
my quiet cocoon of safety
where unpredictability does not dwell,
but neither here does life,
neither here do I.
The silent screams that well up inside me never find their way out
and my door remains locked, the world shut out.

"The war is over,"  I try to convince myself.

This is my holding pattern.
I wonder will I ever feel brave
enough to unlock that door and
venture forth into life again?

Who am I without my captor's angry lies,
that cruel mouth that formed words defining me,
those rough hands that molded me
into the shapeless form of his invention?

I never thought to tuck myself away in safety,
hide myself in a tiny crack, or between pages of a book,
my treasured keepsake that I could run fingers over later,
smiling and whispering, "Yes, I know you."

No, I abandoned myself years ago,
left myself a motherless child.

The hands on the clock go round and round.
I dig through rubble behind a locked door,
searching for the girl I abandoned long ago
on the battlefield of disenchantment.

this is the ship that hears the horn blow
and seeks the brightest beacon of light

her port of call, that sheltered harbor
on stormy dark and windswept night

my ship will break upon the rocks
with no steady compass in hand

ride the mystic waves with me,
we can sound the depths of the ocean

let us plunge our line into the fathomless love
in that oneness, find our measure

then sail on, sail on, into the deep

"Can Poetry Matter?"
by
Stephen Dobyns

Heart feels the time has come to compose lyric poetry.
No more storytelling for him. Oh, Moon, Heart writes,
sad wafer of the heart's distress. and then: Oh, Moon,
bright ******* of the heart's pleasure. Which is it,
is the moon happy or sad, ******* or wafer? He looks
from the window but the night is overcast. Oh, Cloud,
he writes, moody veil of the Moon's distress. And then,
Oh, Cloud, sweet scarf of the Moon's repose. Once more
Heart asks, Are clouds kindly or a bother, is the moon sad
or at rest? He calls scientists who tell him that the moon
is a dead piece of rock. He calls astrologers. One says
the moon means water. Another that it signifies oblivion.
The girl next door says the Moon means love. The nut
up the block says it proves Satan has us under his thumb.
Heart goes back to his notebooks. Oh, Moon,, he writes,
confusing orb meaning one thing or another. Heart feels
that his words lack conviction. Then he hits on a solution.
Oh, Moon, immense hyena of introverted motorboat.
Oh, Moon, upside down lamppost of barbershop quartet.
Heart takes his lines to a critic who tells him that the poet
is recounting a time as a toddler when he saw his father
kissing the baby-sitter at the family's cottage on a lake.
Obviously, the poem explains the poet's fear of water.
Heart is ecstatic. He rushes home to continue writing.
Oh, Cloud, raccoon cadaver of colored crayon, angel spittle
recast as foggy euphoria. Heart is swept up by the passion
of composition. Freed from the responsibility of content,
no nuance of nonsense can be denied him. Soon his poems
appear everywhere, while the critic writes essays elucidating
Heart's meaning. Jointly they form a sausage factory of poetry:
Heart supplying the pig snouts and ****** tissue of language
which the critic encloses in a thin membrane of explication.
Lyric poetry means teamwork, thinks Heart: a hog farm,
corn field, and two old dobbins pulling a buckboard of song.

(from Pallbearers Envying the One Who Rides, 1999)

This silence is of the other sort.

Not that silence of stillness born;
That meditative calm that washes you
when morning's light shyly peeks
through your curtains.

No, this is the *malignant sort,
an out of control cellular growth,

(A Growth!)
that pushes out other thought
and claims the territories
of your mind all for
himself.

for himself.

This silence screams at you, "Listen to me!",

"Listen, now, lover!

And you can't do anything
but hear his absent,
his vacant,

that vacant,

that Voice!

This is the silence that shoves his way into your brain
and demands attention.
He stamps his foot and shouts
"Look at me!"

Are you looking?

And all you can do is stare at his
invisible,

His implacable

Face.

You wonder,
"Who are you, to invade

"my sanctuary?!"

But then it comes to you,
in that moment of

Reckoning:

You left your key laying

casually

on the window sill outside your door,
red ribbon tied on,
an exclamation point,

That mocking point!

No, you can't blame this silence.

You are the one who left the light burning brightly,
in your window,

that small, indescript window,

all night long.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SE_l1hLps1g&feature;=shareice.

While driving the backroads last night, I cranked up my stereo
and let the music take me where it wanted to go.
I'd heard the songs before, but I began hearing a different tune.
Must've had earplugs in before. I drove on, and the music played me.
When I'd driven as far as I could, and lost myself completely down those roads,
I pulled over at some strange station I'd never seen before.  
I thought I'd sit a while there and rest, do a little reading from
the book I've been writing. **** my eyes for seeing words there I'd never
read before.  My book was writing me, I had never said a word.  

I thought for a while about how you can wake up one day, hear the same song,
read the same words, and they tell you something you've never known before.
I realized then, I'd been driving with my eyes half closed.  
Then, as the sun came up, I saw with my naked eyes a strange landscape I had never seen before.

Road signs were everywhere.  One showed I was on I-9, another read, 'Welcome to Idaho'.
I heard gentle clouds roll on by, and felt alone in my wanderings.
I saw paint blistering off the walls of some hotel, and wondered who would save me.
I thought about wicked games,and felt accused. I saw crossroads, up ahead,
with a ***** tonk on one side, wanted to go inside and order a case of finest wine.
I felt so alone, sitting in my rudderless boat (you know how dreams can go).  

Then I looked up, saw a man standing at the crossroads
with a golden hammer in his hand.  I wondered if i knew this man,
and wanted him in my boat with me, to sail on the uncharted seas.
I wanted to drown in a deep blue bottomless pool with him.  Then I wanted to
accuse him, for walking into my dream, for standing in the middle of my aloneness.

I looked up at the sky (it was night again, as dreams go) and saw the
stars in the sky.  I wondered if the stars were real, or painted on
some false ceiling.  I wanted to climb a ladder and break through,
to find true.  I wanted to tear down the veils that kept me from
knowing all the secrets of the universe, to burn up the clouds
that hid the sun.  Then I wondered again if the sun was already
shining, if my rudderless boat was being guided by the soothsayer
of dreams.  And I wanted to know if this dream was a nightmare, just a picture
show, or some prophetic vision.  

I felt pushed and pulled, with winds blowing a strong gale, and wanted to know if they blew from
the east or the west, but I could not tell, I'd dropped my compass miles back.
I wondered what the man was thinking, if he saw the same strange landscape.
I wondered if he had driven me here, or if we had sailed here together, our backs to one another.
I turned my radio on again, but only heard static, and wished that I could find the perfect song,
to express exactly the strangeness of this tale, to sing the truth.

I wondered again if I was dreaming or awake, if my ears
were hearing the real music in songs, if my eyes were reading
lines as they were written, or if I was still asleep, only dreaming.


Sometimes, when you wake up, you just
want to go back to sleep, and dream a little longer.  And sometimes
you think you've woken up, but you are still dreaming.  How do
you know the difference?  How can you ever tell? And where is
a good soothsayer when you need one?  

I'm still wondering.

Last night I dreamed of roughened hands,
And pristine walls with spackled sand,
And feeling less,
But wanting more,
Of windows open,
And a creaking door.

Last night I dreamed of voices mild,
And smiling faces, and laughter loud,
I dreamed of grackles in parkling lots,
Of finding familiar and imagining what.

I dreamed of witchcraft and of lore,
And linen hidden in a dresser drawer.

I dreamed of you,
I dreamed of you,
And all the things I'd like to do.

no curtain call for you.

you tried to
unveil sanity
but the show flopped.

nobody likes a bad actor.

Do you ever think that life could be more?  
That we are sitting,
doing nothing,
that life is passing us by?

Sometimes,
I feel remorse
for having had children so young,
for not having adventured

beforehand.  

I want some adventure!
But all I see ahead of me is

Tameness.

I wish I had had a chance to go out into the

Wilderness

and just lived,
moment by moment.
  
I'm afraid I will die,
regretting that I never once lived.  

(If I were a wealthy man, this might be the beginning of my mid life crisis.)  

What is it called when a woman feels the panic of settledness coming upon her?

There is no name.
  
There is only the feeling of the sameness of days going by,
the aloneness of standing here,
surrounded by routine,
by repetition.

While the desire to jump,
to plunge, into the unknown,
beats steady on in my chest,

and the knowing that

That moment,

That chance,

Has passed me by.

i am a leaky faucet.
the crescent wrench of control
tightens,

righty tighty

but i drip, drip, drip.
a stronger hand has gripped my handle.

lefty loosy, let it flow

my dripping waters spill into your ears,
where earth flower seeds fell in late summer sun

oh, quick! quick! knock out the dirt
somebody call a plumber

blossoms like these
won't survive the coming frost.

*blossoms like these
will make your head explode.

My ex almost lover slides down the page of my messages.
I've got a whole book of faces, and his is the only one I'm looking for.
I have to click the 'see all' button to even catch a glimpse of him,
And even then, it is only his back in the mirror as he walks away.

I count days, hours, moments.
I memorize lines, words, syllables.
Soon, I will make the decision to try to forget him.
The lovely ex almost lover does not know this.
He thinks (at least I imagine he does) that I've already forgotten.

But he beats a staccato song inside my chest, like a hard rain on packed, dry earth.
He wakes me every night with his silence,
Like summer coming to an end, the cicadas ceasing their chorus.  
You don't know how accustomed your ears have become,
How much you need that sound, until it vanishes,
Becoming nothing more than an echo of memory.

A week goes by before you ever realize what it is that has been intruding on your sleep.
There is an absence of the familiar,
and to keep yourself from falling off the edge into the abyss,  
'dear God, will I spend the rest of my life alone?'
(Breathe!)
That habit of loving shadows reinvents itself.


*Once, I believed in fairy tales.
Maybe, I always will.

My neighbor mows his grass at night.
Back and forth he marches, pushing his mower in tight, tidy rows.
He has a lovely sprinkler system.  
It keeps his lawn green, and growing, year round.

Also, he decorates.
For fourth of July this year, he hung a light up American flag on his garage door.
He messed up a little, and it hung upside down.  
He never did fix it, but I'm pretty sure he's much more patriotic than I am, even so.  

In October, he hung a giant, painted jack o lantern on his fence, along with a black cat.
They looked nice, friendly even.
He took it down on October 30th, and he kept his porch light off on Halloween night.

I don't remember Thanksgiving, but I'm sure there was something,
A turkey, bales of hay, pumpkins.  
Probably, he wore a Pilgrim's hat to work every day.  
I would have liked to see that.

At Christmas time, there was a light up tree that he planted in his front lawn.
Also, reindeer, those white ones with lights that move their heads up and down.
Best of all, though, he had one of those leg lamps.  Like from that movie, 'The Christmas Story'?
And it was no scaled down version like you might find at Target, let me tell you.  
No, this leg belonged to a woman  five foot seven, at the very least.
I could see it shining from his living room window every single night for a month.

My neighbor mows his grass at night.
Or sometimes at five in the morning, if that is what works best for him that day.
Two or three times a week, I hear him out there mowing.
Yes, even in January.

His wife operates the blower.  
She blows the leaves that fall off my trees and drift into her yard.
She blows them into the middle of the street, then turns, and goes into her house.

Sometimes, the two of them will sit on a bench in their yard.
That bench faces my yard, my front door.
Whenever they sit out there, they look straight ahead while they are talking.  
It FEELS like they are talking about me.

Me, and all my fallen leaves from the Red Oak that have not yet made their way into their lawn.  
Me, and my Bermuda grass that hangs over the side of the curb, crispy and brown.
That grass scares them, threatening to creep across the road and into their own landscape.
Me, and my hooligan children who turn on the water hose in the summertime.
They just let it run while they play and laugh.  
Sometimes, they squirt the cars driving by.
This drives the neighbors bonkers.

I remember when we first moved in, they brought over a casserole, and introduced themselves.
I thought, 'Oh boy, they are gonna be tough.'
And they are.  They are.

we walked on down the road, following in the shadows of each other's love,
the sweet scent of the sycamore trees distracting us.

we saw a good distance down the red dirt road,
saw enough to know what lay around the bend,
yet we walked on, content in the knowing of the present day,
caught in that moment that felt like a forever memory from childhood.
it was hot cocoa and animal crackers until the third mile.

you, with your hand stretched out towards mine.
me, with my fingers thus entwined,
caught in that moment of the falling sycamore leaves,
the crisp fall air,
the red dirt road,
the lingering memories that blinded us to the changing seasons of our hearts,
to the curve of departure up ahead.

Were you to pass a thousand years drifting
In memories doubly drenched in sorrow,
You would find me pacing the shore waiting
To welcome you home, life's new tomorrow.

Within this land of love's patient slumber,
I will cradle your tender, worried heart
'Til time allows you to disremember
The burdens of grief which set you apart.

Then bring your ship sailing straight home to me;
I am forever your warm water port.
I've sent sweet scented streams out to your sea,
Now awaken to my gentle escort.

  My love is a current, steady and true
  I am your safe harbor;  I wait for you.

What oozes out
                             (between the lines)
the scent of shaving,
your lean leg,
those dancing eyes,
waffles.

What can't escape
                                (the boldface type)
the door that slams,
your heavy feet,
dark eyes demanding
waffles.

What remains
                          (the words that blur)
a broken dish
your cracking wit,
my steady hand, now
waffles.

Blow, winds, blow

He wanders in and out of dream scapes,
Seeking refuge from the nameless ache,
The burn of a thousand cloudless days.

The tumbleweed of his joy blows in the dunes of neglect,
Vaguely rooted in the sands of discontent.

Blow, winds, blow!
Shift the sand beneath his feet,
Tumble him to the river of rejoice,
Where his seeds can bury deep
In the fertile soil of complete.


Walk on, Lonely Pilgrim

Would that you would go a spell further,
Fight a round harder, walk a mile longer,
Perhaps you will see the clear waters,
The soaring vistas, the spring flowers.

Sandstorms blind your eyes and sting your throat,
Your music lost into the wind.

Walk on, lonely pilgrim,
Walk on, and meet me
In the green valley,

It's just 'round the bend.

I've a song to play for you!



Welcome Song for the Weary Traveler


With unsure steps, tread the ground,
Gaze out with open eyes.
Cast away all fear and doubt.
Let the music sing your soul!

This river will wash your bedrock,
Polish the rough stones of your longing,
Flow away your worried mind.

When this love-seed settles in the soil of your heart,
Your rose will bloom, in fertile field,
Where nightingale warbles its melodious tune.

Lay down your head upon alfalfa pillow,
Let the music take you high,
Where daffodil dreams and mystic streams
Sing you sweetest lullaby.

Now close your eyes and feel the pull
This song, the lodestone to your heart,
Drawing out your own sweet tune.

Hear gentle clouds that roll on by,
Smell sweet the scented breeze in sky,

Feel the love,
                  
                      Let go,
                              
                                   *Now fly


Lonely Pilgrim Dreams


The lonely pilgrim fell asleep on his pillow of dreams,
As minstrel sung songs that floated on air.
He struggled to wake from his trance like state,
As he found himself deep in the quagmire of regret,
Wondering how he had found himself
Wandering in green valleys,
How he had been so easily lulled to sleep.

He wondered, too, if dreams are ever real,
And what he would see at morning's light.

Minstrel sang on, into the night,
Singing all good things into his heart,
Breathing love into his pillow,
Playing for light,
Playing the tune of her heart strings that night.

She was not sure what song she sang anymore,
But wanted to sing,
And sing some more.

so i'm standing outside the coffee shop
staring through the large plate glass windows.

it's one of those intimate,
quirky little places.
pressed tin ceiling,
art (originals) on the walls,
pieces of furniture that look more like they belong in a bedroom
than any public place.  

maybe that's my problem.

maybe it isn't impersonal enough.  

because i can't seem to get
my feet
to move
over
the
threshold.

i'm just standing here on the street,
staring through to
                        
                                                     the other side.

on the other side
sit the group of poets
i am supposed to be joining.  
they talk easily with each other,
they share their works.  

i'm wondering at this point,
what sort of poets they are,

they are smiling,
laughing
talking easily with each other.  

these are definitely not
my type
of poets.  

i'm wondering
what kind of poetry
these easy talkers
have inside themselves.  
what could they possibly
have to say?  

probably poems about
flowers
and butterflies
and trees
and stuff.  

this is not the group for me.


i turn and walk on down the street.  

a *****, crumpled sheet of newspaper bounces along the sidewalk in front me.

The box poses on my table,
So patient in its guise.
Allures its extent to baffle,
And prove me thus unwise.

To draw me closer it will bait
And lure by fine sweet sounds,
Perplexity my new bed mate,
Mischief that knows no bounds.

I lie in this bed and ponder,
Choice is mine, is it not?
What gifts inside I do wonder!
Temptation's guile my lot.

Gilded and exquisitely wrought,
Intricacy unparalleled,
My prolonged resistance for naught,
My hand thus adroitly compelled!

I lie in bed, under cover,
fear rising up through the pores of my skin;
it leaks from my hair.

My door is locked; there are no monsters under my bed.
The only demons here live inside my head,
in muscle, bone, cell memory.

Tall and impenetrable is the brick wall that locks me out, that locks me in.
Sarcasm drips from the corner of my mouth, first laughing, then crying,
my face stuck in a perpetual open mouthed gape of surrendered indecision.

Anger trickles through my toes, almost imperceptible,
a shallow breath slowly exhaled, a child hiding in the dark.

The cool porcelain of disavowed feeling snakes between my fingers,
settles in my palm.

Who protects me from my own rage?

Nowhere left to hide,
smashing dishes under cover.

I chase words and phrases
round and round inside my head.
My thoughts slide.
They are soft butter on a hot knife.

Dripping from the blade,
they slip, without pretense,
into my waiting hand.

I cup these thoughts in my palm,
and pour my melted butter words
onto your paper heart.

Mama's in the hospital again; this time she's a saint.

Seeing Jesus in the laundry,
she strung my little brother from red overalls,
pinned his palms to the clothesline.
Martin's small, bare feet kicked his dissent
until his weight brought him to ground.

Now Daddy's in the kitchen making waffles.
His wrinkled trousers wear yesterday's doubt.

All us kids at the table, hands pressed
on knees, trying our Sunday best to not see the images:
the glazed panes,
the way the butter slides and dips,
how the syrup pools.

My gaze falls out the window at white sheets snapping
on the wire. Disappointed angels, their great huffing
wings strain to flap away from here.

I want to say a prayer but my mouth is full
of statues. Fissured
words scrape across the plate. I swallow
each one, sticky-sweet, unyielding,
with eyes closed.

There are a lucky few of us, who benefit from the paltry services of the mental healthcare system.
The rest of us, well, we are the ones who walk naked down the street with absent faces.
We are the ones who sit alone and ***** on the street corners of your small town America.
Your America.
We mutter nonsense to ourselves, for the sake of a sanity that was denied us.
Denied us, yes, as we sought and sought a solution to our degradation, but we never could grasp that golden ring.

Mrs. Murphy trims her hedges.
And we walk obtrusively through the park
on your warm, sunny, sky blue happy day,
seeking love and connection with our own humanity in the garbage receptacles
that are scattered down the paths of our solitary confinement.

And in your eyes?  Yes, yours!
We seek our solace, our redemption.
If only a single soul would glance up,
and connect with the eyes of our soul starved, 'yes, here I am, friend!'

We seek the self same recognition that you do.
We seek that opportunity to be.
That opportunity to be loved.

Oh muse, you are an unfaithful lover!
I gave my heart to you.
You've taken, it and skipped town.

poets possess

dreamy romantic hearts
with notions enough to
stitch a quilt of love
to blanket the world


poets possessed

of cracking wit
and sharp tongue,
by darksome reveal,
spur us on towards
a bold new frontier


poet's possession

immeasurable wealth,
freely distributed.
the mighty pen sways
hearts and minds.

treasures inherent,
readily bestowed.


poet's possessor

the world own's her heart
and she, the world's
through words, none new
arranged fresh for you:

delight and beguile,
awaken again the senses,
as morning dew strewn
on Kentucky bluegrass

or creep up behind
and steal a kiss,
bringing pure bliss
to dry, parched lips

or rush and attack,
leave you flat on your back,
wind knocked from your chest,
in a state of unrest

words own her heart,
they always have,
right from the start




--bruised orange

i had not gone fishing that night.

the sun was down, with dark clouds hovering low.
me, in my rudderless boat, staring at the sky.
was i thinking of fish?  I think i was just lost at sea.

i was thinking, (well, i don't remember exactly)
caught up in a brief break in the clouds.  the stars
were out, shining their shining.   i saw them,
but didn't.  i was looking for the moon, her full, hovering
beauty imprinted still on my mind.

but this night, the moon was but a sliver of light, and i...
i was without remorse.  i had come to that place of understanding
that the moon's light neither waxes nor wanes within the confines of
shadow.  she becomes invisible in this shadowland, and perhaps this
is for the best, for who can take the beauty of the moon on a starless
night and call her their own?  she was not mine to have.

and the tide, it pulled me in, it pushed me out;  this motion set about
by the moon. (oh, my moon!)  

i looked out, saw the waves come lapping gentle onto my boards.
the crash and slap, the rocking of my boat, shook me from
my reverie.  i looked down, saw these dreams gasping at my feet.

oh, beautiful dreams born of moon and tide, how did you land here,
and why?  i saw your gasping, your grasping at calming waters.

who was i to return you to your sea?  
i was only a lost and rudderless boat.  
i had not gone fishing that night;
i was no fisherman.

yet i took you home, slipped you into my
warm, salty waters and called you my own.

real, real, who's got some real?
lay it out in front of me now
spill the beans, spill your guts

goody goody may look pretty
struggle struggle is oh, so gritty
true to me, true to you
who do you think  is fooling whom?

build up walls, lock yourself away
hide from the world, cover your shame
you'll only have yourself to blame

let it out, scream some more
find yourself, and show the world

let it out, scream some more
show yourself, and inspire the world


--bruised orange

From the blue black alley of my worst night terror, you reappear.

I wake, sweating a gauzy film of so many lost years.

You were that nightmare I never wanted to wake up from.

I was your stolen piece of fiction,
You plagiarized my youth,
Writing your own broken inventions
Into the fabric of my innocence;
You ripped my seams
Until I was your blank canvas.

But as you came tearing your way up that alley I realized,
I've been rewriting history,
stitching together a past with crooked seams.

Because every nightmare begins with:

eyes closing,

breath slowing,

the sandman whispering,
"Sweet dreams."

You were not always a monster.

The memory of him is black gravel peppered under the skin of my soul.
There is a burn and a sting that no amount of debriding will remove.
Twenty years of sliding down a dead end street,
And I am left raw and road weary at the end of it all.

And where do I go from here?  Where do I go?
Do I pick up the scraps of my worn down soul
And hobble back the way I came?

It is travelling in reverse, and my soul ****** well knows it.

I wonder why I wore the leather armor, and not the metal, not the metal?

I was a strong woman, and he was a troubled man.
And in that moment of unselfish confusion,  
He put on the maille, and I was pleased.

It was travelling in reverse,
And I ****** well knew it;
I ****** well knew.

The memory of him is black gravel peppered under the skin of my soul.

Iamb, iamb, iamb, I plod along
in verse predicting I could write a song.
To call upon the muse of higher power
pour some wine, kick off your shoes and glower.

While putting best foot forward, don't forget:
cliches are lines that surely **** your wit.
Reality, you say, bears greener grass?
Abstraction always steps across as crass.

It's true you could walk on like this for days.
Your meter's tight, it rarely ever strays.
But what of clever feet and sounds succinct?
If images are dull, your verse will stink,

As blossoms dance upon the redbud tree
and oceans fill your squid with ink of glee,
remember what your mama always said:
mixed metaphors fill readership with dread!

Say: sonics surely sock a swelling swale,
Entwined, the twisted tongues tell not your tale.
Less is always more, the teachers say.
If tricks you train, then please just walk away!

I never knew how hard it really was
to write a poem that might parade a buzz.
I thank you moderators and big brass
for sticking yours so fully up my ***!

Yesterday, I printed some of my poems.
Black letters on ivory, one hundred percent cotton, twenty-four pounds.
It felt strange to hold my words in my hands,
making concrete, that abstract part of myself.

Here is the proof, there is more to me.
There is more.

Is it really possible to uncover these secret,
hidden places within myself?

Are a rose, and the scent of a rose, one and the same?

Bone shards of our imaginary life
break loose from time to time.
Shredding their way
through my bloodstream,
they rip and tear at the fabric of my carefully pieced together reality.

I loved a quieter version of you.
A place where broken hearts held true.
And hands were firm, but nice, though strong.
A place where voices could belong.

I loved you in a fairy tale, a place where laughter was strong and hale.  I loved you in a tiny place, where no one knew your splintered face.

I loved you once, in a country song,
I loved you, loved you, till the dawn,
When truth erupted from each pore.
Your fists broke through the bathroom door.

How many moments locked in time,
Pictures of,
"I am yours," and,
"You are mine."
A fairytale written inside my head.
Our love affair was always dead.

And if I could only separate
The you I loved
From the you I hate,
Would it smooth those shards
Of broken bone
Of twenty years together,
But always alone?

*I loved the quieter version of you.

Tread carefully, now.
A tiger rests in my chest.
She gathers her strength.

Tread carefully, now.
A tiger sleeps in my chest.
She dreams of waking.

Tread carefully, now.
A tiger stirs in my chest.
Crouching low,
The deep rumbling
Begins.

Tread carefully, now.
A tiger springs from my chest.
She waits no longer.

In dreams she struggles,
Bursting from her prison cage.
Her eyes shine diamonds.

The great blue heron haunts the reedy bank,
and combs the midnight waves with razor eyes.
He trolls the river shoals on spindled shank
then beaks his prey with sudden, swift surprise.

In shadowed silhouette his figure begs
my mind to plumb the depths of darkened mire.
But diving there, I rise with naught but dregs,
no meal of meat, no answers to inspire.

The heron pauses thoughtfully mid-stride
to preen his dusky feathers in the glow.
He ***** his crested head to leeward side,
then darts, once more, with certainty, below.

Aloof to prying gaze of passersby,
he lifts majestic wings on moonlit sky.

I strike a hot match against those Front-Porch-Sitting-Mowing Freaks who live across the street.

I'm out there every morning;
Afternoons, too,  
My grass stands tall,
And my fingers dance lightly across my dulcimer.

I'm strumming 'Wildwood Flower', mistakes and all.
I get serious with 'Whiskey Before Breakfast', not well done.
But then I break out with '******* Creek.'
And who can fault me for that one?
It's a happy tune, done well, or poorly.

Those **** neighbors sit across the way.
They don't even bother to stare.

Something has changed.
There is still no sparkle in their eyes,
But I am happy.

*It isn't my job to entertain the world.

the reticent bard sits,
strung on a fence.

his fear of leaping
one side or t'other
has given him a sore ***;
he's sat there for years.

his songs, sung to the birds
of the field, fly softly through
the air.

and not a one hears him
and not a one cares,
the reticent bard reflects

his contemplation lost
to an audience unhearing

the birds of the field,
hearing his sighs,
wing their flight
to places unknown.

our dear bard,
in solitude laments
his yearning

the reticent bard has forgotten
the majestic ministration of words.

that mysterious music
which sings into the air,
and returns magic,
far and near.

--bruised orange

A voyeuristic view through the windows of happy friends
is not nourishment enough for this poet's heart
and does not sate this dreamer's hungry soul

before this spirit journeys on
i'd like to know what it is like
to be loved from the inside out

those delicate strings,
that haunting duet,
of love not bound by fear

i'd like to know love
from the inside out
and not from the outside in

that stuff of dreams,
(yet real i've seen)
that one true union of souls

it's honeyed nectar taste
would be sweet upon my lips
and those delicate strings,
tender music to my soul.


oh muse, you take me too far
i must leave off
before i break this tender heart
and having been turned inside out
i fly completely

apart



--bruised orange

of cracking wit
and sharp tongue,
by darksome reveal,
spur us on, towards
a bold new frontier


--bruised orange

I was a bruised orange,
That round piece of fruit that had been dropped, over and over again.  
Dropped so many times, my insides had turned to sour mash.
(It was a distasteful sort of mush.)
I hid my mushiness behind an exterior of bright orange skin.

(I thought I had fooled everyone but myself.)

He swept into my life, in backward fashion,
Giving himself away to erase the disasters of my wounds.

He was eraser crumbs.
His history, one of being casually swept from the page
As others made their revisions.

Had he not been there?  
Life would have dug a hole through my crepe paper heart,
Scraping and scratching
With its hard, unforgiving end.

But he was eraser crumbs;
He slid easily across my page.

noble soul with eyes downcast
digs in dirt for his repast
seeks he there but does not find
nourishment to ease his mind

noble soul in dross obscured
tarnish he has long inured
mirror must be cleaned to shine,
reflect the rays of love divine


--bruised orange

cramped in the close quarters of my logic
there's a painting party going on.

but i've brought some shellac to seal
the tender places, the cut out picture postcards
of memories i saved, savor, slave over so carefully.
their disconnected connections splayed upon my walls.

i should paint over them, i know.
i should cover them over with a nice, bright white.

but the colors, the patterns, they
are a blueprint on the bones of my house.

they are my proof, my logical proof of illogical theories.
my picture postcards of impossible possibilities.

the decoupage of dreams' dalliance
dances upon these walls, definitively,

the cogent evidence of our coup de coeur.