What would happen if we tore them down
All the walls that keep us apart
What would happen if we threw them to ground
those masks that hide our true heart

Would it not be in our interest if we forgot the tales,
what our fathers told us about the 'other'
and looked for ourselves, with bright new eyes
upon the faces, into the hearts, of one another.

Would we not find there something good and kind?
Could we not discover we have a like mind?
If we look around we just may find
that cord encircling, those ties that bind

Will you see the beauty of this fine garden?
Do you feel the strength of these branches strong?
Can you sense the waves of our connection?
Do you hear the notes of this new song?

open bright new eyes and see

we are made for one another

we are family


--bruised orange

you would chase ghosts down a narrow corridor
seeking absolution from your own regrets.  

don't think for a minute you'll find your answers there.
the love unfolds at whatever pace you are willing to set.

joy is reserved for the heart that forgives the past,
and beats itself wildly into the future.

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.

Plastic,
plastic covers my natural voice.

I am neoprene, with gasoline undertones.
So peel the layers, find my truth.

You never were one to find
beauty in modern art,

Acrylic man.

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.

and already
i see the lay of the land before me,
all it will bring.

i travel up this mountainside,
for what else can i do
but move along?

the cold fear grips my head,
leaves my hands bloodless,
frozen upon the reins.

and i dig,
i dig the spurs of my resolve
into this steady steed.

to this place i go now,
this hot burning land
where all my anger dwells;

and the music there screams my name, screams

my complacency.

i train my gaze upon the horizon of

my freedom.

and i dig;
i dig the spurs of my resolve
into this steady steed.


Here be my dragons!

and their hot, fetid breath
will scorch my vapid plain.

I lowered my bucket into the well of words
And raised it up, hand over fist,
While syllables and phrases sloshed about,
Some spilling over
In my eagerness to drink them deep.

Oh, how I wanted to be filled up.


The words poured out,
And they emptied into the clay jar of my disconnected soul,
Rubra terra terra firma incognita
Plant me deep and water these roots.
(Am I real? Will I always be?)

And oh, how they filled me up.

I spoke the words aloud,
And they slithered between the cracks of my shattered glass self,
Amber crackled sunlight streaming right on through,
It looked like I would go on forever (and ever, ever)

And oh, the words broke me open.

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.

Pour it out,
that dis-ease of your remorse.

Lay your broken bones gently
into this cut crystal glass.

See how the light refracts?

Up we got, morning still,
Breath fogged over,
Deep night's chill.

Sunrise brightening,
Day arising.

Embers stoked,
Fire lighting.

Smoky air,
Disheveled hair.

Coffee, on to brew.

Today is a hollow day.
I am a shallow voice
in a tin cup.

I rattle and clang.

I am five copper pennies
wanting to add up to more
than a nickel.

Brother, can you spare some change?

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

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.

Oh lover!   Your absent heart has left me wanting.
Your unfocused mind has left me wandering.
You are a playing field, and I am the ball.*

Bounce me.


Words are funny things;
We think we know them;
We think we have mastery over them,
That they are ours to manipulate.

But words, they have a life of their own,
And the power they can speak, we do not fully grasp.

Maybe, words will spill out of you tomorrow morning
As the sun lifts it's brow,
And you are in your bathrobe drinking coffee.
Will you be waiting for them?   Will you listen?

Maybe.

Or, perhaps you will be engrossed in the sports section
When the next clear moment arrives.
And you will miss hearing it.

And those words will fly on past you
And settle on the ears of another,
Less inclined to avoidance of the truth.

see the wooden statues,
how they walk about,
locked inside, their
heartwood screams
to be cut free of doubt

watch the alabaster statues,
dance around the room,
their translucent skin
masks the beauty of
roses' passionate bloom

break the marble statues,
real beauty's trapped inside,
chisel away, bright flames ablaze,
with light too bright to hide


melt your bronzened statue,
show me your true form,
though lovely,copper and tin
will never compare
to the gold that shines within


--bruised orange

of pain and suffering many have written
of those fiery tests we've sung forlorn
this, my hymn of how i've been measured
here is my song, of experience born

plucked from the heap with sense of dread
from murky darkness how long obscured
not knowing the glory which lies ahead
we balk at the process to be endured

impurities burned away by flame
the kiss of fire does smelt us
dross once skimmed, reveals the claim
a fine treasure, with beauty ageless

though kiss of fire will burn intense
in hands of master metallurgist
how malleable we become at his bench
fine works of art, fashioned purest

now aglow with joy and praise
no longer are we bemired
singing this hearth song from hearts ablaze
with gratitude we'll next leap to the fire

i welcome the kiss, brought once more to my brow
and embrace this pain, my fashioner's distill
burn away burn away burn away now
create of me what you will


--bruised orange

I crack the brickle bone and then carve back
through muscle taut with cell memory,
past tendons that could never teach us love.

We were bone on bone all the way.

I slice past ridges where my fingertips once danced,
filet the contours of youthful sighs, where repeated
good-byes were a chance to begin again.

This carcass is rotting, and the back and forth sawing
from a knife that's grown too dull for its mauling
has left my hands itching from the putrid remains.

Stand by, watch the blood congeal on the ground.

I guess you can never cleanly cleave the meat that's been
hanging so long in your backyard.
Just let it drop:
the roast,
the ****.

See how the bones settle into the soil.
Who knows what might grow there?

"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)

oh mind, your whirling dervish dancing

leaves you dizzy and reeling.  do you not

know answers fly apart in the centrifuge?

His letters scatter loose upon the ground,
She clenches fists despite arthritic hands
that rail against the words she never found.
To spite the golden noose of tarnished bands,
she douses tomes and quick lets loose a flame.
A tendril's curling wisp of past desire
snakes toward the sky. Still the ash of blame
survives the ceremony's futile pyre.
What fire ever burns away the dross
or dulls the tempered edges of we're done?
Yet embers coax; they succor heat not lost
to years they burned together each alone.
The groan of ache sounds low within her hips.
One letter saved, pressed tightly to her lips.

a woman sits and drinks alone at her table tonight,
in remembrance of all loves past.  in her darkness,
glimmers of chance dance across the room, for
these are things born apart from the bottle.

hope, that slow gasping fish of dreams makes eyes at her,
and she raises her glass in a toast,
but the lights come down, and he swims away.  

the future is a place for young lovers
with stardust whispers and moonbeam glances
she reminds herself, and pours another drink.

i've locked away my love
behind steel bars of remorse
(i forgot my pen was in your pocket)
and now i've swallowed the key.

muse sits and laughs at my predicament.

i stand against the cold stone walls
of a prison cell i never meant to back into,
wondering about the cruel hands of fate
and other such nonsense and predictable phrases.

phrases that make me want to *****.

i stick my fingers down my throat and gag,
wretched heart, too full in my mouth,
that copper penny flavor,
this poor man's meal.

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 has advised more roughage.
"Healthy bowels will keep illness away."

My therapist says group will do it.
"Share your stories with those who relate."

My doctor gave me a script for ******.
"Call me when these run out."

My muse sings urgently into my ear.
"Keep writing, we'll get there, no doubt!"

My friend tells me more prayer is the ticket.
"Talk with God and you won't be afraid."

But my sister (the French psychoanalyst) tells me simply,
"You need to get laid!"

now i've tried the vegetables, they are tasty to eat
and the group i found, well it's just down the street
the prescription's been filled, and easily (twice!)
my pen keeps me writing long into the night
and prayer brings me answers, my truths come to light


but this last advice has left me in stitches
you see, its been such a very long time
would someone direct my feet, and,
please tell me, where do i get some of that?

(and now she dissolves, into fits of hysterical laughter)

Of this, my heart so eagerly embraced
The plans of youth in dreams retraced
And in that song of once forgotten fire
A burning now of long quenched desire.

See the trees standing tall and austere?
The meadow grass with flowers appear.

Split rail fence
Winding path
Stone wall
Signs of a life,
Proof of it all

The poet seeks to recollect
Through phrases in earnest to reflect
But the pen, in solitude rejects

Through wasted years of hopeful dream
I've not set foot in a single stream

Of longing
Of bitterness
Of regret

These will be this poet's epitaph.

Lately, I have been afraid to write.

**** words.

Whatever other costumes might have been hers for the choosing,
She wore the robe of disenchantment.

She should have been taught,
Truth skates a razor thin line that will slice the flesh from your bones
When you try to deny it.  

The mask she placed upon her face, a tragicomic mockery of belief,
Its blue-black marks tattooing her cheeks,
Were a constant reminder of her mistaken identity of herself,

Mistake.


(And in that moment of stark realization,
Didst thou not ponder the sickening irony of a life gone awry?)

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 embrace the darkness within me
and find there is light enough to bear
no longer need to run in fear
or pretend i do not hear
the call, for it is strong,
and will commence the
silent scream within my
brain when i stubbornly
turn a deaf ear to its song

i'll find it oozes through
the pores of my skin
attacks my kith and kin
it only wants to be loved, too

i find a full on frontal address
relieves it best, no mere
handshake will do. darkness
wants to feel the love, too

SO:

darkness, my old friend
what will you share with
me today?  what juicy
news to me impart
what breaking waves
upon my heart?

sit a while, have some tea
i know you have something
good for me.  i know you were here
just last week, but i can't get
enough of your sweet embrace

so crack me open, spill me out
leave me breathless on the floor
in the morning, you'll leave my side
and me? i will have enjoyed the ride

my thoughts impressed by all you share
and i, the better for your care
morning light upon me breaks
you always leave me, but ever return
bearing gifts, so thoughtfully prepared

you always leave me,
awakened, and aware


--bruised orange

and here it comes again,
the cold winter chill
darkness falls and icy
fingers are never far from me

feel the crack of breaking,
the aching of my need
taste the bitter sweetness
that makes the poet bleed

the rain sheets upon my window,
drives away my joy
breaking aching tasting
the loneliness of need

I dream of beautiful things,
Sounds of a warm spring.
A life of joy.
Mimicry.

I want to melt into worlds of beginnings,
Listen to the music of presence.

I want to be.

Joy abides in the celebration of tradition, transformed,
The claiming of creation as your own.

oh words, come forth
do not be shy

your fear of
being misconstrued
has clamped your voice
tightly shut.

words left unspoken
scream silently to a deaf
audience and
are not compelled
to leap and prance


--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.

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.

The stately iris stands in the vase alongside the slap-happy sunflower.
They don't belong together, and everyone knows.
But the people are too polite to point out the obvious.

*Those flowers are just gonna sit there and wilt.

I spin plates on a stick to strike a balance,
But I become a stone that tips the scale.

Now mark the steady ticking of the clock,
How the hand is slower than the I.

The chiming of the bells at the Hour of None is a prayer whispered in my hurried chest:

Of desire,
That road is best travelled as a pilgrim.

Of fulfillment,
There are no shortcuts,

Only meandering paths of slow,
And you.

Your broken paced brand of love has worn me down.
I was a once sharpened pencil,  now worn to a nub.

You were the sharp rock that cracked my alabaster shell.
And you never even knew it,
You never even knew.

I have no strength to blame,
There is no need to ask my forgiveness.

I could have wrapped myself around you,
A blanket that would have kept you ensconced.

But you ran;
You ran until you could run no further.

You laid yourself down.
You slept the sleep of 'I give up."

I did my best to wake you.
I grabbed you by your mind's eye shoulders and shook you.
I shook you hard.

But your poppy-laced dreams have held your eyes fast closed.

*And now I weep for what might have been.
I wring salt-water from my tear stained dress.
I weep for the emerald city that could have been ours.

you are spring showers
upon my parched earth.

i soak you in
and drink you up

your nourishment giving me            
something i've craved                          

i soak you in
and drink you up

i soak you in
and drink you up.

oh, Alice!  how could you?

tumbling down rabbit holes
curiously

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

this fire, this fire
how it burns!

too close i brought my hand;
i've backed into the burner
now, without a thought or plan.

rages, rages, now consumes,
this blazing fire, how it looms!

burned up my curtains,
the veil's been rent
my joy, it seems,
has all been spent

smoke it chokes
and stings my eyes
this fire,
my searing
reprise

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?

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