The material was stretched tight
deep furrows in the red and black
pulled across your shoulder blades so severely
but you were all soft edges.
The blunt edge of a 2B pencil
gently shadowing in the crease
where stomach met hip bones
and warm.
It was lovingly done.

The angels that you can and cannot see
float in and out of life so gracefully;
enfold in winged embraces one by one,
celestial comforters when day is done.
Some angels take the shapes of passers-by
so you might see the Spirit in their eyes.
A smile that lifts the day from the mundane;
a kind hand up, a loving act conveyed.
The unseen angels hover in the realm
where power manifested overwhelms
our common senses. There behind the scenes
they battle fears and reinforce our dreams.
Take counsel from a humbled man, once proud;
they only enter lives when they're allowed.

With tainted eyes,
And soundless cries,
I hear the sadness,
When love dies.

When the dusts settle from the last wheel
and the sickle moon stoops on the bamboo grove
the dead rise in the whispers of the southern breeze.

You may hear them splashing the canal's water
beneath the hazed halo of one quarter
by nocturne music of barn owl and crickets
in lights of glowworms from darkest thickets.

If you stop on the Rotwood Bridge
can hear them sing in gay abandon
though we're now all dead old spirits
the night can't make us anymore forlorn.

The twin moon may from the ripples broken
beckon you and if your spirit awakens
take a plunge for a joyous down go
amid cheers from the watery hollow.

She drained my love like a spider.
She released me from my sins.
She said I spin my web forever.
Not knowing where it ends
or where it begins.

We are fragments
Minstrels in our memories
Ghosts
Only partial presence
Our essence
Only vaporous
In filament
In digital
In audio
Visual
And literary
Fading
As all things do
Imperfectly remembered

I know you are trying to forget me
and all the things you did with me
are to be banished from your universe.
Even the soft touching of our skin
is allowed no memory.
Yet you must know this
you may say you no longer love me.
you can cut me out of photos
you can even pretend
I don't exist.
But we had love once
it grew in our hearts
like a morning glory
in the sunlight.
And love is indelible
it prints below the surface
of our skin like tattoos.
And when you least expect it
you shall look into the mirror
of you soul and see the reflection
of our love and it will take away
your breath as it's loss
will return as painfully
as the moment
when it happened.