On the sidewalk standing in the rain
the old man is a wounded dove.
Longish white hair: wet feathers
grounded in a storm. The rain is heavy
and repeats itself, like buckets of water
thrown out of windows.

The old man stands there
holding a memory or a wish.
Under the streetlight
his wet hair glistens like tinfoil.
The downpour is a creature
that’s eating him up.

Darkness projects
from a deserted apartment building.
The ground floor windows and doors
are boarded, nailed shut.
It appears dead, like an old disease,
or stripped, like a despoiled tomb.
Its bricks cracked and crumbled,
wooden casings dry rotted and helpless.
Painted in bold red
across the boarded front entrance,
a graffiti-message: Girls Rule.

Looking back at the old man,
he stands the way a king stands alone
when doubting himself.
Dark crawls around him. The old man stares
at the building. He is motionless,
in memory. Rain gallops over him.

Inside the warmth of a café,
my steaming coffee. Outside, the streets
are laundered clean of everyone
except for the old man who stares
at the apartment building. Time has grown
over his face and body, has grown
over the broken down building.

Now the rain is as heavy as mucus
and with his tiny body
the old man shuffles away into the dark
and gradually disappears
like a casket being covered with earth.

_____________

from my sixth book-length manuscript

©dah / dahlusion 2014 / 2015
all rights reserved

"In Streetlight, His Wet Hair" was first published in
'Switch (the difference) Anthology'
from 'Kind Of A Hurricane Press'

The spirited light; the solar-like wind;
breath with its passion; the sun’s copious
****** venom.

I speak of everything and all things
without caution: this noise inside my head;
layers of high pitched harmonics;

the compressed hours between
birth and death; the heart’s heat
ascending and descending;

the end always beginning and again
your Gothic eyes. I have been here
and there, a prodigal hawk

with the flavor of blood-kisses hovering
like steam or mist or a weapon stirring
the body’s carbonic magnetic motion;

never the sky always the silence disclosing
the stillness in death’s fantasy—life and death;
love and loss; a fatalistic dream-reel

as if two mirrors facing each other reflecting
the same vacant image. I remember the faint
trail of finger prints; my impatient pulse

raced into yours. Deserted passions
like roses each one dies the same way
—our emotions mumbled

through love and into the glazed elixir
of a French kiss: In my arms you had fallen asleep
not knowing I had left.

——————————————————————————
From my second book: 'The Second Coming'
©dah / Stillpoint Books 2012  
all rights reserved

"never the sky always the silence"—from Andre' Breton

Search Amazon: "the second coming/dah" and "in forbidden language/dah"

In this poem I am not speaking to you
but to myself: As I write,

sentences form their own voices, their own
moods and opinions such as rebellions,

loves, harmony and disharmony. The universe
is not so perfect. My epiphany: A fathomless

consciousness is composed of collective mind
stretched across the magnetism of space only

to exist as ambitious matter—dense and absurd,
light and heavy; humanity has existed

for thousands of years in cold-slumber; unconscious
and inhumane; thrashing about in between

life and death where in the final moment
everybody longs for catharsis.

————————————————————————
From my second book: 'The Second Coming'
©dah / Stillpoint Books 2012

all rights reserved

"in the final moment
everybody longs for catharsis" —from Polish Poet Zbigniew Herbert

Search Amazon: "the second coming/dah"

Late spring. Early morning.
Horseflies in my dream,
dissonant church bells, legless pigeons

I wake to the light’s sharp angle
that cuts this day open.
A breeze stretches its wrap

Lying here, dawn is brief
like a banner slowly raised
then dropped abruptly

Rising from bed
I slump
a prisoner waiting for a beating
The chilled air, a sword
stuck into my skin

Through the blinds
a snap of sun
my eyes rollback
colors pop

I stand barefoot
and become the sum
of a legless pigeon
a horsefly’s faint buzz
dissonant bells

I think of my dream
how it called me
inward
closer to the core
a caravan of pine coffins
lined up in the streets
a future template

Suddenly, church bells,

a fly dead on the sill,

a mournful pigeon’s coo.

--------------------------------------------

from my sixth book-length manuscript

©dah / dahlusion 2015
all rights reserved

"Horseflies Pigeons Coffins"
was first published in  'Secrets and Dreams Anthology'
(Kind Of A Hurricane Press)

Who am I to know that
the existence of heaven lives
in the pause between breaths
or that the story of creation is
a searing scar in the side of Jesus?

I have collected my pleasures,
like monsoons collect the dead,
have collected my memories,
the raw force of vitality,

the swift silk of a spider’s web,
the emptiness of being, all of this:
a country of vibrant emotions.

I have touched the sea with my hands,
bringing them together, feeling the abrupt salt
between my fingers, torrid like
the stinging whip of a lover:

Her tongue burns me alive with
its naked wine; her eyes dig
into the depths of mine.

Who am I to know that the Kingdom of God
lives in the stones, the fire, the water, the mud,
or that twilight is a sudden sadness
like gray blood clots caused by black thorns?

Still, my excitement is like a tower
of energy or a vigorous burst of *****
or the moonlight’s mysteries fitting its key
into my soul where a secret stillness

wallows in its swaggering bliss.
I have tasted the meat of the universe,
its heart, its lungs, its liver, tasting it
with my gentleness, a gentleness like

soft lips, or a feather, or a lover’s whisper:
Her mouth burns me alive with its raw juice;
her heart feeds from mine.

Who am I to know that the Supreme Spirit
lives in the flies, the lice, the grub, or that
death’s bitter sorrow lives in the dust, the bones,
the ash, or in the agony of a broken heart?

—once, Jesus summoned me.
He undid his wounds with the jagged blades
of my tears. I held him, embracing him, saying:

My brother, my brother, my peaceful brother ...
who am I ... to know ...
who I am?

________________

From my first book: 'In Forbidden Language'

©dah / Stillpoint Books 2010
all rights reserved

Search Amazon: "in forbidden language/dah"

I can hear my soul
kicking its feet inside my body

trying to get out. I can hear it
trying to boot my body into its deathbed:

Death lies waiting within the soft harp
of sleep. My soul is thrashing my ribs

twisting my spine, milking my ****
to a shrunken wrinkled prune-like mummy.

There is death crawling under our skin, death
in the broken heart of love, death in Mother Mary’s lie.

I can feel my soul slamming against my lungs
trying to puncture holes in them. I can

feel its pointed teeth eating its way out
of my ***. I hear it inside of me

laughing at God’s sick jokes, licking my heart
dry and clawing at my eyes.

—————————————————————————
From my second book: 'The Second Coming'
©dah / Stillpoint Books 2012

all rights reserved

http://www.amazon.com/The-Second-Coming-Dah/dp/0982874715

Perhaps the doors to our dreams
space   time   rambling mind
hang on cosmic hinges
restless hinges    aching hinges
in need of   hemp   *****   or fine wine

Unmoved by being in my dream
she walked barefoot over my breath
speaking languages
from a trillion universes
unknown to me

I heard her   I called to her
I listened   and her voice
spoke to me   one word
slowly   one word at a time

Her face near my memory
her kisses   her body   our whisperings
I held my hands out   they disappeared
a lonely finger remained   pointing

Perhaps the portals to our dreams
are hungry mouths stuck open
endlessly whimpering to be nurtured

I watched her laughing and crying
at the threshold of my tenderness   crying
slippery tears   severe tears   unreal tears
tears like smoke rings   tears like crystals
tears like rain the roses love

Gently   she lifted a red rose
to my mouth
it lived in ecstasy  
on my tongue

O Love   love   love
daylight is near
and dreams will fade
like one moist blossom after another

————————————————————
From my third book: 'If You Have One Moment'
(Stillpoint Books, 2015)

©dah / Stillpoint Books 2015
all rights reserved

I am hearing it
winter’s freeze
the tightening of air
water light
a noisy gang of clouds
Snowflakes are feathered stones

In the field
this day builds its frozen bones
A beautiful disaster forms

Submerged in it
I listen for birds  
There is nothing

A moment’s wind
brittles my breath
numbs my ears
I listen for a note
There is nothing

A hush of sleep
tucks into January’s bed
Even the dogs stay inside
to refuse the ice jabs
into their paws

The cold cracks the skin
of my hands
sharpens its blade
slices deeper

At the edge of the field
I stand in stillness
an ice-covered statue
waiting for the company of pigeons

____________

©dah / dahlusion 2014
all rights reserved

"January" was first published in 'The Canon's Mouth' (UK)

Editor: Greg ***

I could not sleep
imagining it must be raining
There is darkness inside these clouds

I have come to know this feeling
this obscured emptiness
All night there is nothing
but my breathing
and there is a nebulous death
that happens between breaths

The sky bends around me
touches the trees
and knifes its way between the branches

I stand in the cold air
as a child stands in winter’s whisper
snow angels freshly painted
and pinned to the ground

It seems that there is still
something
that I need to say
to support this melancholy
to bear witness to the sorrow
the world owns

Could this darkness be a god
that takes me to the other side
where what is left is
invisible
Tonight the moon is unseen
by its own absence

How many more thoughts
must I make
to understand the entire world
to understand the joy of some
the grief of others

-------------------------------------------

from my fourth book: 'The Translator'
(Transcendent Zero Press, 2015)

©dah / TZP 2015
all rights reserved

"Invisible" was first published in
'Acumen Journal' (U.K.)

http://www.amazon.com/Translator-Dah-Helmer/dp/0692415254/ref=sr11?s=books&ie;=UTF8&qid;=1437074680&sr;=1-1&keywords;=the+translator+%2F+dah

1.
the architecture of waves, pelicans in adagio
but a tempo slower, the silver-colored fish, streaks
of light, like conversations out of reach, counting
waves, the soft and hard ones …

the sun-reflected surface makes me sleepy
as if a hypnotist at work: my thoughts resisting
this sleep that feels like the final dust of
existence …

starfish ******* the life out of clams,
the weight of the ocean …

2.
the frail branches of an old tree, an old woman
an old dog, a city that’s outbuilding itself, straight
up from Hell, straight into the atmosphere, across
the sky, across the universe …

at sunset, the challenge the sun has to stay alive,
as if a magician at work: darkness falls, like the dead
flame of life, several seconds pass, then several more,
I collect the darkness …

time flies, like a harbinger of bad news, like
an awkward simile that needs explaining …

3.
of all of my loves, of those who were actually
lovers, either married or single, you were the one
who drew me in, against our will, both hearts fell,
bodies withered and ****** …

at sunrise everything reshaped, our bodies felt
alien to each other: nothing has changed but  
the distance between us, always these forbidden
remains …

how our voices grew hoarse, outside it was raining,
everything had rusted …

=========================================

from my unpublished manuscript: Fragmented

©dah / dahlusion 2019 all rights reserved

first published in Fishbowl Poetry, Germany

1.
… from now on, a reshuffling of diction,
word-acrobatics, perspectives gleaming
with thought: somebody built an orange tree
against the other things around it, to devour
boiled eggs in the porcelain hand of a plate,
the convulsions of the world can only go
a short length, it’s a matter of …

… regression, like tumbling downstream
over the backs of boulders …  

2.
… near the end of his journey the man’s voice,
as dull as ashes, a cracked seed ready to burst,
declining through the dark, a short distance
to a wintry end: traveling alone to the bottom,
sound of his dusty age drawing in the earth
lying at the edge of bones: today, the light,
tomorrow the ledge: think lightning fast …

… his affliction is not pain but death: cold
at his feet, like frail children ...

3.
… even in the icy spring of March, your eyes
were the stars melting lingering snow: we lay
buried in the warm blood of naked bodies, like
refugees in a new land, and the wind that did
not reach us, and the ice that could not find us:
outside, the silent streets could hear thunder
beneath our blanket …

… ask me where she is, the one who ignored
my heart, who was gone by summer ...

======================================

from my unpublished manuscript: Fragmented

©dah / dahlusion 2019 all rights reserved

first published in Record Magazine