The long tearful wail of a siren,
distant in the static black night,
pierces the thick silence
of dim dirt roads
and misty pastures.
An old dog mistakes the sound
for the cry of his own.
He howls forlornly into the darkness,
only a numb stillness rings back,
an intolerable sound of its own.
He lays a heavy head down
to dream of warm fields of wheat
where he chases the white tail of a rabbit,
until it is finally clenched between his jaws.

Along the city’s second longest street
At the end of its second longest month
Walked a woman, in plaid,
Lugging an incongruous antique lamp
Toward the sun.

In the desert, the dunes,
The piles of grains of sand,
Are constantly rearranged,
Redistributed, reconciled by the winds--
Are, in short, in flux--
Are never what they once were,
And never will be again.

When the wind’s favor, for a while,
Aggrandizes a particular pile,
Does it look down upon its fellows?
Does it call itself a king, and proclaim,
“Bow before me, for I am the mightiest,
The grainiest, the sandiest
Of all possible piles of grains of sand;
For I have, I am more of nothing
Than you will ever understand”?

How many authors,
Unearthly meticulous,
Have left us symbols in scarves; or, say,
Surreptitiously submerged in salad dressing,
The idea of the priest confessing;
Clues folded carefully between innocuous lines,
So carefully that in ten thousand pairs of eyes,
Not one perceives the crease?

And what kind of beautiful sadist plants flowers in shadow?

I cannot bear the empty tears that they must shed,
The monstrous mute meaninglessness of these
Lessons taught, and not learned!
Worse: words, while wise,
Are not our only teachers.

So I look for the mirrors in smoke,
And in skies, in eyes,
In every word the wind spoke.
Until everything is a mirror;
Everything, however dull, reflects.

When I tried to ride a bicycle today--
And not just because I want that idiom to be true,
But simply because I want to learn how--
When I put my heart to the pedal,
And the wind bent down to whisper,
Unintelligible, but clearly intelligent,
Into my ear,
It felt like I had failed them;
I could not listen, but only hear.

On this generally generous June morning,
The very last of the Daylilies bloomed.
I saw it later, in an evening hour,
And I imagined, as I rode past,
That it (or its reflection) asked
“Might I be, after all, only a flower?”

“To navigate by mirror alone
Is to walk always in reverse.”
So the lily seemed to say
As it awaited, alone, its floral hearse.

I will not, without reason,
Deny a dying wish.

There is a moment
between hello and goodbye:
I already miss you.

The first time I cussed at my mother,
The words ‘*******’ formed a cannon that exploded
From my mouth,
The recoil instantly punched me with guilt.
I almost doubled over,
Holding the cell phone in a sweaty palm.
Her breath shortened, a tight inhale of abuse,
And then a dial tone,
That held more reproach
Than my callous words ever could.

No future nor past,
Only this eternal moment forever.

September began with thunder
a vengeance of repressed rainstorms
pink lightening at dusk splintered
across the western sky
and I stood outside watching
afraid yet unafraid
the booming clouds
so much less yet
so much more
than I

She came barreling into the room,
riding the back of a burnt out star,
her energy crackled and flickered
like flint against steel.
Blue half moons
where her eyes should have been,
simple constellations marked across her face
like maps of emotions and the truth behind her
lazy smile. Her energy took the breath out of me,
and mingled with my own galaxy,
reaching wave lengths of unknown mathematics.
I wanted to say something,
I wanted to touch her,
lightly, a whisper of skin only our
hearts could translate.
I knew something would soar between us,
sparks or maybe even a shooting star.
But she was gone as soon as she came,
an eon of stars following her out the door,
and I was already ten light years behind,
I knew I would never reach her in this lifetime,

but maybe in the next.

I will only ever remember
stubby thumbs or your stubborn head,
and coconut-carved ridges in your paper-white teeth;
laser lights;
my pencil
covering the cliche of a hand hovering over my body;
of those breaths with a depth too recognizable
and the inflated patches so perfect under your eyes;
just to float in a revery of reconciliation,
sitting on the concrete as I cry with a shake in my body like the break of a wave

I am Elizabeth Bathory
I go batty on these princesses,
Bath on the blood of Jasmine,
That is where I get fragrance,
No reflection in the mirror,
Since I am the palest,
Eating Belle(a) like the Beast
But I do it after Twilight,
Tangled Charlotte in a Web,
And unleash the animal within,
Dye my hair with so much red,
Rapunzel would faint,

I am the Un-dead,
A Sleeping Beauty,
The Countess of Castle Disney,
There are no Once upon A Times,
With Me.