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I claim to know the wolf,
tracking scents in the high country  
though half truth requires I confess  
one has never been in my sight    
though in silent night,
in snow weighted pines
and fir, doubtless one
has eyed me in my folly    
I have seen the coyote  
scratching in the caliche  
on the stingy prairies,
crouching in the mesquite
ready for the ****,
whilst the hare hops by  
when chase ensues  
and mammal hearts race  
I have yet to see
the canine succeed  
the hare hides in Alice’s hole  
while the mangy hunter
settles for field mice  
or makes bargains with buzzards
while the flies yet crawl
on the ****
 Jul 2013 Erica Baker
Chrys Pages
It is in the times when you actually think of something to write that nothing comes
And you're stuck listening to the rain falling outside and on the roof
Trying to decipher what it wants to say, you hold out your palms
Inviting the cold smooth droplets of water into your senses.
Or perhaps you create a story about the smell of orange peelings caught in your fingers
Or maybe compose a song about your neighbor's dog,
But still everything is the same as the previous day
Except for the chili beef noodles and a cup of hot coffee you had this morning
Nothing changed, except the urge and want to write something.
I do not ask for youth, nor for delay
in the rising of time's irreversible river
that takes the jewelled arc of the waterfall
in which I glimpse, minute by glinting minute,
all that I have and all I am always losing
as sunlight lights each drop fast, fast falling.

I do not dream that you, young again,
might come to me darkly in love's green darkness
where the dust of the bracken spices the air
moss, crushed, gives out an astringent sweetness
and water holds our reflections
motionless, as if for ever.

It is enough now to come into a room
and find the kindness we have for each other
— calling it love — in eyes that are shrewd
but trustful still, face chastened by years
of careful judgement; to sit in the afternoons
in mild conversation, without nostalgia.

But when you leave me, with your jauntiness
sinewed by resolution more than strength
— suddenly then I love you with a quick
intensity, remembering that water,
however luminous and grand, falls fast
and only once to the dark pool below.
 Apr 2013 Erica Baker
J Drake
The walls of your soul that you
  Toil away building;
The windows are dark and the
  Bricks are unyielding...

( Hate, with a hammer, cracks the wall;
   But Love, with a whisper, makes it fall. )

How many times have I told you, Believe?
And then will you learn how to truly Receive.
  For giving is getting -- these two are the same;
  And living is learning to dance in the rain.
how could You know
as You are walking down the sidewalk
           around a corner       wherever You want
that the world is not assembling itself
atom by sticky atom
from the blueprints
piled in piles (like so many piles of newspaper)
in (the rooms in) the back rooms of Your mind
particles rushing and streaming, fluttering
together with the ebb of Your consciousness?
-
the World blurs fuzzily into shape
before snapping
(snappily)
into focus

just as You enter the room
blending pixilated reality smoothly
into an orchestrated Existence
-
the next time You      reach
for the doorknob on
the door to
the waiting room
-
give
pause
listen            
carefully
-
can’t You hear the anxious atoms
           scraping
sliding
           shoving past each other?
-
they                jockey
       jumping into
the eye of
       the image of
the woman on
       the screen of
the television in
       the corner of
the ceiling where
       it hangs
-
she wants to know
why we divide
Them              from Us
-
so clearly
so readily
-
she wants to know
why our countries
are bordered
-
by an indifference to equality
by a contempt for disillusionment
-
A dispute broke out between two
atoms on the table this morning;
a tiny china teapot was broken.
-
how would You know?
people are no more
then elaborate pieces of Your own mind
now once You hang up the phone
e v a p o r a t e d  
                        into no more than
                                           an afterthought
                                                    ­     of empty space
                                                           ­         -
                                             the smell of burnt matches
                             -                                      -
                You think that
everything You imagine is beautiful
                    even death
                             -
               but in an ugly way
-                            -
the man on the
                                edge
of the third chair
from the door
has no face
(none of Them do)
all of Them don’t
(have faces)
-
until They speak or You look Them in the eye
-
until They do something       Wrong
which is why They look                  down
when They walk down the sidewalk
-
They are afraid
-
to live
  as a tree
    in the park
-
where a pillar of
angry
           energy
                       falling
failing
           the
                       pessimistic
sky
might strike
Them
(older than You
yet born
just this moment)
making the ground
around
Them steam
with the sweat
of a silent room
waiting
for the
            door to
                        swing open
                                      and tell
                                                   him
                             -               -
                she’s going to be all right
              it was close there for a while
                        but she’s strong
                      she pulled through
                                      -
                              in the end
-                                     -
the pressure
of the years
of the rings
(which promise to
grow tighter
as time leaves us)
is heated
squeezed
left sitting in
flesh
turned to char
ash and smoke gently
cradling a tiny newborn
diamond
-
perfect           (silence)
-
broken
down the middle-
                      aged
                             flawed
-                                -
You should be perfect by now
You should have a face by now
-
speak           look Yourself in the eye
-
see Your own          Face
stop looking                down
when You walk down the sidewalk
-
don’t be afraid
-
to live
  as a tree
    in the park
-          -
They say don’t talk             to strangers
and You’re a strange one            indeed
how can You see the glamour
where Others            cannot
see that laughing quietly to themselves
can (You) set the expressions on their faces
to joy
     to pain
           to fear
                to apathy
                     to peace?
                              -
              yeah, she likes him
                and she likes him
                        to know
               that she likes him
                              -
                      in the end
-                             -
she wants to know
why our countries
are bordered
-
to keep Them      out
and Us       in
-                                   -
           this is Mine                  and that is Yours
-                                   -
You see
what You want to see (without)
-
(knowing what You want)
the sticker
       on the bumper
              of the car
                     rolling past reads:
                           “jesus is coming,
                                  hide the ****”
-                                          -
in its green lettering
and its largely silent voice
-
if You listen             carefully
You can almost hear Them
-                  -
              giggling
                ­   -                       -
              please do not think about green elephants
-                                          -
(a student just snuck in
and sat down as
the professor was writing
on the board)
-                                       -
             please do not feed the green elephants
-                                       -
I
Myself
have a strong suspicion
that Your mind is
as You read this
(hidden in a carefully cupped notebook)
spilling
black ink particles into
existence
on the very next          page
-                              -
             ­       You write that
You imagine everything is beautiful
                    except for death
                                 -
                   it is an ugly thing
                                    -
               yet still the chisel gouges
                  -               -
  “i whistle a catcall
at my blushing bride”
      llac ot eltsihw i”
  “edis ym ot god ym
                  -        -
        through the crumbling protests
         of the reluctant stone
                               -    -
                     ­               each new line
                                    tampers with space
                                    holds suspect time
                                    postpones the end
                                    and evades death
-                                  -
You breathe
               You write
You sing
                You live
                       -
You casually craft causality
         -             -
         yet craft on
         surely You are not yet done
         You may never be
         at this rate but
         but
         STOP
-        -
the World reblurs then blows away
listen closely here I say
all things must come to end one day
-                                       -
You
Yourself

have tasted the                     hunger
                        of Greed
seen the                                 wealth
                       of Hatred
heard the                               stories
          ­             of Genocide
felt the                                    loss
                     ­  of War
and smelled the                    decay
                       of Truth
-                      -
                      this        ­     is Mine
                                 what’s Mine, is Yours...
This poem was originally inspired by the Russell's Teapot analogy.
 Feb 2013 Erica Baker
Johnnie Rae
A flower does not simply die.
it is killed, by the very same thing that created it.
Soil. Though now, much less nutrient.

Its honestly quite ironic,
how the things that create you,
are also capable of destroying you,
like nothing.

I mention irony,
in terms of my mother,
whom is now using her bony fingers,
as knitting needles,
to bind my eyelashes together,
as if to blind me from the obvious.

She wasn't meant to be a mother.

No, definitely not a mother.
maybe a toddler,
whom spends her days nursing a bottle,
and then occasionally falling,
flat on her face,
whether its up the street,
or down the stairs,
her face has to leave blood stains somewhere.

She was meant to be alone.

Alone, so she couldn't,
**** the life out of anything that came near,
like she decided she would do to any ***** bottle,
that crossed her path,
dumping me on a road to destruction as she went,
and never came back to save me from myself.

Honestly, I don't know what she could've been.

I just know she gave up everything,
for a bottle and a good time.
shes the flower that sprouted early,
and died in the cold.
 Feb 2013 Erica Baker
Zac Carlson
I rise from smooth bright rays on the good days
On the lesser days I have to know
The sun still shines bright behind dark clouds

Rays burn ******* my wet skin
The warmth is all I have when wearing so thin

Today I am washing away
Memories in my mind
That couldn't always find the way

Now the radio reads afternoon
But I can’t tune
It's fuzz
If I can’t find it, who does?

I close my eyes and hand over my day to my bed
Dreams a sweet gift for my troubled head

Morning comes
It’s a new fight
Confident the sun’s going to shine bright

— The End —