I tied together
a few slender reeds, cut
notches to breathe across and made
such music you stood
shock still and then

followed as I wandered growing
moment by moment
slant-eyes and shaggy, my feet
slamming over the rocks, growing
hard as horn, and there

you were behind me, drowning
in the music, letting
the silver clasps out of your hair,
hurrying, taking off
your clothes.

I can't remember
where this happened but I think
it was late summer when everything
is full of fire and rounding to fruition
and whatever doesn't,
or resists,
must lie like a field of dark water under
the pulling moon,
tossing and tossing.

In the brutal elegance of cities
I have walked down
the halls of hotels

and heard this music behind
shut doors.

Do you think the heart
is accountable? Do you think the body
any more than a branch
of the honey locust tree,

hunting water,
hunching toward the sun,
shivering, when it feels
that good, into
white blossoms?

Or do you think there is a kind
of music, a certain strand
that lights up the otherwise
blunt wilderness of the body -
a furious
and unaccountable selectivity?

Ah well, anyway, whether or not
it was late summer, or even
in our part of the world, it is all
only a dream, I did not
turn into the lithe goat god. Nor did you come running
like that.

Did you?

He touches
My hair
All the time,
Plays with the
Edges and
Fragments,
And sometimes reminds me that
"I can braid,
You know."
Sometimes he does.

Sometimes he mimics me
In History class
From across the room,
And he laughs at all my jokes,
Even when they aren't funny,
Just
Stupid.

And occasionally,
When I'm sitting in my little niche
Between his desk
And Ellie's,
Right on the cold tile,
He'll attach his forehead to mine
And just look at me.
Sometimes he'll whisper,
"Nose,"
And point to it,
And I just giggle
And break the stare.

I don't even think he feels it,
The wishing to always be near him,
To have his fingers in my hair
All the time,
And for his laugh to be
My soundtrack.

I don't think
That when he stares into my eyes
He wants to kiss me
As bad
As I want
To kiss
Him.

It's time, to say goodbye,
It's time to prepare my will.
It's time to buy my plot.
It's time to move on.
Nothing here will care or will notice.
I quietly leave, with no regret.

sitting in the dark long enough, your eyes adjust u

ntil shadows and outlines, the edges of things, be

come tangible. hard as metal, cold as ice. a body f

rozen in a lake. this is the edge of things. a photo

graph in gray. a sigh. a pen drawing circles until t

he page rips. ink bleeding through everything. an

abyss. abysmal. looking at a reflection, seeing thro

ugh it instead. hollow still has a shell at least. this

is the edge of things, where it stops. it stops…….

The crumbs of my bones
Get scattered on the waves
And they come washing home
On the cold back of gray foam
   Surfing the tide

You stood on the beach and waited
Waited and waited
And the crest of that wave
Folded and crashed like a grave
    Taking one last breath

Before it struck the cliff face at your feet
Like my throat opening
To let out your name
This poetry is the same
   Smashed to pieces by the wind

As it has always been the same
The same as it has always been
While you hope for salt air
While you tie your ribbons to driftwood
   While you watch shells break against the shore

I know, I’m still disappointing you
I may not be able to conquer
I might be lost at sea forever
   But I will be throwing open my sails

That I could yet float into your arms again
I’ll be pouring my apology until you say when

And if I become the captain I promised to be
I will leave all the sadness at the bottom of the sea
Until there is nothing left
   And there is nothing coming back but me

I once knew a little man
Who kept at a job he did not understand
And day after day
He’d go off to work and he’d say:
Today I’ll learn who I am

But Monday came
And then it went
And Tuesday came
And it too was spent
Like Wednesday and Thursday
And then at last Friday
While he sat in a confused lament

And week after week
His office chair squeaked
Until finally he made up his mind
He’d quit, he decided, and just in time
For that very night he died in his sleep

(C) Marty Schoenleber III 2013

My spine makes a flimsy quill
When I first penned this poem
                                     crown
It meant          and               of me
             sole
Now I just hope it sounds naked
While I recite it with clothes on
As if I could turn a dial to show
The part of my heart it lands on
Here feigning an emotion so well
While in real life, I fight like hell
To hide it

I don’t care if you did arrive
In a gray palace of clouds
Or if your bartender
Is lightning and your house band
Only accepts thunder claps
As applause
I’m not one of those
Cliché poets
Chanting your name
To play one more song
Believe me, I’ll be happy
When you’re gone

There are not enough
   poems about manatees
If you are interested in human
   rights being kicked like a dog
   and justice being dragged
   through mud, you can find it
If you are interested in love
   that aches with a “burning
   heart” or a “bleeding soul”
   you can find it
If you are interested in death
   that holds out its hand
   to you like relief, or takes
   one too early, you can find it
But where, I ask, do you find
   a badger in a turtleneck?
Or a cup of coffee that doesn’t
   sound so self important?    
If you’re interested in the
   ocean or the sea or maybe
   a single “crushing wave
   of emotion,” you can find it
If you’re interested in God
  dying to save you, or God
  abandoning you to the darkness
  you can find it
If you’re interested in athletics—
   especially running towards
   dreams and horizons—and
   losing and winning, you can find it
But where, I ask, do you find
   a good left-handed centipede?
Or a wonderful, ice cold beer that
   doesn’t turn into alcoholism?
If you want to find a poem about
   how the “gray rain spills from
   the clouds like the pain”
   you can find it
If you don’t want to find a poem
   about rain you’ll still find it
   (cause those rain poems
   are everywhere)
If you’re looking for a poem
   about regret and forgiveness
   and cruel mercy making false    
   promises, you can find it
But where, I ask, do you find
   a barbarian ballerina?
Or a cigarette whose smoke doesn’t
   outline the shadows of a lost soul?  
Show me these things, show me
   a fat manatee, and I will finally
   take a deep breath and smile