The figure in a white
see-through robe
walking seductively across
the bedroom
is a sweet
Pacific breeze
upon my *****

Dream of a warm embrace
during a storm that sweeps across a great ocean
and the arms holding you
make you feel safe
and safe is love
and love is life
that no cyclone
can stop

kung fu
feng shui
wing nut
shang hai
chow mein
chop suey

fu manchu to you, too

None of us write poetry
for anyone else to read
we write it to purge the pain
personal and private
others could like it
but that doesn't matter
then again,
neither does it matter
if we write the poem at all

Fk Charles Bukowski
harder than he fked himself.

My father was not a sailor
My mother was not a saint
Each one was just a failure
But what they were I ain't

Speckled, soiled and hurt
Their dying was long and hard
Each a droning but dull alert
Which still keeps me on guard

I am not a sailor
I don't believe in any saint
I am not a tailor
I'm a walking, talking complaint

If you see me on the street, shake your head
If you get no response, I'm already dead

Belladonna
gotta wan 'er
'donna wan 'er
smooth iguana
majiuana
lips nirvana
call me bwana
Belladonna
god i wan 'er
wanna 'donna

It is summer
when you enter a room
and flowers blossom
wherever you sit

Such a pretty face
in a world of grimaced cheeks
with lips that speak
the language of kisses

Your broken English
is a prayer if you
whisper it in my ear
and say you want me
anyway
all ways
in ways no words can describe

How lonely is the sea of darkness
that bleeds black over
endless space

If I were the sky
I would keep my eyes opened
when the clouds disappear with the sun

Then over this planet
covered in shadows
I would watch for the dawn

the jewel of night

the dazzling bright

the source of promise

the reflection of hope

that one star, the only star

you

There's never the one that got away
Because no one truly gets away
with anything

It's deep
it goes deep
and sometimes
it feels it won't stop
deepening

So where does it end?

She’s a touch away, generations behind
An enigma wrapped in mascara,
Cleopatra in mittens, Desdemona defined
With the sweet scent of Scarlett O’Hara

She strums some strings in tender tune
With a melody’s voice so gently
I crave to believe as I howl at the moon
When she sang of her love she meant me

My cartoon brain scribbles scenes in panels
Bubbled words floating over my head
While asleep she poses, dreaming in flannels
On a phantasmagorical bed

Longing to adore being desperately charmed
My impossible dream is eternally armed.

It's sad
the empty holes
forming in a heart
cannot be filled
with anything else
but what was there
before they were
empty

Yellow striped apron
drapes her flesh
as the meat sizzles in the pan
My senses huddle
the view from behind
more appetizing a meal

Yellow striped apron
is a nightgown
made in Spain
in the heat of the afternoon
making siesta impossible
if she is the cook

Oh Jesus I drool
I thirst I crave
I want I yearn
for
the ingredients behind
Yellow striped apron

There is never a trigger
in these verses

I load the words
but none

have the power
to explode in you

The noise we make
when we move inside of
one another
can wake us, make us
want to want

it to be music
we play together

Hearts that wrestle
thump
And strangle
so if you are the heart
that beats
I am the heart
that is beaten

The light from yonder window breaking
is not the sun shone through
The dawn of what lay waste of me
reflects into the blue
My bones are light an hollow now
no matter the time of day
So what, so there, so left to crack
so near, so far away

you are the brew
        perking
        steaming
        
morning mix cuppa java
dawn that pours on you like lava

The scent stays with me
sometimes
when I can almost feel
and taste
and touch you

My senses conspire
into thrilling sweat
and blood-rushing movements
that can almost feel
and taste
and touch you

Souls are blind,
shapeless dreams
we invent to accept the darkness

But we find out they can dance
when put to music
which is a shapeless dream
we invent to accept the darkness

then there is harmony

I need another hand
I will take your hand
Leaving you one to wander
while three work to fill the well

with souls

A secret is worth
a thousand words
A picture says
nothing

The planets align
the astrological sign
the endless time
between our paths
over decades past.
If these lives escape us now
there may be too much forever
to endure
and the heavenly bodies
may never meet again
How in the world do you
come to me from a universe
so wide?
And when …

Today the sky was wide
and the clouds thick
like a blue painting
in 3-D
Once I drove a thousand
miles to get somewhere
that I thought I belonged
and the same sky
hovered
West of the great river
and through the dusty plains
where pioneers
died
I traveled for love
I drove on to get
somewhere
but I got nowhere
Except the sky was wide
and the clouds thick
like a blue painting
in 3-D

I felt the weight of the world
and carried it through a tunnel
with all my might
and there you were,
a bit beaten, a bit frightened
and yet ready to set your senses aflame
so I dropped the world
and embraced you.

Her hair was red
then black
then a bit of both
and then the sun took over
and her face was like
a sculpture of Venus
and then her lips moved
and they kissed the words
who are you
and suddenly I was aware
she saw me

They point at me
to all
parts of me
and present themselves
to ponder
upon
me

My apple and pear trees cast obese shadows over the blades of uneven grass.

Lick this
and take some words from my mouth
to add to your poems
to soak into your mind
so they form ****** actions
in your dreams

Lick this
with long laps
and canine desire
to promise you must
at least once
taste me

Maybe sometimes
two of us
see in each other’s eyes
the chance
that romance works
on a level that
only the two of us know.  
And we are so frightened
this may be true
that we make excuses
and walk into the distant
shadows of lonliness.

Sometimes, late at night
I look at a photo of her
sitting there with her back to me
after a shower
and I can see down her spine
to the point where there is a
hint of her backside
and all I want to do is
run my fingers up and down
and down and up
and down
and up
and down
and feel the smooth rhythm
like a jazz improvisation
dig it
with a tempo
and a beat
that keeps my heart in time
with love.

Look at me with a
teacher’s stare through
glasses and I see you
want to teach me
but I want to teach you,
too, because I have withstood
more pain than I hope you will
never feel …

Your smile is cordial
but I know you crave the
arms of desire
and you want to learn
that fire does not have to
singe the soul
and one kiss could be
more valuable than
a million brigades of
Hannibal’s elephants …

I am polite, I look and listen,
but I want to take these beaten
hands and slide the
glasses off,
I want to see your eyes
remain open as I lean in
and gently kiss you,
whispering,
”Everything will be all right.”

Pope Frances
always dances
on the tops of chairs
like he did
as a kid
down in Buenos Aires.

In the center of the fire
is red
a nucleus of the flame
a lifeform all its own

And the ripe apple
and the toy engine
and the toenail paint
and that part of the pupil where one sees the soul
and the stained-glass window
and the Native American
and the Fender bass
but most of all
the love that cannot be captured, caged or killed.

The wind so strong it crushes bones
Through the ears it leads thoughts astray
None but the brave leave their homes
For fear it will blow them away

This is why my space is challenged
Shelter from the storm I seek
Every muscle works to keep me balanced
An loathes the state that renders me weak

To weather the storm and journey afar
Where you cringe in the arms of your tribe
How I yearn to struggle to get where you are
Yet return to my cave, alone, alive

Banish the thought you can see the light
That shines on a soul too beaten to be bright

From the dust
rises form
splendid and shaped
so pretty
that eyes upon it
tear
and smiles
dance over the night's fog

This is how I see her
in the shadows
as the only light
a bean that shivers through
the curtain of darkness

It's beautiful
it's a soul surrendering
to the moment
with
no
need
to be encouraged
by the dawn

The sight of you
takes the breath from me

Walk away,
don't run
                 keep it

it belongs to you now.

What formal madness need I study
To learn the love you cannot define?
What recipe is mixed so muddy
It’s neither blessed with blood nor wine?

So my remains, ashes of memory
Are the fates cast to the wind
And anything thought meant to be
Proves how thoroughly I have sinned

The echoes of your bitter words
So much louder than ringing in my ears
Bounce through gray skies like crippled birds
That perch and age through all these years

Hide from shelter, shiver from fate
It’s all been for naught and now it’s too late

Don Quixote's

defunct

        who once

        mounted a stale

                                  stallion

and pontificated theimpossibledream

                                                  Christo

he was a ragged hombre

                      and what I have to say is

how do you like your conquistador kid

Mister Muerte

'Your love has given me wings'
is the answer to
'No wonder my happy heart sings'
I know this because
on hot, sticky days
and bone-biting nights
I would croon the tune
over the sink
with my hands lathered
in detergent
and she would smile
because the old Italian song
gave her wings

On your throne,
legs crossed,
feminine fire,
open bar tonight,
look through me,
and show
my eyes
the mistress
of
night’s inadequate
tempting.

On your throne,
queen of queens,
keeper of the king,
crowned with a sigh,
breathy,
slave of youth
with the will of
a wanton gypsy.

On your throne,
I am your subject,
I have nowhere else
I want to serve.

Shoulders smooth
lips glistening
words dismissed easily
as thoughts
shine, shine, shine
diva eyes
the face plays with
expressions like
an orchestra presents
Mozart

You see me rolling
on the floor
Mr Cool Drool
in a state of the union
your puppy
your mobster
your hit man
hitting on you

Place your hand upon my chest
pound your palm
to pick up the pace
and put the pieces
                                 back

In a sea of pain
we float
sharing beads of water
to drink
locking arms to be warm
under a black sky
hopes drifting
into the dawn of
some distant shore

I look at the rain
and the birds flying
with wet wings  

Hold me

I feel the chill through
the door that leads
to the long blades of grass
wet from the rain

Hold me

I inhale a fragrance
of soft fear and
mortality

Hold me

Nightgown,
white top,
a cloud covering
a sky of skin
so smooth
it spreads
delicate
on the frame
of femininity
and makes
me sigh
and glide
into that sky
holding on
for dear life.

When you aren’t in the room with me,
the walls cry