I'm seven days single
Six days sick
Five days dying
Four days childish
Three days gone
Two days confused
One day strong

The Mountain keeps all secrets. Crusted lichen on timeworn boulders. High altitude longing for alpine daisies. Carefree blossoms, long ago plucked, gone to seed, restless in the fertile ground.  Wildflowers bloom shortly sweet, fleeting paintbrush to layered canvas. Fairy slippers lost on crumbling doorsteps. Glacier lilies pressed between avalanched pages.  Forget-me-nots in forgotten blue hollows. The common harebell feels anything but common when seen through a lover's eyes. Forest tiger, your bulbs taste bitter. Purple lupines sage with fuzzy-leafed logic.  Fireweed, *****, unadorned, eternally reaching. Lousewort, spreading phlox, leave this scarlet alone.  Listen to Indian Henry, it's bad luck to trample what is sacred. The devil dreams behind steep and sheltered walls. Keep to the Wonderland, bypass this Trail of Shadows.  Seek ancient hunting grounds, steadfast shelter in the wooded clearing.  There is no pearly everlasting along these old trails.  Paradise lost may never be regained.

"So what happens after this?"
He asked the most profound question
to the most decisive girl
living in this world, in his world.

"I don't know.. What do you think?"
And she gave him the most accurate answer
she could ever think of -- a question.

"Neither do I."
And he answered her satisfyingly enough.

I crave your mouth, your voice, your hair.
Silent and starving, I prowl through the streets.
Bread does not nourish me, dawn disrupts me, all day
I hunt for the liquid measure of your steps.

I hunger for your sleek laugh,
your hands the color of a savage harvest,
hunger for the pale stones of your fingernails,
I want to eat your skin like a whole almond.

I want to eat the sunbeam flaring in your lovely body,
the sovereign nose of your arrogant face,
I want to eat the fleeting shade of your lashes,

and I pace around hungry, sniffing the twilight,
hunting for you, for your hot heart,
like a puma in the barrens of Quitratue.

A hopeful romantic whistles
His two note call
Outside my window,
Down toward the open pond
Flaunting winter-killed carp.

A raucous crow caws
Derision in black and naked trees
Though in the stillness
And the damp of spring,
His mindless clamor
Doesn't mean a thing.

The chickadee knows only life,
Anticipates the nest to come,
Sings a two-toned song
And beckons to his mate,
For which, libidinous, he
The air with amor fills.

By the time you catch
up with me
I will be just spinning
out of your orbit
as joyous as a comet
fire on my tail
I am whirling
into my own cosmic vortex
approaching other stations
New galaxies
await me
with open arms
Even if all are not
immediately friendly
I have laser detectors
with bits of solar and lunar
wisdom
information I have tenderly gathered
while on my stay
in this sphere
Now celestial pulses
surround my aura
create a whirling halo
of all that is divine
My heart flies
on a this heavenly journey
upwards to the stars
You cannot stop me
from being the woman
I have become
The Woman I will be
who I am destined
to rise into
Now this space traveler
is finding her new orbit
No barriers for me
for I am floating, ever surely
drifting in my own private
navigation
closely directed
yet free