/\

Missa

"Here's to pretty girls with filthy thighs!"
So the time-honored toast goes; another festering monument
to the God of Ignorance upon his writhing throne.

I smile and drink and try to lie
attempt to pretend that I can simply laugh instead of cry,
but behind that smile there's no misunderstanding
of the results that mind-set implies.

And then there are eyes shouting blue nuances from a corner,
deep wells of liquid Band-Aid summoning me
to worship yet again at the altar of Hedone.

The usual small talk, no realization as yet
of who it really is speaking about flowers
and reaching casually for my ******, stricken hand.

She has no name, but she has a face
like carven ivory, she has no past but a tiny diary
which peaks out of her leather purse like a toddler.

She is in my closet of a room now, no pretenses
and all passion, arms around me as if there really
is no tomorrow, and I am all she has left to love.

Out of nowhere, holding my face in both hands and leaning close,
staring me down she whispers "Follow the music."

Symbolum

I found him in a bar I'd never been to,
and I wasn't looking for him, or anybody else that night.

Something about the way he grimaced
when his friend shouted a bunch of crap,
endeared me to him then and there I think.

I've met and slept with so many that I
can tell about things, I can read people too easily,
and he was haunted, like me.

I don't think he knew for sure exactly what I was,
but I have no doubt he guessed,
as he easily stated no other women were
as bold as I am.

I don't know how to tell you what's in my heart.

I don't know how to explain,
that I put my faith in you.

I don't know how to say,
that I don't want to be a hero
or a villain.

I don't have the right words,
for this feeling that I haven't felt
till I met you.

I don't understand what's happening,
this twirling around
and revisioning.

I don't have much to offer,
except my messed up heart
and the history that comes with it.

I do have a hope though,
a hope and a belief
in you.

I am cold and aloof
crawling through empty castles
with my solid eyes and ethereal body

A body you still hunger for

Or is it my soul you send your tendrils after
crooning songs of happiness and children
probing crevices made known to you in my weakness

Ah, and when that fails to move
my heart encased in the shards of empty loves
you send a hand searching for mine

I am not those witless dogs you take to bed
to prove your own power over the gender
that you blame for what you are

And whine all you want about how we're perfect
that we deserve each other
that I can use you as I like

I shall not be moved

You're happy to **** my ****
but you daren't listen to what I speak
Use me as you have been used
and deny it even to yourself

Don't forget that I was birthed in this
a child of the lies we tell ourselves
Son of passions whose sources
shuffle like unwanted abortions into the corner

You will never again win my hopes
while wishing for me to help you ****** your brother
You will never turn again your own hate
into your conception of what my love is

I was told about Hemingway and writing one true thing. Here's today's.

Change is inevitable. Forgive me for not doing it fast enough.

I am consciously willing into existence the day,
when it won't be so hard for us to love each other.

How many?
How many dreams have died?
How many hopes have withered?
How many loves have faded?

How many futures have been shortened?
How many voices have been silenced?
How many friends have been lost?

How many shall have left us wanting?
How many shall have left us needing?
How many shall have left us empty?

Too many.

Farewell my Love
you have gone to a place where my soul can't follow;
perhaps there peace may wrap you in her arms
and fill you with a warmth
that I never could.

These reflections of a future that will never be
a mirror into the great perhaps,
such as what you always wanted to find in the end.

I would have followed if you had let me,
would have poured myself into all the fissures in your
beautiful beating heart;
would have burned my own as an offering to you.

I see that I have not the power to take a heart
and by the power of my love
make it whole.

I thank you all the same for allowing me to see
that all we have are memories and choices.
It is the choices that give shape to our souls,
that make meaning of memories.

Such courage for you to have to make a choice
to spare me a greater pain
and for you to suffer alone.

I stand now weeping and empty
alone in the house of roses
and where now I go that your spirit is gone
only the wind knows.

Early Autumn

Broken brooch pins, fallen cotton

Charcoal thumbprints on sunburnt shoulders

Your locket forgotten in the grass

I loved you then

With wheat chaff and wind blown hair

Ancient memories

I accumulate ghosts the way other men collect trophies

When first we go to bed together
careful I will have to be
in my passion
not to tear your dress
for I sew terribly.

Haunted I am
by images of you
wondering how you might
feel against me
as I labour on
through the night.

A question I have
that stands wonderfully
naked to me
how many ways
shall we find
to love each other?