November.

It lives in the stillness of the dried,
fallen leaf 

in the vapor and legs 
of melancholic trees

the red hues of sunsets 

in the thin veil of bareness.

My hands bleed here

a hum of darker red

cold is the body of 
remembrance.

You – lovely, with no shape

hair of thorns

a ruby in the throat – 

crawl and dig inside

long after the dust 

has turned the walls

a heavy shade of black.

Darkness
the familiar ghost, 

the curious figure,
with its pallid face
and naked wisdom
carries me in sleep.

The stains that we keep
change the skins
to flowers devoid of color
crippled and veinless
turning our bodies stiff like trunks,

cornered, 
in the back of our throats.

These wounds are
rugged diamonds.

I find comfort
in the mysterious, 

in unspoken words.

My skin
grows in wilderness
hiding in things that yearn
to be touched.

In quiet and empty nights I am like small breaths sitting still in the air. Something pulls and I sink into this bed. Loosening fibers. This feeling aches, it lingers, the seeds sprout. I am no longer I -- the form detaches. Thoughts visit momentarily and take flight. Take me hostage, I will not fight. Dreams are not so bitter and so I dream of an unknown world where we can keep our timid hearts in some sample of skin, maybe when we pass. And then like most things that grow vertically, we will fall to our knees. A tree will take our place and speak of us now and again. Oh how I wish it could be now!

Once again --
the formidable feeling:


immersing myself in waves

Or dispersing slowly 
–
like a trail of stiff limbs

among the woods.

I see myself as rain

awakened
in the soil.

A rebirth,

a mind alive,

a mad, feverish heart.

Words come to me at twilight: I have bouts of thoughts where I imagine letting others in my cold, little room: to view the black paint splattered on the walls, the cracks on the floor, the trails that lead to raw, unfinished dreams. Other days - and more frequently - I’m like a board made of great, exemplary wood. I resist the outside. I do not know what I want, only what I need. And I need silence, forests of solitude, and souls that have substance and depth. Rare things. And to watch the birds that know of nests, at every sunset, so that maybe some remainder of feathers can find their way back to me.

My curse is

I cannot hide my eyes
from the fire in your flesh.
I wander into dreams
where shadows are your body
wind, your silhouette
my breath, your fractures.
This house tastes of old bouquets
burnt letters, tired words (gnawing),

an endless ocean,

repeating
I, too, have cracks -- 
cold and deep.

This is how most of us live
pale and translucent
secrets kept in graves
wolves tending at old wounds
ghosts among the ashes.

Today’s morning:

I awoke to find that the trees
behind my house
with their shades of auburn and pale orange,
in some hazy fog, 

had become one glorious mountain.

The pines bursted into arms 
as they slept.

I sense, in moments like these
I am made from the Earth -- 
entrails of dirt,
uprooted, centered,

a mirror of soft, strong, delicate things.