She wants a spark that isn’t there,
that never was, but always burned.
Routine remains in comfort where
love should reside. Two hearts once frost
are made warm when one, and only
joined together when separate.
This truth is implanted to a
girl who is as broken as the lives
she’s left behind. Intentions are
fueled by the hope of a road cleared
ahead of the fallible thick-
et their feet fall on now. Toes are
scarred from entangled roots scattered
the width of the path. To stray is
to stay on course, she says to him.
The fill of a thrill from a chase
already deemed triumphant ball-
oons his wings. He soars in the sky
to rival the eagle. Though ev-
en she cannot ignore the threat
of temptation. Indirect in-
iquities thrive in the life of
the one who began this feat by
fault of suppressed ignorance now
made alive. Infidelity
envelopes their lackluster rel-
ation. They wonder if there ev-
er was anything there at all. A
friendly companionship confused
as love? What is love but a con-
nection between friends. His protests
fall on deaf ears. She has felt the
flames, and they are warm. Their paths are
clear, but not as predicted. In-
to the sunset they walk, between
them another heart, more cold than
the one they shared.

Dad liked the bottle so much he never let go. I didn’t enjoy the taste, some kind of stale licorice, bitter, thick, and smelled of death. That’s how he died. Kidney failure, liver damage, yes, but choking on his ***** is what did him in. Since Mom has been gone longer than I can remember, he was alone that night, and I don’t want to take responsibility, since I was out with friends, but I can’t help myself. Not that I feel bad about it, I’m glad. And I think I feel more funny about that than not being there to see it finally happen. You can consider me an orphan, now, I guess. Technically, I have no parents, and that’s what an orphan is, right? Excuse me if I sound rash, but I’m supposed to feel something, aren’t I? I never loved-loved my father. But, with the help of my mother, he gave me life, after all. He always said, when he wasn't drunk, that I had her eyes. Her eyes, I’ve been told, were beautiful. You can look into them and forget your birthday. These eyes of mine have gotten me in trouble, just like Mom. It’s her fault, that’s what I say. If she hadn’t left that night, she would still be around, and Dad wouldn’t have had to find love at the bottom of a bottle. I hate her. I hate her for leaving. I hate her for making me me. I’m alone now, and it’s all thanks to her. This is my strongest feeling, when I should be mourning my poor father, I’m hating my wicked mother, who left our home. Nothing will bring them back, neither of them. Even if she’s still alive today, she is as dead as Dad. They were weak and so am I. Does that mean I hate myself? That smell, it’s not smelling so bad now.

He rises from his grave underneath the looming arm of the willow tree.
His armor, once waxed to a blinding lustre, now rough with rust and dents, clinks and breaks the silence of the narrow land between the sea.
The ground is soft and disturbed, from where man came he has also returned, only to have risen again.
The one he loves is found elsewhere; he seeks while his heart, as withered as his chain-mail, aches.
In love we die to ourselves, like sleep before waking.
There sings a dream within a haze amidst the lucid glow of images, recalling a time where what was once real has long since passed.
Since that passing, decay has taken hold of his life, like wisteria to a pocket of  lattice.
The ground was cold, as chilling as his broken heart, and what reason there is for his timely waking is known only to the God who watches above.
The sun is warm and colors the sky in burning orange, just before it sets behind a cloud.
In his mind he sees his love, her shape, her touch, her smile, and opens his eyes to the willow’s trunk.
There in the bark, he sees his love, her shape, her touch, her smile, and with his worm eaten hand, unsheathes his sword, brittle yet as sharp as in the day of its forging.
He says a prayer in an ancient tongue,  and whips the air with his sword and stabs the heart of the willow.
Like an earthquake’s rumble the tree splits in two.
In the opening holds a skeleton wrapped in yellow lace.
He has found his love, yet weeps for she is not the same.
She is not the same.
She will never be who she once was.
She has returned to the earth, where all men go to die.

Aujour'hui maman est morte,
Or yesterday,
Maybe,
When the broken tree fell on her.

I will follow fear for us
With a handful
Of dust;
Dusk to dawn in a wordless echo.

We can watch the string show
With our eyes closed.
Tonight
A dark symphony plays for one.

The cruise line veeres off-course
to a land of broken
lobes.

I swim in hairy juice,
peppered with blue sprinkles,
alone.

Later, I forgot to
buy eggs. Write a list next
time.

A trumpet player burps,
we laugh and blow our tears.
There is no moon tonight.
There is no moon tonight.

If there ever was a shadow--
Under this rock you should know,
A plain lilac root
Sips the sun--
Then his is darker when he grows.

Fall back on a green *****,
Where the ground rests with hope,
And the amber orb
Licks the blades.
He has no memory of home.

Pick the purple bloom,
But careful the palm crafted tomb.
A folded cloth from the
Crevice aside his *****.
Release the stem.

There is no shadow
Below the moon.
There is no shadow
Below the moon.
Lilac slumber.

So this is the ocean,
Poison from here to the horizon.
I ask the crab
"Is most of the world salt?"

He burrows in the sand
And I grab with my hand
His one of many legs.
I say to him:

"Is it that you panic
In the sun,
Or find pleasure
In the dark."

The pinching sting hurts
Though it could be worse;
I could be swimming in the ocean,
With all of the salt.

There was time in a way
to be had by me,
For the hands
fell far back
In the wake
of bright fires,
And a face we found
frozen underneath the tree.

Though sands blew up-wind,
round about they agreed
To create broken castles
In an age of
reflection;
Just as well
this will pass in
the mouth of the sea.

Ever there were an escape
from the mouth of the sea
Winged Angels would swallow
the souls of
the many,
And many
and many will be in
darkness before they see.

Now the dust that
will settle on bodies
around me,
Like the dirt
encasing the dead of
my fathers, Will rise again
by a name with the
bitter sting of jealousy

From the mouth of the sea

My mother left on Sunday.
A ghostly presence walks the
Wooden stairs and flicks the finger-smudged
Spindles lining the path
To my parent's bedroom.

Clocks chime the hour, their bell-
Melodies insist mnemonic
Memories
Of her infinite delight.
She loves clocks. She'd often wake
Before us and sit in her
Favorite chair to listen to
The effect of their orchestrated
Sounds.

They have a white noise quality
More musical than whirred fans
And insistant television.
I've met this sound-off
With distaste.
Since her absence my distaste has transfigured
To homesickness.

The heart throbs in shadows.
I'm a clock whose white face has aged yellow,
Without hands to signal the hour,
With a song on a dented bell.

It's either a menace or a nuisance.
You don't know it's inside the walls until
You hear it. Miles of wire, humming
With current. Power lines, transformers,
Radio waves, microwaves, radar. Keep
A vigil or those transmissions unravel
Inside your ears. Every phone call, talk show,
And radio jingle all at the same
Time that you can't turn off. This is how God
Must feel, but instead of omniscient you
Are insane. Love will drive you mad, but the
Silence of heartache is worse than
Static from a television, it's loss.

A smile forever
On this life too soon severed,
Her face blushed
with pockets of
glow.
To the darkness he fled,
Hands stained with red,
and stopped in his tracks by a
crow.

“Begone,” said the crow,
And he started to show
a wide wingspan
directing toward
North.
“A life has been spared
yet you still dare
to test the fates as your
time travels short.”

“Move from my way,” said the lover,
“I’m no stranger to once again smother.”
The crow with
his beak
pecked away at
his feet
And won a prize of a toe from the lover.

“Arise,” said the crow
to his new peeked foe,
“we have not even start-
ed yet.”
Though the journey was long
the crow sang a sweet song
just before a swift
stab at
the lover’s neck.

Denture correlation
Cause a malaise of arbitration
And fuel the fires of disagreement.