The flies have finally flown away
from the desiccated pieces of s*
lying around the courthouse

If I were in Saudi Arabia
I would be beheaded
******, the butterfly started

Dropping off on the lavender
puppies need to work on their camouflage
getting off

tomato plants,
monstrous in their own dwarfish way
march toward me at the bedroom window

Now I enter the guest room
the scene has changed dramatically
it's dark

there's a moaning almost
but actually a droning
the air purifier in the corner

great sleeping
White Noise
Jesus I could sleep for Generations

Now I'm pacing
I'm pacing up and down the hallway
back and forth

between the bedroom and the living room
and now here I am
finally in the solitary of my office

I look at my Wi-Fi printer
working great by the way
I admire its beauty

hardly any dust on it or static
I wipe the dust off
very beautiful

I look at the flickering lights
cable modem coming into the house
that is not the only religion

(Zion Saga, Part 1)

I, like the bush,
I burn from inside out
But do not be afraid
My spirit is an ardent flame
Listen to my essence shout

Come now, up to my plateau
Up here, where the wild ones go
You'll yearn to let your inhibitions go
And learn to let your feelings show

Look into my woody thicket
Stare into its sinewy essence
Here and now, my prickly presence
Exists only for you

I, like the bush,
Mesmerize, with smokeless flame
Analyze, saying, "YOU are to blame!"
Hypnotize, your awestruck eyes
Criticize, recreate, shed your shame
I'll send you, with a push

Red-gold, hot licks glowing
To heaven, ember angels soaring
Your soul's strength restoring
The Spirit in you, you adoring

You now, are burning alive
But you are not afraid
For a force of you I have made
You are standing on sacred ground

~ For Molly ~

There cannot ever be, for me
an emotional peak so high
and beyond all other experience
so much my own, entirely.
A speechless secret, my unsaid words
preserving its wonderful wholeness
the not-telling, keeping it so precious
too precious for me, I fear, to shatter
the silence of its perfection.

The blood bond between us
holds no hidden barriers
in this amniotic floating universe
shock-absorbing all the outer world
nutrient rich, nourishing your growth.
My voice vibrating, rippling
in your sonic breathless bubble.
My body, in all its actions
and motions, marking your time
rolling and turning your shaping.

Your rhythm pressing my organs
punching and kicking, demanding space
Immersed in my body’s womb-core
snuggling safe and deeply nestled
in our sheer and utter intimacy.
I give you all I’ll ever have
my blood, my breath, my everything
beyond all my knowing and imagining
this is a devotion most terrible and sublime.


© M.L.Emmett 2016

Gendering Woman *******

Beautiful, anatomical part //  Ugly, anatomical part
Natural, pleasurable             //   Burdensome, loathsome
Female Symbolic                //    Femme Symbolic
MALIGNANT                             HEALTHY

fearful, tearful, wretched     //  joyful, hopeful, euphoric,
bereft, wept, grieving          //  embryonic, rapt, relieving
leaving, loss                         //  believing, gain
m a y b e - d e a t h                                            r e - b i r t h
                                                   BI-LATERAL
                                             MASTECTOMIES
Operating Theatre

SURGEON                                         ANAESTHETIST
cleaning/ cutting/ knife/ scalpel   //   doping/ unconscious/ airway
blood / tissue                                 //   hypotension
loss/ damage                                 //   shock
drains                                             //   sinus rhythm
stitches                                           //   pain deadening
tight binding                                 //   reversal drugs
                                    
POST-OPERATIVE
a l i v e                                                a w a k e

draining, bound & stitched               draining, bound & stitched
                                            DRAINED
    ­                                   ~ UNBOUND
                                       -- UNSTITCHED –

Empty chest                                                    Flat Chest
FREEDOM from Disease                               FREEDOM from Dis-ease


© M.L.Emmett

The cram of stars in the navy-night
blue-light of summer solstice.

The majestic zodiac sprawled
across the ever-stretching sky.

Ancient definitions of myth
star-stories of pre-determined fate

mapped in the moment and place
of our birthing; such fantasies

such imaginings of stellar systems
and mankind’s significance.

Heavens and humours; rules and rights
from Gods to kings and subjects

All settled in an ordered Universe
until, curiosity, ingenuity and invention

observation and record, rigor and Science
with its license to question freedom.


© M.L.Emmett

A kaleidoscope
Of your hair, lips, eyes
Is all I see
Laying in the cool grass
Enveloped in a curtain of night

Twinkling stars that
form constellations in my heart
and resonate in my chest,
Are honey drops
of your laughter

Gravity loosens its hold,
I lose my breath and
the world tilts
When the scent of your skin
Seeps through my pores

Under my fingertips
You,
Ignite the sun's never ending ember
that flows through me,
Melting the moon

And the taste of you darling,
melting in my mouth
oh so sweet,
leaving a trace

of the milkyway

Walking in the cold rain
Alone and
Going nowhere
Just hiding tears in raindrops

Always dreaming of being lost
Lost and then
The endless fall
Then the gasping awakening

But always the rain will end
And sunrise
Put an end
To the cruelty of night

And life will begin in warmth
And hope
Blossoms
Into the sweetest softest petals

                                           By Phil Roberts