Sometimes I tire
Of the gravity of life
And wish to ride with Gypsies
Dance with tambourine
And raven haired beauty
With sultry smile
And plunging neckline
A peasant dress
And raging fire...
One
      can
           dream.....

r ~ 12Feb14

Ours was less an Arab Spring
and more a half-hearted coup d'état.
There was no immolation,
no burning desire on your part;
no passion in the streets of you.

You stole in at night
through a window I'd left open,
a crack in my need
for something more than mere
existence.  From me there was
no resistance.

I let you lead, and followed blindly;
my voice I raised on your behalf
against all that I had known before.
Your words, your whispers
alone could incite me to storm
against the strongest walls.

Now, as summer comes
and this sectarian affair,
this spring uprising
that we called us has ended,
I sweep the streets of our debris
and wander down
the empty avenues
of you, half-hearted.

r ~ 6/5/14

I like how my lips
fit that hollow
by your collar bone

I could sing an anthem there
or whisper sweet
sweet nothings.

Those things these hands have held
gently -textured care-
tactile curiosities
life's measure

A small, blue bird's egg
broken -sadly-
mocking nature's symmetry

Ice
cold -cold-
water making shape

A stone arrow point
sharp still -old-
black as death

My mother's hand
warm -caring-
now long gone

A small dog
wiggling -happy-
nipping, licking fingers

A woman
smooth -soft-
curving heat

My son
my son, my son -my son-
now grown, love unmeasurable

A coin
gold -only-
worth little

Those things these hands have held
measured -treasured-
memorized
lifelines.

r ~ 8/12/14

18 is a hard age
to be black
and dead

tear-gas in our eyes
burns, baby, burns.

r ~ 8/14/14

White linen,
needle sewn.
Worn denim,
fades too soon.
Horse venom,
evil rune.
Hard water,
silver spoon.
Dead daughter,
red balloon.

r ~ 5/6/14

Some nights
I crack a window
to let out the stink
of darkness

unsheathe my knife
and think of carving
free my eyes

tossing them high
into a pine
so that they can see
all that isn’t going on
around me

instead I let the sharp
hard winter winds
of black starlight in

to fan the flames
of lonesome desire.

Fishing for salmon
Stare that bear square in the eyes
Help you forget your gone friend
Have a hell of a good time
Fishing for salmon

Last night drinking
cherry cured 'shine
from Tennessee
I caught the moon
flinching behind
a tree like a white
flower afraid to be
cut from its dark stalk
whereas in the spring
when I'm sober
it grows outside my
window before daylight
when moths come
and die gently while
I lie here listening
to their silent soft wings
dreaming of bleeding
in my sleep and find
no trace of a wound
aching in the harsh red cut
of another day breaking.

You can’t unring this bell
       of sorrow with your heart
as dark as tonight in El Paso
        Texas by texting more lies
between rounds of golf
         with twenty lives lost
just because you’re El Presidente.

Tonight Hunraqan
roams the night
lifting the shroud
of dark clouds
so the moon can peek
down  on my long dreams
of water, and the mystery
of sleep; I am tranquil
one eye open, thankful
for the respite of brief light
while somewhere a plank
floats east to the Atlantic
carrying a forgotten book
of the K'iche' Maya language
with my name inscribed
just inside, I sigh, oh why
heart of my sky, why?

A heart of stone
Not cold, hard, uncaring
But forged by the heat of the earth
To be strong, unyielding, forever...
Like my love for you

r

For me, it's not courage
or a lack of it
that keeps me hanging
'round. When I boil it
down, it's love in the bottom
of the kettle that keeps me
breathing. I don't think it is
possible to love too much,
but man, I feel like I've been
breathing for a long **** time.

r ~ 16Mar14

When I was younger
I slept in the top bunk
over my older brother

- Pretty soon we’re all going to die -
he was fond of saying
while we listened to Credence
Clearwater Revival on an old turntable
with a penny he taped to the arm
to make it sound like a $100

Pretty soon he got me saying the same
words, like moon, mosquitos and darkness
were in his ear, he’d have dreams of
naked women washing his feet
and sparrows looking out of his eyes

He hollered at old man death
when he was wanting some shuteye

- Nobody on earth is like me -
he’d wake up shouting not meaning
to disturb my sleep

He said - I am the white piano
they threw off the bridge -
- the snake bed and the shade tree -
- I am something, yes-sir-eee -

- I’m something not everybody wants
to believe - he’d say sipping on whiskey
bought from a woman up the holler

He told death to - kiss his white *** -
then holler at me to get out of bed
and go trim the grass around the stone
angels planted up in the high pasture.

Low and wide
against the tide

A partisan -
a part of him
un - fascistionable

Poppa's boat -
- Pablo's mujer

Pilar -
for us her story
well told

- For whom
the bell tolls.

r ~ 10/19/14

Maybe we all need to donate more. HePo now.  Eliot has been running this excellent site mostly out of his own pocket. I try to donate yearly, but could do better. These format changes could be a downgraded server, an April Fools joke a week late, or PUTIN/TRUMP Team doesn't like some of the content we've posted and they have gucifer ******' with us. Could be it's got a bad case of HePo, too. Whatever it is, I hope these changes are just a temporary glitch.

If I close my eyes
maybe you can’t see me
and I won’t have to lie
here, still and silent -
on my side
of the great divide
that’s come between us -
the quiet nights
no longer dreaming
go on and on -
living, breathing
beating hearts, forgotten
seasons lost -
in distant canyons
we once walked
our paths entwined -
companions once
leaving shadows
aligned in the sand -
in the canyons
where we left our hand
prints on a wall -
side by side
you and I.

She dwells in pain
Her Father
His tears do rain
The daughter
Holds the reins
In pain
And tears
And strength
In peace

r
4 Sept 13

She constructs by hand
Seven circles in the sand
A seed of life
Part of the flower
Of her life’s power
In word and art
Oscillating vibrating
Harmonic healing
Sent to me
Sacred geometry
r  
1 Aug 13

she said she fell
for the drunk me -

well, i liked me
that way-better, too

how very sad
- but true

i'd drink again
if i knew i could -
if it would do any good

- to lick her sweat
one drop at a time
all along the jawline

- making her salt mine
one more time.

r ~ 11/15/15

Mud, whiskey, death
and bad debts, the river's
high water, mysterious birds
flying south disappearing
like a youngest daughter,
no good men, bad intentions,
changing seasons, unexplained
pains, all of these are reasons
I've seen good women weeping
after the hardest rains came.

Sky bleeds thin red line__
    Obsidian blade cuts deep
    hinterland of time.

r ~ 8Mar14

To all of you poets
down South and up North
West and to the East
whoever you are
whatever your beliefs
I wish you much joy
happiness and peace
for on this one night
at least think no more
of spite, anger and war
sickness, sorrow or grief
for wherever you are
may kindness be the star
that lights all of our ways.

The night carried you away
like a river
it wasn't a dream
it was a flood
even the buzzards were sad
as I walked along the evening
I wanted you
to come out of the dark
into the dark
I kept my eyes open
for the port of your neck
it was so easy to bruise
with its vessels
blue as the earth
and then the dam broke
like my voice
but not your spell
and when the moon came up
they took you away in a hearse
I double-crossed myself
with the holy water of your eyes.

I like the sound of the rain
washing away the silent day

And the lonely call
of a home-bound train

A mournful morning
kind of pain

....Give me the sound
of a blue bluejay

over the busy noise
that mocks my ways

I want to pack my bag
and fetch my dog

Whistle a tune
while we walk along...

Come on girl
It's starting to rain

I hear the sound
of the lonesome train

and the blue bluejay
calling my name

(Here's where yer sposed to whistle)

Home Depot does not sell azure paint.
No. They do have Morning Sky,
Tropical Lagoon, Morning Breeze,
Ocean Cruise, Cozumel, Empress Teal,
Almost Aqua, and Navy.  But no azure.  
No cyan, either. No plain ol' blue.
I will take my verdant money elsewhere.
Home Depot should be more poet friendly.

r ~ 4/29/14

Pull up a chair
and rest a spell.
In your glance
I can see a tell.
Your heart is not here
when he's in town.
Your home fire
is burning down.

Come sit,
let's talk awhile.
I won't ask you
for a smile.
Here, now,
just take my hand.
Let us watch the sun
sink into the sand.

It is getting cold,
but the night is young.
There's still a fire in me
that has not been sung.
We can watch the moon
creep o'er the hill.
I'll sing for you
and warm the chill.

Pull up a chair,
let us talk awhile.
The night is young,
I can make you smile.
Take my hand
and make me feel.
There is a hearth here
that's burning still

r ~ 6/25/14

The last time we kissed
I broke out in hives
from the honey on her breath
and the sting of her lies.
I swear, I'd die a thousand deaths
if she were the queen of my hive.

An Oklahoma politician
wants to outlaw hoodies
in the hood

It's true, it must be
I read it in Fox News  :)

I'd sooner be in Missouri or Cleveland
or New York City where you don't have to
wear a hoody or raise your hands to get shot


There are other things more pressing
than hoodies in the hood
that don't need ironing

like hoods in suits
and the elephant in the room
that needs shooting.

On a night when nothing better
was likely to happen, a beat throbbed
out just the right line, and a bounce woke
up in the toe of a boot, and everything
in the night sky was sparkling light,
which is how I found myself one time
at the local VFW where they played
the same tattered tunes over and over
until the need to dance drained out
of a lonely sad woman there like suds
from a dripping beer tap, and so
she steered me out onto the back deck
where a hard-boiled moon dangled
from the power lines looking something
like hope warmed over; we untangled
ourselves when the sun finally shined.

that trendy ******(e) addiction
becomes you- and your fiction

goes well with the pale
-skinned thin western booted
blue-eyed shooter
riding sidesaddle
on your scooter

does she kiss like me
and bring you coffee?

i could lay you both down
in the in-betweens
and make heaven-

til hell is heavy as a monday
track day in albuquerque
while she sells your jewelry
in sante fe where it's trendy

-i'll be waiting
on the blue mesa.

r ~  9/19/14

Our good books tell us
Christ walked on the water
but that God was brought
to the New World on galleons,
so I ask you, wise ones, teachers
and preachers of History,
how it came to be that the Son
didn't require a boat like the Father,
and how the hell you managed
afterall to get things so backwards
when the soldiers and priests
kissed the the ground and walked
on God's children around them.

Measure our nights
by the sighs of the moon.
Count the stars
till we run out of room.
Lie here beside me
'neath the comforting sky.
Make me a pillow
of your warming thighs.
Bring my roar to your lips
as my salt you sip.
Twice kissed silken cries
your wakened delight.
Measure our nights
by slumbering sighs.

r ~ 5/2/14

Everything had its place
on the grand prairie-

horse thieving,
land-grabbing,
bad whiskey,
range fires,
dust clouds,
low women,
lower men.

Everything
but the missing
buffalo
and the hungry
Crow.
The fierce eyes
of the hungry
Crow.

r ~ 6/29/14

Her onyx eyes
burn in my mind.
Black alibis
hide hidden heat.
Forbidden nights
in darkened rooms
on darkened streets.

She stills my screams
with silken thighs
in wanton dreams
on twisted sheets.
She leaves me spent
in unknown rooms
on unknown streets.

Her hunger fills.
our emptiness.
Stiletto thrills,
crescendo beat.
Two bodies move.
In hungry rooms.
On hungry streets.

r ~ 5/11/14

Neil Young singing now-
  you are like a hurricane
  there's calm in your eyes

r ~ 7/3/14

I awoke this morning before the dawn.
You were gone.
You forgot to turn the coffee-maker on.
Ai.

r ~ 4/30/14

I dreamed of two men
cold as ice in dark hats
handcuffing a woman
before tossing her in the back
of a black barred truck
with stars on the sides
and a To Protect and Serve
bumper sticker stuck like
a punchline and a baby girl
and young boy were crying
standing behind the yellow lines
but two has never been
a number that adds up to
nothing because it's only legal
to pass one at a time in these
dark days of executive orders
you fear because you know
it's all the evidence they need
to make you disappear.

I could write a poem about myself.
I could write a poem.
I could write.
I could.
I.

r ~ 4/28/14

I could write a poem about you.
It's true.

But a poem would only make you love me
more than you know how to.

I could write a poem about your eyes.
They're blue.

I could tell the world you make my day all day long.
Nights, too.

I could tell the world all about you.
The world would share my view.

I could say that your days live inside
my heart. They do.

I could write a poem about you.
It would be true. Would you?

r ~ 4/28/14

Messengers bring me no messages,
teachers do not raise your voices,
like a flag I will raise my hand, like
a mad dog looking up on a hill
in the afternoon, I will smell you out
in the dead water where my tongue
is held captive, if it is to be silent
it will be silent in my mouth
where darkness and the scent of roses
come out like smoke, I smoke alone
in the woods to be smoking
so I can say I have smoked,
I call out madam
shall I undress you for a fight,
the wars are naked that you wage tonight
in a bed as broad as a battlefield
as the sword you mock the fallen with
and the angel says what is dead is
dead, I dream what I dream.

i still straddle the fence on this
immigration reform manifesto

i see both sides of the story

it's good to have the grandfather clause
for the immigrants in my bloodstream

- the scrappy scots-irish-ingles-welsh
in me - but too late for the cherokee

behind the old fences of history.

r ~ 11/9/14

A professor explained to me once
how there is a limited number
of possible designs for making
an arrow point function as intended.

You can't stick a round rock on a stick
and expect it to penetrate like a dart.

It has to be sharp and hard, yet light
to fly like a feather straight and true
to the heart. I said, you mean like love?

She said, yeah, like love, kinda like love.

Take your sweetness
and bury it deep,
for now is the time
that fire is needed;
hide the tenderness
where you'll remember
to never forget, for
the only fear to fear
is the wild running
through your veins;
take your boldness,
your coffee black nerve
and steady hand squeezing
a hot coal without a flinch;
take your bravery,
your sea legs stiffened
against the storm
of indecision;
take your bright eyed stare
into the dark clouds coming,
take them and nod your head
with downturned lips
at all you were afraid to be.