I give love
love love
with the one look
of my eye
eye eye

I excite your lament ion
charge it
high up high
uuuuu
potentially ready
a ***** cation

I am your aesthetic
flaming electric
activate your kinetic
stop the resistence now
don’t drop voltage
difference I create is continually asymptotic

I am the variation in your magnetic
I am the field of your *** ethic
if you not behave
I become your inelastic scatter
geomagnetic storm
high potential
chemical desire
mechanical fire
radioactive disaster
through your interior
I roar blast break
silence the rocks
shake the lights
reverberate in your head

I give love
love love
with the one look
of my eye eye eye
I excite your lament ion
I am your voltaic lion

Your touch used to feel like lightning; igniting my entire body
as if it were christmas lights you meant to wrap around the entire world.
Your fingertips followed dance routines on my arms,
leaving behind a path of hot embers right down to my thighs.

You set off fireworks in my chest the moment our skin
brushed against each other's ever so slightly;
those Roman Candles were almost lethal,
but it seems your extremities could revive me even after death.

You'd trigger static and sparks that would light up my eyes
and leave a tingling sensation through every limb.

I don't know what you did, my dear -
you materialized me -
made me inanimate just by your touch,
only awakened by the currents you transferred through your palms.

It's as if I were a light bulb,
plugged in forevermore in the socket of your grip.
You were electricity, darling, and I was water; my voltaic shock was inevitable.
You were fire and a sweet, sweet tempting bomb of affection I couldn't resist -
                        tick,
                                 tick,
                                          tick,
                                                    tock.
With all that energy we were bound to burn out.

But, in some attempt of insanity, you reached for my hand today
and I swore I saw those sparks start to pour out of your fingers once again.
And I almost reached out, drawn in by the flare
and ready for the charge to hit me like a murderer's bullet

almost

but instead,
I flinched.

- g.d.

Bring me your tired souls,
Of flesh burned
Marked limbs with numbers,
Age is nothing to me.

Still thy beating heart
Your song trembles,
Words of melody
Writes thy voice.

To thee a single petal
Of motionless thought,
Coalesce into thine mind,
You are the one.

Surging distress,
Lament one’s dying love.
For thy heart beckons
It’s hymn to me.

Indulge thyself
Into the sea.
Searching for love’s
True self.

radiating
street lamps
ionized the
indigo blue
haze charging
the night air

sparking the
city’s eclectic
currents coursing
through the
abandoned raceways
and empty streets

energizing the
phantoms of
the city’s
restive spirits

the ghosts of past
Great Falls Fests came
jitterbugging back
to life

transparent
veils lifting
and falling
with it, a voltaic
indigo blue
billowed out of the
abandoned stadium
pouring smoking
oboe moans
into the cavity
of the great gorge

“I was one of the last
to perform at
Hinchliffe Stadium”
Duke proclaimed
with his usual  
distinguished air

“it was also one of my
last concerts”, he added
with a tinge of
sorrow in his voice

“the band was rockin
the Art Deco tiles,
splintering and shattering
into bits of earth toned graffiti
the last vestiges of
a bygone Jazz Age
dissolving into the
disco fizz of the
Seventies”

the indigo mood
clamoured off
the rocks absorbing
the sonorous waves
like a stand of
hallowed
sequoias

“I’m trying to
remember what
my last tune
was that night.

was it Caravan?
or a Prelude to
a Kiss?  No no
too mellow
we always ended
on an upper
a real crowd pleaser,
I recall the boys swung
a medley before the grand finale
that medley included
Mood Indigo, Caravan,
Sophisticated Ladies,
Prelude to a Kiss.
We opened with Kinda Dukish
Rockin and Rhythm
we closed with
Satin Doll
Yes I’m quite sure
I waltzed them
off the floor
that night with
Satin Doll”

Duke ran his
fingers through
his processed hair.
He grabbed my shoulders
raised his baggy eyelids
And looked me straight
In the eye

“Yes, we followed
Tito Puente, he killed it
we upped our game
He was just starting out
But at this time Silk City
was going Caribe
Juan Tizol was
out of his mind that night,
I thought him and Babs
we're gunna jump ship
and join the Salsa Circus
Yeah El Rex and Celia Cruz
were that good

El Rex had the place
jumpin and jivin
it was a glimpse of the old days
livin in the here and now
just like the old days
I couldn't compete with that
so I waltzed them off
the floor with Satin Doll
a little cheek to cheek swoon
maybe some guys got lucky that night
and maybe some girls fell in love
Yeah Paterson was changing,
the ***** Leagues long gone
the last ****** Auto Races
crossed the final finish line weeks before
when the raceways in the stadium
replaced the raceways to the factories
we knew it was coming to an end
and with it all the good paying
jobs, whatta shame
just like me and the boys
watching El Rex
the Duke was dethroned by a King
just like Silk City
we had our day in the sun too
a Satin Doll Sun
Those were some good times,
sometimes”

Duke scratched
his head,
and he looked down into
the swirling noise
of the Great Falls
“on a night like this
the mood indigo
takes you into the
darkest hues of blues”

fragment from
Silk City PIT 6:
The Great Falls

Duke Ellington, Coleman Hawkins
Mood Indigo




Oakland
3/30/13
jbm

(FRAGMENT WORK IN PROGRESS)

Part 6 of extended poem Silk City PIT.  PIT is an acronym for Point In Time.  PIT is an annual census American cities conduct to count the homeless population.  Hope and Labor is the city motto of Paterson NJ, nick named The Silk City.

The mosquitoes supped histamine limpets into our puckered flesh
dew gilted grass entombed our feet in dappled domes
refracting the overhead fireworks
smears of whirling color
accented by smoke mote ghosts

I forgot to wear my contacts
my near-sightedness
makes you giggle nervously -
a hard full body ****** of a laugh
it arches your spine
pulling our hand-holding into an expansion
only the lining betwixt finger inlets
galvanized our pulse

well, that and your voltaic laugh
its flourishing timbre
resonant
reverberant pyrotechnic
thickly glazing aural canal

lascivious tomes penned themselves
densely
upon neural plane
dendrites imprinting chemical insignia
moment captured in impressionistic blurs

Dark waters ripple thought.
horse drawn carriage tread
voltaic wires, throbbing brain.
lorn elation until osculation
of lips dreamt nightly.
nectarous skin float
between fingers raptured.
everlasting sand blown
from ashes wrought with
doubt.
paroxysm of senses like electric eels
wreck ties bound by vituperation.
Breath like honeyed vapor,
encased rouged cheeks.
savored time in bottles, minutes
turned to minerals mined.
hours of golden flecks
splashed in synthesized
unison.
New always, love evermore.

She is accompanied, by either mild disdain or comfortable curiosity, but always with magnetic eyes that do not spot the glints of time traversing through the shadows to pass her. Eyes glued to the screen, as two reflective sequins, shining opposite of the captivating screen that has momentarily captured her attention. Often squinting with head tilted slightly to the side, unable to give in to the crowd which fashionably wears the smirk of approval. Or with eyes drowning in the hatred of the Legion of Gerasenes, yet still yearning to not be cast aside. Tangible threads begin weaving the cloth of empathy, as each falling grain of sand counts another responsive brain wave reacting to the current. Unsure if these words filtered through the mechanisms of defense forced upon an individual after so many disappointing tributaries, or if rushing claret and voltaic storms of lucidity invited the passing guests. Unsure if you can overcome the luring request of the daughters of Achelous to settle the sandy shores of contentment, or, for just once, endure the salty trials with enough zeal to alter course and navigate to the unfathomable.

Society, the nectarous drenched **** of gregarious giving.
Or so we think..
One must be diligent to not consume to the point of overweening upon her intoxicating milk.
"You can be anything" she coos delicately stroking your forehead.
My bleary scruffed state prevents me from feeling her venomous *****.
I am rendered limp set agog by the hypnagogic melody of society.
Then there is you...
Your Wild renegade eyes pry me from my cemented prison.
Your Voltaic energy seeped in the poetry that coats my marrow and enamel, the substance of my soul.
Such beauty estranged from society? How can that be?
Was this matronly epicenter all farce and rigamarole?
I clamor in search for those eyes to appease my pain.
I search in vain..
until I face the mirror.
Those eyes belong to me, the remedy to society is the awakening of yourself, the claiming of your poetry.

Her hair- black as a raven’s breast
   Eyes glowing through orbs of green
She dances covertly in the dark of night
    Where not another soul is seen
warbling a haunting, enchanted tune

Chanting, dancing around the fire
   under light of a full evening moon
Questions lie on lips to desire
   Is she malevolent or benevolent?
Never a soul has been so bold
   to tell their story, too hesitant!

She possesses many powers, many tales
   Lifting her hands as she chants
Red mist swirling, twirling behind her veil
   Eyes brightening in orbs of green
Chilly mist crawling over her skin
   Under an oak tree dancing unseen

Cloaked under her crimson, blood red shawl
   Strange sounds and names uttered
as she boldly dances, chanting out her call
   Wild, fierce, bold and free
Like a chameleon she changes
    in red blazing firelight so unseen

Suddenly, the ground shakes with deafening roar
    Bursts of electric blue, beam above her head
Voltaic forces join, shaking earth’s woodland floor
    Down the path, robes flowing, blowing in the breeze
Many forces about, electrifying ground and air

Gathering together, chanting, dancing under the trees
    Many denizens of this land astound
Warlocks and witches cast their magic here
    as their caldron bubbles over ground

They come together from lake and fen
    Here they meet from darkened lair
Ferny dells and rocky dens
    “Make room”, they call in pitch black night
Bringing many potions to mix them well
    Taking wool, wand, bone and eyes, what a fright!
Casting out and about their magic spells

   Mixing tooth and tongue and nail
Under fire, water, earth and dung
   They mix the caldron, hold the flail
Hemlock, henbane, adder’s blood
   Chanting out “By thee we bound upon this road"!

Suddenly the spell’s been cannily brewed
   Using blood, eyes, tongue of a toad
    As quickly as they came, they hastily leave
Departing forest dark, entering private glades

   Leaving once again, only to return
On another chilly, full October moon eve
   they’ll chant, they'll brew their magic urns
"Merry Meet", they all say, as they make haste to leave

I remember your breathtaking portrait.
Your eyes were horizon-blue, awake and ignited in love with a modern man.
In a modern era a love so hot you’re prepared to grieve it 
for the rest of your life
Just to dance in its fire until it fades.
You burst forth and lit the fuse,
Loving hot and working feverishly to emerge and
Forge futures for your daughter and I.
But her father burnt out young,
And his ashes lured her into a shivering, toxic sleep.
In that future she also loved a man she would widow young.

She has felt the cold fire of snow on her face
Passed or thrown out onto the ground
But I can’t tell you if she ever felt that love again.
I won’t tell you about all the cats and dogs she slept with
Or how she threw me and threw at me and all through me
To the sheriffs in a wild state.
Then, with you, she lost love in the last person who loved her.
Her voice cracked and shaded when you couldn’t remember her name.
She drowned both of our spirits and we slept poor, wet, drunk.
These decades have tired her body
And I refused to allow its cold hollow eyes near mine.

Asleep, I consumed myself with the loves of men and the grief for each love.
I ate and breathed men and fever-dreamed through relationships.
I aimed poisoned golden robes at lovers thrown with a motor’s velocity
And then ran loud red lights smoldering through hot teared eyes
With the unsober intention to silence us both in the burning frost of February.
Hate veiled all reason and hystericized my being and thirsted for more:
More prohibited liquor than I could ever nurse it with
More pills than the pock-nosed doctor would give when he
Sliced open the belly of a howling wild animal mother me.
Many more.

And when I died I awoke in ice and raged my way to the surface of the Styx.
It was there I emerged warm and wet next to a modern man who reminds me of you.
I fell and I rose through our molten love and forged myself within it.
We, in a worn and unwealthy future still love and work for our unborn daughters
As hotly in dynamic color as you did in crisp black and white.

Through him and through you I can love her again.
And when our daughter bursts through, undrugged and undoctored,
She will incite her own century’s hot voltaic Spring,
In a pyrotechnic era of alive and alert daughters,
Gaining ground and dimension and speed,
Because she will know our love.
I wish you could see the horizon in your daughter’s eyes
When she sees our yet unconceived apple of discord.
I hope the warmth will awaken her, and she will emerge and forge herself
And know again the good rage of a fiery and awake love
Worth grieving.

Lacking imperfection his un illuminating
yarn woven secrets speak spilling
silt that doesn’t even exist.

Inseperable the meta voltaic charged touch
of her skin against his blemished soul leaving behind
marks of polyphony with staccatos hanging by a pine,
gathering gusts of wind and rocking his unsteady soul
on the swing set into a leap into the depths
of the blue oceanic sky and diving deep
into her love
that binds him together
forever more.

Ever again her calming wind
shakes up the roots of the evergreen trees
in the movable earth of his body.