You wanted a woman, full of love’s embrace,
Unscarred by doubt, in a gentle space.
But not one wiser, shaped by her fight,
Learning from truths that emerge in the night.

You sought a woman with eyes that could shine,
Yet never imagined they’d see through your lies.
Not just a listener to every word spun,
But one who speaks boldly, knowing she’s won.

You demanded a woman, strong and refined,
But not one to build a life intertwined.
Just a rare jewel to keep on display,
Reaping the labor you forced her to pay.

Yet here she stands, like a fire untamed,
Refusing to dim or be easily claimed.
Her spirit forged by moments unkind,
Each scar a story, each story aligned.

She no longer waits for approval or praise,
No longer trapped in your self-serving maze.
Step by step, she has found her own path,
Unafraid of her power, unscathed by your wrath.

Accepting no less than the respect she deserves,
The kind you give freely, but she now reserves.
She now sees the heights she’s destined to reach,
Aware that your ego can’t bear her to breach.

Her self-assurance glows like the sun’s warm rays,
Marking the end of your manipulation days.
And perhaps that’s why—deep down, we both know—
You never took the time to see her grow.

You ignored her strength, overlooked her pain,
Blind to her progress, immune to her gain.
But now, as she rises, unyielding and true,
She steps from your shadow into a sky wide and blue.

How far she has traveled, how much she has won,
No longer tethered; she’s embraced who she’s become.

Grief is difference since you
and maybe you arrived just when I
needed you to
Because of the people so precious who left when you'd only
just gotten here
When I wanted to drift up to the night sky
to that place in the stars
where my loss might resound til I lose myself in it completely
There was you.
There were your tiny pink hands
reaching for my body, your only home
Tethering me fast to the earth
So I held my mountains strong
and willed my oceans calm
and remained your safe world.
I miss them.
I miss them so much and
nothing makes sense
except this,
So I'll allow myself to be both there, and here,
and allow myself to be warmed by the joy of nurturing you,
my tiny love.
Because
Even though it hurts
Even though it hurts like a -mother-
Now I've got to hurt
Like a mother

Weathervane, weathervane,
whither does the wind blow?
Will you learn to point the way
or will you just go with the flow?
When the fox would rule the henhouse
as the wind twists all around
will the weathercock crow midnight
without making a sound?

Orange
dancing lady slippers
perform uncoordinated
reblooming of dormant orchids;
warm and cordial in
informal candor
but agoraphobic
from misfortune;
mourning and remorseful
over flowers wilting, mortal.

Daybreak aurora
portent of
sunlight to come,
but stuck northward,
scorching corneas
in torrid dysphoria.

Organism born
horticulturally
disproportioned
and poorly formed,
origin in morbid horror;
cerebral cortex
its own torture,
the mortician
orphaning the organs
from the corpus;
stored in morgue,
torched in crematorium,
vivisected immemorial.

Stems and tendrils incorrigible,
disorganized into
deplorable ****
of tangled discord
clumsily running its course,
corsage and bouquet
aborted in accord.

Important shortage
warrants foraging
for resources
hoarded by some
abhorrent lord;
crowning court this
monarch's consort,
sordid and immoral,
keeping score like some
sick and sadistic sport;
reinforcing order of what's normal,
stronghold cordoned to conform.

Pollinating
swarm of hornets,
buzzing orchestra
of wings in chorus
quarreling with silence,
their scorpion stings absorbed;
stabbed, pierced, and gored.

Like a tortoise
slowly inching forward, torpid,
morass forbids;
roots exploring floorboards,
divorcing into a gorge,
fingers blindly implore
contours of the walls
searching for the door.

But drawn and quartered,
blossoms' florid
and ornate frame contorted,
warping its own portrait;
assorted torment transforming
efflorrescent, metamorphic.

Dwarfing, enormous,
and soaring towards orbit,
forty story high
arboreal forest
flourishing before us;
gorgeous morning glory,
thorny laurel adorning.

Forthwith,
storming windows' glass,
bastille, and castle supports;
warring against fortress
though swordless,
never resorting to forfeit until
entire territory terraformed
into floral orchard-
fragrant and vibrant aura
rewarding victoriously.

[City Bridges (5th draft)]

Indigenous citizen
struggling to stay civilized
amidst
monolithic visages,
stone-faced and stoic witnesses;
overhead,
gargoyles grin—
hideous grimaces
guarding ever vigilant.

Inhospitable city grid
dimly lit,
rain's residual liquid
slicks
gritty asphalt
glistened,
blacktop igneous
pavement glittering–
shimmering
in rigid obsidian.

Hidden within this vision
visits
solitude, unsolicited–
loneliness exhibited,
never fitting in;
island imprisonment
as bridges begin
quivering
above stygian rivers grim,
abysmal reflections glint,
swimming in viridian.

Water's
brim risen
to vertiginous limits
I see
flitting images
of cataclysmic collision
with frigidness
obliterating to oblivion.

A dismal wish
reminded by
a grisly glimpse
of figments vivid since
residual shiver imprints
from winter's winds
whipping shins
and thinning skin;
I cringe, wither, wince,
my eyelids squint–
but I still live, so
no longer motionless
my frostbitten digits grip,
limbs never given in
to blizzard's pins
or crystalline prisms–
I walk,
despite icy splinters
and misery digging in
my ambition wins.