My mother
Vanished into a blackbird
Her song
Shattered
Her frailty on display

My arms turned to branches
But she did not land

She wasn't mine
She was never mine

Her answers
Mounted the wind beyond her wing-tips
The sky is wounded
Her daughters
Briefly turned to doves
To see her off

Now she is a deflowered figurine
Capsized & silent
A ornamental memory
An iridescent spark
In the pocket of my heart

___________

We found love
Between the buildings of New York
In the beaches of St Johns
Within the trumpets of New Orleans
This inescapable attendance  
Reducing the world
To an ambiguous promise

This is the medicine
Our bodies
Become closets of breath
Which we lay neatly side by side

We are not clouded
By words or indecision
Darkness or resistance
We delight in travel
Sweeping over the details
Like the crushing of an old carnation

In each location
We leave moments
Of ourselves behind
Sifting thru the dust of conversation
The tide slides in and
We sculpt our dialogue -
Your voice
Stitching the unknown
To the known
The known
Which I turn
Into song

_________

While you slept
I whispered to your wounds
Uncovered your wings
Traced the highway of your arms
Back to the love in my heart

We laugh
& holds hands
On the beaches of Marco Island

We've slipped into the pages of a novel
This chapter has sun
This paragraph -
Sand & serenity
We sink into our beach chairs
Only to crush on the energy
The cadence of the waves
Reflected in her eyes
Where the gold light spreads
Arresting my affection -
My words performing
Restless
Having been asleep for so long
Drifting thru the tide
With the will,
The blessing,
The estate of the promise
Of a provisional paradise

Your lips part
& the words arrive
Dotting my mind -
Like a songbird
I take notice
I bristle

It is the beginning of all flowers
The beginning of the wind
That parted the palm trees

This is the time
When we learn
There is nothing else to ask for.
We sift the sand -
Our words turning to dust

& later the moonlight
Breathes us in
As it has always done.
The elegant night
Comes to a close
& we surrender unto each other
We commit
To a constant beginning

_____

Our aquaintance is the canopy
Which spills across like romance -
There is no need to explain

We interrupt calamity  
We dot the beach with hands clapsed
To keep all things luminous

Anticipation is the chocolate
The interval that pivots to point
The way
There is white icing between our words
Motion between our whispers
A butterfly kiss on the spine

The gift of idle evenings
Gives way to the flowers
That bow their heads
As we honor your birthday

No one rehearses getting older
Let's laugh & grow younger instead

The theatre curtains of our eyes
Open to the rays of white & light
To the flesh & romance
That is Trunk bay

Her heavenly enchantment
Has us at ease
& we fasten our gaze
To the birth of all things beautiful
Holding hands in her turquoise waves
We happily collapse under the courtship
To the promise of love
To the subtle touch of the heart
As delicate as a humming bird's wing

Out here
Deadlines have no meaning -
We listen to her wisdom
Her elegant, rhythmic mantra
Making love in her sea -
Our laughter billowing out before our tongues
As she molds us into angels
Granting us wings where we once had shoulders
& now she calls on us to pray

__________

I knew it was love
When you tap danced
To the edge of my heart with a sassy shrug

I knew it was love
When the beach became my lungs
The water, my lips
The salt, my tongue

I knew it was love
When your kisses met my face
As soft as snowflakes
When I followed my mouth
To each crease of your body

I knew it was love
When you balanced on my limbs
And forgave me
For what I had forgotten to ask

I knew it was love
When all rehearsal was refused
And you opened the drawers
Of your body
To wash & fold my words

I knew it was love
When - after the wine
The crickets honorably remained silent
And your secret fragility
Like a candle
Lifted me out of what was missing

___________