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

___________

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

___________

Even in silence
We honor the words
That have come
Between us

The silence
That covers our bodies
Without complexity

Removing the fabrics that bind us -
While the world sleeps
Revealing secrecy

Our breathing hastens
Falls to the floor of my heart
As natural
As dew on the fields of morning
I gather these moments
Polish them
Then hang them on the wind

___________

We laugh
& hold 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

_____

This Guitar is the conduit
Both sacred & profane
She can punish or soothe

She is a mirror
And what I offer, she offers
My blood is her blood
From the lilac to the skyscraper
She can make the bright stars lazy
With the slightest shrug

She is the ignition of affection
Her elegance so grand
It makes one feel *****

Her swagger sweeps me up
Enclosed in her murmur
Her breath is my crescent moon
Her wine, my time

_______