would I be with you? Was I
your last resort when all
the rentals were booked. Would you
have looked at me if

they opened up
to you? Funny how life picks
the woman that wears white. If he
said yes to me would we still

be? Funny how life
carries me out to sea like
the tide. But like the tide too,
pushed me back onto the

shore. Funny how the man picks
the house where I reside, like flowers
in his garden. And our castle dreams
harden. Funny how we say we had

a voice when we were frozen, like icicles
hanging on the eaves. We're knocked
to the ground like crimson autumn leaves
from our backyard trees.

will blind me
with their cheshire smile
or cut me down to fit
like red mosaic tile

No One
will have me drunk
on whiskey lime words
salted tongue in my ear
then cage me like birds

No One
will seep
into the folds of my skin
burn my butterflies
or make my head spin

No One
is all
that they seem
to while those green years
on rivers of dreams

about the laughing cornflower sky
honey wheat fields of dandelions
a red-tailed hawk soaring high.
Spraying ink in a billowing black cloud

like the octopus in the sea
a puff of ebony is my shroud.
Planting word seeds in the ground
where men have toiled and plowed,

Deep and dark as cherry wine
my pen, my airplane.
Flying off the page in every line.
Traveling over mountains

to deserts of sleeping lions.
Not a man can tell me where to land.
This is my life, my flight,
laboring birth with my right hand.

herself on the fence,
not moving left or right. Searches
morn and night for the answer. Only
leaves to make dinner. She has no

nest. She has no tree. But she
has longing. For what she does not
know, to fly or build her home? Another
day passes. Another cycle of the sun

and moon. Another snowy, cold
December. Another hot, sunny
June. Another round of eggs hatching
to fly south. Another nest a robin's

patching and feeding hungry
mouths. She sees it all on
the splintered fence. If she could
condence like dew on a cool

October morning. If a blade
of grass was calling to her like
a worm. It's only when the neighbor's
grey cat's hungry that she squirms.

his lies
like pieces of glass
cutting her hollow
as they fall and they pass

She swallowed
her pain
inflating like a balloon
following her around
like a cheese wheel moon

She swallowed
her tears
like salt on the rim
and threw away years
on the likes of him

She swallowed
his memory
like a bitter pill
weighing her down
after all this time still

with vanilla ***** and wedges of men
strawberry wine, stilettos and pen. I have
so many like Swiss cheese. You can
thread them together as if they were

beads. I stuff them with pound cake
and chocolate ice cream, tampons
and broom closet screams. Fill them
with lines of rhyme and feathered

earrings. Some I was born with. Some
I’ve made. But I’ll not forget the ones
given to me. They grew over the years,
like a little brother that didn't leave

home, large as the mountains,
and deep as the seas. But I’m proud
that I pushed out my babies. And I'll fill
all their holes with love and with cream.

Everyone has holes. Some we are born with. Some we have made. And others are given to us. Some we leave empty. Some we fill in with terrible things. Mine, I chose to share.

This is the title of my new poetry book!