we sat after class tracing scratches
through six months of static
stinging and hacking
from so much phlegm
trapped in our vocal chords

as I wrote
their bravery bled through
my dry silence,
an overpowering heat
strengthened my resolve
to speak through crippled lips
bloated from too many withheld words

I closed my eyes, felt their calm
soothing my hands
folding them into a fingered steeple
where now we bow our heads
retreating from today's tension
into the solitude of curved symbols
a hieroglyph for hearts

to recreate
          that which was once broken
to foster reconnection from distance
to peel back layers of feeling
and arrange our secrets
         as poetic scripture

why are we
so crudely made
when placed along side
our conceptions of love

we fall miserably short
of caring, listening,
giving, receiving
yet in our dreams
there is no threshold      we must cross

the slip into love
is as effortless
as the moon's benediction
after an autumn night's
prolonged slumber

hold my fingers in yours
    let's inscribe
                                 love letters
  
       within the cloud's  
underbelly
               dimpling heaven
in golden filigree

         and terra-cotta   b l u s h

she, a placid sea of smiles,
a tincture to soothe his distress
with restorative moonstone eyes
the hue of a frosted moon
in milky highlights

yet tempests corrugate
her shimmering textures
liquid skin trembles
far beneath this sedate surface
a turbulent passion,
a movement of flowing tentacles,
multi-colored sea anemone
brush the sea floor
stirring pebbles in the undertow
as ossified diamonds

his lips tingle at the ripples
released from her long-awaited sigh
he feels each seismic vibration
like a tuning fork held close
to her heart's palpitations
translating their varied tempos

he steps from the shoals
toward her undertows
hand held out to brace
the unsteadiness, then words
break open in sea spray
she hesitates, lingers long,
soaking in his confession
pulling him from the shallows
towards the depths
of her harlequin heart

Do you ever feel
that there is a greater story
living inside you than the one
you wake up to
each day,
one richer,
more prismatic,
where you can dress
in your bohemian voice,
open oak paneled doors
once denied you,
become all the radiant
seasons speckled
in russets
and autumn golds,
pale peonies,
and Titanium whites?  

Do you ever imagine
the mirror's reflection
as the real you
standing beyond your
mind's limitations?  
What would it take
to awaken
on the opposite
side of your thoughts,
to dream in excess
& possibility beyond
the confines of this
reality to a world
where you become
all that you can imagine?

My father died when I was seven.

Like a girl in a museum
I'm drawn to his pictures.
Those inadequate reproductions,
hypnotize me.

Pictures, what do they have to give?
Coal-blue eyes, a knowing look.
They exist, for me, like Cassandra of troy,
full of endless secrets that can never be told.

A snowy, ice slickened, twilight-blue
rush hour parade - hundreds of grimy cars
rushing, rushing... somewhere.

Why do  the details I can't remember haunt me so?
A flash of light, the tearing of metal
like the screaming of dogs in a devouring
dance of energy.

The nuclear family detonating
with death inches away.

Everyone was asking, "What do you remember?"
"I don't know."  7 year old me said.

The family man leaving a gravestone like a calling card.

Sometimes, just before I fall asleep,
memories of him - which I hold dear -
come to me like the ghosts of departed friends.
Image after image in the embracing dark.

Why is it the further away you get, the more I need you?

Those images and that voice are strangely silent
in the morning as I'm, once again, awakened
to a world I'd rather reassemble.