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 Jul 2011 Vivien
Marsha Singh
A poem falls short; I'd like, instead
to draw a single line from me to you
and watch it curl into a word
so beautiful it's still unsaid –
or press paper to the window pane
so that the day might saturate
a note that brightly warms your hands,
spills birdsong from imagined trees
and buzzes like fat bumblebees,
but I am bound by language, love; I can't.
 Jul 2011 Vivien
Ashe L Bennett
I don't remember, any more,
The exact shape of your hands
As I held them in mine,
Caressed them,
Memorized the length of your fingers,
The depth of your calluses.

I don't remember, any more,
Exactly your height, how much
Taller than me
You were, where
My head rested on your chest
When you held me tightly close.

I don't remember, any more,
Your scent, when we lay together
Creating our own
Magic rhythm,
Matching our heartbeats as we
Touched the sky, together.

I don't remember, any more,
The sound of your voice, calling
My name as though
It were a song
Within itself, a precious treasure
You valued with all your being.

And I don't remember, any more,
The color of your eyes, the shape
Of your lips,
Only...
How your eyes crinkled at the corners
And your laugh, as you told me,

"I love you."
Copyright by Ash L. Bennett, 2011
 Oct 2010 Vivien
Sofia
A Will, A Way
 Oct 2010 Vivien
Sofia
The raspy waters shattered,
Against the fearsome shores,
They hailed the stormy Winter,
They opened many doors.

She walked towards the peril,
The hail battered her skin,
She kissed the wind that whipped her,
With lips of reckless sin.

Her bare white feet, they trampled,
Upon the sodden path,
Her eyes began to tremble,
She chose to face this wrath.

The dainty hands gripped mercy
It weighed more than her thoughts,
She felt it, most diaphanous,
While Nature raged and fought.

The icy Winds, they beckoned,
Their voices full of cheer,
For she was but another,
To leave a life so dear.

But who were they to conquer,
She knew she had a will,
And it was them who urged her,
Set forth to find their ****.

She threw her mercy to them,
The Sky, the Wind, the Rain,
She knew this was her ending.
The one that eased the pain.

Her mind began to scatter,
And hold her back, away.
Her heart knew more however,
And allowed her not to stray.

And thus the Thunder bellowed,
Deadly, yet alive.
Her wispy clothing held her,
As her body slowly dived,

And the crash was undistinguished,
Against the heartless weather,
And her mind thus found serenity,
As her heartbeat ceased, forever.
 Oct 2010 Vivien
Lucan
Say you want a cat. A dog's too easy,
would wag when wag is inappropriate,
and slobber on the guests. You'll take the cat,
so different and strange, it drives you crazy,

its shiftlessness, its ins-and-outs, its chi.
You call. It does not come. Is this a pet,
this Dharma ***? You say you can't accept
its vacant gaze, its scorn, who yearned to be

at home with feral grace, with all you're not.
But you're a Body safely locked from Mind,
that Problem no Mind solves. This point's defined
for you by ****, who's not the pet you thought

but Otherness, one owned by God, or none.
Cat sleeps for hours, wants out. A job well done.
 Apr 2010 Vivien
Charles Bukowski
the lady has me temporarily off the bottle
and now the pecker stands up
better.
however, things change overnight--
instead of listening to Shostakovich and
Mozart through a smeared haze of smoke
the nights change, new
complexities:
we drive to Baskin-Robbins,
31 flavors:
Rocky Road, Bubble Gum, Apricot Ice, Strawberry
Cheesecake, Chocolate Mint...

we park outside and look at icecream
people
a very healthy and satisfied people,
nary a potential suicide in sight
(they probably even vote)
and I tell her
"what if the boys saw me go in there? suppose they
find out I'm going in for a walnut peach sundae?"
"come on, chicken," she laughs and we go in
and stand with the icecream people.
none of them are cursing or threatening
the clerks.
there seem to be no hangovers or
grievances.
I am alarmed at the placid and calm wave
that flows about. I feel like a ***** in a
beauty contest. we finally get our sundaes and
sit in the car and eat them.

I must admit they are quite good. a curious new
world. (all my friends tell me I am looking
better. "you're looking good, man, we thought you
were going to die there for a while...")
--those 4,500 dark nights, the jails, the
hospitals...

and later that night
there is use for the pecker, use for
love, and it is glorious,
long and true,
and afterwards we speak of easy things;
our heads by the open window with the moonlight
looking through, we sleep in each other's
arms.

the icecream people make me feel good,
inside and out.
 Apr 2010 Vivien
Allison Owens
He had a hole in his jeans.

I remember, fidgeting with it nervously the whole evening.
Hole, whole.
I can’t even remember his name.
(Now you know that’s a lie. His name escapes you no more than you escape yourself.)

Driving somewhere, someone’s house. Board games that make no sense.

Kisses you can’t escape. And then we slept, I on the couch and he on a camp bed.

Lost my socks, sometime in the night, lustful and half asleep. Don’t remember what we did, though he swears we didn't. I don’t know, I was asleep.

He drove me home the next day, and I fidgeted with the hole in his jeans.
(They weren’t jeans they were some sort of corduroy.)

Never did find my socks.
©2006-2010 Allison Owens
 Apr 2010 Vivien
Langston Hughes
What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
Like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a sore--
And then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?
 Mar 2010 Vivien
Pablo Neruda
I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way

than this: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.
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