A bluebird blissful, fistful of flight
happily hopping to the greens and the grain
accompanies the rhythm and rhyme
subtle solemn songs intertwine

Through the still and the sway, now boy don't you walk away
you just wait, we're gonna fly someday

Hearts flutter in congruency at the speed of waiting wings
swinging in the summer breeze, blending with the autumn leaves
shades sank so deeply--those amber eyes so discreetly,
just dying to complete me

And Love,

Though the fair fall is fleeting
with winter winds freezing
There's a warmth in the way
our eyes dance the days away
starry gaze, steady aim, toward the spring

In a Bluebird toffee tin
Are a hundred letters –
Most of them doodle-stamped and
Delivered by hand.
Unlike the letters I sent to you
They do not smell of spritzed cologne,
(A trick that I learned from Grease)
They are not messy
Or tea stained,
But perfect powder blue
And allowing for small extravagances –
The Cursive of the Obsessive,
Cursed by neatness and perfect hearts.

I pick one out at random,
A casually cruel one sent from Rome –
I imagine you blinking on a balcony
With dazzles on your collarbone,
A teeny tiny sugarless coffee
At your side,
And a pen tapping your knee.

“I’m not a **** at all –“ you wrote,
"It’s only that you are gregarious
In the most DISGUSTING way.
That’s your problem not mine -
Your optimism won’t catch you.
(Cynicism won’t catch you either,
But it has the courtesy not to throw you.)
I’m stopping now,
By the time you get this
I’ll be back home.
What pointlessness we endure for one other.
I miss you, as you say,
‘ever so’ –
Bedtime here is a source of misery.”

And then you signed your name,
Tiny,
Small,
Impossibly graceful,
Just like yourself.

You were always nasty
When you missed me.

I last rode this road in Summer
When the light was as now;
Long, flat and mellow
But by the hour not the season

The trees back then still wore clothes
Green, perhaps liver-spotted with yellow
Now I watch them tangle their naked arms
And the world turns its face away in shame,
Longing for its chastised summer

The wheat field is grey scrub
An old bristling beard
And my bike tyres trace its edge
Like fingers on the jaw of our grandfather

And the watercolour wind
Rinses my knuckle bones
And then bites them open
They don’t bother to bleed
They’ve been chewed too many times

As the clouds wash in,
Black with frostbite,
I bite my winter scarf
And sing to it of bluebirds

bluebird sings in the morning,
wakes me with his voice.
he left with no such warning,
not a word, no noise.

pretty bluebird, come back.
i miss your beautiful sound.
i'm waiting for your attack.
someday you will be found.

It must be two in the morning.
it's cold. Dark. The bleeding is relentless.
My fault.
I didn't ask for any of this
but in the end it is my fault alone.

I try to breathe.
how?
I can't.
it feels like
liquid nitrogen.
not oxygen.
I need air.
can't breathe.
chest collapsing.

I wake up.

two ten.

still dark out.

got a text
at ten something
from my Bluebird of Peace.
a list of inappropriate but still humorous jokes.

some are cringey,
but I still laugh or smile.
and so guilt and shame are washed from my mind,
as I debate running
to the bathroom
to wash the cold sweat off
that has drenched my skin
and clothes.

I keep smelling iron
though I know it isn't there.

the things I have seen
and the things I have lost
like to haunt me.

I would like to be a ghost.
to haunt them
in return.

instead I breathe in.
I breathe out.

I change clothes,
stripping down entirely to put on shorts and a t-shirt.
I put on his hoodie.
Wait for warmth.
Hold my old stuffed lion.

send my Bluebird
a text.

I need some type of noise,
but all I hear is snoring
and the dripping of a faucet.

I am glad
for instances like these
that I do not
live alone.

at least this time
i didn't cry myself awake.

one day
it will be different.

"That part of us greater than the sum of our parts cannot begin and cannot end, and so it cannot fail."

i saw a bluebird flying in the sky above
singing oh so sweetly his little song of love
a lovely melody every note in tune
such a lovely sound my heart began to swoon
he flew down beside has if to say hello
i felt warm inside and my heart began to glow
he sat there  a while then softly flew away
i hum his little tune every single day

There's a bluebird in my heart
too,

but unlike
yours

I like to let mine out
from time to time,

I let him spread his wings
I let him sing

his songs to me
& to the world,

My bartenders like him,
he's how I've gotten most
of the ****** into my bed

and he doesn't mind the smoke,
everyone needs a drag
from time to time,

He's the one
who prefers Jameson
and told my tongue
to not drink
much else,

I don't hide him,

But I'm not mad
that you hid yours away

I'm glad you did
because as much as you
inspire me and make me
want to share my songs

with the world,

I'm glad I'm not as angry
as you made yourself out
to be,

I get it, the image
is everything about
what seperates the men
from the boys,

and at this point I think
I'm all grown up
and we're stuck together
with the same fate,

So I let my bluebird sing
Bukowski,
because more than anything

your songs taught me

how to ****
what the world thinks.

And thank you for lying
to me

You old, drunk *******,

Because you let your bluebird
fly, you know it

and may the gods bless you
for not even trying.

I love you
*******.

Just one question,
Are you crying now?

I woke up early morning
To a tapping on my window
A blue bird sitting on the sill
Asked what I was doing

Oh hey there lil bird
I'm spreading butter with a spoon
But keep it between me and you
There's a few other crazy things I do too

Like taking moon beams that I find on my floor
And putting them all in a jar
I'm saving them for something special
But as of yet I'm not really sure

I hug trees
And chase rainbows
Trace smiley faces in fogged up windows
I even glue googly eyes on my kettle and toaster so I don't feel alone

Tell me lil bird
I've always wondered
Are there creatures with wings
Scared to fly
Afraid of heights

And if there are do they go to social events
Like birds of a feather do
If they walk and don't fly
do they have to wait in a line
At the buffet for their food

Tell me of furry etiquettes and norms
Are you bound by rules
Of the kingdom of birds
Or are blue birds blue bloods

We had quite the conversation going on
My little tapping blue bird and me
That's when I opened the window spread my arms
and we were both gone
Flying away into the free

Yellow, yellow, yellow, yellow!
It is not a color.
It is summer!
It is the wind on a willow,
the lap of waves, the shadow
under a bush, a bird, a bluebird,
three herons, a dead hawk
rotting on a pole—
Clear yellow!
It is a piece of blue paper
in the grass or a threecluster of
green walnuts swaying, children
playing croquet or one boy
fishing, a man
swinging his pink fists
as he walks—
It is ladysthumb, forget-me-nots
in the ditch, moss under
the ****** of the carrail, the
wavy lines in split rock, a
great oaktree—
It is a disinclination to be
five red petals or a rose, it is
a cluster of birdsbreast flowers
on a red stem six feet high,
four open yellow petals
above sepals curled
backward into reverse spikes—
Tufts of purple grass spot the
green meadow and clouds the sky.

Anna
with
bluebird eyes--

Anna with blue
nails about her
black fingers--

Anna with an urge
to drive those blue
nails into my
recently earned cross--

Such a pretty, pretty, pretty
thing,
you should hear her sing--

Such a pretty, pretty, pretty
thing,
you should hear her sing--

Anna
with
bluebird eyes--

Anna with a penchant
for freshly hewn
boys--

Anna with a disdain
for nobody but me--

Such a pretty, pretty, pretty
thing,
you should hear her sing--

Such a pretty, pretty, pretty
thing,
you should hear her sing--

Anna
with
bluebird eyes--

Anna with black fingers,
black skirts, black spine--

Anna with whispers,
with webs,
with cozy refuge in the
dark corners of my mind--

Take my wallet,
let me hear her sing--

Take my wallet,
let me put my picture in her locket--

Take my wallet,
Anna's what I want.

The first time someone called me a poet
it was in the cramped back hallway of a party in early July
heat rising between our ****** spaces
sweat collecting at the base of my brow to keep anxiety at bay
I listen as someone who I could barely call an acquaintance describe me to a boy I just met:
“she is an amazing writer, trust me, she’s so cool”
As if me using metaphors for antidepressants
and words as bandages for wounds
was reason to make me worthy to get to know beyond my first name
to pin my feet onto a pedestal I didn’t ask to stand on to begin with
I press autopilot in my muscles,
mechanically flip my hair,
split my lips into a half-*** smile,
****** my hand,
and let my laugh ring with the music.
Little does everyone know I am the broken jukebox
with a disappearing voice.

I hide behind love and at 19, I wrote “What High School History Taught Me”
It was for you
you, the NYU junior with a mouth that clung onto vowels
and whose fingertips could read the braille embedded in my skin
You loved chasing storms,
I was almost named after a hurricane,
and this was how we were born after Hurricane Sandy-
it was never a question how we found comfort in destruction
But I still remember telling you
that I wanted to love you forever even if you didn’t stay to find out
And ever since I spit that
men come to me looking for their taste of mystery
for their chance to be immortalized
They don’t know I only speak in train station
and everybody is always a few minutes too late
No one has gotten the chance to get too close
because it’s never romantic to **** the girl who makes love to her own sadness every night

I’ve stopped seeing the fire in my poetry like most strangers do
because to them
my pain is pretty
my heartache is dressed in a bow so
they can all sleep better at night knowing
some 20 year old girl in California understands them
better than she understands herself.

I have been singing in a language I never fully understood
because I am the girl who attaches my reflection to a man
whose memory I still keep prisoner in my mind
and this is how I hide from myself
this is my disappearing act

This isn’t poetry anymore
and it hasn’t been for a long time
This is the sound of survival
This is my heart leaking gunpowder and discharging bullets
Right here
on this stage
is where I understand what it feels like to choke on the gas chamber of lost dreams
Right here
is a dusky New York City apartment
with a boy dressed in the mask of a man hunting me as prey
This stage is where I come home to after being at war with myself
This stage is my peace
my prayer for forgiveness once a week
Right here
is why friends from school don’t call me that much anymore
This stage
is why me and Joe broke up
This place
is why I don’t sit with my family at the dinner table no more
because why
Why share grace with those who can’t understand
how these lights I stand under make the full moon I need
to break my neck and howl at some nights

This is where I pluck the guitar strings of my throat to sing like a bluebird and slow dance with every ghost
This stage is the only place I can forklift
all the misunderstood out of my chest and force you to watch
and you
will still call it art
you
will still call it poetry

But this isn’t poetry anymore
it hasn’t been for a long time
This
is the sound of survival
This
is the sound of me using the inhale of night
just to make it to the exhale of morning.
Right here.
On this stage.
This
is where
and why
I
fight.

play me an air
   a bluebird lament
something meant for the breathing
  to remember

  all i want to hear
is a soft melody
  sad as the winter
still on the wind

     let your bow waltz
on the strings of my heart
     let the sound
  of your fiddle
set sail

play me an air
   like the bluebird did
     while i dance
  with the snow
in my hair.

the wild suburban dogs
eat
the leftovers of a tom cat
outside
my apartment door--
the neighbors gone,
they must've done wrong,
the cops keep asking me
where they went--
a bluebird lands
on
a bent limb,
no song to sing
just worms to slurp,
a nest to think about,
and a debt
to me--
for the undeserved attention
I grant.

A bluebird hovers above rifles

raised in memory of people dying, clasping the cold edges of guns in the absence of their mothers' love.

Cheers ring out for survivors having embraced their triggers hard enough to keep breathing

as a million of last sighs were left united above the bruised treetops sobbing quietly in the burning fumes.

Scattered souls getting bled through eyes are seen among the laughing crowds, widows clutching their children's hands twice

making up for fathers lost in a foreign land.

The bluebird cries. His tears fall to the ground stomped by marching feet honoring those who cannot walk,

screaming every word the bird can't roll his tongue around, too real for his trembling lips to form.

His dropped jewels gleam in the

gloomy day as they let their vibrating voices break the crispness of the morning, pieces tumbling down into the

children of his sobs,

enhancing their strength as they shout out the horror of marching in memory of soldiers; the sadness of cheering surviving armies; the utter foolishness of raising guns dignifying buried boys that would have laughed and run, embosomed their children hard enough to squeeze the sorrow from out their skin, if greed wouldn't have given birth to those weapons.

Their shriek clangs through the streets,

clamoring how this should be a day spent mourning the lost men caught in uniforms brainwashed by altered patriotism, how their ashes shouldn't be strewed into a shatter grenade but planted along with
seeds of harmony on open fields,

how a peaceful world

should come to emerge from the endless graves where their spirits sleep.

The bluebird dives into the crowd, letting his body swirl around the uniforms walking stiffly through the darkening day.

He inhales before whirling down into a rifle held high in the sky,

allowing his tongue

to slide along the words no one marching has ever understood.

Freedom,

he calls. Let

peace

spread throughout the world, carried on the back of every bird floating across the empyrean until the message can be heard chanted from every mountain stroking the earth with its roots.

Let's honor the memory of lost men, he calls, let's learn to love as we now ****.

His voice is drowned by firings in the salute of lost troops. No one hears his last desperate cries, his throat celebrating his own mother who will never again

caress his plumage.

He clasps the coldness of the barrel, before his last breath unites with a

bullet.

Gray permeates day\
   Bluebirds dancing in puddles
   with raindrops splashing.

r ~ 16Mar14

there's a bluebird inside
my brain and i let everybody
hear it sing.

the more people listens  
the lesser it bothers my life.

I hate the saying, "Baby's Mama."
It's so ******. As I drifted off to
sleep last night, crocked on a plethora of
pills, and the remnants of *****, I thought
to myself, She's a little bluebird that
burrowed in my heart.
I laughed and slobbered, and drifted
into the warm fuzzy black.

She's intuitive, she asked me to let
the nurse know that her and the kids were
coming so that there would be a smooth
transition with staff. Hospitals can be
peculiar when it comes to visitation with children.

So she asked me how I wanted to refer to her.
She's the Mother of my 2-year old
daughter, and she has a 10-year old boy
that I have been around for 6 years.
He's like my own son, but 'technically,  he's not.
I don't want to offend anyone. It's all so
******* complicated. I could say, "This is Bonnie,
I'm Clyde, and this is our gang." They probably
wouldn't laugh. I feel very comfortable saying,
"These are our kids, and this is their Mom"

If the kids weren't in ear-shot and I felt
like a rapscallion, I might say,"This is a woman
that I used to love and **** a lot! Finally we had
our daughter- WOW- AMAZING! ! !
The boy came along before I met her, but I love him
like my own son- always and forever."

Anyway, this is my daughter, and my son, and a woman that I used to
love and **** a lot, also, a fantastic Mother, and when
I'm twacked out d-toxing- drifting off to sleep, and
laughing about what to call her, I might just call her
my little bluebird, that burrows in my heart.

I believe in romance,
in love
and souls
and spirits.
in everyday, everything
a leaf can move
can touch
can grow.
I believe in forever with you
a forever with
you in the nest
of a bluebird.
love, the bluebird sings.

In lonely moments
I stroll the waning memories
when love pure smiled blissfully
deep within a fawning heart

a wistful melody arises untainted
like a steaming enslaved passion
                         breathlessly released
                              unrestrained,..

         ­                          evident
                    as the pressed and dried flowers
          cuddled between life's ardent petaled pages,
                         bookmarks of the heart

                         traces of the wild bouquets
                         that often soothingly caress’d
                         the energizing tingles  
                         inflaming a tantalizing touch

                         the yearning  empty voids
                         feverishly undressed,
                         traced in the hidden sands
                         of unexplored oceans..
                        
                         though time and distance
make the bereft heart grow helplessly fonder,
memories fade softly as the summer breeze befalls,
  
                         as gentle feather’d touch
                         the evanescent sunset afterglow
                         where the earth and sky align
                         the dimming of the day

         loving can heal
the poet’s bleeding words,
loving can mend your soul ―

                         the perennial dawning of an
                         unpromised new day
                         will someday come again

        bequeathed like the bluebird’s mirthful song
to bring forth nascent wild flowers’ blossoming petals
              flourishing in the meadow of my heart


                 *Someone you used to know

nobody
knows
where
the
bluebird of Tokyo
goes
to
sing
in
the
key of night
Your
wings
flutter
above
the
Breckenridge blue light

after
the
words
we say
we flock
the
bluebird moon

eph you see kay etouffee if you see Kay tell her a catawampus catahoula hound hog dog crossed bayou levee last night all right what did you say if you see Kay tell her a catawampus catahoula hog dog crossed the levee last night all right i heard what you said the first time why you got to repeat eph you see kay you ******* ****** **** what? what did you say you ******* ****** **** heard you the first time you **** a **** a ***** a ***** hello stop end begin believe conceive create no thank you i already ate what? what did you say begin believe conceive create no thank you i already ate quit ******* repeating yourself  you ******* ******* hello stop end begin believe conceive create eph you see kay etouffee if you see Kay tell her a catawampus catahoula hog dog crossed the levee last night all right

the renown physicist dressed in brown wool suit brown leather laced shoes white shirt burgundy knitted tie wild curly graying hair climbed the stairs walked across the stage stood at the lectern adjusted narrow support pole height reached down into brown leather briefcase retrieved his thesis concerning the relative theory of everything tapped microphone composed his posture made a guttural sound clearing his throat looked out at packed full auditorium it became evident to the distinguished audience the renown physicist’s fly was open and his ***** hanging out it was unanimously dismissed as a case of professorial absent-mindedness

all the creatures of the earth (excluding humans) convened for an emergency session the bigger creatures talked first grizzly bears stood upright explaining demand for gallbladders bile paws make us more valuable dead than alive sharks testified Asian fisherman cut off our fins for soup then throw us back into the sea to die elephants thumping heavy feet stepped forward yeah poachers **** us for our tusks rhinos concurred yes they **** us for our horns wild Mustang horses neighed about violent round-ups then slaughtered processed for cat food whales complained of going deaf from submarine sonar tests then sold for meat many dolphins sea turtles tuna swordfish sea bass smaller fish swam forward pleading about getting caught in long line nets barbed baited hooks over-fished colonies chimpanzees described nightmares of being stolen from their mom’s when they are very young then used in research labs for horrible tests song birds chirped about loss of their habitats land tortoises spoke in gentle voices about being wiped out for housing developments saguaro cactuses dropped their arms in discouragement masses of penguins solemnly marched in suicidal unison to edge of melting icebergs polar bears and seals wept honey bees buzzed colony collapse disorder bats flapped about white nose syndrome coyotes and wolves howled lonesome prairie laments the session grew gloomy with heart-wrenching unbearable sadness sobbing crying then a black mutt dog spoke up my greyhound brothers and sisters and all my family of creatures i sympathize with your hurt but it is important to realize there are people who care love us want to protect us not all humans are ravenous carnivores or heartless profiteers a calico cat crept alongside black dog and rubbed her head against his chest an old gray mare admitted her love for a race horse jockey who died years ago a bluebird sang a song suddenly lots more creatures advanced with stories of human kindness Captain Paul Watson Madeleine Pickens Jane Goodall a redwood tree named Luna testified about Julia Butterfly Hill the winds clouds sky discussed concerns by Al Gore lots and lots of other names were mentioned and the whole tone of the meeting changed every one agreed they needed to wait and see what the next generation of people would do whether humans would acknowledge the cruelties threats of extinction and learn grow figure out ways to sustain mother earth father sky then the meeting let out just as the sun was rising on a new day

there is a cemetery in Paris named Père Lachaise buried there are the remains of Jim Morrison Oscar Wilde Richard Wright Karl Appel Guillaume Apollinaire Honoré de Balzac Sarah Bernhardt the empty urn of Maria Callas Frédéric Chopin Colette Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot Nancy Clara Cunard Honoré Daumier Jacques-Louis David Eugène Delacroix Isadora Duncan Paul Éluard Max Ernst Suzanne Flon Loie Fuller Théodore Géricault Yvette Guilbert Jean Ingres Clarence Laughlin Pierre Levegh Jean-François Lyotard Marcel Marceau Amedeo Modigliani Molière Yves Montand Pascale Ogier Christine Pascal Édith Piaf Marcel Proust Georges Seurat Simone Signoret Gertrude Stein Louis Visconti Maria Countess Walewska and many other extraordinary souls it is rumored at late dusk their ghosts climb from graves gather drink fine brandy from costly crystal glasses smoke fragrant cigars and once a year on November 2 party hard all night culminating in deliriously promiscuous ****** **** it’s difficult to know what the truth is since the dead don’t talk or do they

Bluebird singing
In the dawn
Perched upon the highest branch
As the pink sun
Kisses the hills

I wish I were you, Bluebird
You're so pretty and free,
Your feathers are painted
Bold blue
The most magnificent hue

If I were a bird,
I would be you
Wouldn't it be nice to be a bird?
Humans tend to complicate life,
Unnecessarily

If I were you
I would soar high
Or sometimes I would just
Fly swiftly through a field of tall grass
I would
Fly right into the sunset every evening
To the point where it would feel like I was spanning the
Entire globe
Then, I would have to let my bird instincts
Lead me back to my home.

I believe in romance,
in love
and souls
and spirits.
in everyday, everything
a leaf can move
can touch
can grow.
I believe in forever with you
a forever with
you in the nest
of a bluebird.
love, the bluebird sings.

how true, you’ve been lonely
so like a bluebird from my window
you came, to beg for my eyes
you flew, for me to see your color
above this city, beneath the bluest skies  

yet, like a bluebird from my window
you should be free
I’m not the cure to your pain, I’ll never be
for to dream of the zenith, is all I do
I see nothing but zenith, how real, how true

i heard a bluebird singing  such a lovely tune
beneath the stars so bright and the silver moon
a lovely melody with such a lovely beat
it filled me up love with and swept me of my feet

every note in time every note in tune
with his gentle voice i began to swoon
it me feel serene and so very calm
a lovely song of love filled with so much charm

then he flew away in to the midnight sky
flapped his wings so gently as he said goodbye

She is robed in beauty

Singing of the dawn

Shades and hues

Of innocence and color

Make her glow

Like new found love

Sparkling like dew

She has captivated my heart

And captured my eyes

But not my spirit

Even she is not enough

To quell my dark desire

Pity and mercy

Have left my primal soul

I am born to ****

Purpose supplants passion

Gaze becomes focus

As I set to destroy her

Her death to come

In one moment

Frozen in my heart

Will destroy me

But I do it anyway