Professor experienced was he.
Woke up in the morn asking tea.
Hurriedly bathed and brushed.
Towards steely almirah he rushed.

Couldn't decide which pant to wear.
Called wife to decide combing his hair.
Shirts were of different color and hue.
Mother came and chose color blue.

His father decided which tie he'll tie.
While he ate poori and aloo fry.
Couldn't decide which shoes were best.
Daughter chose brown and left the rest.

Couldn't decide 'tween bus and auto.
Son advised from auto he should go.
Entered class room briskly walking;
And taught 'Effective decision making.'

after the painting by Mary Fedden

I kept seeing her around and about, but mostly on the beach. This is a small community and after five years or so I know who everyone is, except those who visit in the summer, though I am getting to know some of the regulars. I reckon she’s my age. When she looks at me in the store, and I look at her and smile, her smile tells me these things.

I have trouble with my hair. It’s thinned and doesn’t grow quite as it should. When I was pregnant and then nursing my children it was positively luxuriant. But later, and despite medical advice (and treatment I was unsure about and abandoned) it became an embarrassment, until he reassured me (just once) and I became an ‘adored woman’. He never ever spoke of it again and loved me so wholly and beautifully I had no reason for it to matter in his company, in his arms.

But seeing her, and often on the beach, more and more regularly, seeing her with her mane of strong dark brown hair flowing behind her in the wind, I felt a curious desire for such a wealth of hair. In fact, I began to feel something stir in me that was desire of a different kind. I can’t think I had ever looked at a woman in quite that way in any previous life. It was always men I sought, I wanted.

Her name is Sara, no h, just an A at the end. She said that when I eventually introduced myself. We were walking towards each other, barefoot both on that glistening skin of water the sea creates between the tides coming and going. It was about midday and I was, I was thinking and walking. I do this now. I don’t bring my sketchbook, I don’t look everywhere I can and more so, I have begun to retreat into my most private self. Perhaps it’s my age and so many years of feeling I had to be wholly attentive and active. Being in this remote place, almost permanently, has slowed me down, and I have begun to dream, to see beyond what I usually would have seen moment to moment. I’ve been re-reading the prose and poetry of Kathleen Raine, who understood this sea-swept place and was haunted by its ghosts, and who dreamed.

Never, never, again
This moment, never
These slow ripples
Across smooth water,
Never again these
Clouds white and grey
In sky crystalline
Blue as the tern’s cry
Shrill in the light air
Salt from the ocean,
Sweet from flowers

Oh yes,  ‘the sun that rose this morning from the sea will never return . . .’* I have become a watcher, no longer an observer. I put my camera away last winter and now hold moments in my memory. Here I can sketch. I can have all the time I need, and more. And I knew when I began to talk to Sara I wanted beyond anything else to sketch her, to know her line by line with the pen, and later bring the texture of her into paint.

Painting is where I am now. It’s direct, mesmeric, challenging, wholly absorbing. My needles and thread only deal with our clothes, my clever printing and collaging lies dormant in my studio, a studio I rarely enter now. I have a room upstairs in the loft that is all light and sky. There’s just an easel, a table, a chair, a small bookcase, a trolley-thing of paints and brushes. Even that’s too much. I always collected things around me. I brought so much in from outside and now I’m trying, trying to have as little as possible. This is where I will paint Sara. I’m already thinking this as we take the first tentative steps towards knowing one another. Names, where we live, (we both know). Partners, family, children? I have all this, but not here, only my companion, my love who caresses me with such care and attention. There are my cats and my hens. She has no one, or rather she talks of no one. She asks the questions and avoids giving answers. She just nods and doesn’t answer. Otherwise, she’s a straight yes / no person. She doesn’t feel she has to qualify anything.

We’re standing together. We’re intent on looking at each other. Words seem a little unnecessary because what we both want to do is look. ‘I can tell you paint’, she says, ‘It’s your finger nails’. My perfect nails and the pads of my fingers hold the evidence of a morning at my easel. ‘I have seen your work’, she says, ‘One could hardly not. You’re well known beyond these shores.’ I feel myself blushing slightly. I thought blushing had stopped with the menopause, not that it troubled me much, the menopause that is. Blushing though was a torturous part of my adolescence, but let’s not go into that.

‘Your husband,’ she says, ‘he’s up very early. I see him sometimes here, on the beach.’
‘Do you get up at five?’ I am surprised. My husband gets up before five.
‘Sleep is difficult sometimes. I walk a lot. I need to be out, and walk.’

Her face, her head is larger than mine. She is a larger woman altogether, bigger *****, long-legged, but with youthful ******* that seem taut and well-rounded under her brown frock, no, her brown dress. I only think frock because that’s what he says – ‘I love that frock.’ And he means usually whatever I am wearing now that’s old and rich in memories of his hands knowing me through a dress, sorry a frock, which remains for me (and possibly for him) the most sensuous of sensations, still. Au nature has its place, and I love the rub of his skin and body hair. But when we are lovers, and we are still lovers and usually when travelling, in hotel rooms or borrowed cottages, or visiting friends and dare I say it, staying with our various children. Last autumn in Venice, in this large, amazing marble-tiled room, with this huge bed, he undressed me in front of a window opening onto our own terrace, and I was beside myself with passion, desire, oh all those wonderful things. And for months afterwards I would return to that early evening, remembering the lights coming on all over the watered city as he kissed and stroked and brushed my body through my Gudrun Sjödén frock. I would replay, find again over and over, those exquisite moments of such joyful touching as he then undressed me, and with such care and tenderness I felt myself crying out. Well, he says I did. In one of his poems (for your eyes only, he had whispered) he admits to his own celebration of those moments again, again.

Sara’s dress is calf-length. There’s nothing else. As the breeze wraps itself around the loose-fitting brown cotton her naked figure is revealed inside itself. No ring, no jewellery, nothing to hold her hair now flowing behind her. She has positioned herself so it does; flow out behind her. This is so strange. Am I dreaming this? We have become silent and together look in silence at the sea. I can hear her short breathes. She turns to me with a smile and looks straight into my eyes – and says nothing – and then walks backward a few steps – still with her warm smile – turns and walks away.

I tell him I met Sara today and ask if he sees her on the beach in the early mornings. Yes, he has, in the distance, mostly. He has said good morning to her on a few occasions, but she has smiled and said nothing. Five o’clock is far too early to say anything, he says. She swims occasionally. I keep my distance, he says with a grin.

I tell him I would like to paint her. I should, he says, You should go and ask her, do it, get it done and out of your system. It’s time you stopped being afraid of the face, the portrait, the figurative. I’d give so much to have been able to paint you, he says ruefully, my darling, my dearest. And he strokes my arm, kisses my cheek, then, he slowly and carefully kneels down beside my chair, places his arm across the top of my thighs so when I bend to kiss him his bare forearm touches the edge of my *******. He puts his head in my lap, and I caress his ears, his quite white hair.

Sara’s door is open. She’s living in Ralph’s cottage, a summer-let habitable (just) in the nearly autumn time it is. I call, ‘Sara, it’s me’, thinking she’ll recognize my voice, not wishing to say my name. She appears at the door. ‘I have the kettle on, she says, ‘I had a feeling you might be by.’ Her accent is, like mine, un-regional, carefully articulated, a Welsh tinge perhaps. There’s an uplift and a slowness in some of the vowels. ‘You will come in’, she says, more a statement than a question. It’s rather dark inside. There’s a reading lamp on, but she has the chair, her chair, close by the window. There are letters being written. There are books. Not Ralph’s, but what she has brought with her. Normally, I would be hopelessly inquisitive, but I can’t stop myself looking at her, wondering even now, in these first few moments in this dark room, how I will position her to paint her form, her face, her nature. What will I paint? I look at her still-bare feet, her large hands.

And so, with mugs of tea, Indian tea I don’t drink, but here, as her guest I do, but without milk, we sit, I on the only other chair (from the kitchen) she on the floor. And she watches me look about, and look at her.

‘I’m rather done with talking, with polite conversation. That’s why I’m here to be done with all that for a while.’
‘I came to ask you to sit for me. To let me draw you, paint you even. You can be completely quiet. I won’t say a word. I’ve never, ever asked anyone to sit for me. I’m not that sort of painter. But when I saw you on the beach it was the first thing that came into my head.’
‘I should be flattered. Though I have sat for artists before, when I was a little younger,’ surprisingly she mentions two names I know, both women. ‘I know how to be still. But, those are days in a different life.’
‘I only want to paint you in the life you have now.’ And I realise then that what I want to paint was Sara’s ‘aloneness’. I think then I have never been truly alone since he came into my life and took any loneliness I had from me. Whenever we are apart, and still there are times, he writes to me the tenderest letters, the most touching poems, he quotes his Chinese favourites down the telephone. We always, always speak to each other before bed, even when we are on different continents and time-zones. He told me I was always his last thought before sleep. And I wonder if I would be his last thought . . .

‘Do you want to do this formally?, said Sara.
‘I don’t know. Yet. I’d like to draw you first, be with you for a little while, perhaps to walk. A little while at a time. Whatever might suit you.’
‘Would you pay me? I have little money. It would be useful.’
‘Of course’, I say this directly, having no idea about what one pays a model. He will know though. He knew Paula Rego and didn’t she have a female model? I think of those large full-length figures rendered in pastels. Her model’s name was Lila, who for more than 25 years, had sat for her, stood for her, crouched for her, hour after hour and day after day. I remember a newspaper piece that went something like this: since 1985 Lila has helped to give life, in paint, and pastel, and charcoal, to the characters in Paula Rego's head. Lila was all Paula Rego’s women.

‘Sara’, I said, ‘help me please. It’s taken more than a little courage to come to see you, to ask you. My husband says I should do this, finally get myself painting the person, the face, body, not as some exercise in a life class, but the real thing.’
‘Of course’, she says, ‘Let’s go and walk to the point.’

And we did. Not saying very much at all, but I suppose I did. She made me talk and gradually I laid my life out in front of her, and not the life she would have found in those glossy monographs and catalogue introductions, and God forbid, not in those media features and interviews that I suppose have made me a name I’d always dreamed of becoming, and now could do without.

‘I suppose you have a studio’, she said suddenly, ‘Is that where you’d want me to come?’
‘Yes, I have a studio. No, I don’t think I want you to come there. Not at first anyway.’ I was floundering. ‘ I’d like to draw you, paint you possibly on the beach, where we met, so there would be sea and sky and breeze blowing your hair.’
‘And a steamer out on the horizon belching smoke from its funnel and the sea blowing white horses and dancing about. I’d be right by the seastrand with waves and spray and foam, and under a greyish sky. Not a sunny day. A breezy day. In my brown dress, sitting on the sand by the tide marks, looking out to sea, looking at the steamer away in the distance, sitting with my left hand behind me holding myself up, and the shape of my legs akimbo bent slightly under my brown dress. How would that be?’
‘Perfect’, I said.

And it was.

He was a Grecian lad, who coming home
With pulpy figs and wine from Sicily
Stood at his galley’s prow, and let the foam
Blow through his crisp brown curls unconsciously,
And holding wave and wind in boy’s despite
Peered from his dripping seat across the wet and stormy night.

Till with the dawn he saw a burnished spear
Like a thin thread of gold against the sky,
And hoisted sail, and strained the creaking gear,
And bade the pilot head her lustily
Against the nor’west gale, and all day long
Held on his way, and marked the rowers’ time with measured song.

And when the faint Corinthian hills were red
Dropped anchor in a little sandy bay,
And with fresh boughs of olive crowned his head,
And brushed from cheek and throat the hoary spray,
And washed his limbs with oil, and from the hold
Brought out his linen tunic and his sandals brazen-soled,

And a rich robe stained with the fishers’ juice
Which of some swarthy trader he had bought
Upon the sunny quay at Syracuse,
And was with Tyrian broideries inwrought,
And by the questioning merchants made his way
Up through the soft and silver woods, and when the labouring day

Had spun its tangled web of crimson cloud,
Clomb the high hill, and with swift silent feet
Crept to the fane unnoticed by the crowd
Of busy priests, and from some dark retreat
Watched the young swains his frolic playmates bring
The firstling of their little flock, and the shy shepherd fling

The crackling salt upon the flame, or hang
His studded crook against the temple wall
To Her who keeps away the ravenous fang
Of the base wolf from homestead and from stall;
And then the clear-voiced maidens ‘gan to sing,
And to the altar each man brought some goodly offering,

A beechen cup brimming with milky foam,
A fair cloth wrought with cunning imagery
Of hounds in chase, a waxen honey-comb
Dripping with oozy gold which scarce the bee
Had ceased from building, a black skin of oil
Meet for the wrestlers, a great boar the fierce and white-tusked
spoil

Stolen from Artemis that jealous maid
To please Athena, and the dappled hide
Of a tall stag who in some mountain glade
Had met the shaft; and then the herald cried,
And from the pillared precinct one by one
Went the glad Greeks well pleased that they their simple vows had
done.

And the old priest put out the waning fires
Save that one lamp whose restless ruby glowed
For ever in the cell, and the shrill lyres
Came fainter on the wind, as down the road
In joyous dance these country folk did pass,
And with stout hands the warder closed the gates of polished brass.

Long time he lay and hardly dared to breathe,
And heard the cadenced drip of spilt-out wine,
And the rose-petals falling from the wreath
As the night breezes wandered through the shrine,
And seemed to be in some entranced swoon
Till through the open roof above the full and brimming moon

Flooded with sheeny waves the marble floor,
When from his nook up leapt the venturous lad,
And flinging wide the cedar-carven door
Beheld an awful image saffron-clad
And armed for battle! the gaunt Griffin glared
From the huge helm, and the long lance of wreck and ruin flared

Like a red rod of flame, stony and steeled
The Gorgon’s head its leaden eyeballs rolled,
And writhed its snaky horrors through the shield,
And gaped aghast with bloodless lips and cold
In passion impotent, while with blind gaze
The blinking owl between the feet hooted in shrill amaze.

The lonely fisher as he trimmed his lamp
Far out at sea off Sunium, or cast
The net for tunnies, heard a brazen *****
Of horses smite the waves, and a wild blast
Divide the folded curtains of the night,
And knelt upon the little ****, and prayed in holy fright.

And guilty lovers in their venery
Forgat a little while their stolen sweets,
Deeming they heard dread Dian’s bitter cry;
And the grim watchmen on their lofty seats
Ran to their shields in haste precipitate,
Or strained black-bearded throats across the dusky parapet.

For round the temple rolled the clang of arms,
And the twelve Gods leapt up in marble fear,
And the air quaked with dissonant alarums
Till huge Poseidon shook his mighty spear,
And on the frieze the prancing horses neighed,
And the low tread of hurrying feet rang from the cavalcade.

Ready for death with parted lips he stood,
And well content at such a price to see
That calm wide brow, that terrible maidenhood,
The marvel of that pitiless chastity,
Ah! well content indeed, for never wight
Since Troy’s young shepherd prince had seen so wonderful a sight.

Ready for death he stood, but lo! the air
Grew silent, and the horses ceased to neigh,
And off his brow he tossed the clustering hair,
And from his limbs he throw the cloak away;
For whom would not such love make desperate?
And nigher came, and touched her throat, and with hands violate

Undid the cuirass, and the crocus gown,
And bared the ******* of polished ivory,
Till from the waist the peplos falling down
Left visible the secret mystery
Which to no lover will Athena show,
The grand cool flanks, the crescent thighs, the bossy hills of
snow.

Those who have never known a lover’s sin
Let them not read my ditty, it will be
To their dull ears so musicless and thin
That they will have no joy of it, but ye
To whose wan cheeks now creeps the lingering smile,
Ye who have learned who Eros is,—O listen yet awhile.

A little space he let his greedy eyes
Rest on the burnished image, till mere sight
Half swooned for surfeit of such luxuries,
And then his lips in hungering delight
Fed on her lips, and round the towered neck
He flung his arms, nor cared at all his passion’s will to check.

Never I ween did lover hold such tryst,
For all night long he murmured honeyed word,
And saw her sweet unravished limbs, and kissed
Her pale and argent body undisturbed,
And paddled with the polished throat, and pressed
His hot and beating heart upon her chill and icy breast.

It was as if Numidian javelins
Pierced through and through his wild and whirling brain,
And his nerves thrilled like throbbing violins
In exquisite pulsation, and the pain
Was such sweet anguish that he never drew
His lips from hers till overhead the lark of warning flew.

They who have never seen the daylight peer
Into a darkened room, and drawn the curtain,
And with dull eyes and wearied from some dear
And worshipped body risen, they for certain
Will never know of what I try to sing,
How long the last kiss was, how fond and late his lingering.

The moon was girdled with a crystal rim,
The sign which shipmen say is ominous
Of wrath in heaven, the wan stars were dim,
And the low lightening east was tremulous
With the faint fluttering wings of flying dawn,
Ere from the silent sombre shrine his lover had withdrawn.

Down the steep rock with hurried feet and fast
Clomb the brave lad, and reached the cave of Pan,
And heard the goat-foot snoring as he passed,
And leapt upon a grassy knoll and ran
Like a young fawn unto an olive wood
Which in a shady valley by the well-built city stood;

And sought a little stream, which well he knew,
For oftentimes with boyish careless shout
The green and crested grebe he would pursue,
Or snare in woven net the silver trout,
And down amid the startled reeds he lay
Panting in breathless sweet affright, and waited for the day.

On the green bank he lay, and let one hand
Dip in the cool dark eddies listlessly,
And soon the breath of morning came and fanned
His hot flushed cheeks, or lifted wantonly
The tangled curls from off his forehead, while
He on the running water gazed with strange and secret smile.

And soon the shepherd in rough woollen cloak
With his long crook undid the wattled cotes,
And from the stack a thin blue wreath of smoke
Curled through the air across the ripening oats,
And on the hill the yellow house-dog bayed
As through the crisp and rustling fern the heavy cattle strayed.

And when the light-foot mower went afield
Across the meadows laced with threaded dew,
And the sheep bleated on the misty weald,
And from its nest the waking corncrake flew,
Some woodmen saw him lying by the stream
And marvelled much that any lad so beautiful could seem,

Nor deemed him born of mortals, and one said,
‘It is young Hylas, that false runaway
Who with a Naiad now would make his bed
Forgetting Herakles,’ but others, ‘Nay,
It is Narcissus, his own paramour,
Those are the fond and crimson lips no woman can allure.’

And when they nearer came a third one cried,
‘It is young Dionysos who has hid
His spear and fawnskin by the river side
Weary of hunting with the Bassarid,
And wise indeed were we away to fly:
They live not long who on the gods immortal come to spy.’

So turned they back, and feared to look behind,
And told the timid swain how they had seen
Amid the reeds some woodland god reclined,
And no man dared to cross the open green,
And on that day no olive-tree was slain,
Nor rushes cut, but all deserted was the fair domain,

Save when the neat-herd’s lad, his empty pail
Well slung upon his back, with leap and bound
Raced on the other side, and stopped to hail,
Hoping that he some comrade new had found,
And gat no answer, and then half afraid
Passed on his simple way, or down the still and silent glade

A little girl ran laughing from the farm,
Not thinking of love’s secret mysteries,
And when she saw the white and gleaming arm
And all his manlihood, with longing eyes
Whose passion mocked her sweet virginity
Watched him awhile, and then stole back sadly and wearily.

Far off he heard the city’s hum and noise,
And now and then the shriller laughter where
The passionate purity of brown-limbed boys
Wrestled or raced in the clear healthful air,
And now and then a little tinkling bell
As the shorn wether led the sheep down to the mossy well.

Through the grey willows danced the fretful gnat,
The grasshopper chirped idly from the tree,
In sleek and oily coat the water-rat
Breasting the little ripples manfully
Made for the wild-duck’s nest, from bough to bough
Hopped the shy finch, and the huge tortoise crept across the
slough.

On the faint wind floated the silky seeds
As the bright scythe swept through the waving grass,
The ouzel-**** splashed circles in the reeds
And flecked with silver whorls the forest’s glass,
Which scarce had caught again its imagery
Ere from its bed the dusky tench leapt at the dragon-fly.

But little care had he for any thing
Though up and down the beech the squirrel played,
And from the copse the linnet ‘gan to sing
To its brown mate its sweetest serenade;
Ah! little care indeed, for he had seen
The ******* of Pallas and the naked wonder of the Queen.

But when the herdsman called his straggling goats
With whistling pipe across the rocky road,
And the shard-beetle with its trumpet-notes
Boomed through the darkening woods, and seemed to bode
Of coming storm, and the belated crane
Passed homeward like a shadow, and the dull big drops of rain

Fell on the pattering fig-leaves, up he rose,
And from the gloomy forest went his way
Past sombre homestead and wet orchard-close,
And came at last unto a little quay,
And called his mates aboard, and took his seat
On the high ****, and pushed from land, and loosed the dripping
sheet,

And steered across the bay, and when nine suns
Passed down the long and laddered way of gold,
And nine pale moons had breathed their orisons
To the chaste stars their confessors, or told
Their dearest secret to the downy moth
That will not fly at noonday, through the foam and surging froth

Came a great owl with yellow sulphurous eyes
And lit upon the ship, whose timbers creaked
As though the lading of three argosies
Were in the hold, and flapped its wings and shrieked,
And darkness straightway stole across the deep,
Sheathed was Orion’s sword, dread Mars himself fled down the steep,

And the moon hid behind a tawny mask
Of drifting cloud, and from the ocean’s marge
Rose the red plume, the huge and horned casque,
The seven-cubit spear, the brazen targe!
And clad in bright and burnished panoply
Athena strode across the stretch of sick and shivering sea!

To the dull sailors’ sight her loosened looks
Seemed like the jagged storm-rack, and her feet
Only the spume that floats on hidden rocks,
And, marking how the rising waters beat
Against the rolling ship, the pilot cried
To the young helmsman at the stern to luff to windward side

But he, the overbold adulterer,
A dear profaner of great mysteries,
An ardent amorous idolater,
When he beheld those grand relentless eyes
Laughed loud for joy, and crying out ‘I come’
Leapt from the lofty **** into the chill and churning foam.

Then fell from the high heaven one bright star,
One dancer left the circling galaxy,
And back to Athens on her clattering car
In all the pride of venged divinity
Pale Pallas swept with shrill and steely clank,
And a few gurgling bubbles rose where her boy lover sank.

And the mast shuddered as the gaunt owl flew
With mocking hoots after the wrathful Queen,
And the old pilot bade the trembling crew
Hoist the big sail, and told how he had seen
Close to the stern a dim and giant form,
And like a dipping swallow the stout ship dashed through the storm.

And no man dared to speak of Charmides
Deeming that he some evil thing had wrought,
And when they reached the strait Symplegades
They beached their galley on the shore, and sought
The toll-gate of the city hastily,
And in the market showed their brown and pictured pottery.

Facebook thank you for connecting me with the people from my past
For unleasing the jelouse side of me being stuck and others passing through
Thank you for making me see that dreams are slow but safe careers are for every one. I mean I don't wanna work at the mines but all my past is over there taking salfies expressing joys and progress
Facebook I check you everyday yet I gain none from you
In a world I live in all is difficult to achieve
So I'm putting a smile on my face showing teeth that have been brushed
Taking a selfie of myself looking beautiful, instead of worried and scared ill post it and get liked for a while
Facebook you beat all buying you roll out the desires and never spead next to ideas
So ill post my self and pretend
I'm doing that for my selfie

Everyday caught
In the labyrinth of mind,
I am,
Where dreams,
And desires
And lust,
From nothing
Conspire something.

Destination: Canada Water.
The next station is Surrey Quays.
Doors will open on the right-hand side.
Exit here for Goldsmith's College.

In the cerebellum
Fragments flash cerebrum bright:
Wheels in tunnels burn,
A neural screech amplified deep,
As waves of electrons churn,
And in multiple places keep.

This stop:
- My birth -
Is in Westminster!

It’s time:

Do you love me?
DO YOU LOVE ME?
          Yes, No, Ohhh (the audience).

In the space-time continuum,
The labyrinth is forever,
Within a fourth dimension.

It’s time …

You love me, right?
YOU LOVE ME, RIGHT?
    Yes, No, Ohhh (the audience).

DO-MI-NA-TION
DEATH FREE
DO-MI-NA-TION
ASH FREE

Lost in the labyrinth: a journey to an exit.
The Overground train pulls!
And from floor to ceiling,
Between vertical orange pins,
A medley of languid listless limbs lulls,
       Seated hips,
       Angled legs,
       Dangling feet,
And neck-less heads,
Lost, ghoul-like,
The disconcerted move doggedly on,
Everywhere somewhere; but forever nowhere
Through London's hills and bogs.

From  STOP to STOP,
In the labyrinthine network,
In tubes splayed out on cubes,
Of bright brushed viscose comfort,
Overhead, the ads exhort:

       Top Up Your Soul,
       Fast Forward Your Escape
And
       uSwipe
       uSwitch
       uSave

Like these,
A hundred escalating messages,
Each more insistent than the last,
Compel, enough to distract,
So man’s desire enslaves his heart.

Its time…

         You love, right?
YOU LOVE, RIGHT?
    Yes, No, Ohhh (the audience).

DO-MI-NA-TION
DEATH FREE
DO-MI-NA-TION
ASH FREE

How? Why?
Has bacterial sludge,
Built these edifices of glass and steel.
This labyrinthian cage,
Whose walls race up at the speed of light,
While the inner commuter flame gutters,
Everywher, in multiverses,
Supernovas explode in showers.
And for a moment, in the moment, The Overground chromatic glows.

New Cross Gate, Canada Water, Southwark.

Lit and digital and LCD:
        
  ALL CHANGE, PLEASE.
  THIS TRAIN TERMINATES HERE

A few automated steps, and:
       Southwark,
       Green Park,
       Then Baker Street,
Appear, fade and disappear.

Now walking down Belsize Road,
On the evening of the
Super Gibbous Moon,
As it rises high over the Ziggurat dimensions of the Alexandra Estate,
And all is blood orange at dusk,
As I, a slinking silhouette,
Make for the event horizon of home,
For surely given, and taken,
A few more bends, another turn,

It’s time, again.

         Love, right?
         LOVE, RIGHT?
    Yes, No, Ohhh (the audience).

DO-MI-NA-TION
DEATH FREE
DO-MI-NA-TION
FREE ME.

To the event horizon of consciousness,
To that black hole at the core.
In death's star-like eye,
Embrace, pass through,
(Fear not),
On, through the labyrinth northward,
Entering and exiting,
We go awhile, a little longer.

Stars, my Stars,
Again, it's time.

You love me, right?
YOU LOVE ME, RIGHT?
Yes, No, Ohhh (the audience).

SU-PER-NA-TU-RAL
SU-PER-NA-TU-RAL
DEATH FREE.
LOVE!
BE,
WINGS FREE:

     SU-PER-NA-TU-RAL

One more stop:

       New Bond Street.

GET BEYOND
DESIRE,
BEYOND THE LABYRINTHEAN LIE,
CONSUMER, DIE!
BE
MATERIAL FREE.

Last stop:

       No-name, this one:

BE:

     SU-PER-NA-TU-RAL.

SAY IT:

     SU-PER-NA-TU-RAL
     SU-PER-NA-TU-RAL
     DEATH FREE.
     LOVE!
     BE,
     WINGS FREE:
    
     WE ARE:
     SU-PER-NA-TU-RAL

One Winged Angel


Dec 10, 2011, 7:39:29 PM by ~OmegaWolfOfWinter
Journals / Personal




It was very late, and Lucian had just gotten back from his assignment. he unlocked the door to his house and set his things down on the bed. he removed his shirt and removed the bandages on his chest. that demon put up quite a fight... he put on a robe and decided to get some rest. he set his things down on the floor next to him and hung his sword by the bed. he exhaled deeply and relaxed, finally back in the comfort of his own home. sleep quickly enveloped him and he began to dream.
******
Lucian was woken from a deep sleep by the sound of his door breaking down. Two massive angels shrouded in black cloaks stepped inside his room as Lucian scrambled to his feet, feeling a sudden chill beneath his simple white robe. One of the angels spoke, "Lucian, Elite Angel number 373-14, you are under arrest for high treason, grand theft, and ******."
Lucian was dumbfounded at the accusation. "What on heaven are you talking about?!"
the guard-angels grabbed the warrior-angel and dragged him out of his house and onto the streets where a small crowd had gathered. They escorted him to the capitol, which wasn't far away. Lucian gazed up at the massive black monolith before him.
He was immediately sent to the rooftop, where the Punisher was waiting.
Lucian desperately tried to explain. "I've been set up!! Please let me go! I've done nothing wrong!!"
The angel to his left looked at Lucian in disgust. "Quiet, you."
He reached to Lucian's throat and he felt a massive bolt of electricity course through his body. He collapsed in their arms and blacked out for a moment.
He couldn't say anything; he had a sign of silence on his throat. He blacked out again and when he woke he was on his knees in front of the punisher. His hands were bound behind his back and he was held by a multitude of chains and braces. The guard-angel touched his throat and the seal of silence was removed. "elite angel Lucian, number 373-14, you are charged with high treason against the holy city, grand theft of a holy artifact and the murders of 7 holy officials, as punishment-"
"I didn't do any of those things!!!"
"SILENCE!! There is evidence that places you at the scene."
"What-"
"your punishment, you will lose your wings," Lucian gasped and tears formed in his eyes. "...and will be given the Mark of Eternal torture."
"No! Not the Mark!! Please no!!"
The punisher stepped forward and drew his slender sword. As he stepped forward, Lucian squirmed and fought against his bindings but to no avail. "God help me!"
"How dare you speak the lord's name, criminal!" the punisher slashed at Lucian's throat, grazing it and leaving a long, bleeding cut. Lucian groaned and said, "No... No... Please..."
the punisher stepped to Lucian's side and raised the sword. Lucian's tears came and began hyperventilating. "No, NO, NOO!!!"
The punisher brought the sword down and Lucian screamed in agony as one of his wings fell to the ground. Lucian was in so much pain, he wished he could die right then, right there. He was crying now, tears of sorrow and pain. "No, please, I beg you! Have mercy!"
For some reason the punisher then sheathed his sword. "Fine, you may keep your remaining wing."
"th-thank-" he was cut off as the punisher knelt down and grabbed Lucian's throat. He screamed again as he felt an intense burning. He continued to cry out as the punisher released him but the burning remained, slowly spreading over his entire body with such intensity that he lost consciousness multiple times. after an excruciatingly long torture, the burning ceased, and Lucian saw that it had etched runes and twisting lines over his whole body, almost his whole body, it had left his head and hands untouched. His voice had turned into a hiss and he tried to speak. he was unbound and he reached back to touch where his left wing had been, there was only a stump left.
"Lucian, you are hereby renounced of your warrior status. Get him out of my sight." Lucian was escorted outside, where the guardians left him stranded in the street. He blacked out and felt himself being picked up and carried somewhere else.
************
"he's heavy" thought the angel. He carried the limp body off the streets and through alleys, to an abandoned complex not far away. "Melinda!" he called. A slender young angeless came from the shadows.
"Who on heaven is this, Ven?!"
Ven looked around and said, "not here... Let's get inside."
he carried the angel inside and set him down on the dimly lit bed. He was still out cold. Ven sighed and said, "Remember that trip I took to the holy city?"
"Yes of course."
"Things happened there... the Network had me do some things..."
she narrowed her eyes. "What type of things?"
"i-i had to steal some artifacts...and some officials got killed."
"WHAT?!?!"
"i didn't get caught! But... i-i panicked, i blamed it on... On him..."
melinda was speechless," i-i cant..."
"melinda... Please..."
"no, i cant deal with this anymore, i'm leaving."
"wait!"
"no, ven. Figure this out on your own." and she disappeared.
Ven sighed and looked over at the one-winged angel.
"i'm sorry"
the angel stirred slightly but didnt wake. Ven looked at the stump where the angel's wing should have been, and the scars that lined his body.
"i need to take him to the Network... Maybe, maybe then i can finish what i started... And give this angel what i stole from him... I have to take him to the Holy One..."
he closed his eyes for a moment, then,"i promise, you will get your wing back." and he fell asleep.
**********
Lucian woke up as parts of his body burned fiercly. He cried out and writhed in pain. Soon the burning became a simmer, but it still hurt. lucians heart was beating rapidly and he was exhausted. He replayed last night's adventure. He glanced over his shoulder and as expected, he didnt see his wing. he could feel the blood caked on his back and he felt weak when he tried to get up. He fell and caught himself on the table. "wait a moment... Where am i?!" he frantically looked at his surroundings. He saw another angel asleep in a chair and a doorway behind him. The door looked weak but lucian wasnt sure he could do anything in his weakened state. "i have to try..." he ran, or rather stumbled toward the door and managed to break it down. He fell down outside and was temporarily blinded by the sunlight. He managed his way into the street, where the angels looked on in confusion. "i'm... this
is my street..." he hobbled over to his house and stepped inside. nothing had been touched since last night. "i'm not going to be able to find work... I'm not going to be able buy food.. agh! What am i going to do!" he sat on the bed, his head in his hands. he looked over to the wall, where he had his warrior blade hanging just in case. He grabbed his bag and packed some clothes. He changed into his finer dress clothes that he used on formal occasions. He grabbed his bag and put the sword on his belt. "i wish it didnt have to come to this..." he pushed on a spot on the wall and it slid away. Inside the compartment were his warrior armor and weapons. He took off the suit jacket and grabbed his vest. he put various weapons in their spots and shut the wall. He put the suit-jacket back on and buttoned it to conceal the vest. He felt energized and ready for anything. That was until he turned and saw the angel from the complex.
"where do you think You're going?"
"who are you?"
the angel looked amused and said, "you can call me Ven."
"well, Ven, i'm going to find the one who set me up, and i'm going to do what he did to me."
ven looked frightened. "why dont you come with me."
lucian didnt trust this ven. "i'm not going with anyone." and he dove through the window. He sprinted down the street, the bag and his sword held firmly in his hands. "i need money, i need food... I need to find him."
***********
after all these years of loyal service, after all he'd done, he'd been thrown out without trial, revoked his warrior status, and now Lucian was going to find whoever had done this to him, and he was going to make him pay. he was a fallen angel, and he had nothing to lose.
lucian was perched on the top of the church spire, contemplating where to start his search. *the evidence.. what evidence...?
"i'll start with the judges chambers..."
lucian looked to the north, where the monolith towered over the city. he jumped from roof to roof as he neared the building. i'll do whatever i have to... anything to clear my name. different parts of his body started to burn, and the others began to cool off.
the mark... its burning, it's going to keep burning...
he cried out and fell from the roof he was on. he hit the alley hard enough to break bone, but he happened to land on his wing, cushioning his fall, only a little bit though.
this mark is going to **** me someday... he checked his wing and brushed off the dirt. he folded the wing flat against his back and sat up. he got back on his feet and continued to the monolith.
will i have to live with this mark forever?
*************
(one day later)
"GET BACK HERE!!! STOP THAT MAN!!!" lucian was on the run. he found exactly what he was looking for, now he needed to find more information concerning the artifacts and the theif. but first he had to get away. he was turning corners and sprinting like a madman, but he couldnt escape the Detainers. then he heard a voice, "One Wing! over here!"
lucian looked towards where he heard the voice and saw an Angeless beckoning for him to come. "follow me!"
lucian reluctantly followed, winding through abandoned buildings and finally ducking behind an old counter. after a few minutes of silence, the woman said, "okay, we're clear. i'm Elora."
"lucian."
"oh... you're THE One-wing-angel..."
lucian looked down at the ground. "yeah... that's me."
"you were an elite, a warrior angel, weren't you?"
"yeah, but then i was set up and now i'm an outcast..."
"you were set up?"
"yeah, i was. i had everything i ever wanted, why would i need to commit those crimes? i was loyal, and trusted by everyone. and i swear that i will find whoever set me up..."
"and then what?" elora seemed to be waiting for something.
"i'm going to do to him what he did to me."
"what did he-" elora was cut off by lucian as he cried out. "what's wrong?!"
"the mark.... of eternal torture..."
"oh my gosh... i didnt know..."
"its nothing... i'm used to it..."
he took off his suit jacket and elora gasped when she saw his scars. she didn't seem to notice the vest of weapons or the sword at his side. "this is..."
"...the Mark..."
she grimaced as she saw them and said, "i'm sorry..."
"but why?"
"because, i was going to turn you in..."
lucian was on his feet immediately. "what?!"
"wait!! i'm not going to... not after seeing what they did to you..."
"how can i be sure i can trust you?!"
elora looked down at her feet and said, "you cant... but i can get you out of the city..."
"you can?"
************
Lucian was still finding it hard to trust Elora, but he stuck with her anyway. She took him away from the city and was about to turn back. Something inside Lucian wanted her to stay. "Wait! Don't leave. Come with me to the holy city."
She seemed hesitant but willing, "i-ive never been to the holy city...."
"It's an amazing place, quite a sight to see."
She took a moment to think and nodded, "I'll go with you."
Lucian smiled and walked forward. After long hours of relentless walking, Elora asked," how far do we have to travel?"
"A few more hours of walking..."
Elora sighed and said, "Alright..."
Lucian glanced over at her and saw that she was tired. "We should rest."
Elora and Lucian got off of the path ad took shelter beneath some gild-trees. "Elora, go ahead and rest up."
she reluctantly slept, but she was glad to, they had been traveling all day.
Lucian sharpened his blades and meditated while she slept.
Lucian prayed, like he had always done every morning. He had vowed not to let his becoming an outcast interfere with his routine. After he was finished, he sighed and glanced over at Elora; she was fast asleep. He then glanced at the sky and saw dark clouds quickly closing in. Lucian didn't want to wake Elora but he wanted to get her out of the rain. He set his suit jacket and weapons vest next to her and he extended his wing over her just as the rain began to fall. he was pleased to see that the rain would not touch the sleeping angel. On the other hand, Lucian was vulnerable, but he didn't mind. He would rather shelter Elora than himself. Lucian ignored the rain and decided to doze for a while.
***********
Elora woke up as a cold wind blew. She rubbed the sleep from her eyes and saw the millions of raindrops in front of her. it took her a moment to realize that she was dry. she glanced over and saw that Lucian was soaking wet and had his wing extended over her. "You should have woken me, Lucian." she extended one of her wings over him as he shivered.
"th-thanks, e-elora." she could tell he was freezing because even the feather's  above her were shivering. she decided to do something to repay his kindness.
"come closer, we can share body heat." suddenly the feathers stopped shivering, they became rigid, as if lucian was surprised... apparently he was.
"really?"
"yeah, its the least i can do." she sat closer to him and put an arm around him. his skin was cool to the touch and his muscles were tense, but they soon relaxed, as did the feathers above her. he soon stopped shivering and the rain stopped falling.

written June 25, 2013

"The Helpless

She is a broken vase that was knocked over and dusted aside for no one to see
Pieces shattered and left to slowly gather dust year after year
She is the piece of glass that he would step on occasionally, a reminder of his mistakes and how he just brushed her aside like it didnt happen
And that pain he felt  in his foot he also feel deep in his heart as he reminisces that feeling of love he once felt
He  used to hold that vase so dearly, and delicately never wanting to let it break
But - it did

And as soon as it broke he made her believe like she was worthless
That truth emerged when months later she was replaced by a mug much more antique which lasted about a year

And the day finally came when she was thrown away
And the vase was happy once again
Until...

She is a brand new wine glass,
Beautiful and young
In bewilderment on how this all came to be
The broken  watches daily, as he loves this glass  just the way he used to love her

And she sits there, helpless for there's nothing she's can do about it

She's just an old forgotten broken vase
Dusted aside to make room for something better

The Powerful

She was a great and beautiful vase
That held the flowers I meant to give to her
But we couldn't be together, and that tore me apart
As the flowers withered, my love only grew stronger
Upset, I threw the vase on the floor
And cried as I brushed away the evidence

A few months later, school was starting up and it was time to move on with my life
I still think about her time to time, as I step on that broken glass piece that I must have missed..it really reminds me of how much I loved her

Now addicted to caffeine, I bought a cheap antique mug
It's beautiful and presses so gently to my lips every morning and night

It's been a year, and the mug didn't seem to capture my attention the way it used to so I threw it away
I will miss it, but I'm not much for coffee after all

Today I brought home a brand new wine glass
It's tall and beautiful and is anything an alcoholic could ever ask for
It feels right in my hand and helps so dearly with the lonely nights
When I am thinking of the past
And glance over at the broken glass
From the vase I once loved
That is now dusted aside for no one to see"

When we met, your body was in bloom,
Roses of purple black and blue,
Planted without care. Strewn about
the bed, your flesh now painted.

Frozen blue buds pushing
through snow, brushed onto skin.
The petals soft and smooth, spread
Across your body, like a vine.

Blossoms of summer, with shades of winter,
Their roots went deep, coiling and constricting.
They became your arteries and veins,
Your nerves and bones.

I cannot pull these flowers,
Without destroying part of you.
Only time and careful tending,
Will wither the roots.

Only when the flowers fade, if you
will let me, I will plant my seeds.

Everything brings back
Thoughts of the Sea
The Tumultuous Ocean
That whispered to me.

Reality is nothing
After all that has passed
Everything’s tainted
Stained and unchaste.

Hours are seconds
Time stopped the day
He breathed out his last
And faded away.

I’ve stopped writing stories
With sticks in the sand
And brushed them away
With slow grieving hands

The water is silent
Where it strokes the shore
Reaching for someone
Not here anymore.

He was definitely dead.  That much could be gathered.  He was standing over his own body, sixty feet away from the car.  fifty-nine feet away from  the telephone pole.  The pool of blood on the blacktop was rippling from the sheets of rain that were piercing it.  The rain bounced off of his lifeless eyes, staring on into the cloudy sky.   His shocked expression was forever frozen on his face.  He walked around the corpse, both fearful and excited.  He was dead....He was DEAD!  He was on the other side!  He looked around, searching for the 'white light',  but all he found  was a man dressed in a ratty  trench coat staring directly at him.  Rotting teeth smiled at him under a grungy  Fedora in a way that reminded him of a jack-o-lantern carved into the likeness of Indiana Jones that had been left out past Thanksgiving.  A withered hand beckoned him.

He was not hesitant.  He was not fearful.  

Those were emotions controlled by a brain that was currently about as useful as a bag full of gelatin.  He strode forward and took the man's hand.  It was neither hot nor cold.  They were no longer in the rain.  They were in a room with a large monitor
sitting in front of a station of various knobs, buttons, and switches.  A large leather chair apathetically awaited use .  He was aware that none of these objects  actually existed, because they were in the place where things don't exist.  Still, he sat down
and turned on the monitor.  He looked at the labels.  Some were obvious, such as P L A Y,  P A U S E, and S T O P.  Others were strange, like the ones labeled F I R S T S and L A S T S.  He pressed the former.  A list appeared with items as simple as "Kiss" to ones as specific as "Sprained Left Ankle in November".

He chose the former.

The screen went blank, then a video appeared.  It was a boy and a girl lying on a hill on a blanket at the onset of dusk.  The boy he instantly recognized as himself. The boy brushed his hand against hers.  She let him.  Fingers now entwined as they stared at each other.  At the time it had felt like hours, but it was less than a
minute before lips pushed apart to make way for tongues.  His first kiss.  It didn't take him long to figure out how the machine worked from that point on.  

He spent years going through every second of his life and reliving it from a new perspective. It didn't matter, he had all the time that never was and never would be.  He saw his mistakes and his triumphs, his loves and his heartbreaks.  Finally, he decided he was
finished.  It was time to go.  The man in the Fedora smiled.  Smiled that Cheshire smile

They were in a hallway.  It seemed to stretch for miles.  Every twenty paces or so, there was a person, standing on a platform, obscured in darkness.  He walked to the first one.
A light flickered on.  It was his mother.  She looked like she did when he was a boy, vibrant and full of life.  She never lost that, even as her body aged and her health declined, she always had something to smile about.  He talked to this apparition of his mother.   They talked for hours about his life, of random topics.  Things they had never had time to talk about when they were both alive.  After some time, she gave him one of her wry
smiles.  He nodded and made his way to the next person.  His father.  

He continued this for quite some time.  He talked to everyone from his brother to a guy he used to get high with in college.  Years passed as he said his final goodbyes to all the people in his life
that he had ever known.  All of them were happy for him.  All of them had something to tell him that he had never known about them in life.  None of them were real.  When he was done, he turned to the man in the fedora.  A smile.  A smile that had a personality all its own, a smile that simultaneously showed compassion and seething hatred.

The last room.  No one said it was the last room, but it had that feeling of finality to it. It was spartan, nothing in it except a marble floor that seemed to stretch for eternity in every direction.  It probably did.  In front of him were two pedestals.  On each of those
pedestals was himself.  The one on the left was wearing a fine tailored suit, had radiating skin and a smile that cameras feasted on.  The one on the right was a stark contrast.  The teeth he had left were hanging lazily from the roots.  His hair that he had left was thin, oily, and ridden with lice.  His mouth turned upwards in an insane grin that was only
matched by his thirsty, bloodshot eyes that seemed to bulge from his pockmarked skin

                                          They both spoke at once.

You were born on                                           You were born on
July 3, 1985.  Your                                           July 3, 1985.  Your
parents fed your                                         mother died when you
curiosity at a young                                     were 4.  Your father
age.  Your passion                                   turned to alcohol.  He
was art.  You painted                                 took his pain out on you.
your first work when                                     You dropped out of    
you were nine.  By the                                high school and moved
time you were 16, you                             as far away from this
were renowned as a                             life as you could.  You
artistic prodigy.  You                      quickly discovered a bad crowd.
attended the Art                                     You met a girl, Cindy.
Institute of Chicago                                       You got her pregnant.
on a full scholarship.                                   You started selling drugs
It was there that you                                     to make ends meet
would meet Claire,                                       for your accidental family
your future wife. By                                       It wasn't long before
the time you completed                                     You made a mistake
your school, every                                             and ended up in jail.
museum wanted a                                        years later, when you
piece of your work                                       were released
hanging in their gallery                               you found that Cindy      
Your work would be                                       had killed herself
remembered for                                                   and your son.
hundreds of years after                                       You had no job          
your death.  You had                                                 no skills
a wonderful family,                                        You spent your days
fame, fortune, and                                          doing odd jobs for
everything that came                                   money.  Money that
with it.  You lived                                           You spent on drugs
until 89, where you                                        Until the age of 45
died peacefully in                                       Where you froze on a
your bed, surrounded                           street corner, surrounded
by loved ones.  This                        by human excrement.  This
is your life's best                                           is your life's worst
possible outcome                                         possible outcome



He nodded, then looked at the man in the fedora.  That smile crept up.  A smile like a hyena. He snapped his fingers.  Two doors appeared.  One was Oaken and battered.  The grains of wood barely visible over years of neglect.  The other door was new and had just been  painted with a fresh coat of sky blue paint.  

The man spoke for the first time.

This is the last decision you shall ever make.  The door on your left will lead you to the  afterlife, and the judgement that awaits you.  Whatever is decided, that is where you will spend eternity.  The door on the right will allow you to be reborn as a new soul.  This one will no longer exist.

He gave it a good long ponder.  Had he been good enough in life to pass the judgement?  What if he ended up in a hellish nightmare for the rest of eternity?  Could he do better
if he started fresh?  The thoughts swirled about him like a whirlwind until finally.

Years later

He chose.

The man in the fedora smiled.

Sixth grade was the first time I remember feeling out of place in my own body. I tried on a shirt from the year before and realized I wasn't the same size anymore. I felt strange for a moment, then brushed it off. I threw away the shirt the next day. By the end of middle school I knew I was bigger than my friends, but I tried to avoid thinking about it. I just wanted to fit in like the rest of them.

Freshman year I got called fat and decided to make myself invisible. Treated every food as if it an allergy. Lost 30 pounds in 60 days. Told my parents I already ate. Told my friends I was eliminating junk food. Told no one my secret for years.

Gained my weight back then lost it just as quickly. The never ending cycle of starving, binging, purging.
Starving, binging, purging.
Starving, binging, purging.
Nobody notices when I fall off track because disordered eating is only cared about when the victim is skinny enough that you can see the evidence. I have been terrified for four years to speak out for fear nobody would believe me when I told them.
No one expects a bigger girl to not know how to feed herself.
There is something to say about a culture so warped that I get upset by the fact I don't have a stereotypical eating disorder body.

Sometimes I wish it was more obvious, so at least that way they could see how hard I'm trying to be perfect... To fit in.
America, am I not sick enough for you already?

Her branches hung low
to the ground
They brushed the dirt
that they sat upon
How beautiful is pain
when it grows
It has a way to hang
those gentle woes.

See that tree all alone
yet so full?

Her shadows weep
in the bristles of doom
Then the sun comes to play
in the cold bushy monsoon.
As gusty sighs sway her eyes
to greet the galloping moon.

i never wanted to kiss her lips,
just hold her hand
maybe kiss her cheeks because she suited a gentler kind of treatment
something softer and more delicate, quiet;
quieter than the constant raging storms inside my stomach,
inside my mind
(never my heart)

those plump lips
she bit them raw when nervous, and they swelled
blossomed ruby as she looked at me
like she knew this wouldn't last
her eyes remained doughy and mellow
when i met her gaze.

my smile stung as it stretched the lines left by winter's bite
and split them open once more.
she brushed the blood beads away with her fingertips
with a touch so reverent that, for a moment, i thought
maybe she felt as though she were touching rosary beads instead,
and i held my breath to stop myself from chasing her
touch, and pressing her down into the mattress

unholy, chasing pleasure.
both agnostic, but she was much more pure than i;
chivalries always in mind, i wanted to preserve that.
there's always been something inside me
that presses down the animalistic urges with
a conscience caught on consideration and something akin to courtly love-
i wanted to woo her before i pursued her

but i never got further than pressing my lips to her forehead,
wrapping an arm around her shoulders.
i laced my fingers with hers but avoided tying any knots.
i am not a man to be bound,
too free-spirit, too restless, too claustrophobic;
a few months in and i was choking on the ghost of a future;
she kissed me first and i suffocated on the phantom of her hopes for us:
a future that didn't yet exist,
and i didn't want it to.
i never kissed her; i never let her kiss me again.

we tangled fingers over the duvet
the television a background noise to our unsteady breaths,
shallower
than my love for her
i enjoyed her quiet affection like one might enjoy curling into a blanket when cold and ill.
i wanted her smiles, i wanted to fill her memories with goodness
so that she never need feel hopeless, like all men are the same
so that she had something to smile about when she looked back on us;
once the bitterness of our breakup had left her mouth-
whenever that eventual end would be-
she could savour the taste of our sweet, slow-burn, love affair
and be reminded that not all love is true love, but nor is all love heart breaking

i broke her heart anyway.

nobody ever taught me how cruel kindness could be.

Remember that afternoon on the ferry
Ride to Nantucket
The labrador who fell asleep on my foot
And the kid who vomited
As we stood at the rail,
Mist in our faces
Foam that curled
From the keel in swirls
A whole world in that turbulence
That no one would ever know of -
Focused on the Grey Lady's
Promise that a warm comforter
Would melt us together again.
And it did, amid the strangers
We brushed past
On the cobbles at the wharf.
Back at the dock,
You greeted old demons
And so did I
But kept them secrets
From each other
On the long ride
Through pine forests
As you slept, I drove
Back home.

2 better days
of better ways
too bigger dreams
in better words
to the express
of my renditions
in wish-less missions
to infringe in fantasy
as i write out the years
of fearless tears
and scream
in happiness
and chant
of the blasphemers
laugh
in the murmurs
of drunken
entrepreneurs
admiring
sewer structures
plucking
the sutures
of my missed maneuvers
clueless
in my bruise-less
cutsss
toofwisss
and still strutting my luck
in abrupt
catastrophes
compliant
to the clause
of impunity
to rhyme-less scrutiny
to sooth the dream
for today
bolstering
the blame
of melancholy messiahs
playing pariah
on xbox
they gonna fry ya
through savvy ****** talk
with their mouth on your ****
but their ears on the block
to fulfill the onslaught
of a distraught
goofball
in lock
about to drop
calm
in happy bombs
of debilitating
shock
you cannot
talk
when you are
smiling
you cannot galk
when you are
smiling
violently
happy
with ******
knives
fixed to enrich
the lives
of the many
i have plenty
in the trunk
just bend down
and look
ill blend in the boom
of bass
thump
ding
the second thump
closes the trunk
strap up
with me
be blunt
don't want
a ninja on the run
in the sun
of reputation
1 finger away
from
nation-less
the mostest patientest
lyrifi$t
a bu3ro$hit
to 0bl1terat3
the glUt3nou$
of thy most muTtonest
of ch0ps
i cropp3d
the plopp1ng rainb0ws
of raindrop$
and Stopped  .
thE hoPped up ho0ligaNnry
of my N1njary
in my socks
sometimes i rock
but mostly not
i wont stop
until outlined
in chalk
until the froth
from my lips
blinds me
in trips
crossed
with a 5th
into thine own
obscurity
from the groan
of maturity
and the **** flapping
of insecurity
i try lyrically
to be free
and stop rhyming
at least stop whining
just trying
to do my thing
dost thou heart not sing
when im plowed
within the silver lining
devout
with a little shining
came hither
to where the sliding turned to slithering
delivering
my ministry
of infantry
infamously
into comedy
applauding me
in my idiocy
its daunting
in simplicity
marinade me
in a massacre
or a major disaster
watch me blow my ***
in haughty claims
of clogged
alpha/beta waves
enslaved
to a pre paid card
and charged
for helping a man up
in a corrupt
city of butts
entrusting
my paychecks to the *****
of never was
im riding the short bus
until she blushed
and brushed
the *** from her mouth
im gross
a little weirder than most
i boast
in defeat
i facebook
over tweet
as if there be a choice
as i crumple
the invoice
and rejoice
in knowing
i know nothing
i'm [Esc@ping]

I see her around the school all the time.
Never did I think that it'd be her touch... just the right one that I need.
We had the same classes, and unknowingly the same life styles.
Her hand brushed mine as we both reached for a book...
Apologizing at the same time we noticed this was the first time we had talked since the eighth grade.
She had bright red cheeks that matched her red hair, with a smile that could power all of New York City.
One touch of our skin and I instantly became addicted.
They should make a Lesbians anonymous, for girls who crave the touch of "her" and have withdrawals  when kept from it.
Her green eyes over powered me...
With her I am Superman and those eyes sparkling so bright are my biggest kryptonite.
One gentle brush of her hand against mine was enough to have me begging on my knees for just one more time.
She brushed her hair behind her ear as she sideways grinned and looked down to her feet.
Her glasses reflected me in them... all I seen was my lips against hers and my hands holding hers against the wall as I slowly lost the fight to her kryptonite.
I'm now without her touch and love... but have you noticed... Superman always comes in contact with kryptonite again.

A cold October morning,
Treated just like the rest,
The boy awoke nauseous,
With a pain in his chest.

A longing for something,
Far out of his reach,
He settled for darkness,
Brushed red in between.

The pain became pale,
followed next by his skin,
Respiring so slowly,
The lights going dim.

Adrift into nothing,
What feels like a dream,
Is death coming slowly,
A dying brain's final feed.

"Is this what it feels like to be dead, I think I like this feeling"

Awoken abruptly,
Surrounded by fear,
Who are all these people,
and how'd he get here.

Looking up from his back,
A tear falls from her eye,
"Relieved" does her no justice,
For not having to say...

Goodbye..

Anne crutched her way
over the grass
from the nursing home
to the white seats on the lawn
and sat down
in one of the chairs
and threw her crutches
to the ground beside her

I sat in a chair
next to her
she had on a blue skirt
and white blouse
her one leg stuck out
from the end
of her skirt

the other kids played
on the swings and slide
or walked around
avoiding being
near Anne

I wonder
if the nuns have periods?
She said suddenly

I don't know
I said

might explain
their crabbiness some days
she said

I nodded my head
unsure of the topic

periods of what?
I asked

she looked at me
sternly for a moment
you don't know?

I shook my head
gazing at her

it's *******
in real terms
she said

none the wiser
I looked at her
hair dark
and almost shiny
where she’d
brushed it so much

do you know that?

no not heard of it
I said

she sighed
and looked at me deeply

do your parents tell
you nothing?

not about
******* anyway
I said
my old man told me
about the Plague of London
in 1665
and rats and stuff

**** the Plague of 1665
she said
this is real stuff
it may come handy
one day to know

I doubted it
but said nothing
I looked back
at the nursing home
for rescue

do you know anything
about the female cycle?
She said

my friend's sister's cycle
didn't have a cross bar
I said
remembering Jim's sister
and the bicycle
I sometimes rode

no no Kid
not that kind of cycle
her body cycle

I noticed as she moved
on the chair
her leg stump
became visible  

when a female
gets to a certain age
her body gets prepared
to put an egg
in a place in her body
ready to be fertilized
ok?

I saw the stump clearly
it looked like the end
of a plump elbow

Kid do you hear
what I am saying?

Yes
I said

good
now if the egg
doesn't get fertilized
by a certain time
her body gets rid of it
in a cycle
and she bleeds
the whole package out
right?

It didn’t sound too good
but I nodded
what kind of egg?
I asked

what do you mean
what kind of egg?
A ****** human egg
what do you think
a ****** hens' egg?
She sighed deeply

and I wondered where
she bought her one shoe

how old are you Kid?

10 nearly 11 years old
I replied
studying her black shoe  
and wondering
what she did
with the other shoe

what's fertilization?
I asked
looking up at her
sitting in the chair
her eyes focused on me

go ask the nuns
they'll know
she said snappily

ok
I said
I will

she reached for her crutches  
and said
right Kid
let's go to the beach
out of the eyes
of the *******
and their reach

and so I walked
beside her
out the back gate
and onto the path
that led
to the sand and sea
blue skies
white clouds
seagulls
and Anne and me.

No more
In love
No more fallen
Rather falling
We are brushed finger tips
Waving goodbye
Choked,
Air stuck
Tight lipped
I feel sick
And tired
Raw flesh
And cut deep
Straight through
To already
Brittle and broken
Bone.
Alone
And tripping
Over the
Falling sky.
Red eyes
Disguise
Roll the dice
Snake eyes
And the next roll
Is in your hands.

January
the morning after New Year’s Eve
In icy weather, warming comfort yields
companionship, hot chocolate,
love. A promise to himself revealed
(again) how resolutions turn to ****.

He poorly planned for no more one-night-stands,
but woke up with a head too hard to think
He slowly dressed and thought it was his man's
duty to bring her something hot to drink.

This year she hoped she wouldn't sleep with *******.
She hid her head in ***-swapped sheets, and cried
inside. He left the bed; she knew he'd lied:
"I'll be right back with coffee and some rolls."

Surprised the lovers'd catch each other's stare
in February's blank and blissful air.



February
when we met again
In February's blank and blissful air,
my inhalations thin and quick and dry
were only halted by your frigid stare;
to me, they wondered where I'd gone and why.

That one-night-stand was fun for both of us,
though neither of us seemed too satisfied;
when your first words burst out within the hush
my face grew warm and, caught off guard, I sighed.

"It's Valentine's," you said; your smile said
much more. "I figured we could take a walk,
cause what we did before was fun. You're red?"
We both knew why, but still I couldn't talk.

I could not reason why she grabbed my hand.
The sort of love that's lust is most unplanned.



March
on Narcissus
The sort of love that's lust is most unplanned.
The self's the harshest lover there could be.
"There is no beauty more than thou I see!"
He calls back to me, "Thou I see!" His hand
outstretched is soft and reaching towards me,
and I reach mine to beauty young and free.
His muscled body causes mine to stand.

But when I touch this creature fair and strong,
that image scatters; beauty must be shy.
When he returns, my passion cramped too long –
I need those rosy lips before I die.

To lust and pride Narcissus was a slave –
but daffodils are growing at his grave
to show desire's poison for our sake.  



April
a beauty out of my league
To show desire's poison, for our sake
she'd wink and makes boys think we stood a chance.
But sweet as honey, April, seemed to make
every hopeful guy compelled to dance

for her. We were her loyal worker bees
and she the queen would reap the floral sweets.
I caught a sight within a balmy breeze
of April's flowing hair in tempting heat.

I stood away where blocked behind a fir
I picked a daisy from the soft green grass;
I never got the nerve to talk to her,
too stunned and shy I let the moment pass.

Her sight is so compelling, sweet and mean,
it taunts my curious eyes in blossomed green.



May
a fairy I cannot catch
It taunts my curious eyes in blossomed green;
that light elusive sprite which mocks my sight,
in gardens where that fae comes out at night
to dance among the flowers' subtle sheen.

This fairy is disguised by buzzing lamps;
by day she hides in flapping butterflies.
In every blade of dewy grass and damp
reflective flower's gloss she hides. She dies

whenever someone says they don't believe;
as children wish on dandelions, she lives.
And flower's dust is magic for her breed:
spring's silent sparkling fairies. She gives

me joy in every fleeting light I see;
I cannot help but love her mystery.



June
on lovers separated by war
I cannot help but love her mystery;
I wonder what it could have been with her.
Though now our time is just faint memory
I always reminisce of how things were.

When school was out and roses were in bloom
and spring was turning summer every day,
I carved our names in branches as a plume
of ornament of love as if to say:

"we share this heart that with this tree will grow."
But unexpected news came suddenly:
my number picked, a soldier now I go
away from you – to war – I'm off to sea.

You say you'll wait and as you wave goodbye
The fireworks are bursting in the sky.



July
a letter to my lost youth
The fireworks are bursting in the sky;
they're popping like the pebbles 'cross the bay:
the rocks you're throwing fast. And free July
is when we watch our worries blast away.

We foolish, footless bandits in the night
were playing spin the bottle under trees.
Like fireflies and glow-sticks, we were bright,
but, grown, you've lost yourself and lost your keys.

And now your son is here; he wants to play,
but you're not playing catch, instead all day
you live your like Sisyphus, unfree –
just throw that giant rock into the bay.

Unlock that chain – conformity – and lay
simply in the sun-warmed grass all day.



August
summer love
Simply in the sun-warmed grass all day
we'd sit, and talk about some useless ****.
And in my jeep I drove you to the bay
to watch the sunset while we shared a bit

of wine. We laid down in that cooling night;
I watched your gentle lips move when you talked.
I told you that I never felt as right,
as when we kissed. My fingers interlocked

with yours; I brushed your beachy hair away
and shared a kiss that may have been our last.
I held you in my arms until the day
peeked through. We knew the sunrise soon would pass

like this. And though we think it isn't fair
departing is the summer's balmy air.



September
my first carriage ride
Departing is the summer's balmy air
to welcome cracking cold and falling leaves.
Before we left my mother'd taken care
to fasten on my mittens to my sleeves.

The foliage was bright, the air was brisk
I walked between my parents faint-clenched hands
and watched the business people rush and whisk
to work. But we were there with different plans.

My poppa propped me up into the car.
The horses both were brown and standing stiff,
but like the whirling leaves of fall thus far
my nerves were flying crazy. Then a whiff

of something as the carriage moved along
I could not hold my breath for quite that long.  



October
a waiting affair
I could not hold my breath for quite that long
awaiting your arrival at my door.
My wife is out and though I know it's wrong;
the wrongness only makes me want you more.

I cannot help but wonder what you're wearing,
and if you think about me like I do.
I wonder if our spouses are as daring;
or if they maybe know of me and you.

I rake the leaves and hope you'll soon arrive.
I put away the pictures of my wife
and stare intently at the empty drive;
then that roaring engine brings me to life.

Your car drives by; I cannot help but grin
the bright red leaves are whirling in the wind.



November
every death brings new life
The bright red leaves are whirling in the wind,
their passing reminiscent of her days,
when auburn hair would break from fragile skin
like cracking umber leaves in fall's malaise.

Her daughter saw the doctor twice a week;
the pregnancy was moving well along.
The two recalled chrysanthemum's conceit:
in life is death; and death is life's old song.

The funeral was on Thanksgiving day;
her daughter in the hospital was ripe
and could not mourn, as one soul blew away –
and one without a Nana burst in hype

to life. The birth would turn out perfectly,
exactly as expected it would be.



December*
when she crossed the line*
Exactly as expected it would be
a snowy Christmas, white and colored bright;
(by strict request) I hung her favorite lights
about the house, so that the neighbors see
together we're a happy family.
She'd picked her gift, but what a sour sight
when, Christmas day, I didn't get it right.
And all was fine until she asked of me –

the last she'd ever ask of me. She tells
me "I don't like your underwear." She reels
off, "we compromise our comfort" (that bold
*****). "I'll be your man, but know my manhood holds.
I'll never change my boxer briefs” which feel,
in icy weather, warming." Comfort yields.

She would often take long walks,
Long walks on a forest path, she hated walking around city blocks.

She would walk with such grace,
As her brunette hair brushed her dress trimmed with lace.

She would walk into a sunny glade,
The only place that wasn't filled with shade.

There she would lay in the evening sun,
The only place she didn't have to run.

She would dance all the time,
This was her place where she could be free to rhyme.

Then she would sit down and put flowers in her hair,
Here, she didn't need to hide from peoples staring stares.

Then she would begin to walk when it was time to go,
Before she would leave, the wind would begin to blow.

Knocking out the flowers in her hair,
She would then be exposed to their dark stares.

The flowers drifted in the wind,
And landed on the soft grass, may this be a reminder.

That I won't give you a dark stare,
If you my dear, decide to put flowers in your hair.

Once, a long long time ago, there lived a happy family,
of good looking dinosaurs, with all daughters; they had three.

The dad went to his job all day, he always worked very hard,
to support his family the best he could, against all evil he did guard.

And so his daughters and his wife never wanted for anything at all,
he even built them a swimming pool, his own hands put up the walls.

His daughters knew that they got lucky by having such a dad,
who did so many great things for them, though just his presence made them glad.

On top of this, these three girls had a pretty awesome mom,
who stayed home with them when they were little, and helped them all day long.

She put band-aids on their bruised up knees and brushed away their tears,
and came when they had spooky dreams, to chase away their fears.

Then, when they grew up a bit, she followed her own dream,
and started teaching little dinosaurs all the things that they would need.

Soon enough, it was time for their oldest to leave the nest,
and find out where she should go to start her own life’s quest.

While they were sad to see her go, her family did not despair,
for it was not that far to her new “independent” lair.

All too soon, it was time for the next daughter to move away,
she chose a slightly farther place, where they could not see her every day.

This made her family pretty sad, they didn’t want her to go,
but they knew she had to try new things, and have her own space to grow.

And so the “baby” was left alone at home, though baby is not the right word,
because she had grown into a beautiful dinosaur, as if overnight she had matured.

It was weird for this youngest dinosaur, without her sisters there,
she had her parents to herself, along with the entire upstairs.

While some days this was pretty nice, it was a little bittersweet,
because she loved her sisters very much, and they had moved out of her reach.

However, distance makes the heart grow fonder, as the oldest soon found out,
she hadn’t thought she could love her family more, but she now did, without a doubt.

And though it made her sad that she did not see them every day,
they were always in her thoughts, never even slightly fading away.

So this oldest daughter was really not too sad,
when she thought of her family, it only made her glad.

Because what she had realized, with all this time apart,
is that you never leave your family, because they’re always in your heart.

Being pregnant is very difficult
no one can understand what you are feeling
not even another pregnant woman .
everyone takes things differently and feels mixed emotions
there are some things that are inevitable
yet there are things that can be avoided.
there is so much i have brushed off in this pregnancy.
but there are somethings i just cant control
like my emotions
im annoyed
im tired.
im in pain
im heavy
things that every pregnant woman KNOW that they are going to feel
yet i cant control my crying when i get upset
or i feel like i need more in my relationship
this pregnancy makes me feel unwanted
unneeded
un-everything
things run through my head that i have no idea where they came from.
but then again these are things that come with the pregnancy
instead of me having all these cravings, stuffing my face and gaining 50 pounds
i just gain all these thoughts in my head that hurt me emotionally and give me headaches
yet who can i explain these things to, without they thinking im crazy ?
they dont understand.
especially men ,.
how can a man possibly understand and not say something like its pregnancy you know what you were getting into...
sometimes i cry at night because i crave an affection that i dont get .
yet i think, and i realize ive never gotten this affection.
ive never really been complimented in a really nice way like "you look pretty"
or something simple like that
yea ive gotten TONS of compliments from people that dont even matter
but the one man that does matter has yet to say it.
i think i have been one of the best women to be pregnant because i havent put my boyfriend through all the **** that i know
alot of women put their men through
and its by choice.
yeah sometimes i feel a major mood swing coming in
and i just go to the bathroom and relax
why push him away if im the one thats pregnant?
ive done all this for him !
what have i gotten?
although i may be upset at him right now that doesnt mean that i am saying all these things JUST because i am upset .
i am saying them because i mean them
i am saying them because i feel them
i am saying them because its what goes through my head and i cant confront him to tell him this without crying before even speaking
its been 8 years.
and i still dont know.
he may feel different things about me
but this is what i feel .
and what i have been feeling for a while.
its the simple things that matter to me the most.
and to him (although he may deny it) its the bigger things that matter.

sometimes i think about
how you woke up this morning
and brushed your teeth

i wonder how you like your coffee,
and if you read the newspaper

why am i wasting my time
letting all these people
that don't really matter
break my heart

when you're out there somewhere,
living your life
and wondering where i am

i know you're out there
and you're waiting for me too

All I could see from where I stood
Was three long mountains and a wood;
I turned and looked another way,
And saw three islands in a bay.
So with my eyes I traced the line
Of the horizon, thin and fine,
Straight around till I was come
Back to where I’d started from;
And all I saw from where I stood
Was three long mountains and a wood.
Over these things I could not see;
These were the things that bounded me;
And I could touch them with my hand,
Almost, I thought, from where I stand.
And all at once things seemed so small
My breath came short, and scarce at all.
But, sure, the sky is big, I said;
Miles and miles above my head;
So here upon my back I’ll lie
And look my fill into the sky.
And so I looked, and, after all,
The sky was not so very tall.
The sky, I said, must somewhere stop,
And—sure enough!—I see the top!
The sky, I thought, is not so grand;
I ‘most could touch it with my hand!
And reaching up my hand to try,
I screamed to feel it touch the sky.
I screamed, and—lo!—Infinity
Came down and settled over me;
Forced back my scream into my chest,
Bent back my arm upon my breast,
And, pressing of the Undefined
The definition on my mind,
Held up before my eyes a glass
Through which my shrinking sight did pass
Until it seemed I must behold
Immensity made manifold;
Whispered to me a word whose sound
Deafened the air for worlds around,
And brought unmuffled to my ears
The gossiping of friendly spheres,
The creaking of the tented sky,
The ticking of Eternity.
I saw and heard, and knew at last
The How and Why of all things, past,
And present, and forevermore.
The Universe, cleft to the core,
Lay open to my probing sense
That, sick’ning, I would fain pluck thence
But could not,—nay! But needs must ****
At the great wound, and could not pluck
My lips away till I had drawn
All venom out.—Ah, fearful pawn!
For my omniscience paid I toll
In infinite remorse of soul.
All sin was of my sinning, all
Atoning mine, and mine the gall
Of all regret. Mine was the weight
Of every brooded wrong, the hate
That stood behind each envious ******,
Mine every greed, mine every lust.
And all the while for every grief,
Each suffering, I craved relief
With individual desire,—
Craved all in vain!  And felt fierce fire
About a thousand people crawl;
Perished with each,—then mourned for all!
A man was starving in Capri;
He moved his eyes and looked at me;
I felt his gaze, I heard his moan,
And knew his hunger as my own.
I saw at sea a great fog bank
Between two ships that struck and sank;
A thousand screams the heavens smote;
And every scream tore through my throat.
No hurt I did not feel, no death
That was not mine; mine each last breath
That, crying, met an answering cry
From the compassion that was I.
All suffering mine, and mine its rod;
Mine, pity like the pity of God.
Ah, awful weight!  Infinity
Pressed down upon the finite Me!
My anguished spirit, like a bird,
Beating against my lips I heard;
Yet lay the weight so close about
There was no room for it without.
And so beneath the weight lay I
And suffered death, but could not die.

Long had I lain thus, craving death,
When quietly the earth beneath
Gave way, and inch by inch, so great
At last had grown the crushing weight,
Into the earth I sank till I
Full six feet under ground did lie,
And sank no more,—there is no weight
Can follow here, however great.
From off my breast I felt it roll,
And as it went my tortured soul
Burst forth and fled in such a gust
That all about me swirled the dust.

Deep in the earth I rested now;
Cool is its hand upon the brow
And soft its breast beneath the head
Of one who is so gladly dead.
And all at once, and over all
The pitying rain began to fall;
I lay and heard each pattering hoof
Upon my lowly, thatched roof,
And seemed to love the sound far more
Than ever I had done before.
For rain it hath a friendly sound
To one who’s six feet underground;
And scarce the friendly voice or face:
A grave is such a quiet place.

The rain, I said, is kind to come
And speak to me in my new home.
I would I were alive again
To kiss the fingers of the rain,
To drink into my eyes the shine
Of every slanting silver line,
To catch the freshened, fragrant breeze
From drenched and dripping apple-trees.
For soon the shower will be done,
And then the broad face of the sun
Will laugh above the rain-soaked earth
Until the world with answering mirth
Shakes joyously, and each round drop
Rolls, twinkling, from its grass-blade top.
How can I bear it; buried here,
While overhead the sky grows clear
And blue again after the storm?
O, multi-colored, multiform,
Beloved beauty over me,
That I shall never, never see
Again!  Spring-silver, autumn-gold,
That I shall never more behold!
Sleeping your myriad magics through,
Close-sepulchred away from you!
O God, I cried, give me new birth,
And put me back upon the earth!
Upset each cloud’s gigantic gourd
And let the heavy rain, down-poured
In one big torrent, set me free,
Washing my grave away from me!

I ceased; and through the breathless hush
That answered me, the far-off rush
Of herald wings came whispering
Like music down the vibrant string
Of my ascending prayer, and—crash!
Before the wild wind’s whistling lash
The startled storm-clouds reared on high
And plunged in terror down the sky,
And the big rain in one black wave
Fell from the sky and struck my grave.
I know not how such things can be;
I only know there came to me
A fragrance such as never clings
To aught save happy living things;
A sound as of some joyous elf
Singing sweet songs to please himself,
And, through and over everything,
A sense of glad awakening.
The grass, a-tiptoe at my ear,
Whispering to me I could hear;
I felt the rain’s cool finger-tips
Brushed tenderly across my lips,
Laid gently on my sealed sight,
And all at once the heavy night
Fell from my eyes and I could see,—
A drenched and dripping apple-tree,
A last long line of silver rain,
A sky grown clear and blue again.
And as I looked a quickening gust
Of wind blew up to me and ******
Into my face a miracle
Of orchard-breath, and with the smell,—
I know not how such things can be!—
I breathed my soul back into me.
Ah!  Up then from the ground sprang I
And hailed the earth with such a cry
As is not heard save from a man
Who has been dead, and lives again.
About the trees my arms I wound;
Like one gone mad I hugged the ground;
I raised my quivering arms on high;
I laughed and laughed into the sky,
Till at my throat a strangling sob
Caught fiercely, and a great heart-throb
Sent instant tears into my eyes;
O God, I cried, no dark disguise
Can e’er hereafter hide from me
Thy radiant identity!
Thou canst not move across the grass
But my quick eyes will see Thee pass,
Nor speak, however silently,
But my hushed voice will answer Thee.
I know the path that tells Thy way
Through the cool eve of every day;
God, I can push the grass apart
And lay my finger on Thy heart!

The world stands out on either side
No wider than the heart is wide;
Above the world is stretched the sky,—
No higher than the soul is high.
The heart can push the sea and land
Farther away on either hand;
The soul can split the sky in two,
And let the face of God shine through.
But East and West will pinch the heart
That can not keep them pushed apart;
And he whose soul is flat—the sky
Will cave in on him by and by.

i like to turn into a girl once in a fortnight
after i just washed my hair...
and take a selfie!
then i read the fashion magazine alongside marquis de sade...
and it makes perfect sense to **** beauty like that...
well according to the marquis it does.
how's my hair? styled properly brushed to the side
long against anti-clockwise curtains of lock
that was propaganda with ****** adopting the charlie chaplin
moustache and people after ****** ensured confusion
whether to split it to the right rather than the left?
i’m right-handed, i need the power base of keratin on my cranium
hanging to the left!

She has a heart of cedar color
And dreams in shades of peony and lotus stems.
She leaves the smell of cyclamen and ripe apricots
Behind her,
Those who are crying in the shadows of Magnolias
Are finding a shelter within her.
Sometimes I imagine that I'm the sea foam
That is touching her ankles
And the air that envelops her lips,
Absorbing her every move,
That is reflected in the mosaic of her pupils.
Her thoughts are sleeping in the depths of my veins,
In every pore that absorbs her voice
I can hear her breathing.
I remain frozen in her existence
And in the contours of her shadow,
All of what I have seek so far
I have found in every thing on which she brushed.
After all,
I'm just a pale reflection of the stars
In her night sky,
The dying firefly in her garden
Of white poppies and wild rose hips.

Loving is inevitable.

Yet somehow, people say that love is a choice. You can choose to love or
not love somebody. I never wanted to, but I did. Loving you was not my choice—
not mine to begin with. But I did. I love how your calloused fingers, all beaten
up because of your love for paintbrushes and canvases, held mine tightly and
intertwined with them; dancing along with mine, which smelled like the enticing scent
of old, wrinkling books due to my love for reading. I love how your eyes are
lighter in color, more radiant and distinct than anybody else's. I love that scar of
yours placed just atop your crescent-shaped eyes. I love the way your crooked
teeth is still perfectly misaligned; not too much and not too little. I love how
your breath brushed against mine, smelling of nothing but you. I love how you
make yourself be like you and you alone. And I know that art is never supposed to
look beautiful, and that art is supposed to make you feel something, and that
you are. It's not my choice to begin with, but I did. Loving you was beyond my control.

Letting go isn't.*

To let go of someone is a choice you can make. You can't let skies, or stars,
or moons, or signs to tell you when it has to happen. You either let go and free
someone, or cling onto someone you know will eventually get hurt or hurt you.
Letting go is something you can grasp onto with your fingertips and decide upon.
It is the fact that you have to let a part of you stray away that makes it hard to
do so, because loving you made me take a part of myself just so I could make
you feel as if you were mine and I was yours. Because once a part of you is given
to someone, you never truly get it back. It stays with them, long after you've
both moved on and fell apart. It sticks with their souls, reminding them of what
you two have had and have been. Once. I could've chosen to not let you go, but I
did, because we never should've been together in the first place—ironic how first
place even appeared here, because we both knew I never was*—for a second. Letting
go of you was my choice. It always has been to begin with.

from day one he held her fragile hand
tugged her along the cliff's edge
watched her through even the longest of days
or peered throughout the green garden's hedge
he tugged a bit harder the older she got
until her skin drooped like elastic torn apart
fed her alcohol like a bottle to a baby
popped her pills till it paused her heart
As he'd comb his hands though her soft brown hair
streaks of gray followed the strands he once brushed
he'd press his black lips on her sun spotted cheeks
and place a rotten finger over her mouth whispering, "hush"
he tugged her night gown once more in the rocking chair
as wind from the open window brushed by with a chill
he held the jagged dagger up to her neck
although his intention was not to ****
as he sliced her open, the scythe hit the ground
her eyes of glass finally stood still
he brushed her hair behind her ear and whisperd
"i promise, my intention was not to ****."
They walked away from the old rocking chair
hand in hand like it was from the start
because although life gives you your pulse
the reaper steals your beating heart

When I'm laying awake in bed on a sleepless night,
I often think of you.
I think of the way you laughed
The way you cried on the phone with me.
The way when you kissed me while you were smiling.
The way you sighed.
The way you chuckled softly and brushed off a compliment.
But most of all,
I think of the way you made everything I was doing seem better when you were around.

The first night I stayed under the stars at your house,
I tossed and turned until finally I woke you with
Soft kisses over your bare shoulders and on your chest
Just above your heart.
After stirring out of your slumber, your lips brushed mine
And the crook of your arm fit perfectly around
My body as you held me close.
One of us just barely awake, the other wide.

Learning to sleep with someone new takes time;
Discovering the way their chest rises and falls
Like the tide comes up to kiss the sand
Before receding back and pushing forward again.
Listening to their deep breaths as they lay
Almost lifeless on their back,
Matching their breaths to heartbeats beneath your cheek.
The way they stir in the sleep and reposition
Themselves so their arm holds you safe and secure
Even when they’re dreaming.

I knew when your hand brushed my collar,

removing a thread,

and removing all doubt

We ****.

I brushed her hair just
the other day
and left stinging
handprints on her
eager flesh like she
loves.

Loved her in an
undertow of
blankets and throes,
fullness and
folds

until the drums
pounded in my
ears and
the adrenaline
burned.

On altars,
in tombs,
the sabbats,
esbats and
moons.

We slap
each other
     for fun;
     she listens
when I tell
her to
.

I'm sure you and
your mate do just
fine,
but

we **** better
than all of you
combined.