"It is really beautiful up here" she whispered.

Her skin brightened in the glow of the fading masterpiece of crimsons, yellows, and golds the sun had brushed across the turquoise sky "This is it, this is what heaven is like."

I couldn't hear her, but I could read her soft spoken lips and study her face, which I always imagined as less of the cover to a book and more every word inside. There was not a greatness of a sadness that ceased to mask her portrait. She was all heart and soul, every bit of her.

I watched as her bright eyes change to become more glass than eyes. As if, for the first time, she was seeing life, love, and something more. Something so deep and beautiful that not even Hemmingway or Fitzgerald could even begin to put the prefix of it into thought.

Among the dusting of the clouds and transparent sunset I felt her heartbeat could silence and the lungs of which gave her the life I so cherished could empty turning her flesh a pale blue, and she would fade peacefully into the scene before me.

This very thought frightened me. Too soon would her feet touch the ground and nothing I was humanly capable of, or possibly godly capable of, would ever captivate and hold her so perfectly or turn her eyes as vivid - and there was nothing more I wanted.

In anticipation of the too-few precious hours in tandem, we divulged our carnal cravings at each others’ hands, but omitted fragments, saving them for some other day, finding them too truthful.

When you hold your body to mine, as you have told me you will, I want a flurry of colored breath, peach and magentas and crimsons slipping translucently from every part of me and wafting in and out and between us like a graceful fog, and not just the force of fingers that have waited too long to touch, but the electrostatic brushes of life’s restlessness falling slowly into their own gravity as we learn to trust the moment.

Our lips are full of nerves and that is why a kiss is so much more than symbolic. I placed my lips to the skin of an orange and I was met with the sensuality of the whole terrain of this world. Intimacy then, is the slow press that reassures humanity – the invitation into a world with no walls – the rush of blood that comes from being completely receptive – that is the kiss I want with your soul.

After all the epochs of lovers, these are all the same words, but they are lanterns bouncing across the plains and sparking anew in the way that the naive are always entranced by the lighter in their hand when they first learn how to light a cigarette, elated and dizzy from the *****. Twinkling.

Sometimes all it takes is a breath and I am light and wind and red paper confetti and the moon and a golden orb that turns all it touches into a shining constancy of what’s called love – and I visit your heart knowing that you can’t tell it’s me, and then I must leave– and I know that I was not in my body, but that it must have kept existing while I was gone because I always wake up in tears, and someone had to cry them.

Conventionality dies between us and there are no titles or promises to speak of. I once found security in labels, only to find that they leave no room for the inevitable growth and weathering of time. So I ask little of you – only that you are always true with me, and that you occasionally put your hand in mine.

Day breaks on Doubletop Mountain, shadowing villages below.
Three-thousand eight hundred feet tall, it captures the eye!
And standing at attention there in front of me, a battalion of Sugar Maples in full…. Fall…. Regalia!
Cascading tones of Crimsons, Burgundy, scarlet reds and Golden Hue.

Gazing over Dunk Hill as farmer’s plow  fields, turn again for fertility,
There are only brief streams of life giving sunlight, and now the sky turns to a pale grey.
Me, well I live for this time of year….enjoying the evening autumn constellations,
Or Moms dining table adorned with Indian corn and blackberry canes!

Bessie's Margaretville home begins the fall ritual of canning and drying.
Breaking out winter clothes…as she proclaims "no whites after Labor Day"!
The last bit of warmth now dwells just behind the Catskill’s Harvest Moon,
And the V of geese honk their good-byes to the summer sun.

I have always accepted you.
I have watched you take and take and take.
You've taken my family,
hell, you've even taken friends.
Suicide. Cancer. Disability. Age of Old.
I've seen it all.

I've seen you in the pain,
the Love that is overwhelming as people weep over you.
Once have I cried because of you.
One funeral.
A boy, my age, murdered by his own hand.
A classmate. A friend. Dead.

And I watched, as people wept at his funeral,
and how easy it was to pick out false Love.
How untrue they were.

You take, and you hurt, dear Death.
But you show the reality,
our truest forms,
our deepest souls,
the Love buried deep down,
how real you make us.

But I see you,
even in things you haven't yet taken.

I see you in the trees,
as they turn to feathery golds and crimsons, oranges crisped as they crunch underneath our toes.

I see you in the morning,
as birds flutter amongst my window
fettering amongst the trees.

I see you in the river,
horses that run rampant across my memory,
as I long to just run away and ride,
to feel the wind rush through the curls upon my brow.

I see you in my mother's eyes,
in her laughter and smile.
Her eyes when she is pained, how hurt she has been, or as she dawns things anew,
or when she cries of the loss she has grieved.
Giggles and joy erupt from her lips, as she dawns on the silly things her father did.
The curve of her lips, as she remembers her past, what Time has given her and what has passed.
Oh how she looks of her parents,
how kind I remember them,
always full of Love, even after I have seen them leave, depart the land of the living and go onto the gates of Heaven.

For they live in memory,
and that is the gift you have given.
You have given us peace and memory,
and for that I thank you.
Most are angered by your name, oh Death,
but I?

I am not afraid for you,
and rather,
I welcome you.
Take me when you will.
I'll gladly take your hand.
I thank Time for what he has given me and countless others,
but you, I thank for the bargain of Time you have given each of us.

It is a treasure,
the memories we are able to hold dear
and the peace we don't have to fear
when we take your wrinkled hand,
and step into you fully,
without a pain left to feel,
because that pain is left in our world
as we step onto the floor of Heaven
and gaze upon the greatest sight of all.

Perhaps we as humans need to stop seeing you as we want to see you
but to see what's in you truly;
the collateral beauty of it all.

I haven’t felt her
in 5 days,
I haven’t felt
how delicate
the rim of her
mouth feels
against mine,
how enticing it
is to get a taste,
I have to taste
all of her,
they way she
flows through me,
she’s mends all thats
broken, then breaks
it when she leaves,
it’s only been 5 days,
I miss the bitter taste,
the way she makes
my tongue curl
up like a slug
swallowing tablespoons,
she pulls me in,
and hangs me with
the rope she yanked,
scraping the bottom
of the barrel,
for even a scent of what
will remind me of her,
every taste
is like losing my
virginity for
the last time,
and she became
so much more
than a past-time,
so much more than
something to
pass time,
it’s been 5 days,
soon to be back
at the crack of the
new year,
she’s a constant
resolution
that I can’t wait
to break,
or is it me she can’t
wait to break,
she leaves a bitter taste
on my mind
and thoughts that flow
through my veins,
she’s someone I can
thank, she’s someone
I try so hard to forget,
she dictates and mediates,
a forged signature
on bills passed to
loved ones
that I’m okay,
but only for the night
she’s anger, she’s happiness
she paint’s crimsons kisses
on my knuckles,
and heals cardinal
crevices in my mind,
it’s only been 5 days,
I’ll see you soon
I’ll taste you soon

The white bleached corpse of day is fast
- reddened, bloodied -
torn to scarlet shreds of evening
slashed by wild and fiery crimsons.

Light leaching and passing westward
from bridge to bridge
garlands of mist drift up the river

Shadows dart, shelter and linger
blackness creeps and claws
the shades of night

Darkness spills down docks and ditches
fingers through the strands of light
by midnight every dock is still

Moon hangs full, naked and weary
slow stiching silver threads
through tall ships rigging
in the dim and dreary night

A yapping dog disturbs the quiet
more insistent than the stars.


© M.L.Emmett

if we were to assign emotions to colors -
passion would be where magenta and orange kiss the horizon at sunset,
joy would be the yellow of my socks every easter sunday that i can remember,
and melancholy would be just another shade of blue.

i told him,
i am not done with you yet.
three weeks post breakup,
we shouldn't feel as unfinished as we do.
like, in the ridiculously complicated narrative of he and i,
the author got up one day,
scribbled a quick ending,
and then set the novel on fire.

i read an article in an obscure magazine
about Shelley Jackson,
an artist
who got thousands of people
to tattoo a singular word
from a story onto themselves,
and then sent them back to their scattered existences.

maybe that is what this is,
another scattered story.
another vaporized narrative.

i can feel it in the air,
but not pull the phrases together.
it's like trying to hold onto smoke.
our story slips through my fingers and gets in my eyes.

if we were to assign emotions to colors -
my ribcage would look like a Jackson *******.
my head would be a paintball arena.

i am so full of indigos,
and mustards,
and crimsons,
that Van Gogh, himself, would dip into my palette
and claim to have never seen such beautiful sadness before.

i don't know if it hurts because it still matters,
or if it matters that it still hurts.

i feel the frenzied ache of creation in my gut.
i am not a painter,
but my mirror is showing me
the immaculate collection of brushstrokes
i have become.

a few weeks ago,
i was approached by an artist who offered to paint my bruises.
to collect my contusions with watercolors.

what a beautiful intention,
to immortalize the growing pains,
memorialize the bumps along the way,
to make something permanent
of these perpetual transitions.

if we were to assign emotions to colors -
my pride would be gold-plated and rusting from use, like my grandfather's watch,
courage would be the pure green of every bud that has dared to grow through concrete,
and love?
love would be prismatic,
like spilled oil on asphalt.

a rainbow one moment,
vanished the next.

crimsons from the runaway sundown
were an open **** on the sea surface
skyline's throat ingested the fireball
whole without mastication

her fingers played hide and seek
while her unbidden tears
matched the hues of the rippling waters

and staccato sad moans lingered like dirge
above the melody of the distant surf…

I can taste the colours of your kiss
Fiery crimsons bursting through
Mellow yellows
Exploding into sweet tangelo
Cool blues
Turning violet
As my senses play this quiet duet

I hear music when you touch me
Bass lines throbbing alongside
Exotic rhythms
Tumbling into trembling strings
Soaring voices
Dulcet tones
Within your music my body groans

I can smell flowers in your words
Tender Honeysuckle pervades
Alluring Rose
Sweet Alyssum quickly follows
Heady Jasmine
Lascivious Lilies
Impressions that set my spirit free

You muddle my mind with euphoria
Sensibility rearranged
In anticipation
Of this intoxication
I live
In Synaesthesia
Whenever you are near

(C) Pixievic

on the steps of the notre dame
i lost my sense of color
every moonbeam through the
cracked walls of the House of God
danced around me like blue gypsies
performing a ritual upon
every ringlet of hair on my head

in the catacombs of paris
i lost my sense of touch
every skull feeling like silk
dead calcium caressing
the flesh beneath which
my bones were moving
alive and restless

beneath the arc de triomphe
i lost myself
the curve of stone caving in on me
like a Parisian Goliath
and I, a madman David
names of fallen soldiers
engraved upon the walls
breathed back to life
from dust they have returned
they reach into my cerebrum
their stone fingers pulsing
with the hymnals of war
to meet with the battle
of indigos and crimsons coursing
through every nerve of my anatomy

behind the eiffel tower
i lost my art
paris lights beating down
a beast sleeping through the
tides of eulogies and odes
its orphans have to offer

Soft somnolent skies have ceased seething, for day’s nearly through,  
while winds echo whispering thoughts of returning to you
and heavens throb, pulsing and bleeding in crimsons, once blue -
their passions, like flames, fill my veins as you pass into view.
The breeze holds her breath as you touch, then embrace me anew
and smoldering clouds withdraw, blushing, then paling their hue.

The twilight is painted with wandering dreams of your charms,
so close your eyes slowly and slip into sleep in my arms.

The pendulous moon appears, sweeping the fog from up high
distilling the drops into notes of a hushed lullaby,
their quavering tunes spinning tales which amaze, mystify,
while tremulous stars fling a fire that fevers the skies,
for stories they tell reflect love as revealed by your sighs -
their fury is burning, alive in the depths of your eyes.

The twilight is painted with wandering dreams of your charms,
so close your eyes slowly and slip into sleep in my arms.

The shifting shore’s moaning, seduced by tempestuous tides
which flow with the rhythm of flesh as our senses collide,
and quiet explodes as the stillness of night’s amplified.
A lingering kiss bids adieu till the morning breaks wide
when cockerels come conjuring dawn with voluptuous pride
enticing the sun into banishing night, starry-eyed.

The twilight is painted with wandering dreams of your charms,
so close your eyes slowly and slip into sleep in my arms.

A stallion pure and thorough bred
With sinewy limbs and a regal head
Entranced a maiden:  coy, fragile
Her naïveté peeking through her guile
The touch of skin on skin, ablaze
The arching back, the dreamy gaze
Oblivious to the world around
When hearts were lost and hearts were found
They rode around without a care
With hair afloat a back stripped bare
Through wind and water, sky and sand
They trod the depth and breadth of land
Love melding with the sunset's hues
With ochres, crimsons, lilacs, blues
She held him firm as 'e sprinted on
Her hands alive on 'is rippling brawn
Both breathless, panting, fit to drop
By a trove of aspen, came to stop
They laid down on the cooling grass
And watched the stars in heaven's pass.
The moments' magic, in their midst
Where gift of fate their presence kissed
The sound of stillness filled the air
To interject , neither could dare
In the conversations of the souls
No words suffice, nor phrases hold
Each secret there that instant shared
All love exchanged, and none was spared.

By the morning sun, came duty's hail
And both knew what devoirs entail
To be with each , although they longed
Of different earths, their loam belonged
They thought, they planned, they tried devise
But union came at a selfish price
In a firm embrace they held on tight
Accepting it was a time not right
And bravely to departure led
Through aching ******* good byes were said
A part of each, with the other sent
For a farewell isn't where love should end
So holding on their transformed heart
On the stage of life, resumed their part
And each then took their separate way
no matter what, wherever they stay
for rest of time, they had had that day
for rest of time, they had had that day!

Grasping my arms
Digging nails into my wrist
Feel the blood trickling down
Its warm... proof that I exist

Biting my lip
Its starting to turn white
Metallic taste lingers
I'm losing my light

Blade to my stomach
Its cold and smooth
To gain some control
I dont plan to leave so soon

Its something about
The blood that flows in my veins
Full of warmth and comfort
Its an odd sensation that keeps me sane

Under pressure and stress
Anxiety and depression
My self isolation adores me
Conjuring my regression

Though the world that is cold
That is scary and dark
This deep crimsons liquid
Staining my skin, leaving its mark

Reassuring me
That my heart still beats
That I'm alive and well
Even if the world is ever so bittersweet

you remind me of sunsets and hearths
that stretch on the line
where empyrean touches the earth.

the golden strokes with hints of red hues
blended with purples, crimsons, and daisies
reflect itself from the rhythmic
glowing collision of ocean waves
like sepia photographs.

as the last bright rays
fade into the night,
it rests a promise before it lifts
the blanket of velvet twilight.

from the horizon
you see the heaven articulating its thoughts,
“paradise is not where the sky meets the ocean,
it lies on your presence,”

i stay lost in you for a little longer.

There are days where we meet up
To walk under cool crisp skies
Made up of indigoes, lilacs and light crimsons
Sunnier afternoons. Skimming to and fro
The slates of English Street. The plains of Sprucefield
Sprawling in front of us. Boulevards of Cookstown
That stretch far and wide, skirted with shops
Owned by unloved mannequins. We journey further
In our red Nissan Silvia, with the roll-down windows
With a pile of yellowed copies of the Beano in the back.
Mine, of course. I like to read. You taught me to.
Blur upon blur, we share whispers with each other
The alphabet, songs. I can count to ten, on my own. I did it once
In Marks & Spencer. Everyone was proud.
Taking our bag of tricks with us, we sup from place to place
Chicken nugget Happy Meals. Crumbs of a german biscuit.
Half of a sausage roll at the Trian. Twilight falls, the blurs
Become darker, curiouser. Soon I am home. The day is done.

There are other days where we meet up
Under a slightly greyer tinge. I laugh
I can’t change that, I tell you. The weather sometimes.
Less skimming, less journeying. Sometimes I’ll say
Remember that red Silvia? All the places we used to go?
But there’s no answer. The whispers have gone.

Miss, Atomic Bomb,
how are you today?

Do you feel a jittering in your veins,
hear a chattering of ivory teeth
in your sugar skull
candied by your wish to always be oh-so-sweeter?

When you fell to the ground under his hands,
rough with militant knuckles
tattooed in unlined blues and purples
transforming into nausea-inducing camouflage hues,
and your new, Target brand, $2.99 black tights
ripped viciously at the knees,
did you feel an explosion in your chest?

Did you feel angry,
willing to lash out with toxic words
that your floodgates had always tried to hold back,
the dams now creaking and groaning in beautiful sighs?

Did you,
when it hurt,
fight against that war hero who had held you close
during a time you could barely remember,
blurred crimsons shading the edges of every smiling photograph?

Or did you fold him into your campfire-scented embrace
and apologize profusely
for being so naturally destructive?
I bet you open your lips-
swollen and bleeding through cracks
that could define
‘damaged’
in the dictionary you flip through
when everything is numb,
and only battle wounds of paper cuts will suffice-
just to speak those awful words.

I bet
you allowed him to tell you
that you were a weapon-
self-triggering,
horrific,
prepared to injure
those
innocent,
pink-lipped,
blue-eyed girls he stared at on the street
just to keep what you had.

But,
Miss Atomic Bomb,
someone had to have dropped you.
someone had to have thrown you
from your security,
and I bet against life itself
that the guilt lies in those calloused palms.

I bet you never noticed
the rope tied around your ankle,
expertly knotted so that he could just keep
reeling you back up into his arms.

He liked you on that verge of manic destruction,
eyes wide,
holding onto oceans threatening to flood that little studio apartment of yours
in New York City.

He wasn’t ready to let you truly fall.
He still isn’t.

So,
Dear Atomic Bomb,
know that that
run in your tights is only the beginning of the end.
The scraped flesh on your knees
is only the beginning of
the carnage that could be wrought.

And none of it will be your fault,
your *******, crumbling-at-the-seams fault.

You won’t cause the war,
and you can still crawl out on
shrapnel-coated limbs.

Take my heed,
little girl –
desert.

its late afternoon in the winter and the sun is dripping into the horizon,
the creams golds crimsons making love to each other in the reflections in the snow. the air is frigid and whistles as i push further and further down on the accelerator.
60. 70. 80. 90. 100. 110. the steering wheel is practically vibrating and i have to grip it with both hands to keep it steady, my fingers are turning blue. there are fields and farmers' markets nearly hidden by the walls of snow plowed away earlier today. my knuckles are white, the pool of my ***** in the passenger seat on top looks like it's freezing over on the edges.
my phone is ringing, i know it's not him, i can't look at it anyway. the sun hasn't stopped dripping below the horizon, the glow of my phone lights up the whole car. the radio is playing a song i don't know, it's so loud that i can feel the beat in my heart, but not even my pulse has a sense of rhythm beating ten beats between 1 and 3, my phone is still ringing, i know it's him but i know it's not. the ***** has developed a film, this car is putrid and i am inside of it.

i know i should pull over but i can't get far enough away.

i slow back to 80 and throw up outside of the window, i don't stop.

You speak in violent crimsons that leave my
Dull silver set stuck between sparkling and faded.
I trade this for nothing, because
No one else is around for any optional situation.
It all swirls up in massive horrendous tornados
Of imaginary chaos- ceasing to linger above me.
I get ****** up in the spiral of spinning infinity,
And how everything is exactly perfect, always,
And how it is all completely beautiful, because it is all
Right.
I feel like people never completely understand that concept.
But then again, one can only attempt to relate based on
One's perception- or point of view,
Being based on personal experience.
I guess we have destiny, along with some of our own choices
To thank for that.
Because we should be thankful for what we have
Around us, and also within us.
Because when all else is gone,
We have always got ourselves.
And no one can take that away.
Even when I feel like I'm so far gone,
That I can't even hear those piercing words of crimson.
But my silver is still dull-
At least I know I have some shine, somehow,
And sometime- I will be so stunning,
That I can be a ******* rainbow if I want to.
Because although there is no one around
To bring harmony to all my many colors,
I can paint my own masterpiece,
And I will live in that world
Until this one fades away.

I took a step forward to taste the waters
I dive deep in my destiny only to find a never ending storm
Fury waters and rogue waves vast with despair
My thoughts and dreams written on the swell disappearing as soon as they appear

My life is dark as midnight on the waters
And lightning revealing only nightmares
Bitter are the tears falling down my cheeks
And the rain can’t wash

I am trapped in my low self esteem
Hands tied I let my weakness helplessly take me under
How do I get out?
How do I take back control?

The fiery winds I hear passing create swells of my misery
The distant sky above me roaring near my ear
A disguise to my cry for help
I wonder if there will be a moment where everything will be aligned

A moment where you float in calm waters
As the sun’s dipping below the horizon
A moment where you picture painted skies of crimsons blended with tangerines and saffrons
The crisp circle casting its colors on a quivering path across the waters
And you get the promise of new dreams after the velvety night

I am in troubled waters and I am weaken by the strong tides underneath pulling me in on a pathless deep
The enormous waves taking me under as soon as I pull my head out
When does it end?

Like the setting sun,
Rich hues of red blended with oranges, purples and crimsons.
She Walks In Beauty.
Awaiting the night sky.

Like the moon,
florescent and luminous,
She Walks In Beauty
Bathed in an ethereal glow.

The canvas of a summer’s evening
Burning crimsons, golden bright
Sweet embers of this day
Singing with life, alive alive!
While suited ants scurry beneath
The shadow of concrete canopies
Look up, it cries, today I thrive
But how can I, they reply
I am blind in the foliage of the city
Deaf to the rhythm of the sky.

The eye of my blood blinks crimsons
And sweat thick nuggets of gold

It glistens through sheens of purple
And flickers when it be so bold

It throbs with pulses of grayness
So stricken in pain and sore

It ravages pitches of black
And swallow it dark even more

Our words were mesmerised, unable at
each attempt to describe the end of day
the sun took its story - the spectacle of hues and ribbons between gold fire and greyblack crimsons - beyond Wolumbin - reclining grandmother - crag head facing skyward - omniscient - pausing inbreath grandeur

Taking our gaze, the cloud hummers went westerly - tribal souls migrating in unison -
their mentor and guide a following breeze
and curiously the stars appeared above them
as if flying in formation against the trend
missiles or satellites - not afraid - in awe - we saluted the spectacle - swaying in silence and wonder
Martinos @ 2018

I was born in the Autumn,
on a brisk orange morning,
early October,
before it turns grey,
but after the crimsons have gone away
52 degrees,
leaves already fallen and
wet beneath our feet

I was born in the fall,
it's no surprise I feel this way,
everything that gives me life
someday will die

to have all my prayers
answered the
days of sunshine and smiles
the ones who guided me

the influences that
painted my visions
in yellows and crimsons
they who saw my needs

and gave me a little room
to breathe
came back later
to check on whether

I was good or not
and when I needed
slapped my *******
woke me from

my myopic visions
and self centered
dreams, or made me read
Bukowski