There are cemeteries that are lonely,
graves full of bones that do not make a sound,
the heart moving through a tunnel,
in it darkness, darkness, darkness,
like a shipwreck we die going into ourselves,
as though we were drowning inside our hearts,
as though we lived falling out of the skin into the soul.

And there are corpses,
feet made of cold and sticky clay,
death is inside the bones,
like a barking where there are no dogs,
coming out from bells somewhere, from graves somewhere,
growing in the damp air like tears of rain.

Sometimes I see alone
coffins under sail,
embarking with the pale dead, with women that have dead hair,
with bakers who are as white as angels,
and pensive young girls married to notary publics,
caskets sailing up the vertical river of the dead,
the river of dark purple,
moving upstream with sails filled out by the sound of death,
filled by the sound of death which is silence.

Death arrives among all that sound
like a shoe with no foot in it, like a suit with no man in it,
comes and knocks, using a ring with no stone in it, with no
     finger in it,
comes and shouts with no mouth, with no tongue, with no
     throat.
Nevertheless its steps can be heard
and its clothing makes a hushed sound, like a tree.

I'm not sure, I understand only a little, I can hardly see,
but it seems to me that its singing has the color of damp violets,
of violets that are at home in the earth,
because the face of death is green,
and the look death gives is green,
with the penetrating dampness of a violet leaf
and the somber color of embittered winter.

But death also goes through the world dressed as a broom,
lapping the floor, looking for dead bodies,
death is inside the broom,
the broom is the tongue of death looking for corpses,
it is the needle of death looking for thread.

Death is inside the folding cots:
it spends its life sleeping on the slow mattresses,
in the black blankets, and suddenly breathes out:
it blows out a mournful sound that swells the sheets,
and the beds go sailing toward a port
where death is waiting, dressed like an admiral.

My mushroom was watered by your  juices
fertilised the head grew in your dampness.
the seedling grew in anticipation, would it
seed in needed spaces or would it be launched
to the gravity of its surroundings and fall cold.

Could this eclipse of growth be sustained, or
in the throws of becoming dehydrated in the
over gratification  of over consumption wither
in needed times and never reach its potential of
what was needed. But become withered in momentary
over indulgence and go limp in the field of warmth..

This once proud mushroom ever reaching new heights,
Its stalk standing once tall but now faltering and lying
motionless where once it stood tall. that warm space
waiting, wanting its seeds to flourish in this damp
place. Know all but dried up, waiting for another flourishing
head to seed its dampness where the other fell silently limp.

"I can see my door, my bed, my window, my chair, and my table.

"I can feel my spine against the wall, my feet against the floor, my jaw tightly shut, and my fingernails buried in my arms.

"I can hear the wind coming in from the open window, my heartbeat rapidly thumping, and that familiar voice in my head, shouting once again.

"I can smell the dampness of the ground outside as the breeze carries it to my room, and the sickly sweet odor from the soap used on my hands.

"I can ******* blood spilling from the bite in my lip; my last harsh reminder that
        I
        am      
        still
        alive.

I’m currently sitting in the coldest clinic,
Across from, probably,
the cheapest Mexican restaurant in Western Arizona.

The floors are sterile white,
And I giggle at the thought
of you
recognizing the irony
Of my emptiness.

The walls are also white and look slick with Lysol.
They radiate that dampness
that I swear that they smell
like loneliness,

We didn’t make love,
So much as **** in the dirt,
But the truth is
I’d rather wake up hot in the afternoon
on the dirt and the ground
(After you’ve already left)
Than wake up next to
The wrong person
in the wrong bed.

From earthy and raw
so quickly
to empty and white.

He was the child with the magnifying glass that lingered
in the exhalation of the heavens. Always holding it on
those of weaker statue than himself. Insects were his
starting point, as they were barbecued under the influence
of what was focused between light and glass and what
lived became inanimate just a blackened smear that he
smothered words into the dirt
        
                           I'LL BURN THE WORLD,

His parents saw this and in jest laughed it off as the
Immaturity of a child's frustration. That all was but a
a boy finding his place within the many echoes of manhood.
A child was maturing, and they assumed that he was not
ready for the collision of what was in-between the moments
of childhood and adulthood.

One cold and sodden night where the only things that were dry.
Were submerged in the cover of roofs and foliage.
But even the penetrating raindrops gathered in haste to soak
the earth beneath the leaves protection. All drowned within
nights flourish of immersed air. Where it felt that breath was only
in-between the flurry of h20's deluge.

Within the house, within the rooms crept a silence.
            It wasn't alone, for it wept unseen streams between the  
crisp white borderlines,  were doused in clear liquids,
Draping the curtains in non received  heavy remorse,
the only things that were burdensome were the drapes as the weight of the liquid pulled at the seams holding them aloft.

Remorse was neither felt or given. just a feeling of accomplishment.  
Felt it in the moments that succeeded between this
gathering of dead lights as a flame was lit.
But not a whisper was echoed this flame was lifeless
in the eyes of its beneficiary.
But it lept upon the walls like a ballerina, gentle,
and dancing within the confides of its given dance.

He stood in the hallway the flashback was unexpected,
but he still stood there gazing and the beauty of something
given with such frailty that a breath could extinguish
its potential. His parents had no idea, they were slumbering
within the confines of blankets that entombed the warmth.
Clasping hand even in sleep love was a subconscious yearning.
The thing with these old houses some had decretive metal over
the wind bars in beauty crafted to keep things out.


But this was his plan, what cant get in cant get out.
He'd gone in there room and stole the key.
He took a last glance, and said,
             "I Love You
,Before sealing them within. The flames were silent like
a stalker watching waiting, till the inevitable conclusion.

As things started to burn more passionately, caressing every
thing it was touching. So the smoke started to thicken like
A heavy smog it got into places the fire had not reached.
Moans could be heard, then screams at the realisation of
what was happening. He Could hear them, he could see them.
For even though a teenager he was intuitively cunning,
tinkering with everything and anything.

And small cameras were dotted around the house,
looking listening to everything that was seen and spoken.
It had come to fruition due to one such thing he had heard
being discussed by his parents.

"I saw him in the woods,

                 "Doing what darling?

"He didn't see me but the neighbours cat,
                                  "you know soot,

"What did he do, nothing bad!

                "He tied it up,
"Then threw what I thought was water on it,
                  I thought it was nasty but then!!!  

"Then what, your scaring me,

"He lit a cigarette, I didn't even know he smoked,
  "Then he discarded the match,

       "The cat, oh my god the cat,

"But he recorded its screams, he recorded it dying,

"I couldn't move I was so angry, so humiliated,
        "I wanted to throttle him there and then,

"But ill phone the police tomorrow,
                  "He's not right, who would do that,

How dare they think that I can just be fobbed off,
         discarded.

                                             I was making music,
the screams were a delicate symphony,
            acoustics that's couldn't be reproduced.
It had to be from the source.

That laid, the plans for what now enveloped that house,
recording every noise, every scream. But what he needed
was for them to burn, to release the music he needed to
hear to complete his work. And they like parents gave it
there all, he had goose bumps as he heard there terror.
his eyes welled up, not in regret but the beauty that his
parent last words were given to him, so personal was this
moment that he'd never forget it.
                                                        
                                                                ­          "Thank Mum & Dad,

After this he released a mix tape, that could be only
conceived from an artist, in the womb of excellence.
That's the reviews he had, it brought shudders to your
heart and mind. It was if your humanity was crying out to it.

As so forth and more were sewn in the adulation of his work.

Now he needed to make more music, but he needed more
screams to make his next piece two were not enough..

So he wandered the night, dressed in unclean wear
so not to be confused with who, or what he was..
He hung around the homeless parts of town,
plastic sheeting for roofs.. and combustible bedding.
It was as if he'd planned himself. but he had to be smart.
for this was if ill planned he would have a needle in his
arm within the year. But he took his time tiny cameras
recording visually and sound.

He had gathered the combustible elements needed to
make this a orchestra of his needing, not a duet like before.
He didn't down play his past offering, but this would make
an album of despair and monument to the flame.

It had been raining, but only lightly as he needed some
dampness in the air on there sheets cardboard mattresses.
So not to raise suspicion on the dampness of there homes.

As they moved away from the embers of barrel fires,
yes he'd thought about that. Not every home was a
crematorium a cardboard and plastic coffin of there
choosing. He waited clasping his hands together breathing
on them as it was cold night. He liked to watch, a voguer
of sort, but his wasn't the fantasy of death it was to hear the
music that was about to be sung with smoke filled lungs.

He'd set up a unique but rudimentary way to light the fire,
a small gas hob with liquid within. it needed to be a certain
temperature ignite, he had tried it before in a field out west.
Deserted he'd made a mock up of this humble place.
And he wasn't mistaken it was fascinating, the flame spread
like the wind enveloping everything but, it was a dull for even
though the flames wept of everything, its tears turning all to
ash..

It was silent, deafening, he cried for a while, there should never
be censorship of the flame, for what is a log fire without the cracking of its inner self being consumed. This was just smoke
and regret. But he now looked down at the camp, his watch
counting down the precious moments.
                                                             He whispered.
                                              

                                                  "Thankyou,
­
And then like a super nova the darkness was ingulfed in
the aurora of flame, gliding over the ground as if a stream
of conscious reckoning. Those near by the civilians that were
                        across the street were transfixed.
As screams embellished the flames, this was my orchestra
of light and noise. Those across the street were either screaming
or videoing the scene.
I looked at them and wondered where there humanity
had gone to, as to film this moment rather than to rush in
and save the few that they could.

I watched as the engines came, extinguishing my masterpiece
choosing the night was always preferable to the day as flames
dance better when there is less light to contaminate there beauty.

My music, I had become quite the remixer, of vocal and rhythmic
sounds.
                               Within a week I had mad nine new songs.

I named them each as deserved, making them in memory of
those who perished that dreadful night.
            It was well received, a few thought it was a haunting
melody of humanity's struggle, while a few thought it was
over ambitious, and lacked the passion of my first piece.

All together it went down well, and the adulation of the
flame was kept, to honour that which gives as much as
takes the breath of life away.
A year had past and the door rang, it was an officer.

                 "Could you come to the station please,

Had I become the victim of my own success, had someone
broke down the acoustics of my music and realised what
they were?? So many thoughts went through the calm
exterior of my persona. But inside the flame dimmed,
had I lit the last candle. I was taken in to a room,
and questioned evasive not to the point but gathering
speed to the answer, where were you on the
                                                             ­       30th April 2019.

Alabi's were a fantastic thing to plan ahead, I had laced
my date with sleeping tablets to leave her in perpetual
slumber. And got back before she awoke, we made love
we were the flame and the wick.. and our sweat was the wax dripping from our form. The next week I dumped her.

They asked if I recognised a picture, blurry and ill framed
but I could make out the figure was me. No sir I don't why.
This person of interest is wearing your jacket, your logo!
I smiled and was truthful to a degree.
                                                             Planning is everything.

I threw maybe fifty into the crowd when I did a concert
in the city, when we drove past some homeless persons.
We donated what was left to them, do you realise how
cold these streets are, who am I to steal warmth away.
I don't wear my own merchandise what do you think I
am egotistical, no I wanted to help those who I could
have been if not for my music. I lost my parents I know
what its like to be alone.

I think the show went well, as I was released before
reporters even got a sniff. But I knew that my time
was a wick trying to keep the flame lit but dying out
anyway. I had made preparations for this time.

I had brought a club only for gigs, cheesy as hell but
had that 80's disco vibe the entire floor was light up.
But I had brought  the ingredients for thermite,
amazing what you learn in school and the internet.
But I never used mine different libraries in different
cities so not raise suspicion. I  invited the music critics
and others which I had personally disproved of.
its was going to be free drinks and themed 80's night.

Who can not want free drinks, well I wasn't going to be
disappointed 90% came, how lucky the few.
Phones were confiscated, no video, but more
importantly no phone calls to the outside world.
I told them at the end of the night that I was realising
a new song, they were like vultures to flesh.
As the night progressed some wanted to leave,
but we offered them the VIP section also lit flooring.

Now was the time, I had put heating elements under the floor
to ignite the thermite. A supernova of heat even though brief
would ignite the choir of harmony needed. I asked them,
                                                           ­ "Are you ready,

And then silence, I put on my welding glasses,
                                                        ­         I wasn't stupid.
Never look into the heart of the flame unless you want
to be blinded by its beauty.
I pressed a button and it was magnificent, it was like a tide of sunlight, they tried to scramble but all exits were locked.
It was like the wizard of Oz, and the witch I'm meltinggggg..
But this wasn't a fairy tale.. The adulation I had for these
chosen few. What excitement the others had missed.

I'd made my booth flame and smoke proof, I had my own
walkway but I knew that this was the last time I could pay
homage to the flame. As the screams died down.
The wicks smouldered and the floor looked more like a battle
field of  WWII. I began I knew I didn't have a lot of time.
But this was just a single I'd already got the backing music
ready. And as I worked away, I could hear the banging on
the reinforced doors. They gave me a breather to get my
work fulfilled.

I heard the doors start to give way but no matter
I'd only needed this time to tweak the music.
Given I'd started this over an hour ago, it was good
on my part for this not to be broadcast till I saw fit.
As the police burst through, gazing at the flaming
effigies that lied before them, some threw up, gross..

While others saw me smiling I pressed the button and
my new song was word wide.. its was called the critics
tried to burn me down. The response was gratifying.
Likes reached the hundreds of thousands in mere minutes.
Well it was only three minutes twenty five seconds long.
As they shoot at the booth I wiggled my finger at them.
I do like to plan ahead but dam was that loud against the
glass. Got to be said some had wicked aim, made me flinch
a few times.

But alas all things come to an end, I uploaded my videos
of what I had done. I was proud of my contribution to
my legacy and empowering others with my music.
As I looked down at the puddle, I tap danced in it for
a moment and then lit the lighter, I looked a them
and once again waved, I was like a funeral pyre.
A crematorium of silence and then I was gone.
                                                I didn't scream,
I was in her embrace and had done her proud.

Shlomit (whom most
of the boys disliked)
stood in the playground
holding one end of the

skipping rope while another
girl held the other end as
another skipped. Her wire
rimmed spectacles stayed

in place as she moved, her
holey cardigan had seen
better days, her grey dress
had been handed down so

often that it shone like steel.
Naaman stood and watched
her from the steps leading
down to the playground. She

sometimes smelt of dampness
as if she’d been left out in the
rain and brought in to dry over
a dull fire. He looked at her dark

hair held in place with hairgrips,
the hair band of a dark blue
remained unmoved by her motions.
Some girl pushed her away from

the end of the skipping rope and
she walked to the wall and stared.
That seemed unfair, Naaman said,
you were doing your bit ok. Shlomit

looked at him with her nervous eyes.
They always do that, she said; never
let me play for long. He stood beside
her; he could smell dampness mixed

with peppermint. Maybe you’re too
good for them, he said. She smiled and
pushed the hair band with her fingers.
Her nails had been chewed unevenly,

he noted, her fingers were ink stained.
Would you like a wine gum? he asked.
He held out a bag of wine gum sweets.
She put her fingers into the bag and

took one and put it in her mouth.
Thank you, she mouthed, her finger
pushing the sweet further in. Naaman
walked with her up the steps that led

up from the small playground and stood
on the bombed ground and looked down.
There used to be a house where the
playground is now, he said, it got

bombed out. The playground was
once the cellar. Oh, she said, I didn’t
realise that. The bombs missed the
school, shame, he said, smiling. Daddy

said I ought not talk with boys, she said,
looking at Naaman then quickly around
her. Why’s that? he asked. She looked
at her fingers, the thumbs moving over

each other. He said boys were rude and
mischievous, she said. I guess some are,
Naaman said. She looked at him. You
seem all right, she said. But you are still

a boy and he might find out I talked to you
and then there would be trouble. How
would he find out here in the playground?
Naaman asked. Someone might tell from

here that saw me, she said anxiously.
Last time someone told him he beat me,
she added quietly. She pushed her hands
into her cardigan pockets. Best go, she said.

I like you, Naaman said, you remind me of a
picture I saw of a girl standing beside Jesus
in that Bible in the school library. Do I? she
said, did she have wire-rimmed glasses?

No, Naaman said, but she had a pretty face
like yours. She laughed and took her hands
from her pockets. He saw two reflections of
himself in the glass of her spectacles behind

which her own eyes gazed out. Maybe it was
me, she said playfully. Oh, yes, he said, taking
her thin ink stained fingers in his, no doubt.

Come hither and feel my touch
My fingertips fueled by desire
Exploring every inch of you
Under this burning blue star

Dim the lights, My Love
Keep your eyes shut
And let your body move as it will
To the rhythm of my beating heart

Your voice sounds so tender
Flesh warm to the touch
As I ****** you deep, your dampness so sweet
Come hither and make my yearning complete

Like sentinels of days gone by
They're silhouettes against the sky
A headstone for those still below
A monument we proudly show

Of times when our tin was the very best
when quality counted not paying less
When the work was hard and the day was long
And the mines were filled by the miners song

Their hymns tell tales of life in the deeps
where darkness surrounds and dampness creeps
where disaster can be just a minute away
and you thanked the lord for every day

For generations all our menfolk
proudly joined the line
never once imagining
that we'd outlast the mine

Cyclonic storm is brewing nearby!
Dampness all over is engulfing;
Only single grey paints the sky!

Trees and plants dance by the wind!
Intermittent light and strong breeze
With a little rain is washing the place!

Storm is supposed to cross the coast
Within 24 hours making all alert.....;
Ships and boats are anchored safe!

End of year with the last storm on
Makes dampness everywhere and
Chilling weather slowly creeps all....!

Anticipating the ensuing storm all.....
Wait and watch suspense at seat edge!

I sat under a paper umbrella of the reddest hue autumn
and like an apple
I waited for you to pick me ripe
bite, smell my neck
and remember.
I sat on bench of grey weather boards
waiting to be thrown down upon them-
wanting to be pinned down upon them.
Feet on a rug of discarded
leaves, just like me.
discarded but beautiful.
still just a season long
season woman,
can you love me winter long?
Ill meet you on the snowy bench.
white puffs of apologises will float from my mouth.
my toes will shake and the fence we loved for being red
we'll love for being white.
Red will now slither to my ears and you will say things I can't hear.
And the stars will paint the sky too dark so we
can see that winter sparkles.
Spring is full of other lovers, this bench-
lovers that are not you and I.
And the playground is full of candy wrappers and mothers sneakers.
The trees are majestically green stretching and yawning and showing off.
The children bouncing, whining, crying,  finding.
Spring is full of lovers but not us
so she gives my heart to summer
and glass doesn't melt so the places where I like to feel your sweat
are the places where they like to touch my body.
summer makes us reckless and the bench, our bench is being held together by the squirrels claws and the sparrows talons... they wait for us to scatter.
hot you kiss my dampness, damper.
hot you kiss my pain and sorrow. boiling all the past good voyage.
our fence has lost some posts as,
the children love to climb and kick
it will hold on, still.
but it won't hold-out and won't hold-in which is what fences are meant to do.
at least they should... they should choose.
Autumn, yes it's autumn ours. We are autumn lovers
with leaves of the book skittering beneath the empty slide.
We are autumn, smell like the burning leaves of who we were.
Smelling like the fresh cut wood, ready to have her rings counted
Autumn lover, hold my hand and tell me you are afraid.
Autumn lover, holding color golden like a circle round.
Hurry, before she blows me past the red fence,
Hurry before our secrets get caught by the wind and dance around the playground.
Hurry Autumn lover,
Hurry to remember that you loved me, once.*

Shannon April Alice
11/2/14

I swirl the loose skin
of my forehead like the swirls
of stars, in weariness of the world.
My lashes beaded with drops,
from the shower that I was to tired
to dry, blur my vision like the floating boat clouds which blur
the moon to a
wisp
of smoke.
I lie, wet in my towel uncaring that
my body is forming a silhouette
of shadowed dampness on
my bed.

the weight of a hand
resting in yours
the resistance to the touch of a single finger
upon another
the sizzle of a thousand hairs between fingertips
the dampness of breath upon your cheek
the redness of pair of lips
...or of a blushing forehead
...or of cheekbones under droplets of perspiration

the silence of an empty room
the sense of someone close
...who is a thousand miles away
...and thinking of you

A ***** with naturally created dampness
causes me to lose my stride
and mess my moccasins.

How will this muddy mess be conquered
by my not so balanced state-
shaky even as I stand and ponder.

A friend is already on the other side,
as use was made of two delicately placed logs
but my trust for them is nonexistent.

I choose another log to complete the path,
heavier than I had imagined,
and I place it not so delicately in between the others.

Medium sized rocks penetrate the soles of my shoes,
and tease the nerves in my feet constantly.
They never pierce me fully and I am thankful.

My brain is set on numerous trains,
and the tracks, and railroad spikes.
I was warned but I was more than disappointed.

There was truly nothing there but garbage,
splinters of wood and scrap cloth
caked with mud and gravel.

There is some beauty in this trip.
The nostalgia I craved was nowhere in sight,
but that was not such a bad thing after a moment.

Sprinkled along the rocky path
little areas of beauty stood out through the vacancy.
There were daisies everywhere.

oft on bus seated next,
every one of your senses
adjusting, modulating,
to her unpredictable
solar flaring

you don't ever risk
that first missing
           misstep,
your entirety is
sun bursted
        (un)/consumed
in unhappy joy of her
consuming presence

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

you laugh
years later
re the topic of
your first shaky
foot in the mouth
a classic misstep
first bow shot,
opening one liner

and each storied retelling  
is nature!s
snow and rain
refilling
the love of your
groundwater table
welling up

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

you love her scent
the silly hats she wears,
her short skirts arouse,
that last open button
a misstep invitation,
angry it incenses,
her every solitary everything is
incense,
pervading a daily
co-riding
passenger's
oxygen? starved soul

~~~~~~~~~

her umbrella is a wet
selfie stick
accidentally opening and dousing
an un random next door
seatmate

just another unlucky misstep for
someone sitting next store,
oil on the fire of
happily ever after

two selfies are last seen as
one
un selfishly
toweling each other off and
on
with wet kisses

~~~~~~~~~~~

you eavesdrop on her
earbud music,
weep internally you do with
crazed jealously

The Temptations
are so unfairly
singing to her
"Ain't to Proud to Beg"
and neither are you

you heart is misstepping
to every beat,
your fingers
thrumming,
you idiot, not quietly enough
humming
in the next seat

the first,
will not be
the last

smile exchanged

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

poem writing on the tablet,
amidst the groaning awful
no moving
city traffic

overheated bus
combustible with
winter snow dampness,
wet dog sweat smelling people clothes

all you want to do is get home
shower off
the daily dirt

the poetry writing pastime
is the place
where you put yourself
to better to pass over
your sour surroundings

her finger rattlesnakes,
misstepping over,
noisily invading,
the invisible boundary
constructed to hold up the
eye-averting
Keep Out sign
to momentary,
too neighborly
strangers

her red painted
pointer finger
smudge prints on your tablet,
accompanied with
bespoke words
"try this"

that smudge suggestion
won't come off

insisting on crediting
a shared authorship,
you ask for her
email and cell,
so you can share
her
forever

co jointed tangled
bus and bed sheet first efforts
on writing, all about
what you play~argue
what should your entitled poem
be titled

you think

endless short love story bus poems

but she prefers,
with red fingers persuading

the first misstep is the best

both see the merit
in each other

water streams from between your eyes
puddles fill the cracked streets
my rage is pure like angel fire
a love which nothing can defile
she wets the world with her dampness
thunder cries out for warmth
her shivering shoulders bare witness
to the sun and what was lost
the windy day kept me inside
holding onto this fright
feelings pressed against my chest
i tremble with delight
youthful arrows
morning sparrows
stargazing at night
just because you can do it
doesn’t mean that its right
streets of cobblestones are being shown
the pavement is our throne
home against the cement
dilapidated boxcars
and temples of respect
remove your shoes before you enter
yurts and cabins made of clay
barely resurrect
sustainable ways are coming back
give thanks and respect
to ancestors who deserve our praise
for they never did neglect
their duties to the earthly mother
her love they sought to honor
children of the wilderness at home beneath her cover
canopies of trees
line feline forests with her love

Hearing fogged drops of rain
Precipitate violence in the Amazon,
Against the placid Leaves;
Left disheveled the unfiltered forest.  

Dampness divorced from its thin vapor blur
Plummeting memoirs retold, the cradled
Past returns its own, splintered light
Edging the threshold of infinitude,
Axiomatic slippage each fell cold.

Fallen moisture recovered,  
Once nourished the ancients;
Correspondingly, we align.
Lineal descendants,
Tides of March,  
Sibilant waters flow through us.

Hoary myths, now hallowed imminent.  
Ponderous, our torn skies cleft, clouds suffused in grey─
The emergent pour, casts a montage of
Freighted silence, implicit tapestries
Sewn seamless; our kindred froth ashore.

Pedigreed continuum bound in common plight,
Unseen flood of halcyon
Dust and flesh coalesce beneath the torrent;
Genetic lines merge ─ intersection of
Time and eternity.
From the same water we drink.
Lineal descendants,
Tides of March,
Sibilant waters flow through us.

©2012 W.S. Warner

Walk through my soul forest
and sense
Anciently evergreen and wise
Fresh dampness deep with life

Rocket through my mind galaxy
and know
Burning nebulas of inspiration
Infinite dustings of thought constellations

Fall into my heart ocean
and taste
Tides brackish with emotional brine
Love foaming on shells and shorelines

Breathing life into my body
Blooming peace into my life
Take a moment to see me
And these natural forces of mine

Sometime this spring, when all
the cobwebs have been dusted,
and all the cold and dampness
has gone away, I'll sit on my
front porch and watch the lazy
clouds go by.

Sometime this spring, when there
are no more dreary days, 0r long
and silent lingering nights,
I'll sweep my front porch and
sit so grand in my rocking chair
and stare and howl at the
sumptuous moon.

Sometime this spring, I'll hold
my child in my loving arms,
and will stroke her hair and whisper
to her about all the adventures to come,
and dream and fill her head and heart
with all the joy that nature brings.

Sometime this spring.


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Static radio click and a skitting bird,
stench of cigarettes and stale beer
salt and vinegar or dry roasted?

The dormant dampness
of barely-used picnic tables.

Flat coke hanging to melted ice,
warmth trapped under cloud.
Phone under thumb -
get together.

Bike chains and combination locks,
empty wallets, Rizzlers, filters,
a key to the house.

Sticky coaster and slimy taps
beads of sweat on the frozen glass.

Rebirth!

Have to clean my house today.
Forlorn for near eternity.
Bathroom once depressed in dank dampness.
Embryonic before new birth.
Now reborn.
Put on dress of new.
Fixtures and fittings sparkling renewed.
Safely delivered took a week.
So glad it was not a labour of mine.
Walls painted as light corn-flower.
Forgotten archaic tragedy as shades of change.
They have evolved!
By ladylivvi1

© 2013 ladylivvi1 (All rights reserved)

but I knew its walls ripe with the hate of an ancient dampness
and the ceilings leaking and the floor quaking with hatred
and the neighbours lurking at the windows, to see what happens in our house.

four generations have hated in here incessantly, no one escaped it.
at our house, hatred acts like a replacement for icons,
food and beverage. without hatred,
Sunday pours over as turbid as lye.

in the beginning it was, maybe, just the hatred of one
deprived of love, but later, for those that followed,
it became a natural hatred, a
homely feeling, our title of nobility
and for some time now none of us has taken any comrade
but the one that he or she could hate the most.

especially at night, when the ending is close,
hatred nestles in its bedtime garments, bleeds between the sheets,
all night we turn from one side to the other
with our eyes focused in the dark to the other's bed.

the children have already learned it, know that nobody sleeps,
listen with their eardrums swollen by strain how the hatred crawls,
with the noise of a heavy spider, from one bed to another.
now it packs one into another and quakes, and from them
here comes a fresh smell of frozen dampness.

this nonetheless only for a few months, two-three years at most,
after which their blood
gets darker and the hatred sends down into them a somber conceit
and then we recognize them as being of our kind.

when I was born, I was born for this:
to take the hatred further, to throw it into children -
I do not matter, none of us matters,
only the hatred we pass on from one to the other matters.
we marry out of hatred. we make children out of hatred.
they must hate in their turn, because otherwise,
our more than a century-long heritage will go to waste.

and if we were not to hate, those prepared for it since childhood,
it would spread among you and we must be very careful,
because our regular doses may **** you,
although nobody can be sure that life
is just life.

Ioan Es. Pop
Translated by Anca Romete

I have never known a love like yours
partly cloudy with a chance of rain
i still carry my umbrella most days
you keep storms in your back pocket
and when your jeans wear down
they fall right out, and during the distant thunder
i try to take a step onto a brave new sidewalk
but my ankle twists and i fall back into the
silk-covered fold-out cot i've known all my life
the dampness of your soggy words make
my bones feel low to the ground
heavy with the weight on your shoulders
sitting pretty behind the worries and woes
my heart makes up to block it from view
I've been all over the same place and back
I've seen all the world you have
through eyes that have the gleam of a dewdrop in the morning sun
covered in a film of dust that coats our lungs and tongues
and makes our breath catch the words we don't mean
I watch the sun rise every morning
i see the sun set every night
you say i shouldn't see as many sunsets as you do
and as the reds and purples paint the sky
and your bold and stinging orange
burns another imprint into my mind
I take a paintbrush and drag the colors in
filling the dent and putting what's left in my soul
so I don't have to see it again if I don't want to because
I know that tomorrow's the same
partly cloudy with a chance of rain
and my umbrella will be with me
for as long as I stay

They say there's an ocean;
They say its vast and deep:

Profoundly deep.
They say that you fall into it,
A simple slip, maybe even a dive
But once it surrounds you,
You dive deeper, and deeper
So deep that the world fades away.

You forget the surface,
Get lost in the depths,
Wrapped in it, you find warmth
You linger in its caress and you find
Your lust for fresh air.. fades away.

They say its vast, some say infinite.
It stretches to a wondrous eternity
You explore it and explore it
Looking not for something specific
Just to find all it holds
You search for years and lifetimes
But you find it has no end.

They say there's an ocean;
I think there's an ocean,
But I fear few are finding it

The explorers are distracted
They set out on their search
And find a river, a lake
A trickle, a puddle.

New explorers seek it,
Driven by the tales they've heard
But some veterans are less sure
"Swim in shallower waters" they say
"You can do it now and at least get wet"

But the dampness is superficial
It leaves you seeking your next dip
Maybe a deeper one, but often not.

Some stop seeking, some just give up
Some believe that it simply never was.

I still believe what they say:
They say there's an ocean.

~D.B. Guy (November 16, 2008)

She was fire, I was water
And we made sweet condensation
The day, the month we met.
She turned me into steam,
Pure steam, in April, no less.
I quenched her raging thirst (I won’t forget)
We drank each other’s smoke
And sparked up *** and cokes
I took her fizz for fire
She took my ironic dampness for jokes.

At first,
All was elemental
And if she burned the bread I called it toast
And if water weighed her down we just got soaked
I did not try to put her out
She did not try to make me burn.

We’re not so different, said the fire,
One day to the water
I could see this month ignite,
Make a bonfire of our lives
We could sit there like a house on fire
Extinguished and set alight at the same time
I flowed around the idea and warmed to it
So I moved in and every day
I put the fire out that she had made
And every night she blazed
The oases that my love had made.
Until one evening Fire said,
While water brushed his teeth,
“Turn off the tap”.
And water, being fairly fluid in his actions
Did in fact for five years turn off that tap
In front of her at least, but behind her back…
I let it run,
                  let it go
                                 let it flow
                                                  flow
                                                      
                                                       flow
                
                                                        flow

                                                             !!!!

And it was not until the 1000th time
That something clicked
And the millioneth drip overflowed the empty sink
And I responded to her claim:
“We’re not so same.” I said.
She, understandably, had not consumed the context
As we’d just been talking about a friend in massive debt
Because of negative equity.
But now the tap was on,
“I’ll brush the teeth in this relationship
Or I’ll be ******!” Water flowed.
The tap was gushing now, the mirror fogged -
The drains were leaking back up out the bog
“For one thing, fire’s not a thing –
Me? I’m hydrogen and oxygen too
But you? You’re no thing, no thing at all.”
“What?” She said.
I couldn’t understand
How she didn’t understand.
I flowed right on down… right on down to land –
I was seeking earth, not fire, earth!
I’d been seeking earth all my life
And not realized until tonight – that night – tonight.
“And for a second thing – Fire’s so loud!
Crackling! Always with the constant crackle
Always eating, heating or causing hassle
Everything’s a hazard or an all-consuming passion
If we just kept calm, it could all be fine
But your fiery fingers always dialing 999.

“Right.” She said. “I see where you’re going here –
You’re saying I’m like fire – FIRE?!”
I said, Jeez we’re 3 pages in already,
I was hoping that much was clear.”
“FIRE?” She bellowed.
“Fire?” She scorched.
“******, he wrote.” I said.
“What are you talking about?” She asked.
“Just a poem I’m writing – it was a funny line, trust me.”
“Says Mr. Water?” She says, looking over my shoulder,
“I wouldn’t say that.”
“You might,” I say. “Anyway, Mr Water, what do you mean?”
“I don’t know, you wrote it, perhaps you can tell me.”
“You meant, by what I wrote, that water’s not known for jokes,
It’s too clear and see through to cause a face poke”
“And that’s the best water-related joke that you know?”
“No. But you just remember who is writing the poem.” I say,
Expecting a laugh.
No laugh.

Then she apologized and very humbly gave me the floor.
After (storming off upstairs and slamming the door and) pointing out
That all water does is sit around
And weigh things down
Making clothes darker and heavier
Surrounding everything with its slowly moulding love
And rather than consuming it up
Firing it up
Sparking it up
Burning and blazing ‘n
Combusting it up!
Water sits.
On what it loves
Which is down
And weighs it down with love
Envelopping it from sides and above
Surrounding it from five sides
And leaving only one way out for its victim –
Down.

I thought around it while she fried herself in perspiration
And I could see how she was not wrong
And I could see how she was not right
For I could see that I clearly was water
And I could see all sides – “I can see.” I said,
And should have left it there, “everyside of what you say –
I can see everything but your true… bottom.

Now when fire alights on bottom,
No thought can put it out
So we rejoin the action
An unspecified –but quite long- time later.
And when the steam settles,
Not much has changed.
The conversation resumes, Ground-hog style,
Ground-hog style, a year later, in a different flat.
“At least I have some substance!”
And again comes the tide I cannot hold back –
“At least I am a thing, I can be happy, I can be,
I’m not just a process, just an action, with an appetite for trees.
I’m not afraid of silence either.”
“Afraid of it? You saturate it!
You smother everything in silence
That’s why you like the snow –
I like the kind of weather that makes
Strangers take off all their clothes.
I like the crackle of the campfire
I like the chatter of friendly teeth in need of heat
I am ambitious, I need the next thing to consume
And yes I like being high and aiming higher –
With you it’s always down down down.
Sitting down,
Calming down,
Going down…
And when she said those magic words
I took the heat that I had heard
And channeled it like she could never do
Being a process and not a thing like me.
Channels are made of things directing process
I took her heat and channeled it
And all because
Those magic words
Going down.
No one likes a love that is damp she said
And so I made her fire wet
And all the while, during, after
We lay and drank in pools of laughter
We were liquid fire flowing
Every night the bed an ocean
The weather inside, hmm… snowing
Warm snowballs of love
Snowflakes of love
Snowflakes of fire
“Higher” She scorched, “ take me higher!”
“No you go down –“ I heard it spoken
And just like that the spell was broken.

I rippled, reflecting the ceiling for a while
In a silence even I could not contain
She processed the surroundings, the curtains, the rain
And burned them back to ash again.
An hour passed.
I was betting that she
Would internally combust
Before I drowned myself
To death in silence
Another hour passed
Slowly.
Ever so
Slowly. Not fast,
But slowly.

Then luckily,
12hrs passed in no time at all for me
In fact, I only awoke because my ears were burning me.
“Have you been asleep all this time?” they sizzled.
“Sorry,” I said, before I’d even had a chance
To remember the argument
And with that rather C-list magic word,
The matter was moderated, thirst quenched, problem passed.

Water sat there boiling.
Fire fumed there drenched.

“I’m not sure I can do this much longer.”
Said water to fire.
“I feel I am spreading myself too thinly on you.”

“You are.” Said fire.

“I don’t like being spread thin.
I see less of the world reflected
In my shrinking puddle.

“Light up my life again!” She burned.
“I can not.”
“Will not.”

“Will not is cannot.”

“Cannot is not will not.”


“Cannot is not will not does not make sense.”



“Does.”
“Does not.”
“Agree to differ?”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No.”

“Stalemate.”

“What?”

­…

“You’re
  
         draining away from me.”

…

    
                                 smoke.”
                               in
“You’re going up


And with that, one morning, they both woke up.


Alone…

November in Quebec.
Almost winter, dull wet snow
And clothing never warm enough
To keep the dampness out.
Nothing like Dallas it seems
Where, even though the television says it’s cool,
She wears a light-weight suit of pink and navy blue
And matching pillbox hat.

November in Quebec.
On a day that seems to go from grey to grey
And grey all in between,
We sit in heated classrooms
With the first damp smell of mothballed wool,
While black and white New England nuns,
Banished for their sins to northern, foreign cold,
Talk about their hero (and now ours)
As if he were alive:
Alive enough to step up from the grave,
Alive enough to kiss the snow-white blonde,
Who squeezed into a dress that shone like freezing rain
The night she sang her birthday tune.
I watch for tears from the widow’s blank-stare eyes:
They don’t show through the sheer black veil
That drapes her pillbox hat.

It’s ’64 and winter in Quebec.
The ground’s so hard
That grandma has to wait for spring to lie down in the ground.
I think of her as if she were alive:
I feel her hold my feet again,
I see her smiling at the door.
On this sad and sunny day,
In my grey wool coat and matching pillbox hat,
I watch a dark brown box get rolled away.
Looking down at the new white snow and my new red boots
I blink and blink and squeeze my frozen tears behind my blank-stare eyes  
And think I might be Jackie.

i am satiated sinful--
who cares more?
that we've been scorching bliss
and grafting these
blameless bittersweet distractors
like we won't hear thunder-
hiding from the condescending constancy
of raindrops on the tin garage
i will swallow you
until my belly rumbles
"enough cataclysm,
enough leaky roofs,"
filling me with sloshing
wistful reminders
of our tranquil dampness,
a shivering placidity in
our secluded synchronicity.

The coach is parked outside the gospel church along Rockingham Street. Brown with a yellow line along the side with the name of the coach company's name: RICKARD'S.

Janice stands next to her grandmother waiting to get on the coach; she's wearing  a flowery dress and a white cardigan and brown sandals. Next to Janice's grandmother is Benedict and his mother and Benedict's younger sister Naomi.  Members of the gospel church who have organized the day out to the seaside are ticking off names from a list.

Weather looks good- the grandmother says, eyeing the sky which is blue as a blackbird's egg.

Benedict's mother looks skyward. - It does, hope it stays that way. Benedict looks at Janice; she smiles shyly. She's wearing the red beret. Her hair looks nice and clean brushed. Sit next to her on the coach.

Wouldn't surprise me if it isn't a little cold by the coast- the grandmother says, looking at Benedict's mother, seeing how tired she looks, the little girl beside her sour faced.

Maybe, hopefully it won't be for their sakes- the mother says, looking at the coach and the tall gospeller with the one eye. - mind you behave, Benny, no mischief.

That goes for you, Janice, no mischief or you'll feel my hand- the grandmother says, her voice menacing, and don't forget to make sure to know where the loo is don't want you wetting yourself.

Janice blushes looks at the pavement-  I always behave, Gran, and yes, I'll find the lavatory once we get there, she says.

One Eye ticks off Janice and Benedict's names; his one eye watching them as they board the coach,and sit by the window, and look out at the grandmother and Benedict's mother and sister. Kids voices; smell of an old coach stink; the window smeary. Janice waves; her grandmother waves back. Benedict waves; his mother waves and smiles, but his sister looks down at the pavement.

One Eye and two other gospellers stand at the front of the coach calling off names and the kids respond in return in a cacophony of voices, then they sit down at the front and the coach starts up. A last minute of hand waving and calling out of goodbyes and the coach  pulls off and away along Rockingham Street.

Well, that's it, just us now- Benedict says, looking out of the window, looking past Janice.

No more bomb sites after this for a few hours- Janice says, no more being made embarrassed by Gran. I know she worries, but I am eight and a half years old, not a baby.

That's the elderly for you- Benedict says, always thinking us babies when we're almost in double figures.

Janice smiles. She looks at Benedict. He's wearing a white shirt and sleeveless jumper with zigzag pattern and blue jeans. He's left his cowboy hat at home; his six-shooter toy gun has been left behind, also. Glad he came; like it when he's near; I feel safe when he's about.

Have you any money?- Benedict asks.

I've  two shillings- she says, Gran said I might need it.

I've got two and six pence- Benedict says, my old man gave me a shilling and my mother gave me one and sixpence.

The coach moves through areas of London Benedict doesn't know. He looks at the passing streets and traffic.

Billie, my canary, has learned new words- Janice says.

What words has he learned? - Benedict asks, looking at Janice's profile; at her well shaped ear, the hair fair and smooth.

Super, pretty and boy- Janice says.

Talking about me, is he?- Benedict says.

No, about himself- Janice says, but who taught him the words neither Gran or I know. Was it you? She asks.

Me? why would I teach him to say those words?- Benedict says. If I was going to teach him words they'd be naughty words.

You haven't have you?- Janice says, or I'll get the blame; Gran thinks I taught Billie those words when I didn't.

Well, I may have said certain words in his presence when I came round the other week- Benedict says.

Was it you who taught him to say Billie without a *****?- Janice says.

Benedict looks down at his hands in his lap. Did he actually say it?- Benedict says.

Janice nods. I got in trouble over that- she says, gran thought I taught him; came close to getting a good smacking, but she thought it over and said she didn't think I would.

So, who does she think taught him?- Benedict asks.

Janice raises her eyebrows. Who do you think?- she says.

So, please don't teach Billie words- Janice says, or I could be for it.

Sorry- he says, looking at her, thought it'd be a laugh.

Gran doesn't share your sense of humour- Janice says. Now she wonders if she ought to let you come around anymore, and I like you coming around. So please don't teach Billie words.

I won't- he says, not a word, not a single word.

She smiles and kisses his cheek. He blushes. What if the other boys on the coach saw that? How would he live it down? Girls and kisses. He's seen it in films at the cinema. Just when a cowboy gets down to the big gun fight some woman comes along and spoils it with that kissing stuff. He's seen Teddy Boys who seem quite tough, spoil that impression when a girl gets all gooey and kisses them.

Janice looks out the window, watches the passing scene. She like it when Benny's there. She doesn't like most boys; they seem rough and tough; seem loud and spotty and smell sweaty, but Benny is different, he's tough in a gentle way, has good manners and that brown quiff of hair and his hazel eyes that seem to look right through her, right into her very heart.

Benedict doesn't think other boys saw the kiss; he sits feeling the slight dampness on his cheek; he doesn't think having a kiss, makes him look weak.

"There are monsters on the building," she said in the sad song of a West Texas drawl.  She sounded like she did when she talked in her sleep.  We had paused there to examine the doorway the way people do when they know something frightening and important will happen to them on the other side.  

Somehow the banality of the details seemed at odds with the profundity of the situation:  A hot breeze taunted us with the smell of garbage.  Pigeons did their stupid strut and pecked and **** on the sidewalk.  Manhattan pedestrians slogged past through the May heat wave in a sweaty river of hurried lives, each stranger a subtle hint that perhaps our pain wasn't so profound after all.  My own rivers of perspiration seemed to drive the point home.

Molly had more than once accused me of being attracted to the dramatic, and she was right.  In response to this weakness, this juvenile habit of seeing myself as a hero in the story of my life rather than just another person in the world, the God I still half believed in seemed to be punishing me with mundane aggravation as we prepared to defy him:  crowded subways, humidity that pressed in from all sides, growing stains in my armpits.  Now that we had reached the building the half-believed God added a master stroke of lewdness.  Squatting on the threshold of our destination were a pair of gargoyles [cement artistic tradition combined with superstition] that peered down at us with obscene toothy grins.  

Molly tugged on my damp fingers, and asked again,  "Greg, why are there monster's on the building?" Her eyes seemed both accusatory and desperate for affection, but her voice was sleepy, like she was trying to pretend it was all just a dream.

"I don't know," I said.  "It doesn't matter."

It was true.  It didn't matter accept as a symbol in a story that somewhere deep in my mind I was shamefully conscious I would someday write.  Disgusting but unavoidable for the boy I was at 19, a boy who wanted to be important someday, wanted to be important by being "a writer," and didn't see how he could ever be anything else.  

"Write what you know" they say, but I was just an upper middle class white kid, nothing important had ever happened to me.  This was important.  This was life and death.  Most of me lived it but part of me watched from outside.

We went inside and found the elevator, then the waiting room.  I held her left hand while she filled out the forms with her right.  I told her I loved her, trying to say it like a transcendent spiritual truth that could make all the facts of our situation irrelevant and sweep them off somewhere they didn't matter.  

Then a nurse came and took her away.  

It offended me that despite the life and death business conducted behind the wall, the waiting room looked just like any other.  Maybe worse.  Worn out office furniture in generic shades of brown.  Stacks of magazines that looked like they had been procured second hand from some cleaner pricier office where happier people sit and smile about life while they fill out forms and wait.

I glanced around the room, careful to avoid eye contact.  There were two other men, one white one black, both looking sad and dejected, staring into space, thinking of the women in that other room I just like me I figured, wishing there was something they could do.  

I selected a magazine with half its cover missing.  Celebrities at a party.  Celebrities at the beach.  I put the magazine down.

I should be feeling more than this, I thought, and that thought seemed shameful too.

It was still a question about me.  The pathetic existential question that has always gnawed my television generation:  Why can't I just be real?  The question brought more shame.  Why are you asking these questions?  This inner monologue  ...  they are killing your son in there!  They are ripping him out of the girl you love.  Shut up and just feel!  Or don't feel, and just shut up.  

Searching myself for sadness I found again a numb disgust for being outside myself and looking in.  

I thought of praying but an image came to me of Jesus struggling to carry his cross up a hill.  He was being chased by His Father who took the form of the God of old paintings, a long white beard, muscled body, the eyes of a tyrant. God was leading an angry mob, scaring Jesus up the hill to his death, screaming at Him:  "This is what my son was meant for!  You don't have any other choice!"  It was not the sort of image I hoped prayer would inspire.

Finally I arrived at the thought I was avoiding:  Molly crying on a cold table, machines inside her, everything happening too fast.  I had asked if I could go with her and hold her hand.

"No," the nurse had said with a touch of scorn, like the question was not just dumb, but an insult to women everywhere.  Why would she let the guilty party make things worse?

A few yards away there were doctors working machines inside the womb of the only girl I had ever loved, taking the life of a child I would never know.  But even if I had wanted to stop them, which I didn't, it was too late now.  

It was the first life and death decision either of us would make, and even though I would try to console her with the idea that we had chosen life, our own lives, our own futures, right or wrong, I knew we had also chosen death for our first child. Death always brings sadness, and despite whatever happiness we might still enjoy in the years to come, this sadness would would linger with us, in some form, forever, unless we came together to conceive another child and raise it.  This is not what Jesus told me.  This is what I told him.  He listened but he didn't seem to care.  He had no time for *******.

Molly appeared in the doorway to the back rooms where I had not been allowed to go with her.  I would have liked to go with her back there.  I would have held her hand, made her know that we were doing it together, that I was equally if not more culpable in this death than her, and if that were not possible, and it probably was not, at least I could have held her hand.            

But I was not allowed back there.  She went through it alone with strangers all around her speaking in professionally sensitive tones.
      
I put down the magazine and went to her.  Her face was blotchy, and there was still dampness in her eyes.  She had been crying for awhile and she was crying still.  A nurse's hand was on her shoulder.
      
"She was very brave,"  the nurse said, like Molly was a four year old who had just made it through her first hair cut without squirming.
      
"Will she be okay?"
      
"Yes, but now you need to take her home so she can rest."
      
The nurse disappeared.  I held Molly, and kissed her forehead, and told her how much I loved her and always would.  She did not speak and her body felt lifeless in my arms.  I led her back to the elevator and then out into the Manhattan bustle.  The humid heat had reached its most brutal hour, and I began to sweat immediately as we walked towards the subway.
      
We passed a deli.  I asked if she was hungry and she nodded.  I went inside and used the little money I had to buy a sandwich and two bottles of juice and we found a bench in the shade and sat there to eat.  She ate a little and drank some of her juice and then finally
spoke.
      
"It was a spot."
      
"What?"
      
"It was a spot.  They showed me.  It was a little black spot on a screen."
      
"It's okay, Molly  It's going to be okay," I lied.
      
"It was my little girl, but she was just a spot.  They showed me and then they took her away forever."
      
"I love you.  I love you so much."  It was true and all I could think to say and it didn't help much.
      
I brought her downtown to the financial district where I was staying that Summer in an NYU dorm with a friend from High School.  We were there to take film classes together.  Our parent's had allowed us to spend extra on the best housing, and the dorm we stayed in was actually an apartment on the 14th floor of a building with a doorman across from South Street Seaport.  It had a kitchen, high ceilings, and huge windows with a view of the Brooklyn Bridge, and even a
separate bedroom.  Fortunately Rick had allowed me the private room so he could have the larger one with the view and the television, so there was a place for Molly and I to go behind a locked door and lay down.

We got in the little bed together and curled into a combined fetal position.  I kissed the back of her neck and she took my hand and placed it on her pelvis where I could feel the bandage rustling under her sweatpants.
      
"Can you feel it?"
      
"Everything will be all right," I almost said, but it felt like garbage on the tip of my tongue and I had not yet grown used to lying except to myself.

I hadn't known there would be a bandage.

"Yes.  I can feel it,"  I said.  This, at least, I knew was true.

I lay there with her like that with my hand where our child had
grown for a few weeks and we fell asleep.

When I awoke, the room was gray with dusk, and Molly was snoring peacefully.  I got out of the bed carefully without disturbing her, sat at my desk, and opened my favorite drawer.  There was my small purple glass pipe, and a little baggy stuffed with the high quality marijuana that in my experience, you can only find in New York City, the Pacific Northwest and American Colleges.  I filled the pipe, lit it, and pulled hard, holding it in as long as I could and then coughing intentionally on the exhale for the fullest effect.  I repeated the process until the bag was nearly empty, lit a cigarette, and sat at the desk with my feet up, looking back and forth from the
high rise across the street to the young woman in my bed, contemplating life and love and God and the future.  

In that moment, high as I was on the drug and the city and the relief of having made it through the day, it truly did seem that everything would be all right.

I had taken to writing poetry a few months before, and I found a
piece of paper and began to write another:

God sat in the abortion clinic waiting room
while they killed his only son.
"My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?”
"I don't know.  It seemed like the right thing to do."
      
I thought I had the beginnings of a very good poem.  I hoped maybe, someday, somehow my poetry might change the way people thought about things.  I was young and stupid and ****** and my mind was about to crack open completely and let forth a torrent of strangeness.

I was very sad.

-2001

fightingcopsnaked.blogspot.com
brickdumbsublime.blog­spot.com

I now know why the Willow weeps
A tragedy of love it's memory keeps
For once a young man and a young maid
On tender grass beneath branches lay
Though pledged by birth to another
From clans they hid to be together
Thus the gentle Willow was their choice
Meeting beneath, till love they could voice
The Willow held these secret lovers dear
So would lower it's boughs when they drew near
Then tucked away in the Willow's womb
Could lay as one, yet this love was doomed
For jealousy lurked within the Pines
Spying the lovers thus entwined
Behind their curtain of slender limbs
He swore the maiden would yet be his
And so it came to pass one day
As the maiden softly maid her way
To their Willow deep within the glen
She saw the branches did already bend
Timidly as she did draw near
A sound of sorrow met her ears
Parting Willow branches to look within
A dampness did touch upon her skin
The Willow was shedding sap laden tears
For the young man in death was near
It was an arrow that had been used
A potent poison it's head infused
The maiden now blind with grieving mist
Removed the arrow, held it clenched in her fist
Whilst cradling his head he drew his last breath
She did plunge the arrow into her breast
And so it is that this is told
The Willow's grief could not be consoled
For unable to stop what had befell
The young love it had hid so well
With it's will broken as the lovers lay dead
The Willow, it's branches, never again spread
And because it is the memory it keeps
it is to this day that the Willows weep



Featured Poem on Poetry Soup, April 4, 2010

The phone rang in Red Lodge.  The sun had already faded behind the mountain, and the street outside where the bike was parked was covered in darkness. Only the glow from the quarter moon allowed the bike to be visible from my vantage point inside the Pollard’s Lobby.  The hotel manager told me I had a call coming in and it was from Cooke City.  By the time I got to the phone at the front desk, they had hung up. All that the manager had heard from the caller was that I was needed in Cooke City just before the line had gone dead.  Because of the weather, my cell phone reception was spotty, and the hotel’s phone had no caller I.D.

Cooke City was 69 miles to the West, a little more than an hour’s drive under normal circumstances.  The problem is that you can never apply the word normal to crossing Beartooth Pass even under the best of conditions, and certainly not this early in the season.  I wondered about the call and the caller, and what was summoning me to the other side.  There was 11,000 feet of mountain in between the towns of Red Lodge and Cooke City, and with a low front moving in from the West, all signals from the mountain were to stay put.

Beartooth Pass is the highest and most formidable mountain crossing in the lower 48 States.  It is a series of high switchback turns that crisscross the Montana and Wyoming borders, rising to an elevation of 10,947 ft.  If distance can normally be measured in time, this is one of nature’s timeless events.  This road is its own lord and master. It allows you across only with permission and demands your total respect as you travel its jagged heights either East or West.  Snow and rockslides are just two of the deadly hazards here, with the road itself trumping both of these dangers when traveled at night.

The Beartooth Highway, as gorgeous as it is during most summer days, is particularly treacherous in the dark.  Many times, and without warning, it will be totally covered in fog. Even worse, during the late spring and early fall, there is ice, and often black ice when you rise above 7000 feet. Black ice is hard enough to see during the daytime, but impossible to see at night and especially so when the mountain is covered in fog. At night, this road has gremlins and monsters hiding in its corners and along its periphery, ready to swallow you up with the first mistake or indiscretion that a momentary lack of attention can cause.

The word impossible is part of this mountains DNA.

: Impossible- Like the dreams I had been recently having.

: Impossible- Like all of the things I still had not done.

: Impossible- As the excuses ran like an electric current
                         through all that I hated.

: Impossible- Only in the failure of that yet to be conquered.

: Impossible- For only as long as I kept repeating the word.

Now it was my time to make a call.  I dialed the cell number of my friend Mitch who worked for the U.S. Forest Service in Cooke City. Mitch told me what I already knew and feared. There was snow on both sides of the road from Red Lodge to Cooke City, and with the dropping temperatures probably ice, and possibly black ice, at elevations above 7500 feet.

Mitch lived in Red Lodge and had just traveled the road two hours earlier on his way home.  He said there had been sporadic icy conditions on the Red Lodge side of the mountain, causing his Jeep Wagoneer to lose traction and his tires to spin when applying his brakes in the sharpest turns.  The sharpest corners were the most dangerous parts of this road, both going up and even more so when coming down. Mitch warned me against going at night and said: “Be sure to call me back if you decide to leave.”

The Red Lodge side of the mountain would be where I would begin my trip if I decided to go, with no telling how bad the Cooke City descent would be on the Western side.  This is assuming I was even able to make it over the top, before then starting the long downward spiral into Cooke City Montana.

The phone rang again!  This time I was able to get to the front desk before the caller got away.  In just ten seconds I was left with the words ringing in my ears — “Everything is ready, and we implore you to come, please come to Cooke City, and please come tonight.”  

Now, it was my time to choose.  I had to decide between staying where it was safe and dry, or answering the call and making the journey through the dark to where fate was now crying out to me. I put the phone down and walked out the front doors of the Pollard Hotel and into the dim moonlight that was shining through the clouds and onto the street.  The ‘Venture’ sat in its soft glow, parked horizontally to the sidewalk, with its back tire pressed up against the curb and its front tire pointed due North.  The bike was not showing any bias either East or West and was not going to help with this decision.  If I decided to go, this choice would have to be all mine.

The original plan had been to stay in Red Lodge for two more days, awaiting friends who still had not arrived from a trip to Mount Rushmore. Then together we had planned a short stopover in Cody, which was not more than ninety-minutes away. From there we planned to take the ‘Chief Joseph Highway’ to Cooke City, which is both a beautiful and safe way around Beartooth Pass. Safety drifted out of my consciousness like a distant mistress, and I looked North and heard the mountain call out to me again.

As much as I wanted to see my friends, the voice that was calling from inside was getting harder and harder to ignore.  With the second phone call, my time in Red Lodge grew short in its importance, and I knew in the next two minutes I would have to choose.

I also knew that if I stood in the clouded moonlight for more than two more minutes I would never decide.  Never deciding is the hallmark of all cowardly thought, and I hoped on this night that I would not be caught in its web as victim once again.  

                                         My Decision Was To Go

In ten short minutes, I emptied my room at the Pollard, checked out, and had the bike loaded and ready at the curb.  I put my warmest and most reflective riding gear on, all the while knowing that there was probably no one to see me. No one on that lonely road, except for the deer, coyote, or elk, that would undoubtedly question my sanity as they watched me ride by in the cold dark silence.  I stopped at the gas station at the end of town and topped off the tank --- just in case.  Just in case was something I hoped I wouldn’t have to deal with, as the ride would at most take less than a half a tank of gas. It made me feel better though, so I topped off, paid the attendant, and rode slowly out towards U.S. Highway # 212.  

As I headed West toward the pass, I noticed one thing conspicuous in its absence. In fifteen minutes of travel, I had not passed one other vehicle of any kind going in either direction.  I was really alone tonight and not only in my thoughts.  It was going to be a solitary ride as I tried to cross the mountain. I would be alone with only my trusted bike as my companion which in all honesty — I knew in my heart before leaving the hotel.  

Alone, meant there would be no help if I got into trouble and no one to find me until probably morning at the earliest.  Surviving exposed on the mountain for at least twelve hours is a gamble I hoped I wouldn’t have to take.

I kept moving West. As I arrived at the base of the pass I stopped, put the kickstand down and looked up.  What was visible of the mountain in the clouded moonlight was only the bottom third of the Beartooth Highway. The top two thirds disappeared into a clouded mist, not giving up what it might contain or what future it may have hidden inside of itself for me.  With the kickstand back up and my high beam on, I slowly started my ascent up Beartooth Pass.

For the first six or seven miles the road surface was clear with snow lining both sides of the highway.  The mountain above, and the ones off to my right and to the North were almost impossible to see.  What I could make out though, was that they were totally snow covered making this part of southern Montana look more like December or January, instead of early June.  The road had only opened a month ago and it was still closing at least three out of every seven days.  I remembered to myself how in years past this road never really opened permanently until almost the 4th of July.

When the road was closed, it made the trip from Red Lodge to Cooke City a long one for those who had to go around the mountain.  Many people who worked in Cooke City actually lived in Red Lodge.  They would ‘brave’ the pass every night when it was open, but usually only during the summer months. They would do this in trucks with 4-wheel drive and S.U.V.’s but never on a motorcycle with only two wheels.  Trying to cross this pass on a motorcycle with high performance tires, in the fog, and at night, was a horse of an entirely different color.  

At about the seven-mile mark in my ascent I again stopped the bike and looked behind me. I was about to enter the cloud barrier.  The sight below from where I had just come was breathtakingly beautiful.  If this was to be the last thing I would ever see before   entering the cloud, it would be a fitting photograph on my passport into eternity.

I looked East again, and it was as if the lights from Red Lodge were calling me back, saying “Not tonight Kurt, this trip is to be made another time and for a better reason.” I paused, but could think of no better reason, as I heard the voice on the phone say inside my mind, “Please come,” so I retracted the kickstand and entered the approaching fog.

There was nothing inviting as I entered the cloud.  The dampness and the moisture were immediate and all enveloping, as the visibility dropped to less than fifty feet.  It was so thick I could actually see rain droplets as it passed over my headlight.  The road was still clear though and although it was hard to see, its surface was still good.  The animals that would normally concern me at this time of night were a distant memory to me now. The road stayed like this for what seemed to be another two or three miles, while it trapped me in its continuing time warp of what I still had to overcome.

It then turned sharply right, and I heard a loud ‘wail’ from inside the bike’s motor.  My heart immediately started racing as I thought to myself, ‘What a place to have the engine break down.’  It only took a few more seconds though to see that what I thought was engine failure was actually the tachometer revving off the scale on the dash.  The rear tire had lost traction, and in an involuntary and automated response I had given it more throttle to maintain my speed. I now had the engine turning at over 5000 r.p.m.’s in an attempt to get the rear tire to again make contact with the road.  Slowing my speed helped a little, but I was now down to 10 MPH, and it was barely fast enough to allow me to continue my ascent without the rear tire spinning again.

                                  I Could Still Turn Around And Go Back    

I was now at an elevation above 8,000 ft, and it was here that I had to make my last decision.  I could still turn around and go back.

While the road surface was only semi-good, I could turn around and head back in the direction from which I had just come.  I could go back safely, but to what and to whom? I knew my spirit and my heart would not go with me, both choosing to stay on this hill tonight regardless of the cost.  “If I turn around and go back, my fear is that in my lack of commitment, I will lose both of them forever. The mountain will have then claimed what my soul cannot afford to lose.”  I looked away from Red Lodge for the last time, and once again my eyes were pointed toward the mountain’s top.

It was three more miles to the summit based on my best estimation.

From there it would be all down hill.  The fear grew deeper inside of me that the descent would be even more treacherous as I crested the top and pushed on to the mountain town of Cooke City below.  Cooke City and Red Lodge were both in Montana, but the crest of this mountain was in Wyoming, and it looked down on both towns as if to say … ‘All passage comes only through me.’      

This time I did not stop and look over my shoulder. Instead, I said a short prayer to the gods that protect and watch over this place and asked for only one dispensation — and just one pass through the dark.  My back wheel continued to spin but then somehow it would always regain traction, and I continued to pray as I slowly approached the top.  

As I arrived at the summit, the road flattened out, but the cloud cover grew even more dense with visibility now falling to less than ten feet.  I now couldn’t see past my front fender, as the light from my headlamp bounced off the water particles with most of its illumination reflected back onto me and not on the road ahead.

In conditions like this it is very hard to maintain equilibrium and balance. Balance is the most essential component of any two-wheeled form of travel. Without at least two fixed reference points, it’s hard to stay straight upright and vertical.  I’ve only experienced this once before when going through a mountain tunnel whose lights had been turned off. When you can’t see the road beneath you, your inner sense of stability becomes compromised, and it’s easier than you might think to get off track and crash.

This situation has caused many motorcyclists to fall over while seemingly doing nothing wrong. It creates a strange combination of panic and vertigo and is not something you would ever want to experience or deal with on even a dry road at sea level.  On an icy road at this elevation however, it could spell the end of everything!

My cure for this has always been to put both feet down and literally drag them on top of the road surface below. This allows my legs to act as two tripods, warning me of when the bike is leaning either too far to the left or to the right.  It’s also dangerous. If either leg comes in contact with something on the road or gets hung up, it could cause the very thing it’s trying to avoid. I’ve actually run over my own foot with the rear wheel and it’s not something you want to do twice.

                     Often Causing What It’s Trying To Avoid

At the top of the pass, the road is flat for at least a mile and gently twists and turns from left to right.  It is a giant plateau,10,000 feet above sea level. The mountain then starts to descend westward as it delivers its melting snow and rain to the Western States. Through mighty rivers, it carries its drainage to the Pacific Ocean far beyond.  As I got to the end of its level plain, a passing thought entered my consciousness.  With the temperature here at the top having risen a little, and only just below freezing, my Kevlar foul-weather gear would probably allow me to survive the night.  On this mountaintop, there is a lot of open space to get off the road, if I could then only find a place to get out of the wind.  

I let that thought exit my mind as quickly as it entered. The bike was easily handling the flat icy areas, and I knew that the both of us wanted to push on.  I tried to use my cell phone at the top to call Mitch at home.  I was sure that by now he would be sitting by the fire and drinking something warm.  This is something I should have done before I made the final decision to leave.  I didn’t, because I was sure he would have tried to talk me out of it, or worse, have forbidden me to go. This was well within his right and purview as the Superintendent of all who passed over this mountain.

My phone didn’t work!  This was strange because it had worked from the top last spring when I called my family and also sent cell-phone pictures from the great mountain’s summit.  I actually placed three calls from the top that day, two to Pennsylvania and one to suburban Boston.

                                         But Not Tonight!

As I started my descent down the western *****, I knew it would be in first gear only.  In first gear the engine would act as a brake or limiter affecting my speed, hopefully without causing my back tire to lose traction and break loose. With almost zero visibility, and both feet down and dragging in the wet snow and ice, I struggled to stay in the middle of the road.  It had been over an hour since leaving Red Lodge, and I still had seen no other travelers going either East or West. I had seen no animals either, and tonight I was at least thankful for that.

The drop off to my right (North) was several thousand feet straight down to the valley below and usually visible even at night when not covered in such cloud and mist.  To my left was the mountain’s face interspersed with open areas which also dropped several thousands of feet to the southern valley below.  Everything was uncertain as I left the summit, and any clear scenery had disappeared in the clouds. What was certain though was my death if I got too close to the edge and was unable to recover and get back on the road.

There were guardrails along many of the turns and that helped, because it told me that the direction of the road was changing.  In the straight flat areas however it was open on both sides with nothing but a several thousand-foot fall into the oblivion below.

Twice I ran over onto the apron and felt my foot lose contact with the road surface meaning I was at the very edge and within two feet of my doom.  Twice, I was sure that my time on this earth had ended, and that I was headed for a different and hopefully better place. Twice, I counter steered the bike to the left and both feet regained contact with the road as the front tire weaved back and forth with only the back tire digging in and allowing me to stay straight up.

As I continued my descent, I noticed something strange and peculiar.  After a minute or two it felt like I was going faster than you could ever go in first gear.  It took only another instant to realize what was happening.  The traction to the rear tire was gone, and my bike and I were now sliding down the Western ***** of Beartooth pass.  The weight of the bike and myself, combined with the gravity of the mountain’s descent, was causing us to go faster than we could ever go by gearing alone.  Trying to go straight seemed like my only option as the bike felt like it had lost any ability to control where it was going.  This was the next to last thing I could have feared happening on this hill.

The thing I feared most was having to use either the front or rear brakes in a situation like this.  That would only ensure that the bike would go out of control totally, causing the rear wheel to come around broadside and result in the bike falling over on its opposite side. Not good!  Not good at all!

Thoughts of sliding off the side of the mountain and into the canyons below started running through my mind.  Either falling off the mountain or being trapped under the bike while waiting for the next semi-truck to run over me as it crossed the summit in the darkened fog was not something I welcomed. Like I said before, not good, not good at all!

My mind flashed back to when I was a kid and how fast it seemed we were going when sledding down the hill in front of the local hospital.  I also remembered my disappointment when one of the fathers told me that although it seemed fast, we were really only going about ten or fifteen miles an hour.  I wondered to myself how fast the bike was really going now, as it slid down this tallest of all Montana mountains? It seemed very, very fast.  I reminded myself over and over, to keep my feet down and my hand off the brakes.

If I was going to crash, I was going to try and do it in the middle of the road. Wherever that was now though, I couldn’t be sure.  It was finally the time to find out what I had really learned after riding a motorcycle for over forty years.  I hoped and prayed that what I had learned in those many years of riding would tonight be enough.

As we continued down, the road had many more sharp turns, swerving from right to left and then back right again.  Many times, I was right at the edge of my strength. My legs battled to keep the bike upright, as I fought it as it wanted to lean deeper into the turns.  I almost thought I had the knack of all this down, when I instantaneously came out of the cloud.  I couldn’t believe, and more accurately didn’t want to believe, what I was seeing less than a half mile ahead.

The road in front of me was totally covered in black ice.  Black ice look’s almost like cinders at night and can sometimes deceive you into thinking it holds traction when exactly the opposite is true. This trail of black ice led a half mile down the mountain to where it looked like it ended under a guardrail at the end.  What I thought was the end was actually a switchback turn of at least 120 degrees.

It turned sharply to the right before going completely out of my sight into the descending blackness up ahead.

My options now seemed pretty straightforward while bleak.  I could lay the bike down and hope the guard rail would stop us before cascading off the mountain, or I could try to ride it out with the chances of making it slim at best.  I tried digging my feet into the black ice as brakes, as a kid would do on a soapbox car, but it did no good.  The bike kept pummeling toward the guardrail, and I was sure I was now going faster than ever.  As my feet kept bouncing off the ice, it caused the bike to wobble in the middle of its slide. This was now the last thing I needed as I struggled not to fall.

As I got close to the guardrail, and where the road turned sharply to the right, I felt like I was going 100 miles an hour.  I was now out of the cloud and even in the diffused moonlight I could see clearly both sides of the road.  With some visibility I could now try and stay in the middle, as my bike and I headed towards the guardrail not more than 500 feet ahead.  The valley’s below to the North and South were still thousands of feet below me, and I knew when I tried to make the turn that there would be no guardrail to protect me from going off the opposite right, or Northern side.

                   Time Was Running Out, And A Choice Had To Be Made

The choices ran before my eyes one more time — to be trapped under a guardrail or to run off a mountain into a several thousand foot abyss.  But then all at once my soul screamed NO, and that I did have one more choice … I could decide to just make it. I would try by ‘force of will’ to make it around that blind turn.  I became reborn once again in the faith of my new decision not to go down, and I visually saw myself coming out the other side in my mind’s eye.

                                        I Will Make That Turn

I remembered during this moment of epiphany what a great motorcycle racer named **** Mann had said over forty years ago.  

**** said “When you find yourself in trouble, and in situations like this, the bike is normally smarter than you are.  Don’t try and muscle or overpower the motorcycle.  It’s basically a gyroscope and wants to stay upright.  Listen to what the bike is telling you and go with that. It’s your best chance of survival, and in more cases than not, you’ll come out OK.”  With ****’s words fresh and breathing inside of me, I entered the right-hand turn.

As I slowly leaned the bike over to the right, I could feel the rear tire break loose and start to come around.  As it did, I let the handlebars point the front tire in the same direction as the rear tire was coming.  We were now doing what flat track motorcycle racers do in a turn — a controlled slide! With the handlebars totally pressed against the left side of the tank, the bike was fully ‘locked up’ and sliding with no traction to the right.  The only control I had was the angle I would allow the bike to lean over,which was controlled by my upper body and my right leg sliding below me on the road.

Miraculously, the bike slid from the right side of the turn to the left.  It wasn’t until I was on the left apron that the back tire bit into the soft snow and regained enough traction to set me upright. I was not more than three feet from the now open edge leading to a certain drop thousands of feet below.  The traction in the soft snow ****** the bike back upright and had me now pointed in a straight line diagonally back across the road.  Fighting the tendency to grab the brakes, I sat upright again and counter steered to the left. Just before running off the right apron, I was able to get the bike turned and headed once again straight down the mountain.  It was at this time that I took my first deep breath.

In two hundred more yards the ice disappeared, and I could see the lights of Cooke City shining ten miles out in the distance. The road was partially dry when I saw the sign welcoming me to this most unique of all Montana towns.  To commemorate what had just happened, I was compelled to stop and look back just one more time.  I put the kickstand down and got off the bike.  For a long minute I looked back up at the mountain. It was still almost totally hidden in the cloud that I had just come through.  I wondered to myself if any other motorcyclists had done what I had just done tonight — and survived.  I knew the stories of the many that had run off the mountain and were now just statistics in the Forest Service’s logbook, but I still wondered about those others who may had made it and where their stories would rank with mine.

I looked up for the last time and said thank you, knowing that the mountain offered neither forgiveness nor blame, and what I had done tonight was of my own choosing. Luck and whatever riding ability I possessed were what had seen me through. But was it just that, or was it something else? Was it something beyond my power to choose, and something still beyond my power to understand?  If the answer is yes, I hope it stays that way.  Until on a night like tonight, some distant mountain high above some future valley, finally claims me as its own.

                     Was Crossing Tonight Beyond My Power To Choose?

After I parked the bike in front of the Super 8 in Cooke City, I walked into the lobby and the desk clerk greeted me. “Mr Behm,

it’s good to see you again, I’m glad we were able to reach you with that second phone call.  We received a cancellation just before nine, and the only room we had left became available for the night.”

I have heard the calling in many voices and in many forms.  Tonight, it told me that my place was to be in Cooke City and my time in Red Lodge had come to an end.  Some may need more or better reasons to cross their mountain in the dark, but for me, the only thing necessary was for it to call.

                                               …  Until It Calls Again





Gardiner Montana- May, 1996

1-
T’was dark when the time came for breakfast
I looked down at my untied shoes
With a spirit only able to be described as broken
I left my abode to stand under a lonely lamppost
And let my body quiver and quake with rage
As I thought about the night’s voyage

2-
Raindrops coated my new suede shoes
As I felt myself lulled by the buzz of the lamppost
Her face filled my mind and I savored the rage
Knowing she now was far away on her voyage
If only I had asked her to breakfast
If only I had complemented her shoes

3-
Looking back towards the house, and my now cold breakfast
I thought about her asking me to join the voyage
But my heart was already broken
And her query only further filled me with rage
She knew I had left my only shoes
Sitting in the rain under the lamppost

4-
The dampness chilled my bones as I stood under the lamppost
Exhausted from so much time lost in rage
My belly ached from having no breakfast
And my body began to feel broken
As if I could not even walk due to the tightness of my shoes
But there was nothing left but to begin my homeward voyage

5-
I glanced at my watch in the light of the lamppost
It would be too late for a McDonalds breakfast
Even if I could find my shoes
It was a seven block voyage
And when I slipped, stubbed my toe, and realized it was broken
I felt, once again, myself fill with dangerous rage

6-
From a distance I heard high-heeled shoes
She approached from a different kind of voyage
In her hand she held a bag of breakfast
From the McDonalds with a sign that was broken
Instantly it left my body, all that rage
And we held each other, under the glow of the lamppost

Leaves rot in dampness
The summer rains came quickly
-An odd musty smell

There is a strangeness in fog
that is palpable
and perhaps it is the strangeness in me
which responds

It is no accident I know
that I was raised
where fog is legend
and so remains
a cloying fact of life
for coastal Sunny California
is coldly blanketed each morning
six months of every year
in chilly dampness

What once was familiar
now changed
hidden within soft billows
of clouds brought to earth
the monotonous drip
from the leaves of the trees
the eaves of the roof
the rocks on the hillsides . . .
stars and planets obscured
only the mysterious moon
peeks through the diaphanous veil
lighting her shroud from above

now moving
now shifting
a glimpse of . . . something
caught
only to disappear once more
deep within the flowing haze

Yet where others find in fog
a thing to fear
I find in it a pleasure
seldom found elsewhere
for me familiar comfort
in the heavy grey mist
enveloping me
as a blanket of spirit
or ancestors

And perhaps it is this
the others fear
for the spirits of fog
can be cunning and cruel
hiding dangers
from those unwary
or disrespectful

But I miss the fog
laying low upon the cliffs
turning ordinary landscape
into otherworldly and strange

I long for the lonely cries
of the foghorn at sea
and should the sea monster come
I pray it finds
the love it seeks

Cori MacNaughton
19Jan2007