"milkweeds" poems
Grandma, sing a lullaby
The fine tune you made for me
I want all the fireflies, the
Glass bottle and light an entire night
Where are my milkweeds
Aeroplanes, milk and honey?
I stood with my umbrella
And the wind took it with her
For the tempest outside my land
And no news returned
There’s my Grandma, her voice
That ooze out of my walls
You’re the bride, the picture
The house and a forgotten lullaby
Grandma, sing a lullaby
The fine tune you made for me
Oct 11, 2015
Oct 11, 2015 at 1:07 PM UTC
among milkweeds and thistles,
on rocks and scraps of metal that tear our clothes,
in a mock lacking more than ivy,
but plenty of barbed wire,
the game is clean. unadulterated.
the slowest five seconds
birthed via a fundamentally sound
thing of beauty.
hands back, the other way.
ah the sweet spot.
we conjure trajectory: wind, speed. geometry.
run away!
Jun 17, 2011
Jun 17, 2011 at 1:04 AM UTC
I carried you on earthen wings
and when we began
the feathers that fell sprouted
fish which flew within our trail.
Milkweeds grew from the red-soiled banks. Their tops
spout like tiny fountains. The Birds bathed within
pink milkweed pools.
Downstream
a chained woman cried,
her blouse coated in sweat and her arms
pulled tight.
Her face lifted towards the sky,
and her mouth dripped thick saliva.
A broken windmill
floated in the gusts of wind
And the current flung us into space.
You gripped my neck
and ran your hands
to my chest. Your fingers stopped
at the pulsation
and you delivered a pin
to my left ventricle.
Poised and clenching we watched
the continents turn grey
Jan 28, 2011
Jan 28, 2011 at 4:45 PM UTC
Upon warm weather instinctively through metamorphosis
it's time to start flutter testing newly minted wings
then the orange covered trees coming alive
waiting to leave their transient homes
billions of orange wings drumming
they decend in sheer abundance
rocky mountains are aflame
orange on streams forest
over desolate houses
man-made dams
rivers and lakes
and swamped
to feast before
to onward journey
a valley of milkweeds
the horde of marauders
entwined confusion
reign on blurry
battle rages
each frenzier
than the other
trying to satisfy
to each a flower
then each a leaf
find to lay eggs
to being them
again be able
to rampage
again leave behind continue
no need to stare looking back nothing last in motion of unison
wings may drop to dust a new generation emerges to carry on.
Jun 5, 2018
Jun 5, 2018 at 4:12 AM UTC
Don’t preen my wings -
I told you, even though
In the beginning I was just
a caterpillar crawling through
a sweeping field of chrysanthemums
Soft, fragile
were my dreams and hopes of
admiring the robins, as they
thrash by their nearby nest
nursing their young
as the babes chirp, beaks wide open
as their mum feeds them hope
that someday they’ll fly like robins do
I hope I can fly, someday
I told you that
the night we feast on the leaves
of Milkweeds
in hopes of growing wings
like those robins
that we admire the most
Little did I know that
You started chewing on what
was mine, my wings-
are imaginary, you said
that my hopes and dreams
to be one with the robins
are farfetched
And you chewed, and chewed, and chewed
till we grew hard and tough on self-loathing
upon the realization that your
words are always the truth that
we avoid since the beginning
when we got drunk on that
Milkweed
I admit, that you chewed
and it forced me to follow
Don’t preen my wings, I told you
that time when we hang up by the
branch of the fully grown Hawthorn
along the red, plump berries
We ghosted each other
on the shell we were forced to take
Like those hermit ***** that we used to watch
by the thorns of roses, seeing them take
the burden of one another makes us
laugh
But as we sit in silence as the
darkness of our own making envelops us,
but I was, contented
knowing that darkness
is an old friend
and you by my side
is a way - a company
to spend the time
blinded
What happened?
What happened that night when
a gust of wind flew
through us, I felt the
chill of the upcoming gale
I shouted
but you are too busy
dealing with the darkness
you’re in
Don’t preen my wings, I told you
as I detached from the branch
that we used to hangout
as caterpillars
But we don’t crawl anymore
Now I am nothing
but a fallen chrysalis
waiting for those mighty
wings of those robins
I admired so much.
I got the beak.
Aug 23, 2018
Aug 23, 2018 at 10:00 AM UTC
The sun's setting,
though it may leave you darkening,
is the start of the burning
far under your soles.
The browning now crinkling of
Summer's endlesseeming greening
is but the start of Springtime's
asylum in Xylem.
Phloem's sweet ware will
flow in 'em somewhere
down the line.
It’s pithy, I know
but life is born in death.
And though, come Fall,
trees seem seemingly sapped,
there's an inspiration transpiring.
The firepit's cooling
it's embers cast only shadows
and shades of memories of warmth
and story
and light...
None gather round, the gloomy.
The dormant circle
an ashen reduction
of oak and of fir
but its blackdust when wetted
(yes, ink!)
and dipped in by brush
will one day,
with luck,
be the source of a poet's
enlightening words.
The monarchs have gone -
a silent orange rustle
and, all at once,
the milkweeds go dry;
the once-green
stalks stand stock still,
Rods of Asclepias whose
seedlings are ever
the earliest snows.
Leaving home:
wherever the Earthbreaths may
take them -
bleak, brokenhearted,
hope in a coma...
How unlike the joy of the
flutterbys whose time now
has fluttered by, a chorus
as uttered by
the ungiven hope
who, though unasked,
has wandered the winds
to bring its daughters
(each healing, each hopeful)
a deathgiven panacea
to lands now in their
own limited unlimited Spring.
And you! I know
your (sic) fiercely pretending
not to be crying.
Hell, to never've cried.
I know your lifework is
'manly' (your words) or
some other idiocy (my words)
and unbroken. Hell, unbent.
But think on this:
if she's gone far enough,
far enough along,
far enough away;
enough time gone by
since you broke into One
('broke in two' is NOT how it feels),
if enough not enough Her
has passed,
then she's also
more than halfway back
to you,
to Whole.
Nothing can go,
nothing is lost
for there is no
'away' within this Here.
No one now, either
at a loss -
for the knowing
is nigh.
Even the knowing
cannot be going
for long 'fore returning;
the yearning is turning
from far-off to nearby.
The Sky lives as well
in every dark puddle.
Its blues, now on Earth
where all even All is at Home.
Nov 2, 2018
Nov 2, 2018 at 1:31 PM UTC
“Honey you got yellow pollen all over your nose!”
exclaimed the cashier at Walmart hurrying to hand me a tissue.
I had stopped to ask her if 4 O’Clocks did well here in florida.
“Oh-h-h” I giggled, “that’s from sniffing the Easter lilies.”
Lately, I have been trying to figure out how to
to add more fragrance to our southern garden.
There is plenty of color, the hibiscus has donned her frilly, coquettish
tangerine and red petticoats
The double begonias are showing off gorgeous salmon pink bonnets
much to the chagrin of their ******** clad penta sisters in
neighboring ceramic pots
Cape May daisies twirling dozens of yellow parasols
caper coyly across the lush terrain
and the newly planted milkweeds hold the promise
of glorious monarch butterflies alighting
on their burgeoning buds
For me the paradise of having a garden
right outside my door is a blessing of
huge proportions
a native New Yorker, I clearly remember
gazing out my window only to be greeted
by another building blocking any scrap of
green or organic color the cluttered urban landscape
had to offer
Thanking the sales lady I dashed off to Lowes
and found a jewel hiding amongst the rows
of spring plants and avid garden shoppers
Star of Tuscany a rose-like jasmine with a
perfume scent only angels could have designed
Whisking her away along with the enchanting
confederate jasmine I hurried home to plant
and welcome our sweet new companions
Later that evening while
swinging in the jhoola at Easter sunset
scarlet, gold and purple hues
cast a glow of hope over the garden of eden
Mother Nature renews herself perennially
shedding all that is not needed or useful
she leaves the sepulcher behind
wrapped in the throes and ecstasy of eternal love
she gives birth to eternal life
Apr 6, 2015
Apr 6, 2015 at 11:15 PM UTC
I am not ill, but
covered in moss and milkweeds:
green skin. blooming hair.
Mar 19, 2013
Mar 19, 2013 at 2:15 AM UTC
*
*BLOWBALL fluffs
Who has been able to change
These seeds of faith?
Scattered all over
Existing around
Blown in breeze
Those shining silver lines
Never-ending flights
Hopeful wishes of breath
Sounding wind chimes
Don't even try
To change these HONEYSUCKLES
The sadness that surrender
Of round joys that fall on souls
SWAMP MILKWEEDS are
Flowers under sunlit blues
Stars under moonlit skies
Hymns of solitude
Floating around
Always FREE flying
Outside personal prisons
Humans should not
Try to reform these JEWELWEEDS
Pride of LOVE
Carrying dreamZ
Of summer LOVE-Rz
Dandy-like...
Lioness with a mane
Adorning daisies within
Liberating caged passions
Beneath the blue skies
Into warm romances..
Sacred than God/dess
Rainbow colored
Burning LOVE of coolness
Blooming blossoming wishes
Frail in its vulnerability
Who nourishes these CANARY THISTLE?
Photosynthesis of two SOUL
Within core of it lives
A SOUL continent
Beyond day-dreamZ and
Borders of consciousness
Creating a paradise on earth
Of muses and creators
A born-BELOVEDz first wish
A dying-LOVERz last regret
Watch the garden grown
Of these STAGHORN SUMAC
Without presence of any seeds
Drifting in search of LOVE
So let's chase OXALIS
And harvest POKEWEEDS
We all are born with
The canticles of
TARAXACUM within
Make mine and yours sings
The SPIDERWORT Rhapsody
It always gets better
Riding a Dandelion puff
OUR MARSH MARIGOLD "LOVE"*
*
Apr 18, 2019
Apr 18, 2019 at 12:06 AM UTC
Every time I look at myself I see a woman painted by others opinion. An opinion that distorts the perception of the very canvas I call my own. An opinion that's akin to a bed of milkweeds, each criticism acts like a striped caterpillar, eating away the greens to their hearts content until left a fragile stem of self worth, exposed to the harsh environments I call insecurity.
But as the narrator of my own, I will strive and overturn these insecurities into resilience, and turn these caterpillars into my very own Monarch Butterflies.
Jul 30, 2024
Jul 30, 2024 at 2:19 PM UTC
Have you ever bought a perfume labeled
“Monday in the Fields” ?
It has a faint fragrance where
milkweeds and lilies linger in the air,
as if a gust of wind from the clouds
drifted it towards you.
Slowly but surely the aroma gets stronger,
as if the milkweeds and lilies are gathering
to form a bouquet made especially for you.
You reach out your hand to accept them
but an unexpected musk flows past you.
Suddenly a smell as salty and natural
as the deepest parts of the ocean appears.
An ocean filled with oxidized metal
and fields of brackish seaweed.
It is a distinct and intoxicating smell,
a smell that can only be found in one place.
That place is from the beads of sweat
that drip off the back and forehead of the laborer.
The very laborer who picked the milkweeds and lilies.
The very laborer who works under a scorching sun.
The very laborer who skips meals to work overtime.
The very laborer who helped arrange this scent.
Not every scent is placed in a perfume bottle.
Well...at least not the natural ones.
Aug 24, 2020
Aug 24, 2020 at 9:06 PM UTC
some places beg to be written about
the lighthouse at what feels to be the edge of the world
has always been one of those places.
the desolate trees stretching up to a gray sky, a birds nest resting, teetering at the top of a bare branch
the clouded water revealing nothing of its depths
the fog so heavy - it doesn't linger, it lives there
forcing quiet introspection
demanding stillness
from those who squint through the gloom
at other times, astonishingly, the landscape transforms
monarch butterflies migrate en masse and flutter on the milkweeds
the sun sets, a tangerine looming over the saltwater marsh
tiny ***** dart into their holes in the sand and slowly poke their way back out when the coast is clear
In my memories of this place
I am always looking down at myself, on my bike,
small,
coasting down the winding road that leads to the tower for miles,
keeping up with the kid on his rollerblades weaving across dotted yellow lines
All-seeing, in the act of storytelling,
As if I'm one of the woodpeckers perched in the pines
Jan 12, 2021
Jan 12, 2021 at 9:50 PM UTC