A harbinger of life and death
He walks the sky
Carried by her breath

From above his many arms reach the earth
They beat rocks down
Carve waterways
And raise earthly pillars

From the sun he brings color
Captured in his work
Down, Down in the leaves
His gift to her

When her lungs are deep and shouts coarse
His shadow is dark
The land lost in premature night
Interrupted by angry light

On these dull nights with sullen color
Life is ruptured
And the blood of torched nature
Swallows her

When her voice is gentle and breath still
His works are thoughtful and cautious
Gifts numerous and precious
And she’s alive

Lost words capture the light
Of the ancient giant
Making the beautiful
Visible to the earthly soul

His touch like the heart
Strong and warped by passion
Imperfect and earnest
And dictated by cyclic motion

Wild and Eternal
The Heart of Nature

I hear you on the radio,
driving to work.
I swear, I almost get sick in the car
at the rush of memory
sometimes.
I remember firelight flickering
across your face,
a dark corner of a bar you wanted
to get away to
after you played a show,
when everyone wanted a piece
of beautiful you
except me, blushing.

Passion Pit was blaring overhead.
I told you about my family,
we're beekeepers from Ohio.
You watched me as
friends of friends approached me,
flirted, I was sultry.
You asked me
if I was warmed by the beers.
Made eyes
like you wanted
to get the hell out of there.

A customer from work, some
rich investor shmuck,
texts me today.
"What are you wearing?"
I'll tell you.
How many ways can I say "remorse"
before it sounds ****?
It does nothing for me anymore.

But no jokes come to mind,
no evasive, coy replies.
Just a flashing cursor on my
telephone
as I remember summer *******
and someone I left behind.

Make outs in a photobooth
that lasted all night
as they swept the floor to
close up shop.
Only our shoes peeked out
under the curtain
threatening to blow our cover.
You wouldn't be thinking about
our cover.
You'd be thinking about what
I was wearing.

You remember
the color of my tights.
You've told me.
The way my sweater fell off my shoulders.
Saltwater-sealed
sandcastle collarbones.
The more you were obsessed
with me,
the more I didn't need you.

You placed my
hand over your heart
that night in the photobooth,
so I could feel the butterflies
surging through your chest.
They ruptured in rhythm
with each flashbulb
of light
at the magic, calculated touch
of a girl who had learned
to trust no one.

I didn't want any
attachments.
Doesn't everyone always leave?
No, recording in Richmond,
touring across the country,
passing through Brooklyn,
sleeping on a friend's
floor in Denver,
You still asked me what I was
wearing.

A sly grin watching you, breathy and
raw, finish yourself in front
of the camera
late nights when you were away,
listening to you beg for me.
Just the way you'd say my name
And all the words when
we wouldn't speak.
You brought me back honey
from Honduras.
Told me about beekeepers there
and scuba shops on little islands.

I was afraid to start my life
again with someone.
Too young to plan to
run away with you.
The unspeakable distance
I never told you:
I was sleeping with a man I had
loved once
the week before I met you.
He had stopped loving me
long before.

I left you before you could leave me.

It was some cheap hotel off I-75.
A Korean movie with subtitles
was playing in the dark
and we were slushing wine
and sliding bodies
Your sweat was like nectar
and you gasped as you entered me.

I didn't know when I met you
there was nothing left
of me to offer.
Isn't timing half the battle in life?
I never explained it.
Couldn't bring myself
to drive your nice car like you wanted
while you were away.
Drink your honey in my tea
without grimacing at
the bitter taste of grief to it.

I got tired acting confident.
I got bored telling you what I was wearing.
I got angry that you had never been hurt
by someone
not wearing anything.
You were
empty
and easy and
looking for something I couldn't give.

You brought me with you.
I don't know how,
VIP passes and interviews,
always on the road.
We stopped talking,
but you reinvented me
so many times over
different in your mind.

Maybe it was my aire
of not needing you like
the other girls.
Not remarking on
the contour of your jawline,
Your firm muscles,
clenching
and pulsing for me, leaving you
crawling, still
now,
remembering
what I was wearing.

I wonder where your wonder went--
why you stashed away your wonderment?
for sake of posture pride and pallor
ironic, yes for all the hours
of studying "normative" culture--
of faults and flaws and freedom ruptured
bashing against consumerism
driven
lives

Your stuff's not as cool as mine
Poor things!
how blind! What empty lives!
Why can't they see the alternative side?

But wait--that's mine! My idea--I divined!
Great spirit told me not to sell half price
and things I buy--of course they're mine

But free trade, bought and paid for
I'm down with the indigenous cause,
I'm no capitalist ***** . . .
But oh my, those pants are nice
and that skirt's lovely, too, I'd love to wear it twice
wait--
Why dothey have those
I'm more hip than them, more
open minded, I'm
Mother Earth's best friend.
or ****, at least more hip.
More hotter,
smile and nod, peace and love, yoga ****, on my journey I'm farther.

See there! Don't look in my eyes, but
at my size 2 thighs
in this brand new outfit
haters despise . . .

I guess I'm wondering where your love is,
I digress from my rant, just show me
where the shelf is
that holds your origin story,
lost child,
eyes wide,
mind blown by lights and shiny bits and
new friends' smile and--
BASS vibrating your spine.

Where's the love that widened your mind?

Room 20: Emergency Room

She is lying there,
Barely breathing
With a heart barely beating enough
To keep her alive.
All the tubes, wires, and prayers
Are fueling her soul to hold on.
"Please, don't leave us."
And then,
The sound they've all been dreading.
The endless beeping echo of death
Resounding in a room full of
Regret, anger, and relief.
"She's in a better place now."

Room 22: Stroke

He keeps on saying
He feels better
Ready to go home
100%!
All the while,
His wife's patience is dwindling.
"I'm all he's got now.
I can't leave him."
They're 70 years old,
Married for 45.
45 years and a ruptured artery
A plaque on his heart
And a boxful of God-knows-what drugs
She still holds his hand
Even when her own heart
Is heavy.

Room 24: Cancer

Maria went through three cycles in past the months
Three excruciating cycles of chemotherapy
They tell you the anti-emetics will reduce the side effects.
When you're 65-years old
And all alone,
And cancer is swimming in your veins,
What else do you hold on to?
These are the side effects:
You lie awake at night
Wishing you lived a better life
Wishing you didn't shut everyone out
You should've married
You should've spent more time living
Instead of merely surviving
"You're a survivor."
But what good is surviving when pain comes with it--
The type of pain
No medication
Can take away?

Room 25: Beauty

I am a mother of two.
A boy and girl.
Beautiful
Is what they call me.
I'm looking at my daughter,
And..
And if only I accepted her,
For what she was
For what she wasn't
Then we wouldn't be here.
Tragic
Defiled.
I took her to the Dermatologist
To fix what wasn't broken
She injected her with chemicals
That would heal her
But a horrible allergic reaction ensued.
I should've seen how
Beautiful my baby was.

Room 26: Prostate

Everybody loves him.
Even all his 20 kids
Whose mothers he can barely memorize.
I honestly don't know how many wives he has.
I don't even know how many
He has actually married.
All I know is this:
I am his current wife.
At 71,
His body doesn't work right
anymore.
At 31,
I have needs
He could no longer meet.
But I love him.

Room 27: Not For Admission**

I am dark & desolate
I am hungry
For souls that need shelter
And tears that need hiding
I've seen enough deaths to even care how I'd look.
My paint is almost drying up,
My walls are almost ready
I can't wait for the next story.

We’d all been out to the Carnival,
Had chilled and thrilled and cried,
And Patsy laughed that she’d wet her pants
On the killer Monster Ride,
While Orville’s face was covered in floss
In a pink and sticky goo,
And I limped past the Penny a Toss
With something stuck to my shoe.

I’d won a horrible Voodoo Doll
That I tried to pass to Kate,
She said, ‘No fear, if I took that home
I would just lie there, awake!’
We’d had our fun on the Octopus
Though the Mouse had made me sick,
And the Big Wheel stopped in a passing cloud
At the height of a laughing fit..

A spider deep in the Ghost Train came
Unstuck in Patsy’s hair,
And Kate had shrieked, for Patsy had
No clue that it was there.
We threw it one to the other, first
To Orville, then to Jack,
But then it landed on some old dear
And gave her a heart attack!

We laughed and pranced and we danced beside
The sideshows – ‘Way to go!’
But Orville fumbled the rifle and
He shot some guy in the toe,
We had to run but were laughing there
So hard, and fit to bust,
That Richard ruptured himself out there,
And now he’s wearing a truss!

The time it had come to wander home
So we wiped off Orville’s goo,
But I had trouble in walking with
That thing, still stuck to my shoe.
I slid and wiped and I scraped at it
But nothing would make it budge,
Said Jack, ‘Just what do you think it is?’
I replied, ‘some sort of sludge.’

We got to the edge of the fairground
And the others wandered home,
But I was stuck, I couldn’t move,
I was standing there, alone.
And then my foot had begun to turn
Back to the lights and sound,
I felt myself, being impelled
By my shoe across the ground.

I tried to twist and I tried to turn
But my shoe was saying, ‘No!’
I had to follow wherever it went,
Wherever it wanted to go.
It took me back through the alleyways
Still lit with a thousand globes,
I felt a bit like a Brahman Bull
With a steel ring through my nose.

It dragged my foot through the mud and slush
And the other followed too,
I didn’t have much of a choice, I thought
As long as I wore the shoe,
It led me in to a darkened tent
With a dais, up on high,
Where a shadow sat in an old top hat
With a single gleaming eye.

The shadow opened its mouth to speak
And its teeth were long and sharp,
‘What have you brought me now to eat,
Some dross you found in the park?’
The voice was deep, was a muffled growl
And it shook the earthen floor,
The shoe was dragging me forward as
I turned for the flap of a door.

I felt a wrench and the shoe came off
So I hopped and ran like mad,
The growl of the shadow had freaked me out,
It had to be more than bad!
My father gave me a hiding when
He found that I’d lost my shoe,
He wouldn’t listen when I exclaimed:
‘You would have lost it, too!’

Next day the shoe was sat at my door
Its prints deep pressed in the lawn,
I couldn’t have put that shoe back on
If the Devil had blown his horn.
I took a stick and I picked it up
And dropped it straight in the bin,
I couldn’t go near a Carnival now,
I’m too attached to my skin!

David Lewis Paget

Death near
don't open the door
forgotten ruptured sky
sees you and I
riches are impossible
in the blinding dust
vision is beyond the horizon
fighting to win
you back
come close to losing all....

Each selective thought
will bring about
pieces .......
that we will think is love
discarding the rest
in street dust
of many tomorrows to come

It has been years since
you left me so long ago
trying to forget
daily life .... that we loved so
this is the last poem
that l will write
of the pain
you brought about


Time schedules
Timbre slows
so very far
in a varied substance
of liquid foam
as death
knocks
don't open the door.....*

By Debbie Brooks

I’m always yelling at myself
For the things I took for granted
They said to save yourself
But I called them cowards
And threw it all ahead
Screaming, tomorrow will be better
Better
Much better
Every day that’s not today is destined for greatness
A steady decline in sadness
Until one day my tombstone will read
“EVERYTHING WAS BEAUTIFUL AND NOTHING HURT”
(That one’s Vonnegut, but I bet you knew that)

See, my flux capacitor’s broken
And I’ve been reading this **** backwards
I just want to go back

I used to be such a show off
Collecting my experiences just to line them up on shelves
Lists of proof of my own beauty
My bright future
Proof that I’ve been loved

Of all of my different selves
I like that one the least
But miss her the most

Now I try not to leave the house
And when my phone rings I get really anxious
Now I feel like I’m always fighting
But there’s nobody around
So I’m fighting with belt buckles and doorknobs
And I resent the people who make those things look easy
Now a part of me feels angry when my friends ask me out
They don’t understand
That’s not self pity
They’d understand if I told them
But that would require answering my phone
And I just can’t do that today

I know I’m being selfish
Self absorbed and petty
But my heart has finally ruptured
It couldn’t hold all of the empty promises I’ve filled it with
And I’m tired of fighting
Now all that my shelves hold
Are stacks of reasons why I want to go back to bed
And the only list I have
Is filled with concrete evidence
That tomorrow will not, in fact,
Be better
Not better
Because today is worse than yesterday

I have died many times. My body hung next to Jesus at Golgotha. I was once decapitated in the French Revolution. I’ve had my eyes gouged out at Gettysburg.

I have died many times. My chest was riddled with bullets on the beaches of Normandy. My lungs dissolved and I had a stroke in Auschwitz.  My skin baked, bubbled, and blistered from Hiroshima to Nagasaki.

I have died many times. I bled out from a ruptured heart during Columbine. On 9/11, my rib caged cracked and I even stopped breathing.

_____________________­

I have died too many times. I shot myself in the head last night. Dream-spells dripped out from the void and so I shot myself through the heart, stuck my fingers in the hole to see if it hurt and it stung a little.

I have died too many times.  I took an ax and split my head open; a flock of pigeons were pecking at my cortex. They flew out and church hymns rang from my cerebellum.

I have died too many times.  I lit a bonfire in my brain; the light burst from my eye sockets and now my head is a paper lantern. I clawed at my chest till I ripped my heartstrings; they sung happy birthdays in Arabic so I blew out the fire.

I have died too many times. I took a baseball bat and busted my face open; I was swinging for the fences and swallowed my teeth on accident.

I have died too many times.  I tore out my stomach, drank the acid, and ****** myself.  I tried pulling my lungs over my head just to suffocate.

I have died too many times.  When I discovered my spinal cord, I plucked it out, wrapped it around my neck, and hung myself from the tallest redwood I could find.

Coyote’s mournful howl echoed
in the new moon’s enchanting sultry ether;
breathing the living harmony of the wilderness rhythm

He seemed to sense a soul reincarnation
      within a pervasive spirit light
      an oft misunderstood
      common thread shared
      this hallowed land’s night

An uncommon Zen stirring from within,
              stifling apathy ..,
. . . of rumble deep beneath
      a dormant volcano reawakening ;
      that which lies undiscovered
      just before the ruptured moment ..,
      liberation of release ―
      dust and ashes taking flight

Through open window              insomnia churns
                          fifty shades of blue ..,
      cast in shadowed hues of broken silence

Coyote stirred the stillness
      with a hauntingly familiar cry
      reading the ridge-top echoes
      like the book of my mind

" YIP YIP   A ―W O O H !!! " . . . the somber plea

For it is in these final hours chosen chore
      the recurring torn
      these chains and things

Coyote was going there ―
      to stand these watermark crossroads
      this hour of need

Accepting brother has always been lonely
      sometimes anything
      means something - -
and so it goes ..,

Coyote communes in pulse
      from ancient realms
      this sacred blood ..,
                Om
         the lost chord

      wounded healers ,
. . . one mutual spirit
      runs marrow deep
      where dogs run free

The moan of doves whisper to the impending dawn
. . . always known these days
      too soon do come and gone

What once was a life well lived ,
      s l o w l y     e v a n e s c i n g
      like the summer river’s flow

some say ..." you never miss the water
      'til the well runs dry "
. . . regrets a waste of time - -

Rumination, a loathsome silent reverie
      a taunting unsolved koan

      an unplanned oxymoron ,  
      beget of a deafening silence
. . . dust sleeps with indifference
      veiling a beautiful handmade
      unstrung guitar
      muted - - abandoned,
      tone poems, unsung

and so "re-begins" the task ...
      come what may rise up
      into the dark star's light ...

Coyote was going there - -
      a dawning metamorphosis
      under another nebulous sky

. . . refreshed by Luna's potent alchemy bestrewn
      in her spellbinding lambent moonlight elixir of life ...


harlon rivers  ... 5. 21. 2015

straight from heaven itself..
we fell
just fell straight down into the darkness.
our angel wings were pure..
they slowly became engulfed into the filthiest black as we fell further with gravity
we fell through the trees
the sharp branches slit our skin and scratched the feathers of our wings as we fell
we shattered the earths surface..
we sat staring at the strangeness...
these gentle wings drooped downward around our bodies..
softly they brushed the cracking land we sat on with their gentle tips
..the tall trees hunching their claws over us whispering curses of deceit
we once shook with fear
but now this became our realm of comfort...
porcelain tears formed at the edges of our eyes
our tears never reached the ground
these hearts that once existed
sadly crystalized
our cold stone hearts stopped beating..
our eyes turned into glossy black marbles...
we could stare right through your soul if we wanted
we were
vulnerable
deepened with sadness
a sadness that was reflected through our eyes
an emotion so deeply piercing a rusted fork trying to stab through a rib cage in a repeating jabbing motion wouldn't even compare.
longing for something that we never found.
the maps to happiness were burned with the fire of hatred
hair lay over our black mirror eyes
our radiant halos diminished radiation
they dimmed to dullness..these delicate auras we cherished
yet they were replaced...
replaced with a black aura and a pair of distorted glazed horns
those twisted manifestations
I watched them arising from that pretty little head of yours as it ruptured your scull
we matched and it made me smile
I think I felt a certain beauty for these creatures we became
our eyes glossed and down cast
we do not look up to the sun anymore because it did not exist
the moon was my favorite, it spoke in tongues
take my soul and stash it 6ft under with the decay.
we manifest the lurid .
you and I.
imperfection must have a place to go with its own kind..
because nobody wants un-ordinary
you are the only one who understands what I feel...
because we feel together..
we fell together..
we are defected as two
but we can love each other..
we love each other in this distorted form of beauty.
this frozen air representing a noose choking the trachea
the thick fog blurring our sight from paradise visions
that loveliness that we are restricted to see any more
but, this vision of darkness suits my  emotions better.
we will call this place home sweet home.
this place filled with fear.
for we cast it like a spell upon the land.
this solemn forest of decrepitude
not just evil..but conniving.
we just add onto this darkness of confused, and mentally abused.
we will find more people and start designing their headstones with their bones like name tags.
you and I.
to create our own universe of this ugly beauty we define.
together we fell.
together we will fiend.

sweet teathers
so swift to stake
the hair, staying twixt
my throb and zoned fake

a deed unmeasured
so gifted a debate
to love a light to vulture-
breath, the bread of lines,
of the beating of a ruptured quake

1/18/09

Dead heads stare from the wall

one can't tell if their glassy eyes
hold the relics of past life
or the sadness of having lost it
to the fires of royal pastime

tiger eyes look pathetically pleading
for re-stitching the stripes on the bones
leopard head growls only in anguish
of his spots being soft spot for target
the open jaws of the croc
can't still swallow the stuck bullet
awed eyes of deer is yet to sense
the muzzle that ruptured its innocence
the jackals, birds, langurs, civets
all frozen in the suddenness of the ***** out.

The hunter's head peeps from a dusty frame
having got his place of pride
among his game.

The devil’s acts scratched into your skin;
Scald yourself with your own sins.
**** his soul out through his chest;
Ink it out- **** his quest.
Her mind in torture, her lack of amour
Fills her with fear- a ruptured shiver
Here he clutches a deadly dagger
Stabs the prey with morbid hunger
Stalks the hundred blackened souls
Digs a hundred hardened holes
His huge wings sign menace
Kills their passion, screams, “There is no grace.”
In his head, he feels misled.
The way he sees the girl
“I’ve always wanted to tell you,” he shrieks
“You used to be so beautiful!”
The sockets in his face leaks
The conjured up image in his head is dreadful
He lets out a final bloodcurdling cry
A signal of his goodbye
Before he stomps across the sunken boat
Tilts her head and slits her throat.

with a clatter and crash
the q-tips fall to the floor
her broken skin a pale ash
white, clammy and cold
contrasting the metallic hue
of her blood spilling down her arm
saying dearly i’ll miss you
i can’t go on like this

a beautiful diabetic girl
with so much to live for
a diamond in the rough, a pearl
among the splinters
feeling one-thousand percent alone
and done with being herself
ripping her heart to pieces shown
to absolutely no one

little does she realize
she has a cloud of support
to fall back on, her eyes
deceive her looking in the mirror
stumbling blindly around a vast
and empty ocean trying to float
every moment is her last
suspended in a single second
and her rope could twist and break
and she would be gone in a snap
when each day is a constant give-and-take
of her emotions and i
wasn’t around

you fell and i
wasn’t there
to hear it

i lived in your house
you were not my friend
you were my sister
and i didn’t know
the way you cried
the blood you shed
the thoughts that plague your head
and trouble your mind
and you trouble mine

and i’m sorry i didn’t see
we may have grown apart physically
you are and always will be
in my heart and in my soul
i’m sorry i wasn’t always there
but now i am i promise

you mean so much to me
and your ocean’s not empty
it’s filled with creatures of the sea
and the coral and the tide
an amazing unexplored wonder
20,000 leagues under

you can scratch the surface
but you’ll never destroy the beauty
underneath

the duckling was never ugly or wrong
it had forever been a swan
its agile grace a quiet blessing
saved until the unfit traits
were finally abandoned

you will shed away your tortured skin
and leave behind your mortal coils
you will mend up your ruptured heart
and heal to somewhere over the rainbow

with the burning passion
of a thousand bright suns
it’s okay to hate yourself
so long as you don’t let the light
grow cold or fade out
someday you will shine bright
your scars show you’ve
valiantly battled
the demons under your skin
so don’t forget to fight

mama said there’ll be days like this
and each day can be torture
but someday you will recover
so stay golden, ponyboy
brush the dust off
and glow

He clenched it tightly
He'd only used it once
"You have to pull the trigger first son, and BANG BANG BANG!
You can **** anything!"
With intense intent on his mind
His verge for vengeance grew within, now it's time
To show the bullies how he feels

He glared at them with and intensity
of a malicious lion gazing at prey.
They stared at him back,
paralyzed and gaping,
surprised, scared, shivering at the sudden ominous
cloud around this figure that once shook with
the demons that clawed at his being every minute of the day.

Teachers deigned to his prowess
Consoling him not to shoot
He glanced at that kid who kicked him, sneered at how stupid he is.
He screamed with angst, blood streaming though his fingers.
Trickled to pull the trigger, this is now or never.

Suddenly,
a whimper. He glances away quickly to see
his little sister's eyes swim with murky waters.
"danny..."
He looks away.
Then, shoots.
one,
two,
three,
four,
five.
He smiles,
watches the chaos erupt the way his mind does every night,
stares at the crimson velvet beginning to crawl out of the bodies as the ragdolls crowed with terror of the dead,
ghastly large eyes , desperately hollow,
wanting only the warmth escaping.

He feels alive, for the first time he's the fire to ignite the dark
Burning everything within his grasp,
Dictating any norm in his way.
The silence preaching him, Feeling remorse of that obscure stance.
He ruptured every enmity that denotes innocence. Screaming, "WHY DO I STILL FEEL SO ******* EMPTY!!??"

You looked beyond my hideous smile.
A smile with a history of broken scars.
I was living under a world where there
Was no love , no sanity of the mind.
Broken patches on my veins .
Hard to sewn , hard to rebuild .
But you stayed....

My heart was in debt , you stayed.
To pay what was lost , to gain its strength.
I was unfixable ,so I believed.
But the truth sank with your touch.
Your touch deposit little wires
To make my dormant heart reignite
With the fire it once reigned.
I could be rebuild .
You stayed

You look beyond my almond eyes .
There were tremendous waves of memories.
I was looking at a world with love tragedies.
Right in front of me , you made me believe.
Rebuild my eyes , to quit being blindly impaired.
You stayed

You tasted my pink subtle lips ,
Your mouth tasted a mouth full
of broken stories to share .
With every taste, I was sinking in my own spit.
Ruptured taste .
Easily to fix with your love.
You stayed

Round and round of long night
Endearing my pain , my broken heart
You taught me to be sane.
You rebuild my cracks
Reconstruction my pavements.

I fell in love with you over and over
Because you stayed through it all
I stayed to learn your flaws .
Who knew you were so close
But in reality so far ....
I still stayed

Through the nights where you found yourself afraid , I stayed .
I was the courage light.
Through the nights where you found still unable to breathe.
I was your oxygen.
Through the nights you need someone ,
I was your muse.
I loved you more than I loved myself.
You rebuild me to become the person
I should have always been .


Only to know you came to fix me .
Only to fix me in order
To be sane for the
Love I truly deserve .
I really want to ****** you with the
Shattered pieces of my heart.
Mourn your silhouette,
I only say this because you made me
See for my own kind .
I can't hate you for that , or depise you.
I looked at the mirror and see
What I am capable of ,
and how hard I can love.

And any one who is lucky to replace you
Will live in world where there is love .
Where my eyes will see hearts .
Where my heart will beat endlessly for him.
Where my lips will taste heroism.

Thank you for rebuilding me for the future.

Soft yellow petals paint the earth, falling like tiny feathers back and forth in a cradling fashion and settling quietly into the dirt. A small figure howls his lamentations. He leans over the earth pounding his fists against the open ground. A vacant face with almost ape like features seems to be silently sleeping. Grunts of sorrow fill the mournful morning sky.

The small man-beast cries. Behind him tiny fingers clutch his light brown matted hair, muffled sobs slipping from their tiny mouths. He turns, cradling the younglings in his arms; then tightens his embrace, smothering their pain with his till there is a small sense of comfort left.

     A flaming arrow soars above a shimmering pool of water, whistling at its own reflection as it seeks its target. He floats gently in the pond a stark contrast from his own life. Once warrior now rotting corpse. Sword ceremoniously placed upon his chest; arms crossed. The flaming arrow falls. The body is consumed. In the distance a tribe stands stoically holding in tears of sorrow mixed with a tense sense of pride.

     Somewhere in the stone city a poets sings his sad rhymes, echoing the love of a stranger, the wrinkled form now fallen. The people pass in a small procession. He lets their soft sobs fill him up. A young man hands him a coin in gratitude for the melody and the honorable words then walks away his shoulders heavy with grief. His body sags as if the gravity has been multiplied by ten. A little girl sniffs the dry dusty air taking in the oils and perfumes, waiting to see if Hades shows up. The poets passes the newly earned coin to a starving stranger sitting quietly nearby.

Deep south a disfigured body dances in the breeze, swaying in time with the leaves of the tree. A mother wails; she is restrained. Her body, hardened by years of labor, crumbles for a moment. Her brown skin moistened by tears glimmers in the days harsh rays. Shaking with anguish, she struggles against the strength of those she loves. A male voice warns her against the dangers of trying to recover the body. Even so, it takes two grown men to hold her back.

A robed figure stifles his sorrow beneath the strong veil of faith. The restraint takes much of his mental strength leaving him emotionally fatigued. There is a small body laying limply in his arms. Blood paints his loose flowing robes red. His beard is sticky with sweat, sand, and snot. The face of the child is ruptured. That which once enraptured and inspired fatherly love now terrifies. The reality is a massive wound paralleled by the sickening hole in his child’s face. Brittle bone broken and bent sinking inwards as what should be there disappears. All that is left is a mess of flesh and pain. Barely a foot away one brother softly whispers his prayers to Allah on behalf of his nephew.

I close the eyes of my grandfather, or at least I imagine that I close his eyes. I do not have the strength to touch him. I do not know why. I want to pay him some grand respect out of love and gratitude. The guns sound a salute as strangers honor him more than I am able to. A folded flag finds its way into my arms. I am merely holding it for another. I look at my shirt, a weird black button up thing with short sleeves and flames, wishing I had worn something better. I wish I had a poem, or petals, or even a flaming arrow but all I have is this stupidly stunned face numbly staring out at the world.

Suddenly, I feel the softness of tiny furry fingers interlace with mine. Then the music of a foreign language plays in my ears. To the left, a strong brown calloused hand squeezes my shoulder in a statement of compassion. Behind me I feel the pat a powerful palms slapping against my back in pride. In front of me a thin skinned black bearded figure sits on his knees. He lowers his head, hands gently pressing against the ground. He prays, and I hear a beautiful accent in a tongue I cannot comprehend, but I understand the intent. Then the bearded stranger raises his head again, repeating the process a few more time. I nod my head in solemn gratitude.

Far far away
As though locked in a room
A doll in a cupboard
Is a girl called Alice
Alice the stripper

I myself at home looking for connection
Flick through cams
As though searching yellow pages

My attention caught
As though an anchor
Was around my heart
I stop on Alice

Fragile and vulnerable is what I see

I take her to
""Private chat""
And I tap my keyboard
As fast as hummingbirds wings
To make a connection

But it is no use
As clothes fall of her like broken slates
Of a discarded building  
Only to reveal half robot
Half dead human being

I type, "STOP STOP"

But she is lost in her routine
An act of ****** pleasure

"Please stop" ,I type

But her soul scattered
As though beaten away
By stampeding Rhino
For a while we just
Float together
In outer space

Where are you Alice
My heart bleeds

As though a spell had been broken
A nervous silence is ruptured
And like Apollo 13
As she types "hello"
Houston calling Houston
A relief breaths through
My whole being

I type,  " hello there"
And ask how are you  
I thank her for her **** routine
  
Then she in response springs back up
As though being controlled
By a remote
Held in my hands

"No No No need no need", I cry I type
" just talk just talk I don't want this"

My heart feeling her vulnerability
Reaches through the screen
seeking to cover like a blanket

Shortly after she covers herself
With a beautiful Royal Blue blanket
I type ," That colour looks beautiful on you
You must wear it when Mr Right
Invites you to a ball
And I tell her she would be stunning
And would shine in that blue  
And the lucky man would be the envy of the ball

A sparkle for the first time
Returns to her eyes

Even more beautiful now I feel

It was as though a harvest moon
Had found a gap through
Thick clouds on a very dark night
As her soul returned home
She began to blossom
Like a brave crocus flower
Pushing through the snow

My soul danced with pleasure
As the love in my heart
Spun around her with the joy
Of a long lost planet
Who had just found his sun

As time passed my need to leave
The conversation approached
I asked her to promise me
To always , Love yourself Always
And to know that you are
A treasure
And that you are special

Her eyes began to well up
As my heart swelled up
As a tear drop fell on her being
It was welcomed like the first
Drop of rain
After a long hard drought

After on my way to friends I pondered
Why is it
Like diamonds in coal
Are jewels so easy to find
In dark places
But become so rare
In the light of prosperity

And why so easily condemned
By world
Which stands on moral castles
Built by the power of
Their own pride and vanity
They have their reward on their tower
I feel Jesus would say

I think
If the love in my heart
Is that of our God
I know who
HE LOVES MOST

With distance
the distaste only grew ,
with time and foreign lands my tree of wisdom only grew
from the confines of meditational winter sprung forth with the seasons change a fresh spring
that led to summers bloom and now with autumns orange face upon us i find myself back where i began ,

where i ran , it seems i was running back
where i thought i had no map , there was something pulling me to a home of sorts
more than one , too many to name , in people who live and in places that breathe
where i roamed , where i broke down walls triumphantly pulling the bricks and letting the river flow through the once more
no more ****** damns to hold back the floodwaters

i had an inkling i was running off borrowed time
or at least credit
death on credit
death in reverse
birthed rebirth
again and again

yet here i am still in deaths ruptured flow -
the unconditional love ran out mother ,
it ran out and you used it up
you used it so , i know you needed it
so from my child’s heart uninteruppted i let that one go
i held it aloft so you would know that no matter what you do , you are loves loved love

you are loves , loved love
but , it all came crashing down around my ears and around my throat a noose with no name
but a holy ghost escaped my lips in angry overtones = this argument for arguments sake
and tears hot on my cheeks filling up my mouth with anti-septic salt water drops
that doused my locks and you said “come back to me when you can speak without crying”

tears are but distilled wisdom and i am your teacher
i am your child - for a reason , i learnt much from you but how much more can you learn from me..
for i am not you - but a part - apart
and the smoke fills my eyes blurring the lines between reality

but i had enough , respect is intended - always
but i have respect in myself and that’s what you taught me.

That’s why i smile at people on the bus and talk to strangers ; because
everyone is reaching their own goals, shining their own light and love is shared , mother , love is shared.
and i try to love
but love seems to be distant
i love

four men

one - island man
two - island man
three- island man
four - out way somewhere i don’t know , never have graced , hope to grace and maybe touch his face ,

is this wrong? is this why i sit up at night with restless dreams
because whenever i see any one of them my heart turns to shreds
and i recall what that love is one more time
one more time
on more time

one - touches and lunch
two - dinner without touches, yet.
three - cheesy beans and laughter lines
four - astral planes baby ,

it’s raining again .
i’m siting under a tree in holloway
next to a knoll with hot chocolate , passport photos and cigarettes

are they not all one and the same
whom would i devote my entirety to , would you take it?
would you take it?
could you take it?

where do we stop?
why not stop..why stop. stop. what? stop loves riptide ?
not likely , not by chance , but by simplistic design
no i will not go
i will stay

please, please.. please.

i want to dance , with you who are you?
an enigma of epic proportions

i read somewhere that if a poet falls in love with you then you will never be forgotten
forever imortalized in their sonnets
and yes , it is true

lover why so shy? why so elusive , who is your soul
won’t you quietly tell me of the bruises won’t you tell me your secrets
and let me smooth down your shorn hair

two.

this world was made to share
and so is my love
so it is my love ,

we are wounded healers
and my , have i never heard anything as poetic as that.

but i cannot stay lone with all this love as it burst forth because it is mine. mother .
it is mine.

so.

dinner.

I saw ripples
Dimple into little dents

And they ruptured through
The door and into
My living room

Tiny sun filled slices
Sliced straight through

Tore my flesh
In molten sinew breath

My barrel pressed
To my head
And leveraged
With the depth

Of the situation

But patience
Patience wasn't my virtue

And I was blind
Blind but
Saw it through

Alive in death
The death before the
  ..booom

In the warmth
The warmth
Of the sunlit
Living room

Burning too

Once they were remembered
As beauteous blue-eyed angels
Who assiduously
Served the creator
Once thought of as the holy ones
Who shone the brightest
Free will and they chose evil
The fallen and their father
Whose actions
Gave way to torment
All the unpardonable sins
They committed
In the age
When atrocity prevailed

Now all they seek
Is retribution
Sparse and angry
Gliding in the skies
With rayless halos
And ruptured wings
Listen as God cries
At what has become
Of his creation.

Somewhere in the furrows of pink and gray
flesh, nestled between delicate arches of pelvis,
in what was supposed to be bowels and pulsating warmth,
lies the wish for chemotherapy.

Old images of skull-white sundresses
glimmering with the glory of summer days in the world of Perfect Thighs
fester imperceptibly,
buried in some remote corner of the midbrain
that smells like half-digested chicken parmesan;

each memory’s tastefully arranged––
rows of wheat, sharp as disinfectant,
sour with antimetabolites and metastatic guilt.
October levels prospects like a hurricane,
and as your mother balances a salad fork between chalk fingers
the full plate in front of you reminds you of ruptured organs.

Ruptured urethra
She has worn it to a nub
My filthy *** fiend

A BLACK DEVILS TONGUE ROLLS OUT BEFORE ME
HISSING, LICKING, FLAMING & SPITTING

I'M ON THE RUN FROM THE DEMON INSIDE ME
GRINDING WINDING CHURNING AND BURNING

A SCREAMING BULLET TEARS FROM HELLS OWN KEEP
THUNDER QUAKES OF LAUGHTER FROM THE BELLY OF THE BEAST

A BLACK DEVILS TONGUE ROLLS OUT BEFORE ME
HISSING, LICKING, FLAMING & SPITTING

I'M ON THE RUN FROM THE EVIL INSIDE ME
GRINDING WINDING CHURNING AND BURNING

A STREAK OF LIGHTNING BOLT BLISTERING THE EARTH
TREMBLING AND SHAKING LOOSE OF HELLS OWN HEARTH

MUSCULAR SKELETAL CONTORTING
BODY BRACED IS FORCING
SPITTIN SPARKS GRINDIN' WHEELS
KICKIN' FAST AT THE DEVIL'S HEELS

FLIRTING WITH PSYCHOSIS
THIS MADNESS TAKES 'A' HOLD
I'M DRIPPIN' SWEAT
GRIPPIN A SPINNIN' WHEEL
GRINDIN' SPARKS AT THE DEVIL'S HEELS

I'M DRIPPIN' WET
MINDS BLEEDING
THIS MADNESS TAKES A HOLD

I'M GRIPPIN' HARD
ON A SPINNIN' WHEEL
KNUCKLES WHITE ICY COLD

I'M GRIPPIN' WET
MINDS BLEEDING
THIS MADNESS TAKES MY SOUL

I'M DRIPPIN' SWEAT
GRIPPIN' A SPINNIN' WHEEL
SPITTIN' SPARKS
ON THE DEVIL'S HEELS

I'M DRIPPIN' SWEAT
MINDS BLEEDING
THIS MADNESS TAKES A HOLD

I'M DRIPPIN' SWEAT
GRIPPIN' A SPINNIN' WHEEL
WAITIN' FOR THE DEATH KNELL PEEL

A BLACK DEVILS TONGUE ROLLS OUT BEFORE ME
HISSING, LICKING, FLAMING & SPITTING

I'M ON THE RUN FROM THE DEMON INSIDE ME
GRINDING WINDING CHURNING AND BURNING

A SCREAMING BULLET TEARS FROM HELLS OWN KEEP
THUNDER QUAKES OF LAUGHTER FROM THE BELLY OF THE BEAST

A BLACK DEVILS TONGUE ROLLS OUT BEFORE ME
HISSING, LICKING, FLAMING & SPITTING

I'M ON THE RUN FROM THE EVIL INSIDE ME
GRINDING WINDING CHURNING AND BURNING

THIS RUPTURED CHASM ERUPTS SPLINTERING THE HEAP
WILDFIRE SPITTING FROM INFERNAL DEEP

MUSCULAR SKELETAL CONTORTING
BODY BRACED IS FORCING
SPITTIN SPARKS GRINDIN' WHEELS
KICKIN' FAST AT THE DEVIL'S HEELS

FLIRTING WITH PSYCHOSIS
THIS MADNESS TAKES 'A' HOLD
I'M DRIPPIN' SWEAT
GRIPPIN A SPINNIN' WHEEL
GRINDIN' SPARKS AT THE DEVIL'S HEELS

I'M DRIPPIN' WET
MINDS BLEEDING
THIS MADNESS TAKES A HOLD

I'M GRIPPIN' HARD
ON A SPINNIN' WHEEL
KNUCKLES WHITE ICY COLD

I'M GRIPPIN' WET
MINDS BLEEDING
THIS MADNESS TAKES MY SOUL

I'M DRIPPIN' SWEAT
GRIPPIN' A SPINNIN' WHEEL
SPITTIN' SPARKS
ON THE DEVIL'S HEELS

I'M DRIPPIN' SWEAT
MINDS BLEEDING
THIS MADNESS TAKES A HOLD

I'M DRIPPIN' SWEAT
GRIPPIN' A SPINNIN' WHEEL
WAITIN' FOR THE DEATH KNELL PEEL

THESE DARK WINGS
SPREAD OVER MY HORIZON
REIGN IN EVIL
REIGN IN FREEDOM
REIGN IN HELL

THESE RIVERS RUN WITH BLOOD
FLOWING TO THE FLOOD

THESE RIVERS RUN WITH BLOOD
FLOWING TO THE FLOOD


FROM THE GNASHING TEETH OF THE JAWS OF HELL
RASPING GASPING SEETHING AND BREATHING

MOVING FASTER THAN THE TOLL OF THAT FATEFUL BELL
WREAK CRAKE SHREIKS AND SHAKES THE HEATH

WINDIN' DOWN THAT STEEP SLIDE
SLIPPERY *****
LANDSCAPE
RACING
THROUGH
MY
MIND

WINDIN' DOWN THAT SLIPPERY *****
LANDSLIDE
RACING
THROUGH
MY
MIND

WINDIN' DOWN THAT STEEP SIDE
SLIPPERY *****
BLACK TRACKS
RACING
THROUGH
MY
MIND

for the past months
the thin veins in my arms
have been ruptured and scarred
due to unhealthy habits of distasteful breakdowns.
drunk on absolute insanity
intoxicated from the feel of misery
i always hope for this to take it's last turn
unfortunately it is one straight road
a long road of wretched nights and messy sinks


- m.n.

Funny how life seems everything but not worth any more pain,

the snow is reducing to hail outside my Parisian window but it will take me years to thaw your heart

I put the frozen peas in the microwave and hope what would it be like to have all fragments of your should lay defrosted on my bone china plate

But all that happens is that I keep on romanticizing pain and contemplating that if my ruptured ligament can heal up in 3 weeks,

                  Then why can’t our hidden love embolden up into a bone?

Funny how all my dreams seem to have left their axis and moved farther away into some other galaxy and nothing seems right anymore,

            And you who seemed like the only date I waited for in the calendar,

Has turned into the Mayan code of Mayan calendar that I can’t decipher at all.

The city is shut, sparing its prey until tomorrow. Night rules, dreams creep down the street, eyes dead
Her poised being is the center of universe, that girl
She is loath to beg yet for the twenty fourth time of the night she sings out, God?
It’s two in the morning and they are sitting at the balcony, God and her, both holding a cigarette
Mother and father are in screaming colors but she is, only, the darkest blue
Two of them are contradiction, a vexing rendezvous but they yearn for each other so once in a while they talk

People talk
A boy across the house is found dead
Parents roaring, raging, crashing the ground, he’s wearing a pair of new basketball shoes. Blue.
He is one of million, a delicate kind, very comely, a subtle presence. Neighbors murmur maybe God
fell in love, maybe God enraptured by the boy. But God is peeking behind the closed door with the girl
Between their fingers still a burning cigarette

Maybe it’s the taste of Marlboro Red, the girl
wishing an epiphany, a revelation, for its been too long, the girl and God
writing each other’s eulogy. The girl has been dead for God and God has been dead
for the girl, ruptured for a very long time, there’s no way back. No long talk
can fix the burn of cigarette,
the eternal crippling affliction taped up in every cavity inside the holy temple of their body

A lady in the house with doors and windows painted blue
is murdered. She was having a dalliance and neighbors talk
behind their open bible. God cringes, God recoils, her god is a beige-tied, cigarette
scented with hair slicked back. She was in his thrall, calls her name in a mesmerizingly fetching way making her girl
again, an ingénue with a pair of chatoyant eyes. Bodies clashing, her muse, they fuse, he choose to ruse, dead,
God is amused, time is lapsed, but perhaps she was not divine. A lady in someone’s car trunk, murdered, dear God!

Inhaling. Conflating. Cigarette
smoke all over the veins. A bright blue
car parked across the street. A week since the boy died. A week since the lady went missing. People talk
about somewhere this week another dead
body is going to be found. Maybe in the park under the slide or on a high school bleacher, like the girl found God
under her bed. The first encounter of God and the girl.

God
and the girl run out of cigarette
counting the days God and the girl
Next time won’t be cigarette and balcony. God and the girl next time at a bar with blue
sign where sinners and saints sipping absinthe because God won’t talk
to anyone but the girl. God and the girl sipping absinthe because the city is shut. Eyes dead.