I wish I could be a super-hero.
I wish I could be your super-hero.
But most of all I would want to be your Bee-Man.

Flying over continents and oceans,
over forests and gardens,
until I found you,
my Rose Queen,
my super-powers would detect
your pink petals
from far off.
Down I would fly,
drawn by the fragrance of you
to the exquisite beauty
of your blushing petals
silkily emerging from the heart of you,
unfolding for me,
welcoming me to your secret treasure.

Gently but firmly
my long, loving tongue would press
between those dew-moistened folds,
unable to resist the perfume
overcoming me.
Tugged in
by your intoxicating scent,
your nectar I would sup
until I could drink no more.

Then transforming
the sweet nectar
you had so willingly granted me,
I would create my rich, creamy honey,
especially for you,
so willingly penetrate
between your soft petals,
find your hidden depths,
and to repay you for the delight
your fragrant nectar had given me,
magically inject my honey,
into the essential heart of you,
until my store was empty,
and we could both feel
the most exquisite joy of all.

I hope that you dream of it as I do,
that you wish it also,
and that some day our dreams can come together.
And if you and I could come
together
in ecstasy,
it would be the most perfect fulfilment possible
of my desire.

Note the time
by seasonal migration
return of osprey, eagle
each feathered pearl
a moment strung
on the banded necks
of brants and loons
velvet-lined memories
gathered within
my threatened
wild spaces

raindrops find
their way home
watch them bead
on the backs
of sitting ducks
serenely surfing
sibilant waves
silkily filling
oceans within
my tumultuous
wild heart

He is my least favorite vegetable.
                                                   
                       No amount or level of preparation makes him taste better:
Boiling-
brings out his bulbous, insipid ego
the texture of his flamboyant ignorance.

when I timorously sip him in soups or broths,
his oozing insidious misogyny
contaminates my blissful dining, contorts any ingredients still pure.

I fry him, striving to remove the  
excess of impertinence which
permeates the oxygen I feebly inhale.
but he evades my maneuvers:
usurps bliss and violates all semblance of tranquility

I cannot prevail
against the throb of his assaulting narcissism

I must instead attempt
to comment
(arduously, fraudulently)
on the delicate iridescence of his silkily mucoused membranes
and admire deftly
his indefatigable ventures to pervade my
every.
serenity.

Poetry lives, sleeps, deep, deep within,
The words, waiting, waiting, waiting,
Nurtured, soothed, lovingly cajoled,
Given form and purpose, till they rise,
Coming to life, unbidden, bursting free.

They echo around the globe, touching,
Slipping silkily into hearts and minds,
Subtly connecting with new-born ideas,
Mingling, coalescing, waiting, waiting,
That’s where poetry come from, (yes),
Poetry lives, sleeps, deep, deep within.

©Paul M Chafer 2016

You came in black.
Drenched in black,
encompassing the night into your every move.
Sun or moon for each eye,
stars twinkling your feet
so that you can slip quietly in,
black holes removing all evidence of breaking in.

You crept slowly, surely
grabbing everything you found,
every little
secret, scar, soul shine
into that bag you clung to,
clutching it so that it hung from your back.

You passed my fire place.
Empty, with nothing left but coal and dust.
The fire once there?
Now long extinguished.
You shivered,
and continued looking.

You glanced at the kitchen counter.
Strewn across it were spices
and ripped up shreds of pictures
of all those loved.
Mixed into remnants of
entrees, appetizers, desserts,
too good to be true,
gobbled up too fast,
gone.
You shudder,
continue.

Finally, you find what you're looking for.
In the basement, kept in a safe right by where I slept,
you found it.
You reached towards me,
slowly, silkily took the key I had around my neck
as I sighed at your touch and unconsciously let you take it.

You twisted the key,
opened the safe
and grabbed the
ornately scarred,
worn down wooden
box that was held inside.

You opened the box.
Inside lay a red thing.
It resembled a minuscule
mauled, mangled, mutilated
crimson heart.
You sighed with relief and tossed the box and it's hideous contents into the bag.

You grabbed everything else you found and put it inside your bag.
Some were lead heavy, others too light...
Memories kept too long,
some fading,
some still fresh,
others just too strong of a memory.

You crept quietly away,
but not before you heard me whisper your name.
You looked away
like the coward you are
and left the house.

Sifting through throngs of ordinary people
Feeling the sweat run down your spine,
Knowing that somewhere, lost in the nowhere
Penniless thoughts are sweeping your mind.

Whispering breezes caress the deep valleys
Towering aspens reach for the sky
Loveliness stretches across the whole landscape
And ordinary people live life as they die.

The everyday actions of ordinary souls
Which gather like old leaves in piles at your feet,
They billow and flow like windblown confetti
And lay there like derelict snow in the street.

The passion and pain that flow through the lifeway
The highs and the lows that paint in your mind
Magnificent portraits of colour and texture
That render your eyesight effectively blind.

You scream at the hollowness, vacantly pulsing
Thrash at the emptiness shimmering there,
Long for the avalanche of substance returning
Long for the touch of her long golden hair.

Swim through the morass of ordinary people
Wade through the ordinary thoughts that live there
Making the most of the moments of lightness
Through quivering lips you discard despair.

Dancing in puddles and splashing through gutters
Cascading on through in a frivolous way,
Tossing your mane with a smile built on vapour
Dispelling your cares like windblown hay.

To gasp for air in the turquoise downtime
****** out your palms apon your knees,
Feel your chest convulse with effort
These flooding tensions gush to ease.

Whispering nothings are echoing softly
Silkily wafting from this side to there
Imparting the message that life is worth living
And crimson & scarlet diffuse in the air.

This ordinary day has done it’s thing now
Temperate airs have cooled to chill,
Vistas fade into the distance
Starlings flock upon the hill.

Marshalg
Mangere Bridge
18 January 2008

I stumble upon them
In the silkily inked night-
Stars straining through like
Candle light in caverns-
And oftentimes nurse my
Stubbed toe in whimpers.

For some revelations
It is like the dandelion in reverse,
And all the pieces I catch,
Blown to me by the cold and unrelenting wind
As I strain my short arms, - higher, higher,
Softly, gently -
Nestle into a place that has been and was and always will be for them,
As it was and has been and always will be since this
Infinite and cumbersomely graceful universe was constructed in the cosmos.
The truth flowers and blossoms into being for me.
I caress it to my chest and stare at its multifaceted simplicity,
Shielding it from the wind that bore it with trembling hands.

Other times, I feel a blow to my temple
And my sternum turns to black, glass shards that implode,
Ripping and flaying as they exit.
My ribs slip to tar, laboriously oozing down the inner constructs
Of my collapsing frame,
Until it seeps from my toenails, puddling around me.
I rest a clammy forehead in its depths,
Soothing compared to the devastation within.

My heart, marred by these,
Flutters in apprehension,
And the closeness of contact causes
An indelible, impalpable, incredible
Rhythm
Falling in with the other.

The best moments of truth
Are when warmth
Crawls like sapling ivy from
The tips of my fingers to my earlobes and calves,
Navel and frigid nose,
Thawing me from the inside out and the outside in and all at once.
Chills cascade down my spine,
Fleeing to a safer place where they always will reside within me,
But that does not matter now.
I am walking on this knowledge,
I am prancing with my heart,
I am surrounded by a melody,
I am, I am, I am.
I was wrought with a tight throat and
Choked whispers
And a courage to hope,
And the moment when I began to know and suddenly knew all at once,
Because sometimes knowledge is inherent in our very being
If we are so bold as to taste it.

Candlelight dancing off the rippling bathwater,
The steam rising off it with an aroma
So sweet,
From the herbs steeped in it,
I’m a goddess,
An empress,
And my nectar is the red wine
Chilled to my preference,
The delicate stem dangling from my fingertips
And I watch.
As the coolness drifts off the glass in lazy tendrils,
Dancing over the surface of the heated water.
I part my lips and exhale gently onto the curve of it
Until the twirling fingers of cold opposing the heat
Swirl desperately,
My breath is the master,
The air the puppet,
And I tilt my head at the first notes of a song that draws me back,
Back to a liason in the dark
With an exotic lover,
The French words slipping over my skin
As silkily as his lips did,
Each verse reminding me of how we celebrated those verses then,
Raucously
Remorselessly
Hedonistically,
Almost as I do now,
With my ambrosia and my rose petals dancing among sprigs of herbs on the water,
With an orchestra hailing my memory,
All by the light of countless,
Flickering
flames.

the venom running through my veins
you sicken me,
making me see satan when i glance at a mirror
you're stellar with the way you flow through my body
so silkily slick,
tired yet energized.
are you red or black?
red as hell,
or black as my soul?
pick one, please pick one.
because id hate to go to hell
with a black soul.

~t.s.

I let myself go, when all I wanted was
             To be in control, no notion
Of living, only emotion
And what it means to be whole,
Means to be driven.

Button up
The remnants; tight thread
Of frost plaited in hate,
Thick
Along my skin, now
To think it is the
spin
Of pain that keeps
things silkily thin
beneath my lashes, beat
The love I’d burned
To ashes. Never again –
But then, with sickness
I cannot ever quite pretend.

In the dark
I lie awake
Wondering
I see her face
And start pondering
With her
I feel my eyes stop wandering
Sweetly singing
Serendipitous songs
Swaying silkily
Into sleep
Insomnia
It keeps me up
And thinking
The time I'm wasting
My mind is racing
And I can't make it stop

But maybe I don't want to
The wind is whispering
Waiting willfully
Watching, wavering
Wistfully woeful
Yet wonderful

Time is not guaranteed
Life is full of danger
And what ever doesn't **** you
Makes us a little stranger

Its not so bad though....

She runs up to me
All five feet of her
Her chestnut hair
Glowing silkily
And her dainty
But strong arms wrap around me
And she rests her head on my shoulder.
"I'll miss you"
She says
And I can hear the tears in her voice
And I will miss her too
This girl
I have grown up with
Now off for her junior year
In college,
I will miss you too
My only big sister
Who I look up to so much.
I'll miss you.

Bright summer green haloed the pupils of her eyes
as wisp of yellow flames found their way
into the crease and creases that the green bypassed.
Her eyes pressed sooth and silkily
into her smooth soft skin.
Her lips parted slightly
but remained closed
showing no teeth as she smiled.
A smile that could warm and calm anyone
but you knew it was meant for you.

Praise Anna
Praise Mia
Shackle me up
Please
Please
Rob me
Rob me of
My innocence
My childhood
Fill me with lies
Make me believe
I'm unloveable
Because of my size
I kneel before you
Spoon down my throat
Trying to throw up
These crumbs
I forced down
Keep me
Keep me
As prisoner
Hand me the pills
The knife
The gun
Anything
So I can die
Young and
Beautiful
Because beauty is life
I don't want to grow old
If it means
Ugly and grey
Teach me
Teach me
Food is the enemy
And you
Are my friend
My best friend
My only friend
And you won't let me
Down
Let me cling to you
Adrift
All alone
In your sea
Of broken promises
And crushed dreams
Make me see fat
When others see bone
Let me get lost
In you
So I won't face
Reality
I'm 90 pounds
Skin and bones
Close to death
A hospital bed
Tube down my throat
Pumping fat
Into my stomach
Rehab telling me
I'm beautiful
I'm strong
Trying to wake me up
Break your chains
Free me
From your embrace
Oh dear
Anna
Mia
You do a marvelous job
Claiming lives
Ripping apart
Families
Stealing joy
Trapping people
With your silkily smile
Convincing them
To throw everything
Away
For beauty

"Sonnets From a Conversation With a Friend V"


We have walked often in the woods away
From the pounding city which is home sweet
Home. I like stony dirt best. The owlet
In the branches is your sought for Holy.
We both realize the wonder, softly
Breathing the world with our souls. A cat
Human, and a shoe scuffling human that
Prays for dry sunshine. Leaves, green or motley
Fill the universe, for a short dream time.
We have shared miles and miles of talking that's
Soon forgotten, enjoying it. Once, I made
You swear an oath never to tell to fools
The deep secret that holds me to nature,
Silkily bound,       I love smelling the rocks.

A line that announces the heart
And stays embedded in lovers
Pale yellow dressed girl breathes
Leaning across blue hyacinths
And wildness tornados the night
As silkily she touches the moon.

Love Mary x