I first found Sundance bleeding in the desert like a dog.

Dirt stuck to him in broken window panes,
he bent his neck toward me in parts.

Spoke through eyes red like Arizona rock.

******* was so *****,
looked like the desert spat him up.

Turns out it was the next town over.



They’d never done a proper hanging, before.


What happens when you’ve never done a
proper hanging before is loose hands.

Loose hands have a tendency
toward knives.

Sheriff sort of looked like a cross,
on his back,
that big knife stickin’ straight up like
a piece of glass.

Almost looked like Christ,
all curled up,
shining bright,
golden in all that dust.

Sundance drowned the devil in the Rio Grande.

Sundance had hands that were ****** quick.

I once saw him on a slow day.
Even then, they didn’t get to see the lightning,
people on the wrong end.

All they got was that black-hole barrel.
Must have looked like a third eye, on the other side. 

Must have looked like a sunset.  
Sundance’s tequila-blues,
a little shimmer, orange, red.  


Six sunsets in three seconds
he was that quick.


In Bolivia we met two hundred Federalies 
and I first saw him shake. 



He said everything’s upside-down on the other
side of the equator and sunsets happen
the wrong ****** direction here.

Said we got lazy and let the Texas
spin us over the wrong way.

I bet he was quick enough to see the lightning
before the black.

Sundance told me when the world ends,
it’ll start in Texas.

Said there’s a few canyons there that’ll swallow
the whole ****** planet if we’re not too careful.

Said we’ll be wakin’ up next to ****** snakes,
before anyone notices.

Hutch hopped about
Foraging as usual
Sundance stealthily
Crept towards her
Hutch sensed danger
Turned this way and that
Wrinkling her nose
To test the breeze
But did not detect
Her murderers crouch
Sundance sneaked
Towards a **** position
Getting ready to pounce
Hutch twitched her nose
Oh no , she thought
I'm being stalked
Sundance leapt into space
That's all he had
Hutch had gone.

how i have ached to walk amongst the evergreens
encased by dazzling quaking aspen
in my rocky mountain home

i yearn to fall again while skiing
and catch a wisp of icy sky blue
snow powder crystals
on my tongue
******* feelings
rise and fall
as they melt
and disappear

i long to breathe in your scent
sitting on the peak of wooded ridges
amidst slate colored boulders
sea salt combined with cinnamon
laced with wildflowers
crisply filling my lungs

i hunger to once again
behold again your red rock formations
creating tender hollows
through which timid coral sunsets peer

i crave hiking at dusk
into your jagged emerald forests
and sit wistfully mid the columbine
while darkened sunflowers juxtapose
against the jet black emptiness
enticing the stars
to etch enchanting paintings
on inky cobalt skies

hankering to be at the sundance film festival
coyly peeking into restaurants
covertly spying on the movie stars
on old park city main

itching to experience waiting patiently
for a moose to cross the street
its majesty splashing gingerly
sending chills throughout the galaxy
magnificence abounds

i pine to have memories gently cradle me
like worn out patchwork quilts
warmed by incandescent fires
wrapping me in soft colored canvas
the past craving transformation
by an echo that’s now dim

faintly crying out for
an old familiar artist’s brush
that still lingers
to snag times gone by
and paint the future in

amalgamating the antiquated
with the present
luring in
my destiny

i dream to don my fringed leather jacket
and hear my cowboy boots
fiercely clicking
against charcoal shadowed midnight sidewalks
while i watch the harvest moon

i’m parched too see your autumn chestnut leaves
against the bloodshot auburn sky
as cardinal hues give way to glistening winter
melding into tender spring

your summertime birthing
tingles down my spine
as chartreus aspen leaves
morph to golden bisque
enticing ute country
to blow in
copper colored indian summers
with cherry fragrant wind

yutaahih you were called
by the apaches
their historic essence
somehow ingrained within
my every cell
thirsty to lie enveloped
like a long lost lover
in your rugged western terrain

once having left your presence
i return to you now
my heart flutters
with wild anticipation
to see your precious face again
utah

©2016janetaylor

you make my legs

                             fill with lust

                                                         and some sundance

                                     chemical I cannot

                                                               ­           explain. you make

                                                   me feel like your

        pupils are the sun

                               and the sun has

                                                               ­                       little in respect

                                          to you aside from

                    attribution to the

                                                               ­  very existence of

                                                               ­                                         the girl I love.

                                                          you make me feel

                                like free chai tea

                                                   lattes, even if this

                                                               ­        analogy was used by

                                                               ­                           an ex of mine to

                                                               ­                                           describe how she

                                                               ­                                                           felt about me I

                                                               ­                                                                 ­        feel it's still

                                                               ­                                                                 ­                     valid in context.

                                   you make me dance

                        like thunder in a

                                          snowstorm and link

                          arms with my lack

                                                      of a bedside table

                and ring as true as

                                           my ears to the ashen

                                                               ­        corner-lounge love-drug-all-this-please.

                                      

                       ­             I love you,
                                    I love you,
                                    
                           ­         I love you,


                                    I love you.



                                                         ­          holy sweet good *******,


                                                   you sweet,

                                                   sweet soul,
                                                    

          ­                                         not even

                                                          novel­s
                                                  
                                                                ­  could properly explain

                                                       how my universe swells into serotonin heartbeats
                                                      ­                    whenever
                                    ­                                       you're
                                                          ­                wherever
                                        ­                                    with

                                                               ­              me.

i'm not worried
about tying any
fraying or
loose ends

just take me back to
where i started
meet me up
in sundance

i want to make
a movie out of your
skin, the way you
move like ivy vines,

a movie-ode
to your ode-begging
face.

if i could,
i'd enter us
into a film festival
we could be a sundance
winner, a student
film phenomenon.

i bet you it would
go something
like this,
enter a blank screen,
fade into a shot of you skin,
pan out to show your face, or
body.

all skin.
all skin.

you are beautiful for
a split second,
until my voice cracks the
silence
i tell you that we could be
no one, and nothing.
and you ask me.

for what?
so we make the movie anyways.

Bury me with the River Spirit.
Frozen underground,
surrounded by snow
in the heart of the canyon.
Let it hold me next to the babbles,
the falls, in the trees and among the cabins
I can't hear or see.
On my knees howling at the sun,
it shines down and
stings my frostbite.
Dead in the ground
when the canyons fail,
the waters halt and
all things fall and
I won't see you.
All things are harder to find
when you are in a wooden box
and buried.

Walking into the Reception Hall,
they stole the show away,
A regal pair they were,
with a little bit of Butch
and Sundance swagger shown.
A confident air, not at all underserved.
Dressed with just enough elegance.

Their posture and hue ,
sleek and silky golden,
like a duet of Cheetahs.
Eyes alert and searching
for prey. Alert for danger.

Like a herd of antelope,
all heads turned to look,
The men perhaps out of desire,
the women staring envy at them,
Like the twin bores of a loaded gun.

Mother and fetching daughter,
From twenty feet, hard to tell
which, one was one, or the other.
Long blond hair, full and fine,
both women tall, statuesque,
moving with grace and ease.

The mother my old friend,
the daughter all grown up now,
each having a smile that would
light up anyone's darkness of mood.

We greeted one another,
hugs and hand shakes shared.
A little conversation in the crowded room,
Many pairs of eyes upon us there.

Enchanted is the word that best describes
my impression, this duo as intelligent and
charming as they were beautiful to see.
The mother sedate, classy and yet open
and free, no pretense, no games just naturally
at ease. As lovely as I remembered her to be.

Her offspring, vivacious, spirited and bold,
smart as whip, with a tongue that could
draw blood if she desired it to.
Chatty and funny, sure of herself,
in the manner of beautiful people,
yet not in a pompous way, merely
Confident in self and her place in the world.
She possessed all the character traits you
would wish your own daughter to have.
Her Mother had done well is raising her.

Too soon they moved on,
meeting and greeting others',
out of my hearing and seeing.
Some weeks have passed, a month or two
and yet their strong impression has lingered,
I can't keep them out of my mind.

The Mother, my friend most of all.

Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                    Butch and Sundance: The Latest Remake

                      Union Pacific: Train Robberies Up 356%...
                                           -News Item

Narrator, old cowboy geezer sitting on the porch and smoking his pipe:

Well, now, Butch and Sundance (I’ll tell you no lies)
Stop the U.P. right in its trackages
And glaring at the passengers one of ‘em cries:
“All y’all hand over yer Amazon packages!”

Take me to the swan-graced waters...
Where dragonflies would visit,
and skim the surface on tireless wings.

I’d sit with the grounds’ keepers
- the cicadas.
Invisible guardians,
whose shrill song and calls
would only echo through the sparse foliage
and trees - entrancing me into a state of
accompanied aloneness.

A calming solitude,
that enables the eyes
to lapse into a deep,
unjudging gaze into the lake.

And as time slows to a halt,
each breath would lengthen...
The sun would dip into the distant edge
of the lake.
And my heart would skip
as it interprets the dance of the sun
on the water.

The culture call
let standards fall
we'll flag them up as mad.

I always was what I was not and not what I could be
I never saw destruction without that hint of glee,
I'm bad.

to gain respect one must expect
to do things properly,
by the book not
by hook or crook
or so
the tutor said to me.

But I was never meant to be
a guiding star or
a celebrity
not even sure if I was meant to be
me
but who is?

watching lightening
rip through the tenebrous sky,
anger-filled thunder scorns
the midnight hour.
We only came here to watch...
to breathe in cool night air.

I couldn't distinguish the shock
of your touch
from the wave of currents striking
the window of this sundance
crossing the blackened sky.

A feather-touch:
my lips, your lips, ours;
soft, seductive shivers.
Touches so electric,
we were unaware
of the youth-filled
dodge gunning
towards the embankment...
teen kisses, too innocent.

(They see our mirror image.)

In excited jolts,
like those of lightening raging
through the mountains,
we seek refuge
to thrill-seek
the precarious union
we are.

The night
sky spills
past and
fills the store
beneath with
pools of
blue shadow
and silence,
they are all
there, the
books, on
the shelves,
waiting
ready to drop
like Sundance
and Butch
making good
their escape,
if only I'd
seen how
they'd been
squeezed
in I could
liberate them
all, wrong
verb (perhaps),
but.....
     ...... what
use will be
tomorrow's
sunrise
with no
book to read
by it's light ?

It aches when I smile.
My State's a disaster.
Coal rollers, burnouts and days full of rapturous
laughter and "Red Face"
down in Lusk in the hot days
of Summer--it's boiling;
Winter winds burn up your face.
I first learned to hate
myself in a snowstorm
on Dow Street in Sheridan.
My best friends are the slow warmth
that spreads through the chest,
lifts a cold heart, grabs popcorn and pints
at the Blacktooth on hundreds of nights.
And 500,000 simple souls are a sight.
Still they're just half a million salty
drops in the ocean--
A quick squall of rain on the Bighorns.
They've opened the floodgates for *******,
morons, bigots and rednecks
and rich, ******* ranchers thinking
          everyone owes them.
And their dollars are deadpan
gallows jokes down in Cheyenne.
But I've seen cheap smiles 4 miles wide
out by Sundance.
And I've got good friends that I still carry with me
like the potent, sweet, earthy afterburn of good whiskey,
or the smell of the lodgepoles in the Spring
up in Story.
And it's still my home
even though it's so empty.
It's still my home
though it sometimes seems ******.
That State's in my bones,
I don't think it'll leave me.
So please understand that some nights
when you find me,
you've stumbled across a small splinter
chipped off of Wyoming.

You may look for me on Oxford Street
At dawn or dusk or night.
Or downtown where the down-and-outs meet
To drink and sleep and fight.
You may catch my shadow lurking on the curb
In the rainy middle-class suburbs.
(You’ll be chewing on the cud and on the curd,)
And they’ll all think you quite absurd,
And pass you by without a word
Without a care.
You won’t find me.
No, I’m not there.

You might get a glimpse at sundown
Of me and The Sundance Kid,
Riding onto Cape Town,
Or sliding through Madrid,
Or stealing through the byways of Turin –
Winking at the bottom of your glass of bitter gin,
Breathing through your window, on your skin,
Guessing what I think, just like a twin
But I swear,
You won’t find me,
No, I’m not there.

Chase my name to the horizon
Or the shores of Timbuktu;
Just be sure to keep your eyes on
Those two feet in-front of you.
I’ll be biting at your heels,
The stinging citrus scent of the fruit you peel,
The whirling hub of your bicycle wheel,
The hassock you fall upon when you come to kneel
In prayer.
But you won’t find me,
No, I’m not there.

Do not think that I will answer
When you ask or shout or call.
The figure of the folk dancer
Will not be me at all.
I’ll be the one that you’re not looking at,
Sitting in the place where you just sat,
Wiping from my face what you have spat,
Sleeping in every dark empty pocket of every new coat that
You wear.
Oh, you won’t find me,
I’m not there.

In every crowd and every gathering
You will turn around to see
That where I am not standing
Is not where you want to be.
Somewhere between you waking and your sleep
I swim the deepest secrets that you keep,
Silently catching the tears you weep,
In the kitchen cooking the food you eat
Minding what you sow you reap!
I am one step ahead of a sentient sweet
And fair.
But you will not find me.
I am not there.

Caterpillars drowning in the rain.
Not your typical sundance romance situation.
Financial calculators,
Homemade ice cream cake,
Oil change 3 months overdue,
One of those museums made up of an old town where people dress is 19th century clothing,
***** martinis.

As the sun, and moon
Danced together
Under a blue azure sky
The stars
Awaited the twilight
Their moment
For now
Suspended in time
And whilst the sun
Still shone
The universe
Batted no eyelids
As the wings of time
Floated on the ether
Of  the tomorrows
Of the unknown

by Jemia

Haven't done what I love

in so long.

Trying so hard to love.

Hurt for it.

*****, cut

blood,

want.

Hands,

bricks, numb.

20 years on this Earth,

had enough of this poison.

These little sticks of fire.

*******,
**** it. *******,
don't feel.
Don't care. Hate.  

*******, hate,
**** me,
hate. ****,
not good enough. Dead,
not good enough.

Dead this,
**** it,
lie,
forget about it in the morning.

Don't want anymore.

Finished with this language.

Don't care about command.

Just tryin' to be honest.

Don't want anymore good writing.

I want to know what to do.

I am sorry, New York.

I knew it was 5am.

I called anyways.

                               is now a fan of your poetry.

                               is now a fan of your poetry.

                               wrote a reaction to 26 January 2012

                               liked Texas, Part 1

                               liked Invalides

                               liked Invalides

                               is now a fan of your poetry.

Read this, think it's good.

Think I'm good. Don't know ****.  

Goodnight.

Goodnight, Sundance.

Goodnight, Texas.

Goodnight,
goodnight.

Eagleman taught me things about his people.
He showed me the pipe,
he talked about the way,
the good red road,
and the four directions.
I was sitting in a sweat
when I learned
about Mother Earth.
It was fascinating,
felt so real and magical
at the same time.
I learned
about animal spirits,
the sundance,
burning sage,
and why his people
danced like ghosts.
But he didn't teach me everything.
He said some things
will always be a mystery.
He said the Great Spirit
wanted it that way.
He told me if one
listened hard enough
to the fierce winds
hugging the plains,
you can hear the pain
of his kindred,
millions of souls
crying in harmony
to the beat of the drum.

I'll be Butch Cassidy;
you be the Sundance Kid.
We'll jump together?!!

This is my romance
I long to fly,
sunsoak, sundance,
buzz and sing

When I'm a bee,
I fly erratically,
looking for flowers.
to help make honey

Where are you, Queen?
I respond just to You
I bring my nectar only for you
I feel your presence near

Buzzit! I feel strange,
downright deranged.
What's that in black?
Is our hive under attack?!

Humans are very fine
targets for my behind.
Buzz, buzz, I make a pass;
Now he gets a piece of ***

Uh-oh, what's that smokin'?
Bzzt, I'm feelin' heartbroken.
Bee hearts are so tiny
And easily broken

I'm flying
erratically
so high now



I'm out of breath
I'm closer to death

I'm going down now,
drifting
I'm going to sleep now, dreaming
of my Queen in our Hive of Honey
When I'm a bee

It's thirty minutes to three in the morning.
I woke up from a nap that was half a night's sleep.
It told me to take it further than the tips of my fingers.

Then the words swirl around in my head and get
caught in whirlpools going around and around.
Never really quite profound until
something changes
and the flow changes direction...
all it needs is a little guidance,

and there you are being a little sundance.
It's a cute inward angle of the feet,
ankles out and pulling on your fingertips.

I can't seem to write fast enough
to record the rapid vignettes
flashing around my skull.

but I'm dancing in the rain as
sheets of water slip off rooftops.
and I am wearing a tie-dye shirt that
will never fit me anymore.

a shirt my mother made me...

and my brother is laying
at the foot of the staircase
and I am running down the steps
and with four to spare I jump —
landing on his stomach.

a trampoline, I imagined

and there I sit, in my father's lap
out on the back porch,
with a bag of carrots.
I only like the crunch
crunch crunch ptooey!
my brother is wheezing on the couch

and my porch is covered in carrots

Our salt will stain the sky
As we pray everything's alright
We huddle as the meteors crash by.

Hold hands into the night,
A star! is all we cry,

Calamity crashes
Salvation in flames
As we fade into the night.

Lady love
Young and Innocent, Not in my world,
Maybe a thousand years ago, No fifty shades of grey, only black,

My joy being with pop-pop, his joy his Lady Love adorned in White Powder we would visit.

12 yrs old, I was commissioned, a guard, a lookout, a soldier, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance kid, armed with a fork and instructions from pop-pop on how to gouge an eye. (Just in case) we ventured to visit Lady Love.

I was ready, a knight in confused armor.

42th street, nobody's dancing, Bright lights washing the hopeless,

"Stay here, I'll be right back, keep a eye out for the bad men in blue"

Alone, armed with a fork, fear, and apprehension, I pushed down below, you see, I adore  the man I needed and wanted to be here. the power of Lady Love.

Bus ride home, Dad out like a light dreaming of heaven,
I'm happy, I love the man,
No dreams of heaven or hell for me
I have my poems.
Firewalker

I ask for freedom,
Freedom to release this weight.

The weight of this world is lifted
Lifted like a feather.

Feather moved by the wind,
My wind that shall carry me.

Me to you the eternal slumber,
Slumber as brown shape shift zip...zip

Zipper do da day.....
Day of the day day yay day yay daze

Dance sundance film
Errrr.... Away... Yay day yay day away daze.

Ablaze in a maze phase away in a daze,
In this ways,
it pays to gaze.

Praise with the ways,
Are you still reading this?

Stop.... Now!

I mean now...

You don't need to read any further.

Because you are finished right now!

Mammon, their false god of avarice, says,
their 'final solution', extinction,
to steal everyone's everything,
can't be stopped, notseeism will rule.

"...We(e),..." bay, nay, you will be separated from
the State, as the Constitution dictates, the people
will rise again, your treason will end, Oyate.

Somatic revolution, each one's foci of attention
solutioning with all life, betwixt Earth and Sky,
evincing to be alival, not survival, lifting sights,
inspiring visions, meditations, actions, sweats to Sundance.

While we look to the 7 th generation, with our climate crisis strike,
starting 9-20-19 and 'the Green New Deal', we also mournfully remember
'Wounded Knee', 12-29-1890, where 300 Native Americans were exterminated.

Most of them were women, kids, a root of our king-kong sized terrible-two's
current war on kids, mostly Latinos.  I would fly just for a day, as a mayfly,
the Beauty Way, if I were more me, rather than as long as an eagle flies,
selling out, destroying, killing.  Viva la evolucion.  Wakan Tanka.

Bluebells danced,
green fields pranced
The sun overhead,
was leading the dance


© 2021 Carol Natasha Diviney

AFTER THE ROW

Built an over large
snowman

on your front doorstep
&
hid behind it.

Rang your doorbell

until you were annoyed
by it.

“Yes...yes! ”
you flung open the door

to be confronted
with a snowman

telling you
he loved you

until slowly

your heart
began

to melt.

**

SNOWBALL WARS!

Use a shiny blue megaphone
to magnify the menace

in my voice.

My snarl barks curt commands

as authentic as
any movie scene I've seen

with a Rod Steiger fat ugly cop
tone.

'We know you're in there! '

'We've got the house surrounded! '

'You don't stand a chance! '

'Give yourself up & come out with
yer hands up! '

And, it's true:

I have ringed the house
with an army of snowmen

(some better trained than others)

others a little shaky
nothing more than half-made rookies.

Their nasty little coal black eyes
trained on the door

a snowball in each of
their twitchy twiggy fingers

more for effect than
actual firepower.

I command
from behind the line.

My little pyramid
of snowballs at the ready

waits eagerly at my right hand
longing to be thrown.

A tense suspenseful
second that seems to last for ever

then suddenly
you emerge

a human blur
dashing from the door

like the last freeze frame from
BUTCH CASSIDY & THE SUNDANCE KID.

My army of snowmen
are caught on the hop

frozen to the spot
not expecting the unexpected.

'What now...boss? '
they scream

losing their nerve.

You are armed
to the teeth

with snowballs
frozen from the fridge

one or two snowmen
have already lost their heads

another has his snowball
shot from his hand

as you break through
the cordon

determined to take me
down.

Get me
(you reckon)

& all the snowmen
will just cave in

turn
& run.

Your lipstick
yells redly

(voice made visible)

I take a snowball
to the heart

fall in almost
slow motion

as you leap upon me

kiss me

...to death!

The Sundance
Romance

Daisies flowing
She sprawls

Dad growler
He drools
The Moth_
Mothered
flies gathered
Missing some
wings ((ER))
Whoa!! Emergency
Room_
Being
dismissed
He misinterprets
Moth-loving both
Her and me
***** of fire
Babe Ruth
Tolerate
In-laws
 You're hired
Mothers
Amazing
graceful

Being prominent
Words are
Imp-or-t-ant
His glass
half full 1/2

Her beauty whole
Of all ((Mothers))
*Providence*
The E-R emergency
The 99 bottles of beer
on the wall
Someone must
Save the date
Please call?
Singing
mouth he drills
That sunshine
Sunpower *pill

Tony Tiger
Bengal his gals
Rejuvenating
Dad loves the
mating
Alice in Motherland
((For Tea)) lips
of hearts

Beside me
Remembering
B.L.T...
Kevin-Bee- Bacon
Best greens lettuce
Lips Palace
Kissed her face
Linked to her
Charm bracelet
3 words magnet
I- love- her
Motherlove**
The triple-decker
sandwich
((Upper-Dove))

His temperature
Mothers day
Spring fever
Smiles worthwhile
Waiting
My Mom
E Everlasting R-
Nature name
Robin
Blessed by Mother,
Book could read
A+ home
Entertainer
My emergency
Show
some
heart
Be heart
T tremendous
We learn so
much from

To outlive
this world
Because
we are
way
Over
with flowers
Like Motherlove
The earth loves her
The emergence
of birth
Emergency
she saves
Heart so smart__

At the Black Mountain's peak,
the rapture of sundance ripples
across the Golden Valley's leaves.