"unspeaking" poems
The old man paints seashells
for all of the women he has loved.
He takes his husky for walks
along the beach, returning with
a bag of **** and a collection
of spirals and fans, still pregnant
with the whispers of the ocean.
By the window, he licks his brush
and steadies his nervous hands.
He will share a steak with the dog,
and wonder when the best company
became inanimate or at most; unspeaking.
He had long turned his back on Dylan
and Cohen, in favour of empty sound
and the rain hitting the tarp
in the garden. He recalls Diane
and the green of life in her poetry.
Louise, the blue of her moods and the sea.
Each woman had coloured his life
in hopeful hues, oh, and what a mess
he was in their absence.
(even the dog wouldn't sleep beside him)
The old man drew his last breath
when the silence became deafening.
When he realised he could not reclaim
memories through art, or through
the patient analysis of nature.
There was no shape or colour
that had not been created before.
Oct 19, 2014
Oct 19, 2014 at 5:18 PM UTC
the bigness of cannon
is skilful,
but i have seen
death’s clever enormous voice
which hides in a fragility
of poppies….
i say that sometimes
on these long talkative animals
are laid fists of huger silence.
I have seen all the silence
full of vivid noiseless boys
at Roupy
i have seen
between barrages,
the night utter ripe unspeaking girls.
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You are like a child
who grows younger
& younger
every day,
smoothing over lines
with the sharp -cracks- of a smile,
& swaying
back & forth,
back & forth
like the swing
in an overgrown backyard,
like the child who sits
(lonely)
on that swing
& grows backwards,
(backwards)
you regress further
with every moment.
You are like the hair that grows
from the head of the child,
?wild?
& unruly
& never the same.
Like their small, chubby fingers,
you are clumsy,
s t u m b l i n g around a dark world
that offers you
no rest
from your actions,
(& yet)
unlike a small child
who is more clever,
quieter
& observing
each moment in life,
(learning,
growing
by leaps & b o u n d s , showing
that there is hope yet for them
in our adult world,)
you cannot seem to learn
from the mistakes you make.
Each error leads to another;
like a child,
you are running in a circle,
forever chasing a butterfly
that has lost its wings.
Your toys lie
scattered around you,
abandoned,
dusty,
-cracked-
& broken.
Like a child,
you grow tired
of the same old routine,
the people you see
& the games they make you play,
(day after day.)
Moment after moment
after unplanned moment
you grow younger
until one day
you will be an infant,
unspeaking.
& then
you will be
wailing & wishing
you could grow older
& make it all up to me.
Oct 11, 2012
Oct 11, 2012 at 12:49 AM UTC
The pale, the cold, and the moony smile
Which the meteor beam of a starless night
Sheds on a lonely and sea-girt isle,
Ere the dawning of morn’s undoubted light,
Is the flame of life so fickle and wan
That flits round our steps till their strength is gone.
O man! hold thee on in courage of soul
Through the stormy shades of thy wordly way,
And the billows of clouds that around thee roll
Shall sleep in the light of a wondrous day,
Where hell and heaven shall leave thee free
To the universe of destiny.
This world is the nurse of all we know,
This world is the mother of all we feel,
And the coming of death is a fearful blow
To a brain unencompass’d by nerves of steel:
When all that we know, or feel, or see,
Shall pass like an unreal mystery.
The secret things of the grave are there,
Where all but this frame must surely be,
Though the fine-wrought eye and the wondrous ear
No longer will live, to hear or to see
All that is great and all that is strange
In the boundless realm of unending change.
Who telleth a tale of unspeaking death?
Who lifteth the veil of what is to come?
Who painteth the shadows that are beneath
The wide-winding caves of the peopled tomb?
Or uniteth the hopes of what shall be
With the fears and the love for that which we see?
2.5k
Who paints the world with sunshine
and whispers louder
that which matters,
with whirling streaks of hope?
When I am spinning round
with speaking eyes
for unexpected hours.
Feeling alone………..
as an unspeaking ghost.
I wait with a passion
and a fire inside.
Lit by a precious brilliance
with a smile of wonder
on my face.
Until your light paints my hands
which ache……
my heart beats to claim
your ever saving grace.
Apr 5, 2015
Apr 5, 2015 at 10:44 AM UTC
She is the typesetter’s “e”
The once-rounded uncial script,
Unbroken like the solemn vow of a monk,
His whisper, a shepherd of words under the cowl,
Murmurations of the Holy Mother to the lambswool shroud of candlelight.
His candle-flock of dreams to some hill of penitent towers, war-cowed
And broken open like faith-unfended helmets, littering the ground,
With their unspeaking tassels in babbling pagan sound of wind,
That hill too, once-rounded bare under the glittering apostles of twilight.
In the abbeywork of air, calligraphy was a cipher of souls,
He unwrested demons from an inkwell of sunsets, smothered them in blotting paper,
Freed the incarnate whole to the book of hours, nib-pointed in quills and illuminated in gold,
Line by line, in Carolingian winding sheets, he returned the misshapen to the fold,
To the carpet page of home and the warm ligatures of their waiting women.
So the shutters of the heavenly house could blow light in slanted rays to a wilderness in storm.
But he never tamed the aero-elongated, descender of Troy in a “t,”
He never knew the unholiness of the underscore or fonts as ******
Or the world unwilling to know itself in serif robes of ancient lore.
His life was a simple rounded-out syllable of one man,
Left in the muddied, unintelligible text of faith and war.
She is the typesetter’s “e” and now belongs to any hand.
Jul 6, 2019
Jul 6, 2019 at 9:21 PM UTC
French kissed by the sun
Those warm lengths caress
Cascading down your body
Drawing forth your scent
Pushing goosebumps away
Like wearing something
Pulled directly from the drier
Covering and an all over feeling
Static electricity, sorted down
Stretching from hairs to a shimmer
Working a caramel, from the oven
Warm through your fingers
Gooey, sugary and messy
Stretching from hand to hand
As you play, a thick treat
Fingers play, and steal a kiss
Work delicious candies
From unspeaking lips and
Silken thighs, against chest
I eat a caramel candied dipped
Sep 1, 2014
Sep 1, 2014 at 4:55 PM UTC
Two pairs of eyes, one yours and one mine,
Unfocused, we stare beyond the ceiling.
The room is awake with white noise,
Only we are dead to all it's appealing.
I am barely aware of your hand in mine,
Like I am aware of the clock and the still running shower,
It is a spot on the horizon, this room is far far away,
And the silence grows outward like a deadly flower.
And my lover floats with me on this numb sea,
Ebb and flow we go, from one memory to another.
You may leave us now dear reader, for our agony is still too fresh too feel,
Come see us when the dam breaks and pain demands an appointment.
Come back then dear reader and witness the downfall of your muses.
For now we must lie here hand in hand, unthinking, unspeaking and be a mere poetic disappointment..
Aug 19, 2016
Aug 19, 2016 at 5:26 AM UTC
He is
No longer
A person
To me
As I sit here
And watch him
*****
Onto the floor
And it looks like
Alphabet soup...
But
Maybe it's just soup, or
Just Alphabet...
As he begins speaking
1, 2, 3s.
And I have cried before,
For him. but
Now that I sit,
Eyes on his back,
Unspeaking
And still
.
.
.
I frankly hope he
Chokes.
May 22, 2016
May 22, 2016 at 4:48 AM UTC
Colorado mountains climb into thin air
And demand two reasons to be speechless
Peaks that quench and ignite existence
And silently demand reverence
Beauty and terror wed
Uncanny companions
Hardest and softest thrive
Unspoken and unspeaking
Ascending conquerors
The spider and the flower
Sep 6, 2013
Sep 6, 2013 at 9:45 PM UTC
It's silence where we
Learn the most about
Each other, about ourselves
Words unspoken are words thought,
More potent than the
Guts of storms
It is the pain and power of the
Sound after shattered glass
Strewn about the floor
Unspeaking
Stares
Necessity beckoning
Broken pieces into
Trash bins
Uncollected memories
Ignored bites of information
Transforming into
Ghosts and whispers
Self-willed inanimate
Matter
Creating and destroying
Us
Oct 28, 2014
Oct 28, 2014 at 1:03 AM UTC
The failings of man confound, as tremors urge seas to crash upon shore. Turbulance follows in your wake. Each wave hurled towards land disrupts the peaceful sands of days passed. Coastlines are forever altered, our innocence lost. As tide and life ebb away, a hope for reprieve surfaces. All that is found are the barren shells that once housed promise of shelter and stability. No more. These hollowed skeletons serve as unspeaking, unmoving reminders until the surf returns. The sands and I feel settled before the undertow rips away our shoddily compacted reserves. There is no escaping this cycle. Our only choices are to forever struggle against turmoil, or submit to uncertain seas.
Jan 27, 2013
Jan 27, 2013 at 3:14 AM UTC
And all lips were sewn
So that the word was
Never spoken, not uttered
Under darkened breath.
Whispers were its key
And that lock was now shut.
For with out word what can
Spread it lies upon the listening
World, all was silent, mumbling
Echoes of a now restrained voice.
Evil is one word, its is four letters
Two Syllable that can spread, but
Now it is unspeaking, rejoice knowing
That words are sealed. Kept from
The ears of those susceptible
To the whispers of corruption.
Of moments clouded, but a single
Now forever sewn closed words.
Mar 4, 2015
Mar 4, 2015 at 4:41 PM UTC
some harts through forests dappled lope
gentlest
keen feet
rumple leaves
scatter
or trees unspeaking sing
with the fat incurable
lust of sharp
lovers sore
hands
fingers
nuzzled
against
the fair muscles of arched
backs wriggling muscles
so sudored magic muscles
viscously
o'er
the pretty spines of
roots
splendor
splits and
out bursting
harts
through loping forests
lovers sorely
hurt with crisp intricate eyes
looking
lean raw eyes
wide into omnipotent pain
Dec 26, 2011
Dec 26, 2011 at 7:50 PM UTC
Sandpaper teeth,
a slight taste of dark,
bitter coffee grounds.
Ants.
Fire ants in the stomach
biting, stinging,
in acidic bile.
Working into a swollen
and unspeaking throat.
Into the veins and arteries.
A thin layer of sweat,
or rain,
as the cloud follows.
Can they see it?
Tongue, thick and heavy
as a brick sliding into
the windpipe.
Choking, gagging,
suffocating.
Over-active nervous system,
shocked by lightening
from the ever-growing,
ever-looming cloud above.
Shaking, tense, angry,
why?
Neurons firing too fast.
Why?
May 17, 2017
May 17, 2017 at 10:01 AM UTC
Sitting in moon light
And in hand in hand
There eyes looking deep in each other
Silent and calm
Under a tree
There hearts beating in step
Unspeaking as they hold each other
A silent promise
Before the thousand stars
Forever and always
Feb 12, 2015
Feb 12, 2015 at 10:58 AM UTC
sleepgirl don't
the world
waits
for
your
hands to
find it
kindly nestled unfisted gracefully held
A round word of unspeaking lips
berried in love of colours inumerable
cupped in the stomach of the ocean complains
against the night
A LIGHT
which in your carefullest heart eternally
quakes for letting
so uncarefully more divide thy palms
admitting a fragile infinity of kissing)andsleepinggirldon't
Dec 10, 2012
Dec 10, 2012 at 5:02 PM UTC
i hold it, like roses hold on to the snow.
like the snow holds on to the cobblestones in the sky.
and the sky, its wandering light.
and light, its arrival in its absence.
and releasing, its weary seeker.
i flee from it, like time keeps fleeing from the clock.
like the clock flees from its last stop.
and the last, its living truth.
and life, its vast unnameable.
and questioning, its pallid resting place.
i forge it, like the moon forges the waves.
like the waves forge the cliff's labyrinth.
and the labyrinth, its single thread.
and the thread, its thousand fragmented words.
and dissembling, its puzzle pieces without end.
i ask it, like a sinner asks forgiveness from a God he believes dead.
like death asks of life nothing but patience.
and patience, its tender faith.
and faith, its open hand.
and answering, its fragile soliloquy.
i reveal it, like the holy spirit reveals itself to non-believers.
like belief reveals shelter from its own incompleteness.
and incompleteness, its secret freedom.
and the secret, its anonymous keeper.
and hiding, its unspeaking reply.
i seek it, like the waves seeking to return from the beach.
like the beach seeking footsteps unfading from the sand.
and footsteps, their fierce stampede.
and ferocity, its crystal shape.
and reaching, its impossible limit.
i find it, like a book finds its reader.
like the reader finds an old friend between the pages.
and a friend, their love returned in full.
and love, its givingness become relay.
and searching, its pilgrimage.
i hold it, like roses hold on to the snow.
like the snow holds on to the cobblestones in the sky.
and the sky, its wandering light.
and light, its arrival in its absence.
and releasing, its weary seeker.
Feb 26, 2018
Feb 26, 2018 at 2:38 PM UTC
.
Must your arms
Be a circle of stones
Locked with truest heavens
Embracing me?
Must your hair
Branch in a wood so deep
Impenetrable and unspeaking
Where lost are souls?
*O how your love was so tall,
Such a frame for me to climb,
But I never could see stars up there
From shy ground I felt you looking down.*
Must your eyes
Make me see as someone
Who suffered lifelong blind
Lidless in the sun?
*O how your love was precious,
A plaything just to dole out only,
The driest morsel after long famine
And I, a feather in winds without sky.*
Jun 19, 2017
Jun 19, 2017 at 2:03 AM UTC
Lo! On the wing of heavy gales,
Through the boundless arch of the sky he sails,
Unspeaking, rapid, immensely strong,
His silent shadow is borne along
By his steeds of fog and cloud and hail,
The earth does shake and the skies do wail.
The skies darken fast, and the golden blaze
Of the sun is quenched in a lurid haze,
Then black, a black of a starless night
When clouds descend and block all light.
I stand, I wait, I hold no fear,
My body poised and my mind is clear.
He is come! He is come! Do ye not behold
His ample robes on the wind unrolled?
How his huge and writhing arms are bent,
To clasp the zone of the firmament,
And fold at length, in their dark embrace,
From mountain to mountain the visible space.
And he sends through the shade a funeral ray—
A glare that is neither night nor day,
A beam that touches, with hues of death,
The clouds above and the earth beneath.
And with the glare comes a heart-wrenching cry,
Solemn, grave and joy deprived.
And with the cry falls fast the tears,
Lashing, bitter, punishing, drear.
His tears the lashing rain that breaks
In torrents away from the airy lakes,
Heavily poured on the shuddering ground,
And shedding a nameless horror round.
Darker—still darker! The whirlwinds bear
The dust of the plains to the middle air:
And hark to the crashing, long and loud,
His agony, high up in the thunder cloud!
A whirling ocean that fills the wall
Of the crystal heaven, and buries all!
I stand, braced ‘gainst his icy breath
And speak, my voice strong – I’ve no fear of death.
“Lord of the winds! I feel thee nigh,
I know thy breath in the burning sky!
Calm thy storm, I know thy pain!
I too lost my lover – my heart was enchained!”
“Thy agony is clear, but why dost thou cry?
For can ye not see that before you ‘tis I?
I’ve roamed o’er hill, mountain, valley and glen –
I have searched for too long to lose thee again!
My love! Reach down to the earth and clasp me securely
And united together forever we’ll be!”
Sep 15, 2015
Sep 15, 2015 at 4:58 PM UTC
We were stuck all night
in quicksand light
and talked for fifty three tequila
hours, from bench to bar, to
dusk lit park, to the rust and arch
of the Golden Gate Bridge—
death watched us from
windowsill alleyways, between drying
sheets and shirts, and men’s
underwear, while life
climbed down the fire escapes
to greet us.
You smiled, with your eyes—
illuminating the still
second hands of streets clocks,
and the whole
infinity of Time between.
We lit cigarettes in pedicabs
unspeaking, vibrating mind
telepathy at midnight between
imaginary African angels.
And your smell reminded
me of an art lined fireplace
I once knew in Buffalo, with no fire
burning, but a window lighted
neighbor ********** while
the Main Street sirens howled.
And we don’t know each other
anymore, but
I still remember the You,
who broke down crying
in a light green kitchen, trembling
before a dirtied stovetop, and
ending on a bed—
missing a life
you couldn’t remember
Oct 30, 2014
Oct 30, 2014 at 7:08 PM UTC
almost daily
I am asked
about my Native heritage
but my ancestors are mute
unspeaking
yesterday I was angry
ready to boil over
yet no one
brought me any strawberries
Jul 12, 2016
Jul 12, 2016 at 7:49 PM UTC
You sit next to me,
most unwillingly,
and I can't help but stare.
You have remade yourself;
a group of working parts
of which I am not apart.
Same beautiful woman.
Same beautiful pride,
with that air of regality
that leaves everyone else
pondering their inferiority.
However, now there
is something new.
An awe inspiring anger
that flushes your cheeks
and clenches your fingers.
You are gorgeous when you're angry.
You have this face that you put on;
a flare in your eyes and a
compression of your lips.
You would never let yourself
come down from this ledge.
--even though if you jumped
I would catch you, I promise--
You have remade yourself
into a new whole and
I have received my eviction notice.
But I know it's not as simple
as you allow it to be,
I can see the digs in the edge
of your thumbnails
where you bite into them with
your index finger.
Signs of stress
to anyone enough to know.
I see it in your flippancy.
You are not a reckless person, always
careful, calculating risk and reward,
but you've thrown
caution to the wind, it seems.
Perhaps an act of revenge,
perhaps of retribution,
it doesn't make a difference.
I only watch in wonder of the woman
I escorted out of my life, as
she sits next to me
unspeaking, unfeeling.
And I've never felt farther
in my life.
Feb 23, 2014
Feb 23, 2014 at 2:38 PM UTC
Of course as always
these dreams
they displace me from despair:
embraces smile
from shadows and
the silverfire scent of your hair.
But when morning comes
crashing the joy no longer there
you sing unspeaking
and evermore sinking
like a key lost in the deep
of my seawater sleep.
All this No and lack of Yes:
why do I even bother?
I just like you,
too much, I guess.
Dec 26, 2012
Dec 26, 2012 at 12:25 AM UTC
It hardly matters now
what's been hoped for
in my heart,
revealed in the demeanor
of your words
is the ice cold
unhoped for fact
that you don't.
and maybe you never will
enough.
My presence doesn't
fill up the air
in the room when we're together
so that all you can breathe
is me.
Those dark brown eyes of yours
stray away from my face
long enough for your mind
to wander away
from thoughts of who
you came for,
and my mind is quiet
now that it's no longer
buzzing with possibilities
of staying,
this is all we'll ever be;
two sets of unspeaking mouths
and wandering eyes,
even though at times
the thought of you
makes me nearly
choke the words out
to empty rooms:
I love you.
But you'll never love me
and I'll never be enough to make you.
Apr 29, 2017
Apr 29, 2017 at 1:36 AM UTC