Wake me. Shake me. Just embrace me. Let it all unfold.

Tame the pain that boils insane and stand for me to hold.

Rise and run the race you won for I still can't believe

A world exists where you are missed in just the way we grieve.



Shell-shocked. Broken. Clutching tokens proving you were here.

Stretching skin that's wearing thin on hands that pull you near.

Unfair: a word that's too absurd to symbolize the hour.

The moment when your soul escaped and hope lost all its power.



Return. Confirm that love holds firm in proving it can't lose.

I won't submit. I can't acquit the demon of his ruse.

How dare he take it all from me and leave this life asunder?

Ripped apart by apathy of others, I sink under.



No one knew us. No one saw the bond that rubbed the moonlight raw.

The love we held, its flame too bright. The light that left the day in awe.

Hurtful, too were all the truths that you shared just with me.

In doing so, you hid such depth that no two eyes could see.



Memories of all the times your lips formed words that shone

Echo evermore within. Reverberations hone.

They whittle bit by aching bit into the home you dug.

The roots you planted in my heart consume me like a drug.



Ironic, maybe that the reckless torture I should mention

Was one more creature that you conquered, breaking all convention.

Pride is such an empty word compared to what I felt

When you became a woman who could stand where she had knelt.



So this I have: A picture of your ever-gorgeous face.

Lividity I hold cries, "Save the angel he disgraced."

I've nothing else but vestiges of all that we once built.

A laugh. A tear. A broken fear whose sword pierced to the hilt.



Destroying misconceptions that once drove you to protection

We found love among the ashes of rejection.

Thus grasping toward affection, we got lost in misdirection.

Vonda, truly, our bond matches your complexion.



Beauty lies where dreams won't die, and this we'll always cling to.

Sharing minds that defy time and complicate what they knew.

Standing, fighting, life-delighting, wonderful; you opened

Eyes unto a world that showed you you were not quite broken.



Some part of me wished wistfully that I might 'ere have listed

Lines that drew a complicated swath 'round what we'd twisted.

Fingers that beat perfectly in time with songs of meaning.

Singing long into the nights that screamed of fates convening.



No, I think I'll keep the truth that only you and I can know.

The tears I've spilled don't need to find a place for life to grow.

I'm terrified that I can't hold you, see you, catch a glance.

But I love you too much for death to ever have a chance.

(A Christmas vacation vignette)

Lisa and I choppered onto Manhattan island yesterday morning. We’d both felt toasted—so we took naps—and yay! We awoke recharged.

Later that evening, Lisa and I were at the ‘Elsie’ Rooftop Bar, in Manhattan, waiting for Lisa’s boyfriend, David.
Ok, man-friend? More age appropriate I suppose, he’s 27, but that description doesn’t have the same bf slap.
Dave’s a Wall Street M&A guy and they’ve been together for over a year - a future for them seems very real.

Slinky, jazz-like versions of secular Christmas favorites were playing somewhere and it’s a groove I slipped into immediately. We had reservations and I’d misbegottenly hoped for a five-star, breathtaking city view, but the indoor tables turned out to have these uncomfortable, high-backed, bench-like seats that face away from the windows—***? I made a mental note to check website pix in the future. The place is in need of some serious feng shui-ing.

Disappointed, I asked for a side table where there was, at least, a pitiable skyline view and I placed my iPad, volume down, on the table so I could side-watch the Thursday Night football game—hey, I’m not meeting MY boyfriend, ok? As the official third-wheel, I figured I’d need a little entertainment.

After a few moments, a waitress came by and she paused to look us over with a cat-like indifference that signaled she was better than me, better than us really. She was just cooler.
I was delighted—why am I drawn to people who look down on me?
I suppose I need years of psychoanalysis—but who’s got the time?

I glanced at Lisa. We know each other at a cellular level. With a milli-second of lash flutterings and eye dilations, I asked “are you getting this?” And she affirmed that she was. Because we’re cyborgs. A couple of cyborgs.
Just kidding. We’re not cyborgs, neither of us. We wish we were sometimes—think of the advantages, you could complete college in a blink—wirelessly.

Anyway, back to the narrative. The waitress reminded me of when I was starting high school and my mom and I toured colleges, how snooty the Harvard people were, even though I’d been accepted and offered a free-ride scholarship—I mean, shouldn’t we all have been one, big, self-congratulatory snooty-group together?
(Of course, I chose Yale because the people were totally friendly).

“I better get used to it,” I side-bar’d Lisa, who got the reference to my upcoming, year-long, master's program at Harvard—because we’re cyborgs. I handed ‘Laura’ (our snooty waitress was tagged) my Black American Express card, which got her attention, and said, “start a tab please—someone will join us—run a 40% tip too,” I added with a smile. She practically jogged off to get our drinks and hors d'oeuvres and I turned my attention to the game, you know, to catch up.

I love Pro football—it’s not really fall without football—is it? Even though Tom Brady retired. This all goes to say that I’m a pro football ******. Lisa likes it too, though she’s not totally obsessed.

Just after Laura brought us our martinis and ‘poached lobster’ slides, a random, well-dressed man (he was wearing an expensive Brioni, wool linen silk suit), 35-ish, receding mousy-brown hairline, high-ball glass in hand, took the opportunity to stop by and chat. “SO,” he said, in a deep, jolly, ice-breaking salesman’s voice,
“You girls like football?”
I decided that the suit was too shiny for a Brioni—was it a Zegna?—I idly wondered.
“We’ve boyfriends,” Lisa announced, almost apologetically, nodding to include me—in case he missed the plural. Undeterred, he swiveled my way—as if he needed a second opinion—and asked me,
“What do you like about football?” He sounded somewhat condescending to me, so I did what I always do with condescending males—I played the ‘ditzy-girl’ card, “The costumes,” I answered.
“The uniforms,” he gently, fatherly, corrected—before rocking back a little on his heels and sipping his drink.
“And the hats,” I updogged, but before he could digest my reply, David, Lisa’s man-friend, arrived on the scene.
“Sorry to be so late,” he said, giving me a little, jiggly, 4-finger wave, shedding his coat and giving Lisa a smooch on the top of her hair.
The salesman wordlessly took his leave.
It’s a night on the town—let the 3rd-wheeling begin!
.
.
Songs for this:
Diamond Dave by The Bird and the Bee
You Belong to Me by Vonda Shepard
.
.
And a Christmas Playlist - because the big day is 8 days away!
http://daweb.us/xmas/Christmas_24.mp3

This subdued wordsmith
doth not rack his brains to **** fess appeal
toward one household pop starlet.

He blithely, nonchalantly, and willingly
add mitts audiological enjoyment, sans the lithe
hot feline Taylor Swift - I might be
the only baby boomer ****** mwm,
who admires this talented singer/songwriter,
yet owns NO (absolute zero)  
aspirations beyond composing poems or prose
toward divine dame.

A questionable attempt to stitch together –
analogous to knot sew swift a tailor,
this scribe sought to create a poem
(crafted countless years ago)
from her then song titles spanning
the letter “A” to the letter “H.”

Despite never setting eyes
(AND MOST Definitely NOT PAWS),
this grateful dead corpse of a skeleton
(essentially lovely bare bones),
when alive I found one gal powerhouse,
(asper the title of this informal homage)
genuinely fashioned, entirely
dutifully composed, benevolently addressed
as an attraction among
the wonders of the
world wide web, confidently enduring,
gracefully immensely known,
mainly not overly prone to quibble
regarding her less outstanding
musical and lyrical confections.

This doggone muttering pooch
bow wows against
nattering nabobs of negativism
able, eager, ready, and willing
bugaboos countering, dispelling, excoriating...
courtesy unsustained denunciations
against latent natural born talents
of aforementioned musician,
whereby pulp magazines make mincemeat
hammering, nailing, and wrenching
storied accomplishments
never yanking off the top of list
of solo women musical artists
who sold the most number one albums.

Before the advent vis a vis
crafting this literary challenge
incorporating a poetic endeavor
predicated on prolific tunes
comprising audiophile of Taylor Swift,
(and thus a prescript interim),
as iterated above,
a whim took hold to string
her partial song playlist
(quite substantial even up to
BUT NOT including the letter “I”).

This scribe dabbled, hocked, and limned
what evolved into a semi satisfactory effort,
to articulate, copacetic, enigmatic, generic,
ironic, kinetic, magnetic, opportunistic,
quixotic, scholastic, ultra democratic,
holistic yik yak paddy whack
give this bard a bon bon.

Adieu admit to elaborating, jovially,
and openly leave readers second guessing,
(what might easily be labeled,
misconstrued, and nullified as gobbledygook),
asper how mashup song titles
got figuratively slapped together
as a feebly note worthy attempt
to put down sew sew pontoon
swiftly tailored literary bridges
in an effort to connect a cumbersome,
fulsome, and irksome pseudo
straight forward itemized songs
sung by said seductive singular sylph..

Thee Mademoiselle found,
or made a place in the world for yourself
aching like a boy out in left field
pining to catch that high fly
there ain't nothing 'bout you,
(nor Brooks and Dunn) I can attest
even if hypothetically,
we spent eons at an all night diner,
where culinary staff knew thee all too well
and perhaps all you wanted
(shared with Michelle Branch)
perhaps positing the rhetorical question –
am I ready for love?

With an American boy
or a ***** best buddy
re: best friend forever with an American girl
if someone got cross, tis beneficial
(in this one republic) to apologize
regardless, whom ye choose as a confidante,
the following refrain plays in your mind
baby don't you break my heart slow
(at least according to Vonda Shepard)
memories no doubt arise,
when thee hapt to be a baby girl

thoughts unspool back to December
beautiful eyes peered
at a fractured reflection
before the love story
would begin again,
while ebbing, and flowing with my baby
recalling Bette Davis' eye
(taking visual delight
fantastic world tour live)
reminding self how better off
the choice made

tis much better than revenge
but umpteen times bother I will
asper boys and love
combustible mix – nonetheless
always reminding myself to breathe
deep, cuz being breathless
likened to a taste of death,
(I admit better than Ezra)
learning how to act points back
asper being brought up that way
lessons oft learned getting busted.

Oh...and by the way can I go with you?

Can you feel the love tonight?

Discern ache kin to sand castles crumbling?

Such granular, or solid state matter
doth forced to change
attested to by chaperone dads,
who dressed as Santa Claus invoked
that Christmas must be something more
especially, Christmases,
when you were mine
ah...closest to a cowboy
as “sigh” ever got
or tasting Gunstock rattlesnake pulverized,

yet countenance goose
(and found you under the care of Chet Atkins
at the make believe medical center)
shivered flesh against cold as you
though desiring thee to come back...he here
no doubt prone
to announce crazier requests asked
even crazier (as demonstrated
by flash mob generated
by Hannah Montana, one live wire)

if able to glean my sentiments...
cross my heart
aware as an adult feeling
the life source of daddy
or mommy, while hinting
with a stone temple piloted cold stare
double dare you to move
(or switchfoot), one to another
das feet – planted within
pitch dark blue Tennessee

dwelling with thoughts
of ma dear Digdan
or writing an imaginary letter
starting...”dear John”
ample melancholy maudlin material
to completely bind a diary of me
yes concert cavorting circumstances
avoidable, though didn't they
make chase like butterflies,
and don't they hate me for loving you?

So please don't tell me you want to,
when I don't want to anymore
argh, yet impossibly unshakable
the recurring thought don't you
act indiscriminately
as when down came the rain,
washed the spied her out
following suit (wet)
drenching yea...one drama queen
with chin amen along pearl
(jammed) harbor drive
(in conjunction with alan jackson)
presaging Jiving drops of Jupiter
(train chugging, clacking, clattering
railing gestalt of alien nation),

and all of a sudden like how odd though...
thinking about eighth grade graduate,
when lifetime seemed enchanted
now everything has changed
eyes open (“hunger games”)
maketh me – fall back on you
instant messaging you –
fall into me fearless,
though only fifteen
and how against pyrotechnics,
you find your way back home
on the fourth of July
perhaps led by a zeppelin sized firefly
ah, I ask myself who is the foolish one?

Me for you forever & always
(a platinum edition)
for girl at home
(donned in deluxe edition)
going bananas
in reference to Amazing Gracie
swaggering, and immune
to gunpowder & lead,
(whose leading lady Miranda Lambert)
whatsapp penned left her looking haunted
heartbreaker – (my words –
like the late Tom Petty)
about her, but unsure
if our thoughts aligned

anyway, here you go again (Dolly Parton)
a hero heroine
so...I clamor to yell out “hey soul sister”
and hey Stephen
along the boulevard of broken dreams,
this ribbon highway don't care
about trumpeting his lies
nor desecrating holy ground
honey baby, yes ye in the mom jeans,
I feel hopelessly devoted to you
(as didst Olivia Newton)
instinctively keen how to save a life
bobbing buoyantly amidst the fray.