Why I Hate Toast

Because it gets cold very fast
like a lover turned friend
no jam or jelly can mask
such a moment
when you bite down
expecting hot butter
strawberries
creamed honey -
nothing but frigid crust
no matter how intense the promise.

You would think by the time it popped
there would be something left to celebrate.

Downslide

My mind is awake and climbing.
It’s learning about gravel, embedded
in knees, it’s finding the grip when there
are no handholds. It is screaming
upside down with no rope, flayed skin
nerves exposed. How long will I live?
3 seconds. So much to do.

Please, unopen your arms
There is joy in this fall.

Parabola

Would the swallows hear
the shatter of eggs as they
fell from the nest?

I wondered as I lay prone
on the hard concrete sidewalk
in the middle of downtown
Chicago, because they said
if you lay there in front of that
particular building, you'd see it.
The parabolic curve looming
over you, was the only way
to capture the illusion.

Just the way you loomed over me
there was only one perspective.
Flat on my back - your form an arc,
such architectural strategy.
Everyone else just shoes and legs -
but hey, a girl has to get up
at some point - astonished
by the directrix of the view.

Mary, Mother of

Jane, who works in the coffee shop -
rough part of town. Her hair is dyed
for the sake of it, blows red flames
in the wind. Her skirts are too tight
she just doesn't care, what does it matter
in the end? She blows kisses into cups
just before serving, doesn't matter
if he's one of the regulars. It's due to
Mary never kissing her as a kid. Now
all Jane ever wants to do is kiss.
"All good things come to those who wait"
Mary always said. Just one more cup
even if he lies to her. God didn't
give her those big lips for nothin'.

Oil of Sweet Vitriol

Ghosts are here, smells of ether
dark in remembrance, never forgetting -
they float to surface every layer.

We stripped wallpaper in the kitchen
found the hole in the plumbing stack
after six years of pure stench, the diapers,
cat piss, kettle boiling dry on the stove.
Times we used to love, hard on the kitchen
floor while the wallpaper peeled away.
Sweet smells. Sweet nothings cling to me –
before day seeps in beneath night’s door.

Ghosts are here, smells of ether
dark in remembrance, never forgetting -
they float to surface every layer.

Atargatis (Derketo)

She lives below the great swells

still in unfathomable depths

of wounds so great cast down 

by weight of her own heart 

heavy with love of a mortal man.

She longs to disguise her shame as fish

no waters can conceal her beauty so.

She grows a tail, to not be touched between

what once had held his seed.

Her nakedness appears in waves

to sailors lost upon the sea, her long wet

hair wraps around their waists

she takes them down, embraced in loneliness

no knowledge that they cannot breathe

and so she mourns her syren song alive

in storms her cast off scales litter shores

where once they ran, whole
stripped and blameless.

Her Sorrow

Her sorrow is the song of birds

a nest, bits of string and paper

wound tight to the bough.

It is a swallow in river swoop

an instinct, a knowing.

It is whip-poor-will in moonlight

blood haunt at dawn, widened eyes.

It is red-winged blackbird

on the thin reed crying home.

It is sparrow that flies through

emptiness, search for roost

belfry, steeple, God.

It is rareness of a nightingale

caught deep in fury of thicket

her song a burst of heart

flutter of fingers

against furrow of brow;

sleep, sleep

your head on feathered pillows.

"take your seaside arms & write the next line"

Carrying a Torch

I was walking

furiously grey with morning sleep

that didn't come    rain

full of hip-hop     drum

beat on pavement    bass

mock to my discontent

hissssssssss 

on the coal

smoke from the chimneys

when I saw the sparrow

my tears fell hard

soft 

as the pile of feathers

cold on the dead ground

until nothing was dry

something had died -

O love,

where is your hand?

Sympathetic Magic

She was no shaman, cavewoman x

she spoke to her lover through unholy hands.

She lead him to the wall, his palm down

against the rough damp dark, began to trace

charcoal finger flutes both hers and his.

She drew herself, rare in the language of caves

rendered him, between their bodies - a heart, 

red ochre.  Behind the fire burned, light flickered

all eyes.  They raped each other in the guttural night

lost between echoes.  He left her full, awash

with sweat, her scent heavy upon him.

The next day he gifted fish wrapped in leaves.

She squatted to eat, adorned her hair with bones.

Nobody heard her voice as she began to sing.

like flowers

I would not run from you

for your shadow would follow me -

leaning tree where you carved my name

cast to the ground

lengthening long, a leafy umbrella

like the one you held over me 

when everything was rain.

bent by the wind

a field of grass whispers

I hear your name

See the beach reeling beneath the gulls 

as they swoop, cry for us.  

I know that is where you'll be waiting

along the shore, a map so worn 

I know every fold of your face 

every crease of your arms

hue of your eyes painted 

with the blue of the sea's own watery brush

How could I leave you?

I want to fill you with poems

words softly scented 

like flowers

Apical

My Spring -

my bud below the bark

unbroken root to stem

strung scent of unborn

flowers seep through

protrusions lateral

weaves a delicate lace

of seasons

past and those to come

the surface stirs:

a thousand dormant ladybirds

await the burst of flight.

Heart - Break

There is smoke in the hills

this vineyard is ravaged -

doves fly from my chest

sentinel

I am old and drunk

at the top of a hill -

nobody looks like you

Spain, 1519 (Victoria)

How could she not?  Love him.

That man of spices, circler of globes.

She was his carrack, heathen sprung from

a name so holy, her church still perched atop

his hill.

They left as one, hot August,

from the Spanish coast, his eyes grey

blustery as the wind that crossed

her lanteen sails.  Her ropes taut

his hands eager, keen upon the rudder.

Three years they fought, discovered, sunk

within the choice high seas.  She sailed

as one of five, to witness murder

in the Phillipines.  Her heart gave out

storms set in, her love lost upon the sea.

When he was gone, she almost toppled -

what kept her was her stable deck

their promise to deliver just 18 men

starved and filthy, her holds heavy with 

pungent spices, her wounded sides

that longed to sink.

That chilled September day she appeared

no surface was left uncelebrated, unflowered

untouched.  And yet she only saw him

as he sunk far below the surface

eternal anchor left to rust.   The smell of

cloves, all hands upon her -

never so alone.