Eternal Morning

I am beginning
to disappear;

it has been
a long beginning...

several times a year,
the light shifts

from young faith
to old bodies struggling

to move through air,
resist the earth,
dress up their bones,

tie strings

around their dreams
to keep them nearer.

Our end, perhaps
is fallacy- a winged horse,

an invisible cloak,
a magic button

or the desiring

of an eternal morning.

Lanterns of the Dead

Lanterns hang low
in dark trees,

orange mouths glowing-

I try not to remember
the eyes of the dead

reflecting stars.

Garden of the Past

We knew the way
to our garden, though
covered with grasses,

stones

we could not identify...

flesh marks a trail
like a home-sick wolf

back to its whelping ground.

Rises the Moon

The heart

left out

in the woods

to forage alone

grows thin...

every night fall

rises

the moon,

every day break-

longing.

The Making of a Tree

The first step (God said)
is to build this thing
and call it MAN...
just because I can.

(unfolds a blueprint)

Start with soul,
wrap in skin,
fashion a heart
that might love or sin

and then...

a special gem
to place in eye,
absorb the colors
of the sky,

peel red flower,
split in half,
pinkest lips
to sing or laugh

and pray...

so he can dance,
I'll give him feet
to wander far
or keep the beat

and just to give
this MAN a life,
I'll crack a rib
to be his wife-

in a fit of ADD,
(God said) Hey!
I'll make a TREE
instead of MAN-

just because I can.

The Silence of Rain

If you come with me,
I will take you
to a quiet place,

not like thunder-

silent rain.

Where you follow

grows

what we have planted,
a forest of remembers,

spring

glorious flower.

Grey Day Passing

Rooms of dust,
warm roses, black
ashen rimmed and flecked

door half opened
to anyone passing.

Silvered ancient
walks his shadow dog,
head held down-

fallen heavy fog.

Loose-leashed twine,
shadows bind, pulling
on his creaking spine

grey day passing.

By the door
broom and pan
to sweep away

the shrunken man

restore the haze
to crisper days...

grey day passing.

Seedling

I hear this cancer sprouting from my head,
white lilies, twelve abreast and dying,
loosed horses gallop on an open plain-

freed yet frightened.

I see this tunnel vision within eye,
empty page, blank universe of sky,
swings on rope and wood

falls to ground.

You once said, as if it mattered
never bury seedlings quite so deep,
cleaved from skin and bone, we weep

my blood will seek its own level.

Bits of Coal

The man had a face
like cellophane (ghost)

whirs, cogs,
elaborate machinery
exposed-

as if he had sold

his eyes, his smile,
his nose, his soul

for a few dark
bits of coal

(to warm his toes)

Wind's Memory

There were others before us,
there always are

even

the ghosts of daffodils and tulips
return on newly sprouted stem...

and butterflies

where do they go to die?

(to bulbs of flower)

some colors of their wing
swallowed by earth

flutter

in a field of poppie-

how sweetly, remembers the wind.

Eternal Perfection

I cannot say dying
is perfection, nor understand

the grace of life
in its shapeless cradle...

these nights of waking
to the sound of questions

moving over a wooden floor
like an anxious lover, yet

wearing the robe of faith

over the trembling back

of desire.

The Kiss

In the small corners
of your mouth

waits salvation-

unspoken word of waiting,

terrible to survive, even more

mysterious

to possess.

Our Journey

It is clearer now, the horizon;
where we are going, where

we came from...

see how the sea reminds us,
trapped beneath the sky,

our journey is a narrow space
that stretches far beyond the light.

Drinking Light (draft)

I knew the dark stranger
standing at my bed
would not understand

that (this) night
was not for sorrow...

outside, leaves have sprouted
from dead bark with small lips

drink light each morning...

my morning
still flowing

through the thirst of throat.

I will not pass the cup

just yet...

the light is alive.

The Love of Night

She is beautiful when she walks away,
the graceful spine and sweeping hems of Day,
sky implores an image of her fleeting face,
pale blue eyes adrift in clouds of lace...

shoulders glowing polished alibaster,
haunted song of lark, her unearthly laughter
with timid smile returns the kiss of Dusk,
a patient wooer pacifying lust.

The rising moon, a yellow sapphire
ignites their slow and burning fire
in the bridal bed they lay-
the love of Night for ravished Day.

Heart of Earth

When we fall upon this ground,
till our shallow dimple down
through charcoal shoal-

form the walls, our concave bowl
burial of furnace-glazed porcelain souls.

Peculiarly divine our tomb,
flames immersed in soiled gloom,
glimmering of our lamps dispersed

into the gloaming of our birth,
becomes the heart of earth.

Love's Instinct

Startled, the swallow flew away-

instinctively

its frightened shadow followed.

Imperfectly Learned

My body moves or recites
something imperfectly learned

pulls one elusive thought
into the fading light-

a shadow

with its vision unwrapped.

Breaking Away

Many times fallen
at foot of that (same) mountain

became its root,

held there.

As incomprehensible,
moon falls from sky

all its silver bells
jangling inside-

irreparably damaged.

Finger Food

Dragon ate man
without a fork.

Strange how nature
consumes its mysteries

without utensils.

Wind Chimes

We are such embroidered creatures
all our fragile loose ends

unraveling to fiber...

our weave enriched
by knots of chaos,

a snarled net, rings
such a muffled knell

(tangled windchimes)

Nuages

Dans les calmes echanges verbaux ses mots etaient doux,
Il disait quelque chose a propos des nuages et je me demandais
pourquoi ils etaient fait de nuages... doux comme ses mots
et eleves au dessus des autres hommes.

Il murmurait en francais, j'entend de beaux sons fremissants
comme des nuages se deplacant dans le vent,
comme des nuages se deplacant dans le vent.

Son discours d'argent comme le revetement des nuages
se refletant au soleil.

Ecoutant sa langue maternelle, je suis un champ etndu sur
son dos bouche bee d'admiration
les ombres nuageuses de sa presence filtrant au travers mon visage,
mon cou, mes epaules... sa voix pressant mes levres

avec le poids d'un ciel lourd, sa main effleura ma joue,
quand il dit au revoir, les nuages se replient...

Il manque a la nuit comme a moi.

Walking the Storm

Bold of I on storming weathered wings to walk the forest threatening to temper like a displeased lover, while blackened clouds, a darkened arch, etch prophecies in rotting bark with green-mossed fingers. Thunder rumbles bones of fallen trees, speckled stones, it is I alone, guided by a crackling light a winding path, who understands nature's wrath...its gnashing teeth, frozen breath ripping holes in heaven's chest while dark blood stains billowing sheets of sky, the quickened river bed runs high, pulling saplings from shore's grasp wrenching them away at last- to disappear beneath its surface.

Longing

Truth within web
is spider

hungers for larger prey
than flies-

how it dreams
of hornets, hummingbirds
and horses trapped

in sticky threads.

The Gift

Unfurled, my heart
separates thread
from flesh, unravels
a small, red blanket...

weaves

a scarlet* cloak for you.


*this dye was obtained by the egyptians
from the shell-fish Carthamus tinctorius
and by the Hebrews from the Coccus ilicis,
an insect which infests oak trees... called
Kermes by the Arabians. It was one of the
colors of the ephod (Ex. 28:6) and the
breastplate of the High Priests. Scarlet
and crimson are the firmest of dyes-
thus not easily washed out of cloth or heart.

Carnivorous Faery

Celestia wept against a tree
natural for a faery to be
raining tears in cypress wood
white-faced beneath her velvet hood

lined with wysteria.

Strangely though, her silvered eyes
resembled those of hawk that flies
hunting over enchanted woods
not the way a faerys' should

like water gleam of sun.

Disturbing more, her berried lip
bloodied from the meat she ripped
from bones of animals she ate
not faery food of nuts and dates

collected in the morning dew.

Not a butterfly or rabbit
followed her as is their habit
to haunt the steps of faery nymphs
fled from her at just a glimpse

of long, sharp talons.

Though her beauty in silken gown
a voice that sang a siren's sound
lithesome waist, legs of tender reed
could not disguise the ghastly needs

of a carnivorous faery.

The Redeeming Quality of Shadow

These days, he came up with a plan-
solid and serious gray like the exterior
of a house or an uncut tree trunk...

he built stairs that faced the road-
a secret double life, the trust
of things and balance

between pure form and natural elements
(objects he carried with him always)

He knew modern things grew quickly
and more easily than old buildings, oceans
or transluscent stars...
(lanterns over his huge and thinly packaged city)

He created horizontal spaces, he created
facades of body set against bright blue walls,
floral prints of women walking through his night

and dazzling things that glowed like steel...
(translating them into something organic)

In the end, he rejected Light and swallowed it
in favor of the redeeming quality of shadow.

Hook of Light

In the round room of eye, seduced
as fish to hook of light, your lips,

the space between, folds of wing
just touching against the porcelain spine

of a grieving angel.

Your small ears, shells discovered
in sand- pink, fragile and gift-like,

each curve a staircase, an instrument
whose strings of music unwind.