Suicidal Angel

We are the same
model of weapon
we use to kill
eachother. And

bound & beaten,
a short life seems
impossible to bear.
If nothing happens

when the heart stops
beating, how are we
to understand a reason
for living or love?

Just before we pull
the trigger, there is
something standing
close beside us-

white winged & terrible.

Shine

Each day we struggle to retain
our shimmering qualities, the heat
of blood & fire. Some of us are
eaten by the flames, succumb to
famine. What touches the soul
burns itself through arteries to
heart, into the lungs that warm
the breath, moving in and out like
faith. On a perfect day, we hold
our tears, smile into the mirror
imagine light where light is missing,
pierce the blackness of the skies.

Emptied

Inside the windows, where dust
adheres to glass, its opaque silence
swallowing the light, disguising
any signs of living, smells like
stones & salt, tastes like sickness.
This place has been abandoned
for awhile, a vacant carcass lying
in its ornate coffin waiting for
the world to end, for confirmation
that its missing tenants have moved
into a bigger house. At night, outside
the windows, stars admiring their faint
reflections, attract the moth's attention
with their tiny, glowing mouths.

Suddenly Unhappy

Is that the moon or did
your face just open like
a yellow poppy? Also,
celestial bodies don't
have teeth or lips or stems
holding them to earth.
Now, shadows of the cloud
across your pale, white
cheeks as if you are
suddenly unhappy. Why fear
the cold-stone darkness when
you were born to fight it?

Sub Silentio

Otherwise, this is
not a poem. For me,
standing in silence
of this hour, I am

silence as words are
repetitious dreams.

Surely, you know
the quiet voice
bleeds into spaces
of the hollow bone.

For this reason,
stars, scattered in
the carved out spaces
where they were born
never master speech

or hearing and worms
with earth-filled mouths
never learn to sing.

Burn Patterns

Am I mad when I see the birds
on fire, the bridge in flames,
burn patterns on the bodies?

See how gray and blue the shadows
moving towards the river's water.
Am I too human to endure the dying

floating in its swirling violence?

Are we condemned to travel towards
the flickering light-ness letting go
of memories of life disguised by

sweet, cold darkness?

Here are my blistered shoulders
sprouting into white and shining
wings thrashing towards the sun.

Wine

I go back to places
where dreams are living,
grass and roses, light.

I will arrive wet,
anticipating sweetness
like a frenzied fly.

Ah, I am the rain.
What I feed will set
its eyes on heaven's

flashing, pulsing stars.
Hissing of the fields,
like coiling snakes,

the steam rises. Here
is where the grapes
are picked and trodden

the blood-stained fluid
numbs the mind, slows
the dancing of the heart.

Quiet Silence

She began every sentence
with a sigh like moon's body
obscured by clouds, disappointed
of its chance to shine, even
softly, another night of darkness.

And what she said- sigh in this
late hour, I will remain nameless,
without once would shine and now
disappears, a shooting sphere of light
whose silver wings ignite the skies.

Then falls inert and quiet silence.

Struggle of the Self

I will not curse
the blessed; they have
been blessed, while I,
have not. This unselfish
act, then propels me towards
the bright and blessed-ness.

When had I begun to doubt
what I couldn't see or hear?
In each of us there is a light,
a sound, a feeling. Lie down
in a field of weeds and flowers,
each of them is peculiar while

they are intimately woven.

Welcome

In the pre-life, we hear
voices. We swim, press
our ears against the shore.
No fear while sleeping;

no one here to warn us.

Of cloudy waters, the room
walls tighten, a supernatural
cold, first consciouseness
of danger. A mother's love

and welcome to death.

Out into a space as wide
as Universe, where light-bulbs
are constant stars, plaster ceiling
skies, a mask of oxygen, wind

blowing through twin tunnels.

No one says a word, the bomb
squad dismantle the explosive,
which to cut- the wires white,
black and red. Leaving only screams,

my screams, to break the silence.

Nothing More

I tried to tell you
there is nothing more
invisible than nothing.

Hard to understand
the bottomless hole
akin to heartache.

I have no idea
who shoveled out
the pit or who would

fall into its mouth.

From such a depth,
one can fixate on
the stars and wish

the sun would rise,
your rescuers would
save you, bring you

out into the light.

Imagine the beauty
of joy, of whiteness,
the warmth of that

first ray, the final
disappearance of
darkness. How this

sickness, the constant
pain, has left its tracks
in the mud, hidden like

a lizard in shadows
of crevices, under rocks,
under houses, has left

its fingernails in cracks
of its prison walls,
a sign that something

has overcome the nothing.

Discovery

You found me again
like an overgrown path
in the woods covered
with brush and stones.

In this cold rain,
I am surprised you are
still searching for a way
in or through barriers

I have constructed
in the ruins. Are you
suffering in this weather,
shrinking from darkness?

Now you've discovered
the ocean on this tangled
road. How secret your perch
on the hidden cliffs.

How astonishing you found it.