Near-Death-Experience

These seasons become a place,
different light shadows, water stains,

a far-away singing, a moaning siren
whose sadness reveal near edge.

Slowly thick molasses, blood drips
on untouched snow.  A wind whose

tiny hands flash quickly like a world
reveals fragility of distance- 

here from there.

Product of imagination, imprisoned;
truth astonishingly clear.  Now pray

this shiny, broken face, this sense
of body splitting spares you from

disgrace.

Never Falling or Rising

They climb, not with feet
or hands but entire body
writhing upward.  

Some stray to the side, even
downward attracted by unseen
forces.  Do you suppose they

know the distracted might
play a role supporting
the journey of others?

And yet, there are singular
blossoms earth-tied in tangled
bundles, always raising

their heads in fear of
being forgotten.

The Natural World

After a day and another
evening bending to night,

no original shadows or 
stubborn hearts, now the 

silence.  Great black silence;
a sadness and exhaustion.

Life's wheel turns, turns
then breaks with violence

but the nature of the soul,
its other-worldly compassion

rests quietly. 

Give Us a Sign

You can't bear to see it,

white against white, abyss

in deep, swirling fog,

the self in myth.

The purpose of illusion,
its nature to deceive, leading
light into unexpected

darkness is departure;

this life moving towards
self-less absorption.

For what other reason does
moon clutched desperately
by night endure its unending

punishment?

Fool Through and Through

There is a mouth where it shouldn't be,
an ink stain.  Yes I've said certain things

that amounted to nothing.  I should say
them again to multiply nothingness.

What fools do well is what fools
should do.  This makes us foolish

but with confidence.  

The Highest Bloom

Because you are paralyzed, 

wounded but loved, you were given

voice, a song of struggle, 

a singing shadow.

It doesn't matter you're different,

like purple striations on wildflower

or albino moths whose moonlit wings

attract night birds

to swallow them whole.  

Perhaps you're a messenger 

and no one is listening.  Like

hearts when the body stops

breathing or prayer memorizing

well-rehearsed words.

It's not as if you understood the value

of punishment, the purpose of

suffering, the meaningful beauty

of resting ever so lightly

on the highest, most dangerous

bloom in the field.

The Flame Quickens

Burned, I remember

patterns of rain sinking
and the zen-like
trajectory of things

that catch on fire
and fall.

I will miss the black
stars, the two yellow
planets whose sadness
was this life 

looking out through 
the bodies window.

The smokey ring,
the coal eye narrowing,
a strobe light catching
motion, the click, click

click from birth
to quickening flame;

an orphan striking
matches in a thunder
storm.

Beneath the Robe

Black-white robed women, 
God's wives; you never see
their bodies beneath the cloth-

only eyes.  

Beautiful eyes
whose iris broken

pieces of prayer.

This Place like Cyanide

The unlocked body, my own
dark garment thrown-off curved like
hip bone but sharper. 

Every year the stones thrown 
farther, without aim hits any target
harder like a cruel game.

This shore, its hoary shelf,
lightless room without a bearing wall
calls and calls my name

in a moment like cyanide
infects the vein, disappears in smoke
and still I hear it calling

"Rachel, Rachel".

Human Gems

Always on chain those small lives
gold settings flashing light.  Hooked
together by careful hands.  

A magic show of emotion.

Dazzling.

Hematocrit

Stop making such a big deal about
the color of blood.  On the inside,
the hue is different, raging like 
an oil fire or spurned love.

What you can't see may change you.

These living dead creatures thirsting
for corpuscles.  No image in the mirror,
no sunbathing.  All drapes and coffin.

How pegged are you?

Stinky Little Dove

Wet, matted, leaking
clinging to ledge, your dirty feathers
reeking.  Then that soft

white, purr that cleans
you... my little stinky

dove.

And Shall You Find

Who would pathologically 
fight a father who killed
you first?

Phantom Pain

People who eat sugar don't suffer
hypoglycemia.  My next-door neighbor's son

falling

in a war of dust;  how can you understand
phantom pain if you've never lost
a limb?

Nothing Whatsoever Erases

We don't have the ability to close the door,
lock the keys.  When I say that I don't mean
making decisions, I mean protecting.

Do you hear the sea waves swinging, the sound
of darkness bumping into another darkness
then one of them leaving?  

Some fibers just won't snap, some hinges
don't stop creaking, some lines keep leading
to the same critical point.

I can still remember the heat of your mouth
against my neck.  The sound of cloth rubbing
against cloth, the later clacking of rock crashing

against rock.

Humility

Everyday I climb Mt. Everest
in my soul.  This senseless survival-pride,
misguided goals of conquest
will snuff its-self out.

Relativity offers perspective. 

A miniscule mosquito penetrates
a human hair of jungle with
a laser-thin sword, seconds

before the swat.

The Dead Twin

Alone tonight and restless, pacing
in and out the door, claws marching
across linoleum.  A vacuum of time
where motion keeps the mind from focusing
on what it's missing.  A child scribbling
furiously ineligible, frantic lines and circles.

In a house made red with waiting, walls
shrunk in and beating, a diseased heart
trapped within its desperate symptoms
longing for the long-straight line, the silenced
beeping.  I'm trained to save you;  what have
I saved you for?

You are the prize.  We both have lost
our twin.  

The Shroud

Overcast sky, a fuzzy moon's true edges

obliterated like milk poured in the eye.

If you're not guilty, why do you hide?

Even crossing from great distance,

dead and white finds its mark-

a star, its sleepless dreamer, 
a prayer, its sinner.

How comforting the low, dark valley
where what God made shimmers
in the trees like light moving through

small glass windows, like tiny holes
beneath a blanket.

Bird of Mourning

It could not have come
at a better time, 
tiny, silver trinkets of sound
sewn to wind-

the last bird singing.  

The listening mind 
goes numb, a body
frozen in a blizzard.  

You heard the same
song briefly, memorizing
its delicate rhythm 

as if we would never 
hear its voice again.

From the Safety of Sleep

There are places 
where no one should be

like night and its guardians
who step out of their dark, grey cloaks
searching for vulnerable company.

Or underwater swimming
into murky with no visibility
to a bottomless bed.  

Once you asked me 
the difference between life
and dreams.  

They are the same
to the strong, dangerous
to the weak.

As unfortunate as dying-
the closer we become
to losing what we know 

from what we'll never
be.  

I pray for sleep, thoughtless
sleep.  The kind of sleep
whose eyes remember 
moon and stars

without seeing.

Somethings Are Worth Creating

Creature, you are both in beauty
delightful and feared.

Your eyes aren't blank at all;
filled with times of wisdom
and curiosity.  More importantly

your sharp, marble teeth
stained with blood

remind us of mortality.

I understand, yet I free
the prey from your mouth,
making you victim,

stealing something visceral,
something that could preserve you;

at least in this world.

Disguised as hunter, I disobey
the law for pity. See how children

string together colorful beads
of sharp-edged glass on wires

with hands as white
and vulnerable as fish

their fingers bleeding?


.

Jagged Jaw

There again, a troublesome trap
buried under leaves, things we said 
hidden meanings.  

Which limb or structure snaps
when captured?

The neck or throat most vulnerable;
ironic, the most destructive.

Whose words will change the course,
the hunt, the heavy silence which brings
awareness to its peak?  A mandatory
waiting.  A type of kidnapping, 

a tight but necessary hold.

The good samaritan who finds us,
turns the key-   releasing.  Screaming
run rabbit, run.

A broken leg is not the soul.
A gaping wound may heal eventually.
Then with distance like a tail,

lie still and free and listening.

Retained Form

The moored waiting of evening,
the patience of an old soul and its afterlife,
the sound of its metered breathing.  

Many sacrifices, mistakes, reprieves;
the familiarity of losing.  The heart
is not dead when its tongue still speaking

sings or weeps.

See how the untied boat floats away
in rhythmic waves, never sinking.
On some foreign shore is found

by a fisherman.

Its purpose equally returned
to carrying its particular burden,
a well-worn saddle,

a spoon for soup, a hat
in a storm, a prayer

in the form of being.

The Tongue Tastes Two Flavors

Gentle, wild soul.  A wolf
or tree.  A childless woman.

A branch of poison berries,
purple and sweet or the kiss

of swarming bees. 

Jealousy of dangerous, 
dark things-

the sting of them.

Then Like Thieves

In the beginning, the earliest sign
without announcement or celebration,

we come here vestigial,

blindfolded, unformed winged
in celibate silence.

There are no white horses
waiting in the distance

just wild sounds

of darkness following
the first small steps

towards fire.

The flame transforms the blossom,
opening, ripening

bursting.  Then like thieves
Death's large birds collect

their seeds.