like this-
barely shadows
thin clouds across
the sun
in a palm
and a brew
of lightning on
night sky
or love in sudden
tense regard,
bright and bitter
in the doorway
waiting to go
or leave
is how I remember.
Ghost in the door,
palm with its
reminders,
a mouth
closed
too tight-
all a storm
dark and a little
sweet
in its making
somewhere
along the Atlantic.
And this,
the reason
to go when I ran,
maybe
yellow could be
like dahlias
and black just
professional attire/
not reminders
to re-mind again
that the cracked
walk, the fractured
frown following –
a memory of
monsters
of grief and
abandonment
now held
in the bones that
must be un-done
and how tiring.
Could sing
unkempt and
broken vowels
like the hair that
wasn’t combed and
spoke instead
that the heart
is red, and bloody
but so quietly
and of fiery dreams
set ablaze
to burn hotter
than the very thing
that could have
taken them away
if not taken in a hand/
the broken relics
to find.
In the night
a coyote runs
along a river
telling the pack
how he runs
and I run with him
for awhile
every belief
left unchallenged
the held heart
shrieking to
be free,
to love.
Gray cloud,
same old, same
old ghost in
the palm,
in the fading lines
of barely there
maybe
a bright moon,
maybe a white moth
on the tufted ear
of an owl.
Tag: friendship
dear wildcat
winter comes again in time and our
skin splits/ the heckling of stars:
the way implied, they could
be a sun, be the warmth
spoken of, yes I know
and we instead cracked
cups glued many times
hold fast.
how small the earthquakes warn
of a shatter and maybe
we choose to tie the rope tight
instead, tight around
our own eyes-
my dear friend, hold
the hands of your choosing
eyes shuttered and heart wild
with hollow rage like
a sun burns
from its self until done.
and what can we choose but
an anthem of joy or
despair?
dear wildcat, please free yourself
of the hunters trap and if
you must chew your own
leg to be free, be free
or if the rope is tight
and just right, I will try to
find you if you ask,
because I know your wild heart
and you know I am cracked
and full of nuance/ how you
came along and saw me going again
above the waves, breath held
to go down again but I stay
where nothing will rip
feet from sand, even
the crash all around/ but
you could see that I was tired-
it will be a choice, my dearest friend
to let an anger go that will not
destroy your enemies, at the
knowledge that nature is unjust
and will not strike down those who
would harm but give them chance
after chance… for you and I
to speak truthfully and
uncomfortably is
the only justice.
so pull the wound wide
and see like the ocean waves
there is no choice
but to return to the shore pounding,
flailing as a storm brews or in a sleepy slumber
beneath a still blue free of everything
but the pull of time, no choice
but to hold, “thought by thought.”
many worlds
All the reasons the heart couldn’t form,
a humble stem/kitsch in your mother’s attic:
there’s a hundred hours left
still,and the sun won’t really set
just sway into someone
a world away,
looks like you, looks like I,
holds a star like space holds/
limitless.
Even how love, was the baby frog I kept
in my pencil case to bring
along to school,
‘little buddy,’ because the softness
of empathy is there before words
get in the way
but only realized when we talk about it.
It’s likely not many notice
the beauty of someone young
holding their space fully/
or how outside of god
we hold the words of many gods
we have loved in our memory:
I still will sing
at the end of the world
walk into storms the same way
a ghost can only be ghostly.
Eat the cake! I really think it is fine
and to love peculiar things
like tiny frogs and funny-nosed sloths:
because love informs when chaos
gentle at the gate is hot
and all-too-ready.
In Due Proportion 