Robusta too bitter rips my stomach apart

the crackling of a blackened heart

amidst deep hues burnt red

drags down the bones

the flesh the sinew that connects 

hazed in a cool room mending

sweet-tea cooling beside the bed

not if but when

breathless is the heart

fit to burst 

as my Love grows I know 

she will break me 

as if the Shattering of you

was a mere nuisance 

and now my knees are cold

I

sleeping in summer’s scorching 

months of kicking restless 

flesh too hot for dreaming

light and sound at their slightest 

dazed in waking moments

all night long

II

last night I woke huddled 

in a blanket over cold ears

as She slept close, curled 

in chaos, in fall bedding dug 

into a nest in the night 

I never woke but the  once

craving lemon squares and fireball candies

I

there’s an offer on the house 

a fortnight ago given 

the second thought to have fell

through the ways of banks 

saying yes…but wait…

a wait-weight negated now 

I am asked to wait a few more days

while papers are sorted,

hope kept close lest it fade

II

it’s always come easy, the stillness 

of body and a gaze attentive 

learned I to live on others’ time 

even acknowledging with words 

understanding easy off the lips

It’s the mind, my mind, unseen

behind the wizard’s curtain 

where organized clutter thrums in baskets 

loosely woven, the cacophony discordant 

craves lemon squares and fireball candies 

cracks and protrusions

I

the pressure to perform

in perpetual motion 

be a shark be a lion, ROAR

along those lines allowed 

I learned this was the Way;

naught for trying as a babe

in the woods I have teetered 

concrete or bramble both paths trudged

but the shiny always beckoned 

in the peripheral flittering 

‘come sit, come sit and calm’

it cooed, ‘look to your own self’

II

the walkabout unsteady on

pavement leaning, gray-grey 

are the cracks and protrusions 

reaching for walls and sign posts

stopping for cars, head on a swivel 

Hope keeps dangling thing 1 thing 2

as she always has as she always will

will, willingly would won’t, all the Ws

will I make it to you before you go?

and will you know me?

as I look around

 I

on the stone etched I chose 

ivy one side flowers the other 

II

it was always spring 

when things occurred 

births deaths shattering

shipping ash for internment 

III

in winter I was born, Caprica

the youngest yet always the oldest