Tuesday, September 16, 2008

august

August 29, 2008 - Friday


letting time pass slow


September comes
on the morrow three
and the heat
no abatement alludes

too warmed bones press out
drying flesh
parched lips
never quenched thirst
organs boiling

lover – if that –
from the past
sought; fractured
allusions to the one just gone

Texas, my land, my heart
is sore in her summer
of cracked black gumbo
cicadae soft

yet perhaps the latter
is the years
and my own impending
silence

this year
I wilt with my summer
with my land; fan the gnats away
brain a drift; indifferent

languid
letting time pass slow



August 28, 2008 - Thursday


parts work


I didn't even mean to fall-in with this one guy
we don't even really click so much
but he's a good guy and
on the rare occasion we actually hook-up,
great fun
gets to me every time, which is not that easy.

That's all it is really
except I do like to hear him talk,
really like his writing
and can see what he meant that first time
(a few years back)
when he said don't fall for him.
I can see how most girls do.

The other day someone had asked a friend
"Who's she seeing right now…"
I replied with a "Why do I always have to
be seeing someone..."
I suppose it's that struggle for self-identity
after a long marriage that was kickin' in,
but in case some of you wondered...

Me?
I'll settle for not clicking on occasion;
hell, at least my parts still work.

july

July 16, 2008 - Wednesday


the weight of the air


In the denotative
sense of the word,
the action
'to kill"
I have killed a man.

But what books don't say

your drugged out stupor
yelling
you were not ready to go
as I watched from the hall
accusations
to the vacant room

and the weight of the air
at the threshold
where I took a breath
but could not enter

and the drugs
as they left you
as I took them away

unable to speak
save
for your eyes
pleading.

I have seen
my father low,
sister falling,
mother going mad,
and in the denotative
sense of the word,
the action
'to kill"...

I weep for my brother.



July 11, 2008 - Friday


the way brothers do


Big Brother says,
"keep doing what you're doing
and you'll keep getting what you're getting."

Of course my verbal reply
was "six hours of amazing sex
with a lover I adore?" and a wicked smile.

He frowned
the way brothers do
knowing I knew better.

And all through frowns
and smiles
I was thinking,

'don't you think
I wish I weren't
some pup….too in awe of men.'



July 7, 2008 - Monday


poem for t.c.


nose soft
along his jaw
his ear
on his collar
faint scent
cigarettes
and pot

and on his tongue?
suckled I
faint again
cigarettes
and cherry beer

flesh
long and lean
I devoured

lovers few
and far between
but each
I never forget
too much
around me
to not recall

nights
of wonder
and how
I found me
in your arms



July 5, 2008 - Saturday


transient


I sold books today,
my desk last week
to buy gas (if that)
hopefully paint
so I can
rent my place

go to another
ghetto, one of youth
instead of hookers
cheaper, North
away from my city
my city
I mourned you
these last years anyway

books! words!
of others
my life blood
once
I consumed like
beer
chips
and salsa

another life

before
I came alive
before
I found my own words



July 4, 2008 - Friday


in the ghetto


In the ghetto
guns

are poppin' off

drunk
on meat and sauce
happy

we make
our own
fire in the sky

in the ghetto
in the ghetto

with my degree
and grad school
application



fireworks in the distance

Do you remember
that year atop the Texas Star

(oh we were
so young then)

and the fireworks
in the distance.

It wasn't all bad,
my husband;

it was just
the fireworks
were so far away

or perhaps
the manifestation
of my own desire.

If the latter
I am sorry

so sorry.

July 2, 2008 - Wednesday
strong
I was young
oh
a girl of twenty
maybe

and we
had been together
three years already

why that year?
I can't say

but I was crazy about you,

the receptacle of all my giving

my husband,
mate…

until the day I knew to leave.

Then suddenly
I was not so young
a woman
of almost thirty-four

who left
knowing

her desire
could be consuming

but willing
to face the world
alone,

strong.

june

June 28, 2008 - Saturday


and August days with hours


He could not compare
– that boy of summer –

to Ra in his brilliance,
blonde hair
spread wide against cool white linens
while we slept
for all there was, was sleep
and innocent nights, few;

but he would stay
– that boy of summer –
a thousand times longer
holding back the winter
with August days
with hours

from which I would awake
dizzy, breathless,
spent

heart sore and not the one.


this girl she is

she never meant to follow
the academic track
or Quest
for knowledge and meaning

to get her life together
however long it took
(and it is taking
overlong)

she never meant
to have a lover
in her bed
for hours, days on end

never meant
a short list of them
or to give her heart
to any

or to feel so cruel
the absence of one
from her bed
even longer

she never meant
to thirst
or dream

or be this girl
she is



June 24, 2008 - Tuesday


over and over


Over
and over
the lyrics

the songs

until one day
– when the lights die
and the words
will spur the rhythm
and the beat will stir
from the depths,

strong in her being –

she will face the dark.

But today she wists
in the half-lit night,

over
and over
the lyrics

the songs

her tears

the dark looming.



June 17, 2008 - Tuesday


sine nauseam

living on tortillas
oatmeal
vitamins

vitamins from the discount store
birth control
from Health Services

ad nauseam
the sight of consumption
without thought
without means
in debt bondaged

oh sweet my life
where guilt is coffee
nine dollars a pound

to wash down
the tortillas
the vitamins

something with taste
to accompany
laughter as I live

sine nauseam



June 14, 2008 - Saturday


the years


I
slim
she walked, eyes cast down
slight and gentle
the cut of her jaw
long blond hair
past her waist
past her hips
slim again
bright the green
Murphy eyes
that girl
of twenty-two, reserved
shy;
the years still ahead
of finding grace in crowds
and ease around men

stunning
any would call you
looking back
though you never knew it
for no one ever told you


II
swaying
she walks,
short blond hair
bright the green
Murphy eyes
shining
lively
a woman
of thirty-eight, alive
full breasts
curves
at the hip
the belly
jaw line full;
behind her
the weight of hours
of finding grace within
and ease around men

lovely
some would call you
though you barely know it
you do try
for friends surrounding tell you



June 6, 2008 - Friday


off the shore of the long forgotten


off the shore
of the long forgotten

battlements of Vieques

far enough
the land was small

I gazed out
upon
a wide vast ocean

and knew
I was just a speck
in it all



June 5, 2008 - Thursday


I had not imagined the first


perhaps I had been waiting
these three odd years for them
these days since
the house now gone

I didn't know it
couldn't

but the fireflies came
finally

in the heat of early June
this eve
and they danced

near enough
yet far away
though only two

they
were still a they
confirming
I had not imagined the first

and on the wind away
away
they drew

in my heart
in the faint lit night

fireflies bright

for which I had been waiting
only never knew



June 4, 2008 - Wednesday


she wonders yes


on occasion
every year
or two or so

she comes
across a heart
she has to touch

then lets them flee

recalls them later
smiles soft and wonders
she wonders yes,

but fleet

may

May 16, 2008 - Friday


lyric 7 - without guile


I am yours, we both know

lay me down, cover me

your body
heavy on my heart

suddenly, I am far away
floating in the possession
of your smile.

and if this breath that leaves me
never comes again

hungrily we loved
without guile.



May 14, 2008 - Wednesday


lyric 6


like a moth to a flame-<
and on past again>

but for a while-->
she flickers in his light-->

wings beat and broke>
as she flutters next to close>

and her scent of burning-->
on the breeze-->

oh----
oh----
oh-----
she's a woman---now>

she comes and goes—>
comes and goes---->



May 10, 2008 - Saturday


May is here


May is here
and your would have been forty-second birthday
is nearing
but now you are ever my younger brother
not my older

And the days are fading
when I think of how your death made me
but I still think on you
on my decisions and your slow leaving

on my decisions and your slow leaving

and how your death made me
made us all



May 4, 2008 - Sunday


lyric four


young girl
alone in her bed

little heart
beating

little hands
finding

she slips away
humming
strumming

gently

wanting
wanting

Wednesday, April 30, 2008

white space

In the white-space
between the words between the lines
where ink cannot go
steadily
steadily
the artist's passion flows;

the thing they attempt to draw
strive to convey

the soul of their child
prostrate to the world
dismembered.

Look past
into the white-space
where you will see a Glowing.

May comes tomorrow

April 28, 2008 - Monday


onions and graphite


writing
late into the eve
of a day of
slow stewed savories

wrapped in warm
chenille I fell adrift, room
aglow; faint scent

onions and graphite
on my hands
filling dreams



April 24, 2008 - Thursday


breathing the good wet earth


Through the tall wetland grass she glides
bare legs, limbs, nosed sun-kissed

long hair a glisten
on toward the herd,
the baby white she calls Hopi, the people.

From the rocks comes the baby snake
skin new and body blue organs,
eyes milk white, gleaming blind
into the warmth of her palm.

The way was leaving
and her mourning would go long
into lives as yet unknown

where she would dream her days
of breathing the good wet earth.

And where she walks, with Hope she goes…


lymerick 121 (yes that’s a random number...)


little girls dream of Princes
little boys dream of luck

but the gender nutritive
on the whole,
they're more oftly fucked.



April 17, 2008 - Thursday


bright penny


I
nary the first to come away
unstick from the mess that binds
that took a life to ingrain

– yet like a child to the sun
her first bright penny –

she looks on it all with wonder

II
and what it took to unconform;

those things that should frighten
release her heart to soar.

in her new day
no other's



April 16, 2008 - Wednesday


a strange malaise


knowledge, comprehension,
bring about a strange malaise

as if something detriment
to innocence were lost
with their gain;

sad and bittersweet
the joy of her ascension

how she loves her way.



April 15, 2008 - Tuesday


her heart’s unrest


There was a comfort
to the lack of want
and the
– not so much denial of self –
but a firm hold on the reins
on the strong will that said
conform

an allowance
of observation of others
that keeps you unnoticed
of liberties the norm
cannot come away with

but I was not free
perhaps never would have
in completeness

if not for another paying

the death toll

oh my heart knew peace
(of such without tactile
pleasure)

my heart knew peace
but my spirit was not free



April 11, 2008 - Friday


if i could breathe water


If I could breathe
Water
the moon to drink
your smile sweet
though brief

fleet


logic’s child

She stared
about the room
wide-eyed
ready for things that go bump
things that may come
in darkness

Logic's child
knowing otherwise
she may be hacked to bits
off-guard.



April 8, 2008 - Tuesday


and the world suddenly


May steals soft into my heart
stalking it creeps along
the shadowed rim
just outside the light;

Robert
brother
death

that first May cruelly

these years of becoming

and the world suddenly

too wide

the nights of wonder...



April 6, 2008 - Sunday


she seeks


Her inheritance?:
a heart too wide

Yet
when her mind stills
brief
knowledge interludes

and The Quiet
is deafening

The Quiet
The Quiet
feels more like destiny
the harder she tries to spite it

And transcendence?:
The Little Death
far and few between

she seeks.



April 1, 2008 - Tuesday


A question to Mrs. Parker


Oh Dottie,

Did everything throb
that first time you read the author’s name on a book and the inscription inside…
...to you...

Did you adore him?
Were you near enough to reach out
and touch his
…heart…?

Did you desire him?



March 29, 2008 - Saturday


missing in America


the call came one night
around one or two

I awoke my husband who didn’t want to wake

didn’t recognize her in the bus station’s exterior
amidst the crowd of street-lit downtown
faces searching for lost hope
as I kept my gaze low

there she was, down-trod but not beaten
bright eyes in a body hitting forty
always a dreamer
with a scheme up her sleeve

but all I had was credit
and she wanted cash

so at the end of the week at the hotel
the end of the week of getting her clothes
new documents to replace the lost…
food, a hot pot, and anger
at the little cash I could spare going
toward cigarettes
half drunk bottles on the dresser
skimpy swimsuit on the towel bar

gone again

my sister

missing in America



March 28, 2008 - Friday


not what i meant at all


sometimes I
look into things
like health insurance
or birth control
that won’t make me feel
so fat

but I come to no decision
and nothing changes

in fact I come away more confused,
the questions to the answers I sought
not what I meant at all

and the answers?

I’ll never know them anyway.



March 19, 2008 - Wednesday


The Summers of My Youth - short excerpt/non-fiction


March 02

You know, it didn’t stop raining for days in March that year. But it wasn’t a gray rain. And when it stopped, there was Texas in a beautiful spring. It hadn’t gone straight from winter to summer as one would have thought. And though I don’t recall a spring in Texas before that year, it seems like we’ve had several since.


this day

this day
six years ago

when all the world was raining
and all the world was green
flowers, startling abloom

the smell of damp earth

everywhere
everywhere

and then we buried you.



March 14, 2008 - Friday


i have become


sometimes
when I am happy
I cry – senseless deep sorrow.

it’s for you and you
and how you used me
that one of you knows it
the other will never cop to it

that brother is dead
sister is Missing In America
father is happy at last
mother may never know
only she can help herself
that My Husband Once has grown without me
because of me
is the one who knows he used me

that when this one man holds me
I feel as beautiful as I believe myself to be

and that I have come this far, baby
can do anything
be anything

I have arrived
have
become

and cry perhaps
for the sorrow and loss it took to get here.


mind a drift

My Husband Once
had taught me how
not to pre-wash dishes,
not even to knock the big stuff loose
what a time saver!

and the dishwasher
took care of it

and we could be out and on
to other senseless tasks…

but in my little place now
where when things break I fix them

or not

I am learning

I loved my hands in water
and the clean smell of soap
puttering, doing, making

and the time

to think

in my little place
where these little things please me

and I walk-about

singing



March 11, 2008 - Tuesday


otherwise


Last night I dreamt

of Medieval things.

They came at me full on

in blood and glory,

Honoria with her sword

and the fire burning...



Words for the visions,

aglow in air came streaming,

I the vessel to convey.



And I awoke weeping.

All I want to do

is write these things I dream.



But the world won't let me;

it would have me otherwise.