Sunday, December 27, 2020

Leaving



There wasn’t a goodbye

It was a New Year’s flight

A forgotten black velvet hat

A glowing golden ball of light

Channeled on the plane’s wing

Not imagined, real as anything

Opened the door of my new home

Found a dozen roses waiting full of thorns

Reminding me not to go back


Saturday, December 26, 2020

Muse



I want to press into you with a mortar and pestle. Break open your binding and extract what makes you essential.

A little dot of you dropped onto my fingertips, smeared lightly onto the pulsing vein laid bare on my neck. 

Exhilarating this thing you bring, adventure, exploring beyond comfortable boundaries. The danger in you is invigorating. 

There are fire and poison mixed through your meat, rubbing you onto me proves a fatal mistake. 

Wanting you to be my muse, refusing to acknowledge the bomb inside you. 

Exploding against my throat and face, blood rushes out, into black, into space. 

I chose you, your elegance, your grace. I ground you up into an opalescent oily paste. 

Believing the notion of mixing us like this would be a climactic soul rendering embrace. 

Here I am, clenching my hands around my throat. Laughing while the blood swells around them, aware that I'm some cosmic joke.   

You, my muse, standing over me, with deep ruby lips grinning unapologetically, placed your fingertips against my eyes, closing them this one last time. 

"You should have known better sweet simpleton." 

The last message delivered with tongue curling venom. 

Sunday, December 13, 2020

Warm Hands



My hands were cold.

We were sitting outside at a table, sharing stories of our exes, just friends spending time together, this wasn’t to be considered a date.

You took my hands into yours and blew warm air onto them.

I remember drinking delicious beer that tasted like banana bread.

We were having a supremely excellent time, being innocent, talking.

Hepcat's "Dance Wid' Me" was being covered by a live band.

All of these things culminating in a swirl of serendipity.

At that moment, in my chest, my heart took the shape of a ship passing yours in the night. 

Knowing if I didn't say anything, this moment would continue sailing, turning into treasure lost at sea.

I couldn’t leave our time together, it didn't matter that someone was dating you.

Blurting was the best I could do.

“I have a secret crush on you!” a primal, guttural, hindsight, embarrassing thing. 

Just standing in the street with my car door open, hanging in that awkward limbo, not ready to head home.

You had just finished walking me there, I still wasn’t ready to go.

“I have a secret crush on you too.”

Relief washed over me when you echoed it back, in the dark, in the quiet of the night that was turning into day.

That moment was the beginning of everything.

A smile locked on my face, our future full of possibility.

It persisted as I passed the threshold of my front door, as I laid down for a moment, after finally getting home.

We crossed out the word friends, replacing it with lovers, our lives changing forever.

With you, my hands have always been warm.

 

 


Monday, December 7, 2020

Magic Apple Tree



She was five years old and precocious as they come. 

Freckles, green eyes, walnut brown hair that had hints of red in the sun.

She blew the best bubbles, bigger than her plump cheeks. Bright, enormous pink ones that made her laugh when they burst against her tongue.

Her imagination was paired with curiosity, she had an old soul that would never stop investigating.

Being her mother was challenging.

Still, her mother had a few tricks up her sleeve, and she wasn’t going to let this daughter of hers win the year of five without giving her a run for her money.

It was fall, the apples were ready for harvesting.  Her mother went to the store and bought bundles of a thick blue string and prepared nearly every apple within her reach.

She created a magical setting that looked beautiful, full of round, red orbs hanging like ornaments in a Christmas tree.

The next morning her five-year-old ran out into the cold.  She was going to climb the tree and pluck all the apples that the fairies brought her. That's the story she'd been telling everyone, she even wrote it down, detailed with illustrations made by her tiny hands.  

“Come and see! Come and see!” Her impatient voice was racing, giving away that something miraculous was happening.

Her mother grabbed a basket, ready to bring in their picking.  She prepared her face for the surprise her little girl was about to spring.

You could see the child midway up the tree, hanging herself out on the branches, she couldn’t manage words through all her giggling.

“Mommy look! The apples are on strings! I told you there were fairies around our tree!”

Her mother grabbed the apples, string by string, placing them in the basket, while her daughter climbed down to sit on the autumn grass next to it.

“I told you!”

“Yes, you did my dear darling girl.  Who knew fairy apples grew on strings?”

“I did.  I know everything. It's exactly like the pictures in my book!" The little girl held the apples by their strings, laying on the ground with them above her head, dangling.

"Off the cold ground now young lady." The mother laughed as she helped her daughter up, placing the apples back in the basket. 

They walked back into the house, peeled the apples, cooked them down, and made a cobbler fragrant with clove, cinnamon, nutmeg, and sugar of the deepest brown.

“Those fairies made delicious apples.” The little girl said, filling her stomach with the warm magical apples hung in the tree with blue thread.

“Yes, they most certainly did.” The little girl's mother was quietly pleased, keeping her secret of blue strings and apple trees.

She kept it in her book of mother’s magic, filled with spells that grew her child's imagination while going to great lengths to inspire her insatiable curiosity.

It wasn't until many years later, still blowing pink bubbles, and knowing everything that this curious child was told the secret of her mother's spell.

She cherishes that memory and raised her children similarly.  Casting her own mother's magic, the kind that happens from generations of imagination being handed down.


Breakfast



The smell of breakfast in the morning, it’s different than what you imagine it smells like.

In a perfect world, it’s thick-cut applewood smoked bacon, two eggs bubbled away in a pat of butter, and a toasted English muffin.

Coffee, but the kind that’s from a percolator, that smell of gas stove boiling the kettle while it bubbles to the top, letting you know it’s ready to be ripped from the kiss of its flame.

The smell of steam and hot water mixed with Ivory soap, soaked from a 6 a.m. shower. 

Squeaky clean hair bundled in a towel right out of the dryer.  The kind that’s been thrown in and popped out to be kept warm so you can wrap yourself in cozy before your breakfast.

With the smell of clean plates from the cabinet, your eyes aren’t blurry any more from hitting snooze too many times.

Sitting down at the table and adding just a touch of salt and scattering of pepper.  All of these smells come together during breakfast getting your morning underway.

That’s the imagined perfect breakfast.

That is not how real smells of the morning play out.

It’s a crusty eyed hustle, ignoring the many screams and shouts of the alarm, squeezing in one final micro dream, something this time worth journaling. 

The smell of the pillow reminding you that you have to get out of bed, there’s a deep morning breath yawn with a stretch telling you there’s no time for breakfast.

It’s the smell of soap splashing against the face, of saline that drips a tiny salt spot onto your cheek, putting in contacts while blinking.

The smell of coffee is true enough, that’s the wrap of the morning, glug, glug, glug.

Pull-on some comfortable pants that smell like fresh laundry, not breakfast you’re thinking maybe there’s time for a toasted bagel. 

Pull a shirt on that passes the sniff test, spray some wrinkle remover on it.  This doesn’t remotely smell like breakfast, but at least you’ll look respectable for that last second remote meeting.

Mint fills your mouth and sink as the toothbrush grinds with activity. Take a moment to put a brush through your hair that smells like green tea shampoo, a reminder of the shower you took last night to help put yourself to sleep.

Cup your hand around your underarms to make sure they’re pleasant, never wanting to sit in your own smell, there’s no body oil, winning at staying fragrant.

Breakfast smells like an apple today, the crisp flesh being bitten by cleaned teeth pulls it away. 

More coffee, more cream, the smell of vitamins, especially B happens to be overwhelming.

Run up the stairs, throw a hat on and smell the dust burning during the morning turn on of heat.

This is the smell of breakfast that ran out of time today. You’ll wake up on time tomorrow and capture those toast dipped eggs.





Tuesday, September 1, 2020

Year of the Cicada


It’s the year of the cicada, it is deafening. 

Their voices rise from the ground like a million corpses resurrecting.

They usher in the cast of characters changing the global scenery.

A blood-curdling fevered pitch of waking violence, sickness, and death.

Death of how we used to live.

Death of comforts taken for granted.

Death of mankind that choke our hope.

They usher in the cry of change.

The blood-curdling fevered pitch that wakes collective consciousness.

Rebirth of how we now will live.

Rebirth of comfort found in Mother Nature’s ingenuity.

Rebirth of mankind embarking on newfound paths.

They mark the year that found the world on fire, waking growth like a forest after burning wild.

It’s the year of the cicada, it is deafening.

 






Sunday, August 23, 2020

Cigarettes & String




A cigarette is trapped in her crinkled, pursed up lips.

Smoke twists away in curls of gray from her face.

She knows better, but there’s self-loathing woven in with her love.

Better off now than she ever was her mind tugs.

Neat and tidy in everyone’s view, a taunting string threatens her with unraveling.

Pulling it would mean destroying things in the pattern she designed.

Not an easy fix, pushing the thoughts back in with the string now stuck in the needle.

While no one’s watching she’s busy sewing, stitching herself back together.

Careful not to expose the secrets of her stuffing, hidden behind this bespoke version.

There’s a pause between these thoughts of hers, lingering in the ashtray.

Slow ashes are still burning from her cigarette put out too early, searing off the string.


Sunburn



There’s purpose in your whisper, it just annoys me, like peeling skin from a sunburned blister.

In another time we could have been friends, hell, even sisters, yet we’ve turned out very differently, feeling more like sworn enemies.

Still, you have your moments when you aren’t worthless, and there is love in you, you can feel it.  

Just like that late summer sunburn that torments but leaves glowing new skin behind.


Tuesday, April 21, 2020

Fireflies




The lake was beautiful, astonishing that you made it.  A man that made a lake! It sounded like a Paul Bunyan sized tale to a small child, but you did it, magic was real!

Every precious perch and trout made a journey with you there. Placed in new fresh water, they would thrive in this carefully made home.

I remember pulling your whiskers while I sat on your lap before bedtime. You smelled of Ivory soap and aftershave, your T-shirts were always soft and brilliantly white.

"Ow! Why you wanna do that?!"  We would giggle that silly bad giggle, a little girl with her best friend, making trouble and squeezing into your safety with all my tiny might.

The simple things about my life with you are captured, they are a scene of love like Polaroids kept bound in a secret folio, my memories a priceless treasure.

Seeing you in your bed that day was pain that shattered my gentle heart. The study of you, my ideas of man, my patriarch was leaving, traveling small and frail into the dark.

Fireflies were lighting your way, while you talked about the universe and being far away. Traversing all that frightened you, finding a reconciled final view, they led you with their glow of soft respite.

I have a family now that you never knew,  I'd love for them to sit on the lake with you.  To be at peace on the mountainside all of us quiet taking in painterly skies.  Listening to the streams together, pulling your whiskers tenderly, imagining all these things I can see your fireflies sparkling.





One more


One more batch of cookies with sugar lemon icing

One more Christmas making every ornament by the fire

One more call telling me your love of blackberry brandy

One more time hearing granddad shout "That's my French talking lady!" after you've been cursing down the hall

One more I love you is not enough, I want to say them all.

Indian Summer




The smell of late Summer is in the air.  Juice runs down my chin from a perfectly ripe pear.

Barefoot in the grass shucking peas.  Surrounded by rustling sweet-scented leaves and diligent hovering bumblebees. 

You'll tell the story about the frog and the lily pad.  You'll take me down dirt roads and remove everything that's sad.

The end of summer means I'm going home soon.  No more sleeping covered by scratchy line-dried Aztec sheets under a watchful moon.

You'll make me an RC float to wash this Indian Summer down.  Singing Country Roads in the Ranchero, your love tied up in the sound.



Sunday, April 5, 2020

Dead End

Dynamic, I saw you getting better

Problematic, my heart became untethered

Dramatic, our paths won't align 

A road never finished with a Dead End sign

Wasting


She mainlines herself until she is dry.  A brilliant mind that becomes addled and will be ruined over time.

Pushing an elixir of ego spikes deep into her veins.  A beautiful warm liquid floating into heaven, delicious and delirious, she is lulled by the singing of worms in her brain.

Lacking logic or judgment she does this over and over again.  Each time melting herself in her heated spoon's bend. The bubbling and burning excite her to no end.


She's happy when she's sprawling, eyes-rolling, stretched out along the floor.  Running her hands over her body, itching her soul, still craving more.

Monday, February 24, 2020

Dog Dream




I woke up tonight startled. 
I had to identify a dead dog; my friends tried to save it but he was belly up in the water headed toward a small flow through in a bridge   

This dream, it means so many things. 

The end of a man losing his journey while he slept. Your daughter loves you; she looks just like you.  Your granddaughter is everything you said she was and seeing her buried in her mother's side both broken and missing you is more than this heart can take. 

The man leaving my side to be in another part of the country, thank you for taking me out of my shell. I hate that I miss you already, it makes me feel weak. I’m happy for you and angry at you, and no it's not right but that's how these feelings register. You feel like family to me and I’m just not ready for you to leave. 

That dog, that dog is loss. That dog is losing a best friend, that dog is losing great men, that dog floating away from me, part of a future that I had imagined differently. One that can never be. My cheeks are wet, and sadness is set free.

Used Gum






I think they cut something bad out of me.

People are telling me they remember me, the old me, and how good it is to see me.
It hasn't been a one-time thing, it's not flippant, it's filled with purpose and certainty.  
I've found myself again, a piece of pain pulled from me.  
Like a piece of used chewing gum, that's what they said to me. 

Sunday, January 5, 2020

Back Seat


Take the back seat
My legs are too long, I’m smashed in, can’t keep my knees straight, everything feels wrong.

Makes me car sick, makes my mind tick, anxiety turns my mouth into a dry wick.

Feel the hair on my neck stand, backseat driver up to my neck in worried quicksand.

Look out the window, fresh air lets the breeze blow
Forces the leaves to turn, we start talking about it because we know

The rain is coming, starts hitting the windshield like nothing
Crunched into the back seat with my fists numbing

Turn the wipers on, soon we'll all be gone
Our destination determines the back seat won’t last too long

Slammed on the breaks in a full stop, throwing me forward, bit my lip, slightly swollen, it feels hot. Broke my skin, I taste the blood, just a small drop.

Open the door and let my body stretch, the driver doesn’t even look at me, stares down into his phone locked in melancholy and a paused itch.

Throw my jacket over my head and listen to the rain’s sound. I'm fine with finishing this journey walking on my own ground.

Thursday, January 2, 2020

Remember that Night




We were at a show, it was summer sticky, the air was thick with patchouli & peace tea.

The band was moving bodies, limbs were flexing & flowing in rhythmic contortions under the spell of their set.

Mounds of flesh blending, cooling themselves with condensation dripping with cold alcoholic wet.

We were laughing at the stage diver because this wasn't that kind of show, he seemed so foreign, almost funny that he wasn't 'in the know'.

On his last failed attempt at crashing they pulled him up by the pits of his long shirtless arms.  

He thought he had command of them, doing his bidding, but for them, he held no charm.

They were pulling leaves from the palms around them, fronds peeled into strips it was strange, the audience perplexed by their actions, and then it happened jaws dropping center stage.

The musicians leaned into him, saying something inaudible, but his actions made it clear, he went pale, very sudden, the leaves were his humiliation meal.

Picking them up he started eating, looking like a conquered bully deposed by the underdog champion wearing a freshly plucked crown.

The band pulled him behind the curtains and made a gesture to us all -- middle fingers raised to heaven and a quick kiss that absolved.

The music never stopped & I wondered if he vomited from the shame or eating what one aught, had he learned anything, had anything been taught?

A frame by frame replay loops in the swelter of that day, and while the band name escapes me, the memory stole some innocence, something changed in me that day.

Wednesday, January 1, 2020

Not your mother





I'm different, different how? 

Different the way your eyes look around. 

I'm not your mother. 

Don't tell me I remind you of her. 


Acrobat





Go ahead, think you're the shit, think you're the tits, your mind is doing splits. Does your head hurt? Are you calling it quits?


You're no acrobat, your skills are lousy at that. I'd help you up if you'd only accept it, instead of holding it against me like a blade to my neck.  

Stop and see, but you won't, your show-stopping blindfolded trick prevents it. There's no common sense, and it's affecting your balance. 

Your fingernails pulled away from their beds during your last act, crumpled in a swan dive to the floor. 

Shredded, your clumsy get-up prevented the heights that you sought to soar. Worn out, faded pout, black smoke, you've finally burned out. 

No more effort to be wasted, since the high wire betrayed you.  It snapped back with precision, now your show will never sell out.