sweet little light
how you flicker
like a fairy caught
in a darkened kitchen
you are a winged heart
and you sing as you soar
if only you weren’t so small
or this room so dark
or you voice so hard to hear
Tag: writer
pearls (20170509)
i mistook
what came
from your mouth
as words
when they
were teeth
you can hear the moon talking to herself (20170508)
the wolf plants himself by the fire
just an emaciated bag of sticks
–what do you want, moon chaser
he licks a paw and grins
–just waiting for you to die, fat boy
–ingrate
together, we watch flames
sparks echo stars
shadows echo night
——
matryoshka (20170507)
this hollowness aches
a matryoshka missing
its final babushka
a cold shadow
without enough room
to allow even an echo
but all too empty
the walls too far apart
the smell of wood
faint
the odor of red paint
overwhelming
x marks the spot
where the heart is buried
but the map is now lost at sea
and no one searches
either on the sea
or in the woods
no one willing to dig
no one willing to open
that last casket
thicker than water (20170506)
you’re a trickle
through my bloodstream
like a drop of oil
suspended in a bucket
of rusty water
the plasma is so heavy
you can’t rise
but you’re too buoyant
to sink properly
today’s haiku (20170505)
sun breaking through clouds
mariachi, street tacos
cinco de mayo party
slaughter complicit (20170504)
we rail against the butchers
complain about their blood-soaked
aprons and their knives
designed and dedicated to slicing
muscle from bone
we point our fingers as
they lead the food beasts
lowing and weeping through
dark alleys into the
sulfurous light
of the slaughterhouse
we rail
we point
we sit at our well-appointed tables
and fill our mouths with meat
gravy runs down our chins
gravy is just another word
for blood
we rail
we point
we complain as the butchers
press their thumbs upon the scales
and tip gold in their favor
we rail
we point
we pay extra for the fatty parts
and pray extra that we are not lead
lowing and weeping though
dark alleys into the
sulfurous light
of the slaughterhouse
we rail
we point
we sharpen the knives
in chains (20170503)
everything is ashes in my mouth
they taste like graveyard dirt
rife with greasy sins
of the dead
and those waiting to be reborn
eager to work off karmic burdens
the universe will not last
as long as their labors
long ponderous chains
manacle my hands and
hobble my ankles
i smell the smoke of regret
and envy
and it is my own flesh
that burns
filling my nostrils
worship (20170502)
i want to worship
but the only goddess
who will listen
in is a bottle
of salad dressing
pieces (20170501)
silent tracks this morning
but so much glass
glittering on the ground
were the wind to pick up
the air would cut me
to pieces
i follow the rails in shoes
with soles so thin
i feel every facet of every stone
trying to pierce my feet
though empty, i have seen the trains
not the romantic locomotives
with porters and bewatched conductors
crowded dining cars
mysterious liaisons
but industrial bulk behemoths
the color of rust
the odor of old burned oil
delivering invisibles
in closed cars
i walk the middle of the track
wood
gravel
wood
gravel
iron on either side
a shirtless jogger approaches
loping toward me
glistening in the sun
i imagine myself
in a coat hanging past the knee
a dusty, wide-brimmed hat
arm relaxed but ready
to draw at my side
another poet’s words
write themselves nearby
first in soot
then in blood:
inspired by beauty
betrayed by lust
abandon[ed] by greed
enslaved by guilt
the jogger turns
the wind rises
and i am cut to pieces
Words and Feathers 