Bare

What's a girl to wear
with so many scars to choose from?
I want to project my very best
when I'm dragged to the prison pyre.

My pale blue, retro conscience
brings out my gang / green eyes,
but it's lizard cracked, tarred and patched,
and the dial is stuck on Vice.

My gene pool flaunts my ass
like I'm melted and poured in it,
but it's pseudo-suffocating,
so I hesitate to wear it.

With so many scars to choose from,
oh, what's a girl to wear?
I want to project my very best,
so they'll have to burn me bare.

A little Jasmine's Jetsam for Open Link Monday at Real Toads.

Nevermind

A zen koan
melting,
Rumi-d,
and gone goddess.
A riddle
and a promise
held in secret self
divine.

A blank spot
for knowledge
between instinct
and insight.
Illumination -
attainment
of Nirvana
is mine.

Playing around with Shawna's #16 Word List.
Submitted to Poetry Pantry.

Monkey Mind

Time turns turgid in meditation
thanks to a miscreant monkey mind

that disrespects the demarcations
I attempt with ethereal candlelight.

With daily dementia and nonsense
and effervescence in his burlap bag,

monkey mind swings a treetop perspective
and uses zen to scratch his ass.

For A Word with Laurie at Real Toads

Naked Nights

There is something naked about these nights.
They cattail cold around my legs
until my flesh fails
and my bones brittle
blue to black beneath my skin.

Ragged in my old, pink robe,
I drag the small hours behind me
like a limp -
phantom limbs
splinted in silence
and aching

making mockery
of the amputations I've undertaken
to shorten these naked nights.

Gifts

I give you what
you tell me to give.
You give me what
you want me to have.

Orders placed.
Burdens shouldered.
Gifts exchanged.

Snow Ice Cream

When the snow reached my knees or better,
I'd get out the big, green bowl
and make snow ice cream.
I was twelve and unsupervised,
and I had few inklings
and even fewer concerns about food safety,
but I knew what I liked -

two raw eggs dropped in a bowl of snow,
a dash of vanilla and a slug of milk,
sugar, and more sugar
all stirred together into a sweet, sticky, salmonella slush
and popped into the freezer
to ferment and fester to a creamy concrete.

Oh, it was like eating pure, unprocessed heaven!

And, it's a damn wonder food poisoning didn't send me directly there.

But, deadly as it sounds,
I didn't even come close to dying that snowy winter

despite being twelve,
unsupervised,
and doing exactly as I liked.

For Open Link Night at dVerse

Merry Christmas!

Autobiography

If I pull me from the poem,
will the words stand on their own?
Will the heart still beat?
The blood flow free?
Or, must the flesh hang on my bones?

Numbers And Words

In numbers, I'm naked -
"maybes" calculated
on the anxious
abacus
of my ribs.

In words, I am a feast -
a banquet
for the beasts
unleashed
by what actually is.

For Open Link Night at dVerse

History Of The Prairie

Death whelped

white
walks-on-two-legs dogs
with iron, root ripping jaws
and open maws
for hands,

wire
fences surrounding
sod busting,
soul rusting
allotments
numbered like graves,

and wind
at the backs
of widows
and wet-eyed children
weak and wandering
west
to get ahead of the storm.

For Hannah's challenge at Real Toads

Venus

I didn't have time
to look at the moon that morning.
But I heard that she had never shone so bright.
A crescent call, come hither to her Venus
just before the dying of her light.

Now the sun declines
to pick apart this darkness
that layers like laments
on a lover's tongue.
Tired
and still as a tideless ocean,
endless as the song
I wish I'd sung

pretending to be Venus.

A disaster of a poem for a special Wednesday edition of Fireblossom Friday at Real Toads.

Note: The disaster I'm trying to depict here is the dying of the moon and sun.  I had this up for a bit yesterday, but I was really unhappy with it, so I took it down.  I reworked the first stanza; hopefully the whole thing is a little better.  Anyway, it's either this or a death of a pretty flower haiku.

Ambling

Linoleum longs
for the life of tile,
never seeing
that walked on is walked on.

Serendipity struggles for structure,
and silence seeks a voice.

Filled to the brim
with emptiness,
I bed down
in the briar

to Ambien amble toward slumber -
my butterfly of choice.

A few ink-stained words for Real Toads and Open Link Night at dVerse.

Mass Produced

Image by Daryl Edelstein

We were 

young,

witty,

sexy,

and straight off the showroom floor.

We had that new girl smell,

and we were hard as hell

to handle.

Then,

one became a mother.

One took a married lover.

One joined a faux ashram downtown.

We got cracks in the glass,

droops in the ass,

and engines making funky clunk sounds.

Quality control was slipping.

All our warranties had been let slide.

Wheels, years, and odometers rolling -

from latest models to classic rides.

For the Mini-Challenge at Real Toads

A Mother's Christmas Wish

Santa, dear Santa,
so jolly and nimble!
Don't bring me a gift;
just help me assemble!

Come in from the cold.
Come out of the weather.
Come in; I've got cookies -
help me put this together!

For Words Count with Real Toads

Holy Grounds

Pilgrims pew to get a view of God;
she never spills the coffee.
Faith is found in holy grounds
held by steady hands.
With the sign of the Sunday crossword,
St. Creola gives each a blessing
and a small to-go-with-God box
as the Queen purrs, "Come again."

Having a little fun with Ella's prompt at Real Toads.  Hmmm . . . which Toad's "home" could this be?

Ugly

I have an itch
for something meaner.
No more pretty words.

No fuck-me flowers,
no petaled lips.
No star strewn sky
or moon wet wish

can touch me today.
Not when I feel this way,

and everything's ugly.

For Open Link Night at dVerse

Two Views Of A Night

Oh, this honey hewn night!
I am manic with just desire
to shape your sugared stardust right;
put wax to fire
and fuse the fork between our wicks alight.

Oh, damn this forlorn night!
Our grand affair ground down to sand
by clash and drive and spit and spite -
you're just a man,
I'm sad to find; just a man of blacks and whites.

A form wordle for The Sunday Whirl and Kerry's Challenge at Real Toads

Note To Self / Don't Forget The Milk

Don't forget the milk -

the way it filled you
at her slightest sound
and tender rivered to her
as she butted and nuzzled
like a calf at the udder.
Don't forget how every other
thought fell away until she lay
sleep sighing against you,
her tiny hand curled around your nipple
as you rocked little and long
to the sing-song of the oldest
prayers and incantations.
You were becoming,
and you were patient.

Don't forget the milk.

Vaticide / Murder Of A Poet

I hate you less today
than I did yesterday
when I first read your poem -

the one that rained perfect words
like shards of glass across my thin skin
leaving a thousand cuts of covet

and me
rocking disconsolate in my chair,
my mouth filled with the taste of fungus and failure,
and my hands itching for vaticide.

I hate you less today
than I did yesterday.

But, not much.

Miss D'Meanor

Call me Miss D'Meanor.
I'm the method and the measure
between the girl who eats the apple
and the girl who bakes the pie.

Never wholly wholesome,
but less than average evil.
Call me Miss D'Meanor;
I'm how the middle makes a life.

For Open Link Night at dVerse

Eccentricities

I collect my eccentricities
like seashells and bones.
Shine them
till the hollows glow,
then hold
each one to my ear
to hear oceans all my own.

For Open Link Monday at Real Toads

Paradise Says

The day is a priceless gift.
Unwrap it.
Then, play with the box.

Rosie

A gathering murder,
a murder of girls,
with flesh feasting tongue beaks
and shrill, shredding words,
ring around Rosie -
pebble posies to throw.
But, Rosie couldn't fall down;
we wouldn't let go.

For Open Link Night at dVerse

Pinwheel Dress

I was a pigtailed girl
in a pinwheel dress
when Mama met a man
with thigh-high hands
and problems.

There are things that you don't talk about.

When I'd balance ballet
across the cattle guard,
he'd peel me like an orange
with his eyes and suck hard
at my tender segments.

There are things that you don't say aloud.

I felt so dirty
in my pinwheel dress;
with downcast eyes,
I'd run as fast
as I could, but never fast

enough.

There are things that I still dream about.

For Open Link Monday at Real Toads

In Trade

I'll trade you a kiss
for the key to the cellar.
I hear that there the darkness keeps

its paper dolls
and fractured children,

and I think that I'd feel
more at home there than you.

I'll trade you a kiss
for the leash of the monster.
I hear the rumbling growl in its gut

for paper dolls
and fractured children,

and I think that I'd feed
it far better than you.

I'll trade you a kiss
to lock the door behind me.
I've heard it said that I'm not safe

around paper dolls
and fractured children,

and I fear
that I cannot be trusted with you.

Post Its

At night, I dream

of house fires

and milk,

of empty jars of Noxzema,

and of sandwiches

with the crusts cut off.

During the day,

I don't dream at all.

Gentle Reader

Don't leave me stuck here
tonight -
crushed against your bookmark
and buried 'neath the blanket
of the facing page.

Don't set me aside.
I have words still left to whisper
to the tender tip of your finger
as you keep your place.

For Kerry's challenge at Real Toads

Camera Eyes

Fearing that I love you,
I craft camera eyes
to zoom in nearer,
focus clearer;
macro
and magnify.

But, I still
cannot see your insides.

So, fearing that I love you,
I stitch scalpels on my hands
to open you,
explore you;
dissect
and understand.

I'll put you back together
if I can.

For Open Link Night at dVerse

Thanking A Veteran

If you'd stand against war
like you line up for iPhones;
if you'd make peace the platform
and not just a plank;
if you'd only spend soldiers
like a miser spends money,

I could be the last veteran
you have to thank.

Note: I am not a veteran.  This is just a bit of idealism in their honor.

Submitted to Poetry Pantry

Etude / My Daughter's Recorder

Skreek, squawk, hiss, hoot all crazy.
Weep, whine, whinny, and groan.
Bleat, bray, blat, shriek, and waver.
Quaver, keen, cry, and moan.
And, to each tone
I say, "That's lovely, baby."

For the Mini-Challenge at Real Toads

When He's Gone

When he's gone,
I take the air
deeper.
I unfold to fill
my natural space.
I reclaim my shadow.

Untamed

"Though little fire grows great with little wind,
Yet extreme gusts will blow out fire and all.
So I to her and so she yields to me . . ."

--- William Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew

Red cedar trees,
drought dry
and tinder tight,
arc sparks
into the smoke stained sky
to be caught and carried
by the Oklahoma wind
and kissed to fiery blaze again.

So I to him and so he burns for me.

What She's Gonna Do

She's gonna do what's she's gonna do.
She's a train wreck on the tracks.
She's a labor of love that breaks your heart
and breaks your back.

It's nothin' to do with you.
Her wrongs are rooted damnation deep.
Sickle through them like so many weeds.
Harvest her black and blue.

She's gonna do what's she's gonna do.

All That's Left

All that's left
is right in front of me.
All that's left
is to write it down.

Teacups with shattered saucers.
An unblinking doll in tattered dress.
A penciled map thrice folded,
twice followed,
and both times misread.

All that's left
is what's been left to me.
It's only right
that I should write it down.

For Open Link Night at dVerse

Texting

I take myself out
4 coffee,
then text myself
2 look important
& less lonely.

For Open Link Monday at Real Toads

Just Beneath The Skin

image by SueAnn

Just beneath the skin of sleep,

I am bird bones fleshed and feathered.

I am stubborn, skyclad branches.

I am silence in full throat.

Just beneath the skin of sleep,

fruit embraces seed

and want mates true with need

and both

sides of the pillow cool my face.

For Poetics at dVerse and Poetry Pantry.

Pictures

I keep a camera
close at hand
through the day's best light.
I frame.
I photograph.
And, at night

I dream
myself
into the pictures.

Just Friends

I have a fragment
of full moon
on a chain
and a breathless
beatitude
stained
berry black
on the small of my back -

otherwise, I'd just forget you.

I have a snippet
of verse
in my shoe
and a bottle tree
ready to bloom
between your house and mine.

It straddles the property line

where you end
and I begin -

just friends.

For Fireblossom Friday at Real Toads

Places

I keep my spiders in a jar
and my matches very far
from my gasoline.

I keep my redbirds out of sight
and let my blackbirds fly at night.
When they come back to me,

I ask them what to do with you.

Why Writers Stay Single

You're a rough draft.
A not good enough draft.
But, I'll make a man -
u-script out of you.

I'll cut,
edit,
and rewrite.
Discuss you with my crit group
on Thursday nights.

I'll purge,
polish,
and plot.
Develop whatever
character you've got.

Till happy or not,
we're ending.

To Winter

Late fall roses with frost etched leaves
barely bloom born; already
they're half gone
to winter, to winter -
I'm feeling my age
and something like rage that cruel
winter comes so soon.

A belated entry for Kerry's Mini Challenge.  Submitted to Open Link Monday at Real Toads.

Ghosting The Writer

Let me linger
here
at birth's bedside -

hands hovering at your brow,
but not daring
to smooth the furrows,

ear turned and tilted
to catch any wayward,
whispered word.

Let me linger
here with you
at birth's bedside

as midwife,
as muse,
or as mere

secondhand god.

Sunday Drive

image via Google

"Here we go to Sunday school, Sunday school, Sunday school.

Here we go to Sunday school

at 30 miles per hour."

--- little ditty my sister and I made up and sang when we were kids

Riding in the backseat

of my step-great-grandmother's '76 Pacer

on Sunday mornings,

I began to question my belief in God.

I was only nine,

but Nannie took her time

winding her unsteady way to the straight and narrow
little Baptist church on the county line,
with every minute being a thousand years
of swinging from ditch to ditch and swaying
to crackling honky tonk turned holy roller on the AM radio,

so I had plenty of time to think

of how the "tink, tink, tink"

of the right turn signal

blinking mile after mile

reminded me of Moses wandering around the desert for forty years

with the promised land forever

just up ahead . . .

and of how I would have gotten a map, 

instead.

True story.  To this day, traveling slower than the speed limit gives me felonious urges.  Written for Mary's "pet peeves" prompt at Real Toads.

Vultures

Black finely feathers blue.
Stealing shadows kill.
Rancid rain that pecks the eyes.
Stealing shadows kill.
Flooding the feet of the huntress fair.
Stealing shadows kill.
Till she's buried there in brainless number.
Stealing shadows kill.

A chant poem.

Simple

We are simple, really.

When the loudmouth neighborhood dog barks at 4 AM,
we want to know that we aren't the only one
awake and pissed.

When our hated high school rival of twenty years ago crosses our path at Target,
we want to see that she's aged badly
and her kids are ugly.

We want
the opposing quarterback on a stretcher,
an artfully stolen parking place,
and occasional sex in positions
(unsanctioned by any missionary)
where we come first.

Simple, really,

the petty offerings
that serve to sate
the complicated appetites
of our darker gods.

For Open Link Night at dVerse

Water's Edge

Moonshine hollows the cypress tree
and pools pale on roots
rutting the mossy, muddy hips
of the dark, cradled water.

Gettin' my Jue Jue on for Real Toads.

Butterfly Lights

Butterflies against the light.
Capsuled breath and shadowed space.

Butterflies beneath the light.
I push the final pin in the place.

Reaping The Wind

random stolen photo

Gypsy dressed, the night sky 

smoothes her cloudy skirts

and waits for the wind

to lift her hem

and bare her crescent thigh

star-gartered.

But the wind, never shy before,

is silent, still, now

spoken for

to feed the mills

and fill the sails -

bartered

till it's

gone.

Some harvest whirly gig for Real Toads and a little enjambment for dVerse.

Ah, it's good to be back!

Mediterranean Homesick Blues

Mama's in the cafe
writing in her cahier.
Waitress is narrow-lipped
thinking poets never tip.
Dude in a raincoat,
barefoot, pants off
straight off the shamba
here to syphon off his drop.
Stupid little girl-
slinging your pearls
and tapping your casks
for any shivering fool that asks.
Politeness is destruction
taken critically to task.
Peering round the curtains
a sculptured mirror mask
watches Brandy pour the brandy
as the awning just collapses.

Flipside . . . for OLN at dVerse

I'm having surgery tomorrow, so I won't be around for a few days.  Wish me luck!

Partition

Vague has its own vibration.
Loneliness likes to hold hands.
Your eyes are a darkroom
where negatives seem to transcend
every pinprick of light
that I try to sneak in.

Damn this throbbing in my head;
overexposed again.

The quivering edge of the high note
hangs like a bracelet on the bone.
I'm huddled, small, in your sweatshirt.
And, I just want to go home
so I can build myself a partition
between you here and you gone

to keep myself from looking backward
and keep moving on.

A belated Flipside poem for Open Link Monday at Real Toads

Be

I can be your man.

Tall, dark, and handsy.
Magicked up as midnight.
A doorway to the dawn.

I can be your woman.

Brothel born and fancy.
String you south like starlight.
Suck the skin right off your bones.

Don't matter to me
what you want me to be
as long as you be
mine.

I can be your dog.

Panting just to please you.
Roll over on my back
anytime you say.

I can be your cat.

Curling round your legs
and getting all familiar.
Twitch my tail and strut away.

Don't matter to me
what you want me to be
as long as you be
mine.

One October Night

Jack
had a wife
and a butterfly knife.

John met both.

For Words Count at Real Toads

Skeleton Key

I gave a quick twist
to the skeleton key,
but the skeleton wouldn't start.
So I got down
on bended knee
and spoke to its absent heart.

"The bed is burned,
and the birthing knife
lies buried in the ash.
Undertakers on overtime
trade puny plots
for cash.
Worms wiggle wet
within my gut;
I'm eaten half alive.
And, dry rot claims
great chunks of brain
like a rich man
claims a bride."

Then I rested my bones
by the bones at rest;
some solace to await.
The skull just smiled -
a dead man's joke -
the living learn,
but learn too late.

For Open Link Night at dVerse

If We Were Lovers

If we were lovers,
I would kiss you at red lights-
hard, thoroughly, and unhurriedly-
until cars backed and stacked
and curses blued the air
like vulgar, finely feathered
birds.

"Green means go
get a fucking room,
why dontcha?"

I'd lace my fingers with yours,
dangle my feet out the passenger window,
and let you drive me (mad)
to the next intersection.

If we were lovers,
I'd wear your old t-shirts
with heels and with diamonds
and without panties or plans to leave the house
on Saturday night

or Sunday morning.

If we were lovers,
I'd soak in you
like a hot bath

with vanilla lavender bubbles.

For Poetry Pantry

Country Air

photo by Susie Clevenger

Screams carry clean

through country air,

through unlocked doors, through open windows

when vinegar splashes

sun blistered skin, 

and cruelty is the price of being small. 

Words warp to starker howls.

Survival strips the curtains down,

and she cocoons

in a makeshift shroud

burning,

burning.

Screams carry clean

through country air.

Lock the doors.  Close the windows. 

For the Sunday Challenge at Real Toads 

Spellbound

Autumn breezes waltz
her skirt high above her knees,
and the trees shiver

soft incantations
that flutter leaves loose to fall
spellbound at her feet.

For Haiku Heights and Fireblossom Friday at Real Toads

Shaped

Shaped
as I am
by uncertain
hands
can I ever
be fit
for meaning?

The Canopy Bed

Shadows skitter atop
my canopy bed,
and heads hang
over the side -
moon sliver eyes
peering
through flouncy pink ruffles.

Fast!  I muffle
my little girl screams
(with pillows, with shame),
take big girl aim
with my Monster Spray
WhimperWhisper

AWAY
BEGONE

and learn monsters always stay
till dawn
when a girl's alone.

For Open Link Night at dVerse

September Girl

 

photo by Ellen Wilson

 

September Girl
shakes the branches
with an eye to winning ribbons.

Autumn Woman
shakes in places
she doesn't think is fair.

Judging a pear / pair.

A stab at a sevenling for the Sunday Challenge at Real Toads

What It Was Like

Image via Creative Commons

Outside one morning,
waiting for the bus,
cold
and still half asleep,
I rested my head against a fence post
and my foot on the bottom
strand of wire.

"What are you doin'?"
he hollered from the front porch.
"Nothin',"
I hollered back.

He whipped me twice;
once for having my foot on the wire

and once more for lying about it.

For Mary's Mixed Bag at Real Toads

Burnt Toast

I cannot save the world
on burnt toast and bad coffee.
I cannot preach the peace and love
with Folgers on my breath.
I cannot feed the homeless
if I can't even find the jelly.
This ain't my day for miracles;
I'm going back to bed.

Accomodations

You don't have to bed me down
in the dense capillaries of your heart.
I'll be fine
in the cranial castle of your skull

where I can thread myself
through a clenched jaw -
wringing dizzying, queasy panic
from a threatened throat.

Where I can siphon sight from one eye,
dedicate it to its opposite,
and let cataclysmic rivalry
blind them both.

No, you don't have to bed me down
in the catastrophically constricted capillaries
of your poor, miserly heart.
I'll just crash on the futon,
and in the morning, I'll go.

A Flipside poem for Open Link Night at dVerse.

Yard-Art-Work

red dirt hands
shades of green grass knees
yard-art-work

A bit of haiku for Haiku Heights and Kerry's Firefly Jar at Real Toads

Spin Cycle

We went for a ride on his motorcycle.
I didn't know his name,
but dragging Main,
I imagined him just as I wanted.

Smart and strong
with a gentle heart
and a quirky taste
for art
and poetry.
And, girls like me.

Climbing off of his motorcycle,
I didn't catch his name.
But, I've imagined him
in every man I've wanted,

had,

and then found wanting.

The Jug Line

They swim
like a school of fools
to The Jug Line
for cheap cocktails and cleavage -
"more than a mouthful!" -
and to help each other tread
truth's choppy waters.

To crack a few jokes,
slap some ass,
and lie
about pussy, perch, and big mouth bass.
To keep themselves from ever asking
for something more.

Fiction in 55 for my G-Man.

The Divine

Bread bones dust my lips,
but I turn my face from wine
and scent/seek instead

the pale, pagan pulse
river rushing sacrament
just . . . under. . . your skin.

A bit of True Blood haiku . . .for Open Link Night at dVerse.

Make (It) Up

Image by Margaret Bednar

With a bit of gloss

I turn this everyday dross

into some fool's gold.

For Haiku Heights and the Sunday Challenge at Real Toads.

In The Voice Of Barry White

Baby

you are the pineapple
in a fruit medley
packed with kumquats
and dumb twats
with prepackaged eyes.

You are old-fashioned sass
and frass
with herb laden
licorice lips
that I can still taste
late
the morning after.

You fresh squeeze me
like juice;
you savor the pulp and pith.

Baby

you are my low, low,
easy road
to the natural.

A Flipside poem.

Cure (Worse Than The Disease)

Sixty long minutes
with Infallible Doctor,
alluring, but distant,
in his oversize chair.
He tries to talk me to cure,
asks framed, feckless questions.
Then, shakes his head in surprise
at my mistrustful stare.

Next, a witty internist
imported from Pittsburgh
brings his learning and love
of electronics to bear.
Entangling wires, evolving theories
of voltage.
I'm shocked from my toes
to the tips of my hair.

So, come dashing knight
in pharmaceutical armor!
Come bearing Prozac
and relentless good cheer.
I'll be here waiting
with cottonmouth kisses.
Energetic, but aimless,
and not thinking too clear.

A Flipside poem.

Tired

Come dark I'll embark
on sleep's thin raft.
It's brittle rest at best,
but it's all I have

between harried days that eat away
at my shallow grace.
Between shrill demands that sand
the smile right off my face.

I willow into my pillow
like it's a lover desired,
and dream of the me I'd be
if I just wasn't so tired.

Dosed

I used green wood glyphs
to feed the fire,
witched up a story
while we got a little higher,
and hoped it was true
that white wine
goes well with a Pisces girl.

Under lunar light
the plain looks profound
and ripe for divination
when the bottle spins round.
Banishing better judgement -
came natural in the natural world.

Was it the loss of our heresy
that cost us our potency
and left us trembling for a tonic
to keep us safe and bored?

Dosed
of our own accord.

A much belated Flipside poem for Open Link Night at dVerse.

Paper Boat

My little blue vote
is a leaky, paper boat
on a red state sea.

For the September Challenge at Haiku Heights and Open Link Monday at Real Toads.

Law Review

Everyone knew
that law review
sorted the "withs"
from "withouts."

So imagine the look
on each earnest face
when I gave up my place
and walked out!

Recalling one of my finer acts of rebellion for Poetics at dVerse.

Morning With Dogs

Dawn breaks warm and wet,
lapping and licking my face
with a drawbridge tongue.

For the September Challenge at Haiku Heights

Mother Wolf

Whimpering wet against my belly,
searching, suckling blind,
you are deaf to my mother song -

the song
that rises from the deepest heat of my belly,
and drifts, gentle, into the sacred blind

of snow and ice, the savage blind
of slow death. I sing the mother song
to silence the growling of an empty belly -

the belly that shiver shelters you - whimpering wet, suckling blind, and deaf to my mother song.

An arctic tritina for Real Toads and dVerse.

Silvered

Sad and silvered are these bones -
safe from sinner's death decay.
Oh, but where you held my heart,
hell's hateful hemlock has its way!

I'm always drawn to the imagery of bones . . .
For Words Count at Real Toads

Close Up 2012

Underside by Jaime Clark

In close up,

stripped of rhetoric,

flag waving,

name calling,

and all other distractions,

it's clear that we're screwed.

For the Sunday Challenge at Real Toads

Letters In A Drawer

I keep your letters in a drawer
under jeans I can't get into
and swimsuits I don't wear.
I keep you there
with things that no longer fit me.
You no longer fit me.

I don't hate you anymore.
But, I can't say for sure I loved you.
It all seems so blurry.
Why was I in such a hurry
to be somebody's girl
as if that's all there was to be?

Your letters in a drawer
are like ashes in an urn.
When I'm feeling funeral black,
I let them take me back,
not to the corpse of you,
but to the ghost of me.

For Fireblossom Friday at Real Toads

Watermelon

We fall

sticky
in the fresh cut grass.

Fingers
seed slick.
Legs
vined.

We kiss

lips
watermelon wet

from the sweet suck
of flesh from the rind.

Fall

Lacking a dead horse to beat,
I water the garden.

Late August of a very bad summer -
everything is sun scorched
and dry as drought,
but I have a root deep reluctance
to just let go;
wishful thinking is my blind indulgence.
Fall, I say to myself.  If we can just hold on till Fall.

Hose in hand,
I watch the water
slant sparkle
against the unforgiving menace
of sun and cloudless sky,
then bounce splash the dead, dormant dirt.
If it would matter,
I would fall to my knees on the parched earth,
dig the tender leavings by hand,
and clasp them to my rainy heart.
If we can just hold on . . .

Inquiry has brought me
only quaint tales and distraction:

Fear not!  For the Master Gardener will come
to claim this sad herbarium
and take it to the great utopia in the sky!
You will be left with photographs,
lovely parting gifts in probate,
and granite carved grief!

I grit my teeth
and tighten my grip on the hose.

hold on till Fall.

A Flipside poem for Open Link Night at dVerse.

Green Grass Summers

My green grass summers
are but brown grass memories
as my days shorten.

For Haiku Heights and dVerse

Stairs

I wanted a home
with stairs -
two stories of stability to house
a happily ever after
rooted deep
and backdropped by unchanging scenery.

I didn't realize there would be so much climbing.

Sick Bed

When my illness craves your illness
and my plague pines for your dark plague,
I prepare my pride and poultice
and take to the sick bed I've made.
With Bible, bleeding bowl, and blade
atop my fever twisted sheets,
what unsuspecting haste is made
to bring you, my disease, to me.

For Poetics at dVerse

Monastery Wine

We drank monastery wine,
got leather lashed and vacant,
and chewed the long day's demon fruit
down to stone pit night.

From our hospital hearts
came poetry -
surgically scarred,
but grammatically correct -
limping through our thickened lips
in a mad mix
of thumb crunching consonants,
strutting sex,
and slouching innuendo

until we fell

into silent genius
and the well-tried triangles
of our own eccentric geometry.

A Flipside poem

Kinky

Kinky St. Curvaceous
is the patron saint of me.
I preach to non-believers
from the alcoves on Avenue B.
I hand out maps to heaven
to the lost who wander past.
Narrow is the invisible way,
and the time it dwindles fast.

Praise Kinky!

Kinky keeps her counsel
behind her veil of lace.
Police car lights refract the night,
a red and blue ricochet.
Last week we flooded out again,
and the stick-spin men said "go!"
Well, the water warped the clinic door,
but didn't wet the methadone.

Praise Kinky!

A Sunday Whirl for Open Link Night at dVerse

Books

Had I not

run out of books,

I would have not

come out.

A Magpie Tale for Open Link Monday at Real Toads

Animal Girls

We are laugh eyed dogs
sniffing under logs.
Feeding on the frogs
that failed to prince.
We are alley cats
with a taste for rats
we've caught and crushed flat
in our pawfists.

We are birds of prey
circling through the day.
Seem to fly away . . .
and then we strike.
We're nothing like you.
We're untamed and true.
And, we're gonna do
just as we like.

A Cyhydedd Hir for Kerry's Challenge at Real Toads.
Also submitted to Poetry Pantry.

Summer Blonde

I starved myself blonde
that summer.
Wished on every star I saw.
Cluttered the backseat
with boyfriends and girlfriends
and fed myself raven
come fall.

For Poetics at dVerse

Grinding Stones

Meet me at miscreant
midnight.
Cradle me
like a character flaw.
Bear witness
to my weakness
and tell no one

of grinding stones
and rot.

For A Word with Laurie at Real Toads

Venus Aphrodite

Tame her tangled hair.
Paint her lips a pleasing coral.
Sweeten her to sate
a sugar craving tongue.
She is alabaster clay,
bloodless at the wrists.
Her finger dipped in gold
hardens in the sun.

for Poetics at dVerse

Critics Rave

Doomsday hit on Tuesday.
The reviews were terrible.

Cheesy.
Predictable.
A poor excuse for an Apocalypse.

Personally, I didn't think it was that bad.

For Izy's Doomsday Challenge at Real Toads

A Shanty

A pair of loose lips
may sink a ship,
but, oh, what happy sailors!
Before you navigate the boat,
you gotta navigate my trailer.
Don't bother dropping anchor;
I'm just a port you're passing through.
And, if you wake my Ma,
you'll get a good, stern talking to.

I'm always at the rail
when a ship comes sailing in.
A link to shore and what's in store
for our fine seafaring men.
I've never felt the pitch and roll
of a deck on a stormy sea.
But, I'm salty to my marrow
so the seamen come to me.

A Sunday Whirl shanty for Open Link Night at dVerse

Ouija Circle South

A Shayzen

He hadn't been there to see, and so didn't believe
in the empty, loss-scented envelopes
that arrived each day by post.

Each pastel,
each precious
as a past nursery rhyme.

He said, "you are excitable,
hysterical,
to believe we have a ghost."

And, my mind saw my womb
wandering waste
in the night.

This form is called a Shayzen poem.  Combining the undisciplined, scattershot doubletalk of Fireblossom with the stingy, taciturn, snotty monosyllables of Mama Zen, this form has been hailed by the avant garde even as it has been panned by the literary establishment.  The Shayzen can be used to get stains out of carpets, it can rid your dog of bothersome fleas and ticks, and can even be worn as a fragrance.  Do not read Shayzens near an open flame.  Talk to your doctor about Shayzens.  It's our form.  Eat your hearts out.  You may now touch the hem of our garments.  





For Open Link Monday at Real Toads

Big Tent

photo by Teresa

No blacks.

No gays.

No women.

No brown of any shade.

No Occupiers

or leftists.

Socialists,

keep away!

No liberal

tax and spenders.

No atheists

or sluts.

No pansy, pussy

war-enders.

But, we proudly welcome 

NUTS!

Oh, relax!  I'm just having a little fun with the Sunday Challenge at Real Toads.  Also submitted to Poetry Pantry.

Tally Mark

ink melts
drips
from my fingertips
and splashes the page

no love poem today

just scratches on the coffin lid
and another tally mark
on the wall

August 1st

Separate the clouds
from the cobwebs.
Weed the lightning fields.
Hold hands with the sky
and midwife the moon.

A zuihitsu for Kerry's challenge at Real Toads

Standards

You offered me
dewberry tea
with a dismal lack of grace,
a weather bitten wink,
a warped tooth leer across your face.

I could see you were ill-nurtured;
still, to the ruttish I'm a friend.
But, when I saw the pox
midst your comb-over locks;
I thought my kidneys would cave right in!

I won't stoop to call you beast, Sir,
craven, or a varlot,
but next time you come
reeling out the weed
bring good malt
or find a cross-eyed harlot!

Poetic Words 2 for Open Link Night at dVerse

Skinner Box

I am mortal inside this humble structure,

but I have the threat of hell

and a promised portion of paradise.

I have senses,

exquisite,

but I exert my will

to deny them what they want

at least a third of the time.

My fears and frailties

(generally)

fail to penetrate

my (un)consciousness,

and I am blindly dependent

on the drug of destiny.

By any objective measure,

I prove the science I abhor

and the effectiveness of the Skinner Box.

From Wikipedia:  A Skinner Box "permits experimenters to study behavior conditioning by teaching a subject animal to perform certain actions (like pressing a lever) in response to specific stimuli, like a light or sound signal.  When the subject correctly performs the behavior, the chamber mechanism delivers food or another reward.  In some cases, the mechanism delivers a punishment for incorrect or missing responses.

Poetic Words (List 1).  Submitted to Open Link Monday at Real Toads.

Wayward Arrows

From my bow, six wayward arrows
arc sublime to rough the sun's halls.
Oh, fly fast, my sharpened sparrows!
Pierce proud channels through the sky walls.
Attack the clouds and break them all!
They'll settle on our drying bones
and our once rich and robust homes;
falling frenzy on the marrow
of  life left marked by tilting stones
and a flight of wayward arrows.

Sunday Whirl words in a dizain for Kerry's (brutal!) Sunday challenge at Real Toads.
Also submitted to Poetry Pantry.

I Tried

I tried, but could not
catch the bird whose song I heard
lilting through the leaves.
Stay and lie with me.
Let me coo, soft, at your breast.
Maybe, she'll return.

If They Can't Take A Joke

On the tip
of my intemperate tongue
is a tasteless joke
tickling
inappropriate giggles
from the guts of grief.
Snickers and snorts
of every sort
crash against the cracks
of my crumbling composure.
Finally, I let it loose -
the gallows guffaw
of a hanged man
struggling for balance
at the end of a fraying rope.

Hat trick!  A sound for Think Tank Thursday, balance for dVerse, and . . . 55 words for my G-Man!

Hieroglyphics

Night's hieroglyphics are plain to me

as initials carved on a tree.

Graffiti is history.

History, graffiti.

Stars shine with secrets.

Moons fill to tell.

Then, sunrise

steals my
sight.

A Magpie Tale

Submitted to Words Count at Real Toads

That June

We agreed that Michael Stipe
couldn't sing, but he could write.
And, hip hop was a fungus
that would kill acoustic soon.
Playing Thursday gigs for Pearls,
resolutely amateur -
the nights so humid
the guitars went out of tune

that June.
That June.

Monday mornings we'd ditch German Lit and Culture
to go smoke fairy rings behind the Student U.
We'd settle back against the dying tree roots.
Three summer credits; we couldn't graduate too soon

that June.
That June.

Now Monday mornings, I'm drinking coffee through a straw.
Got student loans to pay; I gotta suck up to my boss.
Monday mornings - migraines and anxiety.
Monday mornings ain't like they used to be

that June.
That June.

Some of Shawna's words for Open Link Night at dVerse

A Woman's History

Five times

she survived

sweating,

screaming

childbirth

at home without a doctor.

She buried two babies.

When harvest crews took the fields

she spent the heat of her days

cooking meals

for fifty or better.

She ate last and cleared the plates alone.

And, every Sunday

she attended church

wearing her finest hat.

Whether she prayed 

or demanded an explanation,

nobody knows.

For Ella's prompt at Real Toads.  The picture is not mine; it ended up with my watermark when I cropped it, and I'm too lazy to figure out how to get it off.

Unfinished

This poem

would have turned poets into rock stars,
renewed the human spirit,
and cured cancer . . .

but I got distracted.

For Theme Thursday

The Devil

The devil dresses me down
to a trifle scrap of lace,
powders sweat from my face,
and curls ringlets in my hair.

The pulse inside my wrist
he scents with tears of absinthe
then tongues his judas kiss
in the palms of my dirty hands.

For Fireblossom Friday at Real Toads

Roadside Stand

I
build

bells of bones
and pretty stones
string them for the wind that blows
backwards
east to west
stealing words
stealing sage sweet breath.

I
sell

trinkets
from roadside stands
to catch the eye
and money in hand
of some white man
and his lady;
they don't sleep well at night.

Neither do I.

Fiction in 55 words for my G-Man!

Unanswered

When there's a lull

unwelcome

unwanted

between one thing and the next,

the question comes

unwelcome

unwanted

how do I feel?

A Magpie Tale

Also submitted to Open Link Monday at Real Toads

Constellations

I whispered until the sky came closer
and haloed the dark around my nightspeak lips.
And that's how constellations arose here,
lit by longing and crafted by a wish
for a storm starry night, a breathless kiss,
and a water moon pooled between my thighs
to hungry harbor any sailing ships
led lost by my constellations' lies.

A Huitain for Kerry's Challenge at Real Toads
Also submitted to Poetry Pantry

French Today

Give me wine
instead of whine
and cheese
instead of Cheez-Its.
Give me quaint, street side cafes
instead of Chuck E. Cheese's.
Give me chic!  Give me style!
Listen to what I say.
Give me a break and take these kids.
Mom is French today.

Inspired by a fairly recent bestseller (Bringing up Bebe).  It claims that French mothers are far more relaxed and happy than their American counterparts.


For Karin's prompt at dVerse.

Thirteen Seeds

Thirteen seeds in a beggar's hand.
Sun comes free, but he ain't got land.
He won't get a plot of his own
till he's buried without a stone.

But, beggar - he's a thinkin' man.
Keeps road dust in a coffee can.
Gathers dirt wherever he goes,
and that beggar man plants and grows
his thirteen seeds.

Thirteen seeds in a Folger's can
are treasure to the beggar man.
Then the guvmint screams "taxes owed!"
and comes to take the "land" he stole,
leavin' him with nothin' to show
for thirteen seeds.

For Mary's Challenge at Real Toads

What We Wore

Undone
as the buttons on a barfly's dress.
We wore madness
when we dressed to impress.
And, disappointed butterflies
with our tasteless flowers.

You let me sleep
when the house caught fire.
You bound my feet
with ribbons and barbed wire.
Ran me down like rain
on a window pane,
but I didn't go.

I just had to know
what it was like to hurt for love.

Sanity wears a somber suit.
Maturity favors darker hues.
Sobriety's a hair shirt;
sometimes I still itch.

I think about you every summertime
when the days are longer
and the sun stretches out the time
it beats down like pain
until a window of rain
opens in the sky

to let a storm blow by.
And, I know better
than to call it love.

Down At The Local

Down at the local suck-n-fuck,
time pole dances
a slow strip of past progress
while her newly literate patrons
peruse fifty shades of poorly written porn
and mutter to themselves,
"I knew it!"

Shades of social commentary on Fifty Shades of Grey for Kenia's Challenge at Real Toads

Wood Of The Widow Maker

She is wood of the widow maker tree.
Sap sticky seed
of the first man to ask
and the last to leave
before famine took the fields.

She is a snake strung bow.
Drawn of the drink
of the first man to come
and the last to go.
Circles sink to dust and yield

when she steps like a goddess,
restless
and homegrown.

for Open Link Night at dVerse

Other Housewives

Other housewives
linger longer
at the stove
they know they ought to
have a hot, fresh meal prepared
when Sir Lord Alpha wanders home.

My tongue stings citrus,
working word fruit from the rind.


Other housewives
jog with strollers
around the block
sun on their shoulders
and greet neighbors like eternity
has passed since they last spoke.

I jumble half-folded clothes into drawers,
subtracting sounds that fall too easy.


Other housewives
keep the balls
moving through the air
and spurn the flaws
they've concealed for years;
months of magazines beside the bed show them how it's done.

I stink of ink and am artfully ignorant.

***

A wink and a nod to Kerry's awesome piece at Skywriting.

Submitted to The Sunday Whirl and Open Link Monday at Real Toads

Uncertainty

I swallow uncertainty
like a pill.
Head thrown back.
Eyes clenched shut.
Throat closed in rebellion.

I swallow a pill
to like uncertainty
just a little more
than I like Mitt Romney,
high humidity,
or a pelvic exam.

for Theme Thursday

Boxed Up / Boxed In

Those parts of me that left you cold,
my laugh too loud and eyes too bold,
I packed them in a box somewhere
to ease your fear a look or stare
would mark me different from the fold.

Together, quickly, we grew old.
Quicker still all the lies we'd told
to make ourselves seem much more fair
than real can be.

Now, I search for that battered, old
box to see if it might still hold
those parts of me I hid in there,
the parts of me that never cared
for doing just as I was told;
the best of me.

Indecision

Yes.
Yes?
Yes.

A parody of my own brevity for Izy's challenge at Real Toads.  

Ghost

Your ghost comma curls around my shoulders
when I go walking late at night
to seek my solace from the moon
once the whippoorwills have sung her to shine.

The laying on of hands failed twice
to wash my one wish from my flesh;
to mate the mist that's left of you
comma curled against my neck.

for Open Link Night at dVerse

Snapshots

Under the skin
of the snapshots you sent,
thin lips strain against empty gesture smiles,
stillness studies the act of touch,
and you stand with the other I called friend.

Under my skin
with the snapshots you sent;
under I'll be fine in time,
under I don't miss you quite so much,
under forgetting what might have been.

So, I utter a curse
on the snapshots you sent.
A curse on your plastic, pitying smiles!
A curse on the hands that used to touch me!
A curse on my reptilian bitch of a friend!

And, each time I see them I curse them again.

A Sunday Whirl wordle submitted to Open Link Monday at Real Toads

Ellipses

In the pause
after the asking,
kiss ellipses .
                   .
                   .
down my neck,
and I'll say yes.

for Poetry Pantry

Gardener's Secret

Every day's a long day
when no one waits for you at night.
Every day's a long day
when no one waits for you at night.
Get no glory in the bedroom,
Lord, it sure does steal your shine.

Every cry is ugly
when your man done done you wrong.
Every cry is ugly
when your man done done you wrong.
Gotta weep like a woman scorned
when you tell the po-lice he up and gone.

Every crop's a bumper
when the soil is rich and right.
Every crop's a bumper
when the soil is rich and right.
A good gardener's got her secrets.
I plant dem bad seeds late at night.

White Flag

I whispered your name to the sunrise
when I was only half awake.
The emptiness that is my answer
is still a little hard to take.

I cut my hair as a sign of mourning.
The city cut the power off.
I cut the sheets and sewed a flag of surrender.
You're gone.

You're gone.
But, the world moves on.

I haven't eaten since the last time
someone asked when I last ate.
My friends gather to drink my coffee
and worry about my state.

I threw my keys at the repo man.
I couldn't find the will to run.
I cut the sheets and sewed a flag of surrender.
You're gone.

You're gone.
But, the world moves on.

For Marian's music prompt at Real Toads

Lunatics, Lovers, And Poets

Lunatics, lovers, and poets
see signs in the clouds
and hear whispers
from pictures they've taken.
They snip locks of hair
for lockets
to carry in pockets
stuffed full of talismans
and stare longingly at nothing.
Oh, to be
a lunatic, lover, or poet!
To know that a pill, a kiss, a rhyme
can cure all that ails you.

"The lunatic, the lover, and the poet, are of imagination all compact."

William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream

For Kerry's Challenge at Real Toads

The Light Loves You So

The light loves you so
that the sun hangs on in the sky
and refuses rest,
the moon waits
widow white and worthless
without the night,
and once proud time stands still.

I borrow my next breath
from your hands.

The light loves you so
that the sun bares its teeth at shadows,
the moon weeps,
and time sands itself smooth.

I drink dreams
and dine on drought.

The light loves you so
that the sun finally burns itself blind,
the moon creeps
wily
from the willows,
and time regains its fragile footing.

I am as much yours
as I was before.

For Open Link Night at dVerse

Bent

My every beat
and bone and breath
is bent
toward you

like a flower follows light
and swallows the sun

while still remaining rooted
and firmly fixed;

 a blossom breaking sky
 from broken ground.

For Open Link Monday at Real Toads

Em

She writes
to the faint light
of a window
across the way

poems that linger
on her fingers
and smudge her lips;

kisses,
soft as untried wings,
forever longed for
in her singular, untried darkness.

Written with my neice, Hayden, for Fireblossom Friday at Real Toads

Skipping Twilight

Darkness deadfalls quick
and buries day's bruising bright
under bliss black limbs.

For Tackle It Tuesday and Open Link Monday at Real Toads

Inheritance

Flat feet,
thick, dark hair,
a need to please
that bleeds all over
everything I touch.

Absent handed gifts
tied tight

with why did you leave
and forget me knots.

D-Day

Hey, Mama Zen!  After months of torturous planning, the first day of your vacation has finally arrived.  So, what are you going to do now?

I'm going to Disney World!

Be back in a few days . . .

Empty

As I empty
of all there is
to remember,
to forget,
will I rattle like a stone in a sieve,
or will my sleep be dreamless?

For the "dementia" prompt at Real Toads

This Box

Let me lock this box
of disappointments and give
you the only key.

If my traitor hands
tease and test the lock, take these
traitor hands from me.

And take these pearls of
past offense I noose around
my neck; loose them all

and let them fall like
precious planets finally freed
from hateful orbit.

For Haiku Heights and Open Link Night at dVerse

Man Like You

Walkin' be slow, but you too tired to run.
You either gots too much, or you ain't got none.
A man like you bitch if I shoot you with a solid gold gun.

You cuss de watered down liquor and de skunky seed dope.
You cuss de preacher at Holiness for holdin' out hope.
A man like you bitch if I hung you with a brand new rope.

I bake you a pie.  You got yo mouth set fo cake.
I calls up a miracle.  You call me out fo my mistake.
Lord, a man like you bitch till I gonna put you in a fresh dug grave.

A little blues for the mini-challenge at Real Toads.

This Machine

This machine
rides my hips,
my lips wrapped around a microphone.

This machine
breaks curfew
while nice girls sit at home.

This machine
rocks hard,
cradles soft,
and loves you free.

This machine
kills sexists
and preaches wildcat truth in E.

Note: "This machine kills sexists" is a nod to Woody Guthrie's guitar.

For Marian's "Suzi Quatro" prompt at Real Toads.

The GMO

When weeds were still flowers
and time was more white than gray,
you could let your feet dangle in the water
without fear of teeth beneath.
All was saccharine and sweet.
Then came Progress
and the Genetically Modified Orgasm.

No one is quite sure how it happened.
Some claim that it was discovered
by a lone female scientist
after years of solitary research.
Others blame frack fumes or the French.
Regardless of from which loose loins it sprang,
the GMO threw the world into shuddering, writhing chaos.

Religious leaders condemned it as an abomination
and issued warnings against Fruitless Fornication for Fun.

Liberals applauded it as Climax We Can Believe In
and promised access for everyone . . . you know, someday.

Conservatives held firm
and continued to dismiss all talk
of any female orgasm as mere myth.

And, so, the Genetically Modified Orgasm might have languished
forgotten in some lab somewhere forever
had it not been for the bravery of women.
Just as they had for thousands of years,
women took their orgasms into their own hands.
For the vote, these savage suffragettes might settle
for starvation and signs,
but for the Genetically Modified Orgasm
they traded their femininity for foxholes
and went to war . . .

where they still are . . .

under the banner of the Snake & Apple.

Kind of a Steampunk thing (sort of?) for Kerry's prompt at Real Toads

This House

This house is dying from the inside out.

Don't let the glimmering corpselight fool you.

Funeral flowers bloom close and thick

and suffocate the crumbling brick.

Cancers writhe within its womb.

Rafters rot, but fail to fall.

This house is dying from the inside out.

A tomb with alabaster walls.

A Magpie Tale

for Open Link Monday at Real Toads.

Joy

Joy gathered alone
never quite fills the basket,
belly, or the heart.

For Haiku Heights

The Seer

If I were hewn from sterner stuff
and not so tightly strung,
I wouldn't tie myself in knots
for fear I'll come undone.

A mortar round, a sniffling sound
sink order's ship the same.
And, worries, random, real, and remote,
I wear them like a braid.

So with a pounding pain at the nape of my neck,
I seek the seer's shrine
and climb her creaking, listing stairs
to learn the extent of what's mine.

The seer tarried in the topmost loft
like a fear left to ripen and rot.
She handed me a mirror.
"Child, this is all the control that you've got."

Using Shawna's Thursday Words to vent a little stress for Fireblossom Friday

Two Doves

Two doves sit on the fence
like whispers from God.
I watch them from the window.

Soon my daughter and I
will stand hip to hip,
but I don't know if my mother
will live to take next spring's crocuses
from her granddaughter's hand.

Just a breath away
from colors and clatter
is a massive, empty stillness
where grief blooms in my marrow
like an unwanted flower.

Perhaps, I'll have a secret garden in my bones.

Two doves sit on the fence
like whispers from God.
I watch them from the window.

A stream of consciousness wordle for dVerse and The Sunday Whirl.

Imago / Couples Dialogue

She removes her tortoise shell glasses
with the rose colored lens
and begins

Imago, my Imago!
Knitted from pheromones
and knobbed kneed memories,
birthed from a blueprint half unfolded
and wet with shadows,
you were to be the surgical stitch
for the endemic wounds of my vulnerable childhood.
Yet, you have proven to be merely a dry hump mimic
of my Electra complex.

He, mirroring: A dry hump.


We sit in this room
and burn incense to cover the stench
as we excrete every variation
of the tale of The Wandering Proboscis and the Random Honeydew
as if the ending will morph with the next retelling.

He, summarizing: Wandering Proboscis and Random Honeydew.

We pin ourselves beneath sodium lights
until not even a wing can flutter,
tunnel deeper,
dragging our inverted funnels into the day
as if photonic therapy can cure
neuroses and assholery.

He, validation: That makes sense because efficacy has not been documented.

All of the dialogue in the world
is just pencil scratches on a pine box.
You can't bring true sight to an eyespot.
A predator with good hair and a Jaguar
is still a predator.

He (beginning to bristle), empathy:  I imagine that you feel, uh, feel . . .

I feel like I want the goddamn transcription to reflect that I am done.  My daddy was a bastard.  You are a bastard.  Men are bastards.  I'm going to take up witchcraft, become a lesbian, and learn to crochet.

Note:  When I saw that "Imago" was one of Shawna's words, the therapist in me couldn't resist.  Imago therapy is based on the belief that we marry a composite of our parent(s) to heal the wounds of childhood.  It is practiced through structured couples dialogue.  I don't think much of it.


For Open Link Night at dVerse

Gemini

Lovin' a Gemini -
it sure do be nice.
Gettin' love from a Gemini -
ya get the beans and the rice.
But when a Gemini tires of you -
and they do -
ya get your fool heart broken twice.

For a Gemini themed Open Link Monday at Real Toads

Sleep

Let
me sleep
so that I
can dream and stop
worrying thin each memory of you.

A tetractys for Real Toads

Stillness

In the stillness,                                                                                                                          In barest light.

I will seek you,                                                                                                                          I am waiting.

and I will listen                                                                                                                         Hear me whisper

for your voice                                                                                                                            sweet everythings.

Two points of view for Real Toads