why, after all these years

this is my heart 

on my lower back

the man was a train; I lay

on the tracks

and forgot to remember

love goes south and slack

but the tattoo's forever-

that's why I still  ❤ Jack.        

For Kerry's prompt at Real Toads

Note:  I'm going to be really slow to visit.  My husband just had surgery, so things are a little crazy at my house.

Boots / Tea Ceremony Pt. 2

Tea Ceremony Pt. 1 

"Experience is the key."  - Sen No Rikyu

The killer wears boots.
You can tell by his tracks;
a wolfway saunter,
he never looks back.
Walking with dawn
and a moon barely gone
to call upon
Father and Mother.

Father! he calls from just inside the door.
No answer; he'd flayed father
two nights before.
But is that a whimper -
upstairs, second floor -
or just noise inside his head?
Erotic noise inside his head.

I'm coming, Mother, the killer said.

Note:  I wrote a rather ghoulish piece (see link above) for the first tea ceremony prompt, so when it came up again at Real Toads, I couldn't resist doing a follow-up.  Forgive me, Magaly; the flesh is weak.  Today's nod to the "The End" by The Doors was inspired by a comment that Shay left on my original poem.

If you're not completely sick of me yet, I have a new poem up at Enclave for the #FINALPOEMS series.  Check it out; I'd love to know what you think!

Lord, It's Hot

Perspire turned to sweat
ten degrees ago.  My ponytail
drags dew thick dirt, and my alligator
curls at my feet.  She is the mother
of deadlines and reptilian
revisions, quick slashes,
aggressive, quick, efficient punctuation,
and bare bones evolution.
Dainty deadly, she demands
coldblooded treks
through swamps, sewers, strip
malls, and cemeteries.
Bring out your dead!  Bring out your dead!
The art is in the autopsy,
someone should have said -
but, Lord, it's hot
and hard to be quicker than the rot.

For Hannah's prompt at Real Toads

The Woman Card

Ladies!
Duty calls;
vote!

Our Sisters bled
blood coming out of her wherever*
for better than this.

*Republican nominee Donald Trump on Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly's performance as moderator of a Republican debate.

For Midweek Motif~Suffrage at Poets United

Whites

On Sundays I study the sacred
and sort the laundry.
The difference
(if there really is a difference)
blurs when I'm washing whites.

We all want to get our stains out
and be clean again
We all want to be fresh
and sanctified.

For The Tuesday Platform at Real Toads

The Social Contract

Offer your word,
your bones, your sweat,
the fleshy swirl
of your fingertips,
and your X.

Accept
the market value
of being eaten.

When you consider yourself, consider
you're one
of the lucky ones.

Nevermind the breach, my peach.
Nevermind
the breach.

For Karin's prompt at Real Toads.  Also submitted to Poetry Pantry at Poets United.

What A Tongue

Milena Pavlovic Barili

can tell is ripe

or rot

with a single taste,

a heart cannot.

For Words Count at Real Toads

Fragile Things

I can be trusted
with most fragile things -
an infant's sleep
or a butterfly's wings.
Nothing is subject
to rough handling
by me
it seems
but me.

For The Tuesday Platform at Real Toads

A Day At The Fair

She's twelve, and she wants
to spend all day
tromping the midway
and tasting everything
so I fish for dollars
and somehow refrain
from sermons
on what's really fair.

For Poetry Pantry at Poets United.

Note: I have a new poem (Silent Movie) in this week's issue of Page and Spine.  Let me know what you think!

For X

Breathless, restless, spell sick.
Starved for touch - anorexic.
Damned, drowning consumer
of every whiff of rumor.
Are you, will you, would you?
What would I do should you
uncover my unseemly wanting
and put flesh to this whore boned haunting?
I hide my clinging in plain sight
crushed in the crowd at your side
just to brush against the burn of your sun -
symptoms of a secret love.

For Shay's prompt at Real Toads

At Old Navy

Some little girl wants a straw fedora
just like my little girl who is becoming
such a big girl

posing in front of the mirror
checking out her coming curves
in an Old Glory bikini

not even on clearance,
but more than 50% off.

For The Tuesday Platform at Real Toads