A Bad, Really Sad Poem

I knew that I had lost. And I was glad.
Until you told me it was a game;
and I learned that you I'd never had.

Which one is the greater loss, my love -
to have lost my breath to your loving sight,
or to know that you were never 'the sight'?

And I still hope that you sleep in peace,
while I tame my fading breath into life -
may you never know what it is:

fighting life.

Six and Seven

Want, I do. Wait, I will.
Can't you hold me until

until I learn more of you;
until I want to my fill -

fill I must, this dream of you -
fill with wait; fill with will -

can't you hold me until
I learn to wait and to will?

To What We Were

Long ago, our shoes came cheap -
the air was free,
and so were our feet.

You and I, and a long, dusty road -
the wind in my hair,
the world on your glasses...

My poems and the untamed grass.

The slowness of that winter
that fled so fast!

And your photos,
that now
take me back

take me back -

take me back ...

Let Us Autumn

Let us autumn -
shapely ripples, you and I -
let us pour upon our dreams
a callous tenderness -
life to our feet,
this deadness of leaves -
let us unearth sounds
that could mean poetry?

A wildfire, aren't we
a million untouched logs of gold -
wither, let us woe -
slip like streams, tow
our defined running into
life!

Autumn, let us,
into the nude mirrors,
hurt the starkness
with our seething blurs
of gold.

Winter Exists

Winter exists, a mole
upon your beauty -
you, who are slipped upon
by sensuality
are the soul
of a naive poem -

they want you here,
they need you there -
faith handed out
as your unsmiling limbs
attempt to rhyme.

And the world dares
to impede the mole;
obliterate it.

Chime to the time,
when you,
give yourself away to the dance -
let the mole
travel within you.

Beyond My Pounding Heart

A sepia cloud, a shapeless sound -
beyond my pounding heart
is the loud 
life of love.

I dare not open the scroll,
this length that unfolds my impotence -
I continue to perceive shivers
from the beyond that is love.
My arms inundate a chest –
A cold melody like the moon,
I attempt a spread beyond you.
Why am I still not enough?

...beyond my pounding heart
is the loud life of love.

I Know for a Reason

One day this force will fail,
and my heart will know
how not to pound.
One day I will run away;
one day I will slow down.

This that throbs within me,
will fade into silence -
one day the force will fail
and I won't be around.

All that I didn't say -
these words that meant life -
one day in death they will
astound.

I may be drifting to the dark
letters no one reads -
I know for a reason
this treasure will be found.

Snow

We give in.

The sun is only a shard of life -
and there are cracks, too many -
we're eaten dry, our longings
slipping beneath our feet
as we walk to the top -
a foggy top -
the climax of our pains.

There, where it snows,
the breath is a fume
that billows from the soul
until it is lost
to death.

As the shard falls flat,
I hail the white shroud -
between my short breaths
and the windmills of snow,
you are lost and how!

Wanting to let go
of my icy hand -
wanting to clutch
the billowing fume -
wanting to unearth the fire
that would undo doom.

You, with your feather flight,
and I, with my shackled heart,
give in to the white -
give in
too soon?

Love, a Little Curl

I kindle the pen, a cigarette -
I smoke a syringe.
Perhaps, they're right in saying
that I'm doing it wrong.

Smoke-song, I break
into little curls
as I poem the homeless love
for him.

He arches in my thoughts -
a pretty, garden bridge;
I coil, a snake,
guarding this memory.

Long time, he chimed
to the wind in my hair.

Long time, he fluttered
his lying lashes.

Long time, I held
onto his cruel, cruel ways.

Long time, he denied
me a divorce.

Her, Wailing

Haven't heard from you, love -
been on this page for long -
descend -

a first cackle for the door -
your touch again upon the core -
blend -

lend to me a whole new self -
been on this page for so long!

gorges deep - the dark mouth -
accursed dawns; dreamless pits -

nibble away all my hours -
if only I could watch you sleep ...

Loss

I'm so full -
so full of your emptiness.

Hollows,
all hollows -
you swallow
the air I breathe.

Tear, shriek -
you're the peak
I lose my echoes to.

You who are this fog -
how I do see you?

You're blinding my eyes
and I?

I term this loss,
love.

Night After Night

Night after
night after
night after
night -

I pour myself a dying street light.

Night after
night after
night after
night -

he finds me by death; black against white.

Night after
night after
night after
night -

there's the moan of the moon -

there's night, there's night.

His shadow has the heart
to crawl out of sight -
love lingers on the saddle,
dirt like.

The Burning Poem

I

I wait for Time to walk away. I conjure a gun and rest my fingers upon it. This is how I sleep. This is how I sleep.

II

Rub, rub on my chest the truth that I needed from you. Tonight, any ointment is hope.

III

There's a ceiling fan I've jumped into - a rain of soundlessness. Life, not suicide.

IV

I dream of burnt poems and of running through the thick, black forest of Night.
Will you hold my hand, sweetheart? Will you touch a burning poem?

To the Memories I Could Not Have

To all the memories I could not have -
there's this empty space that my heart
always seems to notice.

When I choke at the sight of this emptiness
I plant upon it songs of woe,
I wet the abandoned bench with tears
and sometimes I get pretty unfortunate:
I imagine, imagine, imagine.

His taste. His touch. His words. His wants.

And all the gifts he could melt me with.

To the nothing that pervades my world:
I know I look a sculpture -
there's just black crows that worship me.
I know I appear frozen;
I know you think I do not hear.

Let me have a memory; let me call it mine -
I'd melt into the night before you catch me dying.

Lightning

Lightning planted
across the skies -
still eyes
and the visible current 
of blood -

truth be told
I don't shake anymore -
my trembling from the thunder
is a frozen feeling -
an ice spear
that shreds my insides.

Sometimes, within me,
a shrub matures -
green and frail yet full, so full -

I present it 
an easy death -

uprooting the wreath
with all my might -

I leave it a shorn stem,
a beckoning stem -
lightning like?

In a Dream We Dwell

In a dream we dwell -
memories swell
up the bubble.

A million shells on the shore -
and night quells
their existence.

The double meanings -
this rubble down the road -
slumber and numbers -

the tolling bell -
the rolling shell -
how night quells,
existence?

Church

The womb,
a sad church -
harmony of darkness
and soundlessness.

Intrusion, worship;
the darkness being
looked at.

Bent knees -
they soar to a cloud of pain.

Asking.
In whispers.

One last look
at the light 
through the stains -

and they're gone.

Not Anymore

There isn't time
corking the bottle anymore -
the soul has fled -
fled away from the fragility
of trances ...
from the deadness, life?

Unforgettably

His voice is the smell
of roses I have
never touched.

Clutching the seconds -
a skiing in snow,
he races across me ...
unforgettably.

I trace these wrinkles
and taste an intimacy
between us.

We are, we are -
in a timeless moment,
the meaning, the meaninglessness;
the mirth of the earth
when upon it a star,
falls.

Seize Me

Seismic, the sorrow -
seize me, my horrors
at war with dreams.

What do you see -
up there, there's no seeking it.
Seize the sunken,

Me.

They cut me here -
stop me short, as I,
see... see through the morrow
that I was promised.

Seize me tonight,
a fool, the seeker, me -
meek, bleak, toad's creek -
a pool of torchlight 
under a tree.

Comet

Noon and heat -
white brightness, I bleed -
a little thought 
slipping from my hair -
I sweat you,
a comet.

Down,
down into the heart of blackness -
you die a dot -
a little thought,
slipping down the leash -
sweat, comet, love, memory.

You,
having lit the charred walls
of the Universe,
die.

I'm That Light

I'm that light -
caught between bubbles -
several bubbles -
they choke me,
a little, round rainbow,
trying to exist
like a soul in too many bodies!

These bubbles die -
no dearth of death here.
And then I'm set free,
an invisibility.

Bizarre freedom,
a curse -
nothing contains me;
nothing sustains
but me.

Tears

Tears,
unwelcome tears -
flood the hollow of the night -
Dawn floats,
a broken branch -
a lost hope,
cracking the eyes
with its dryness,
piercing the heart 
with all its might.

Boot

There's a boot with loose laces,
the loot of time.

So worn, so brown,
so full of the dusk.
Not worth a dime.

Forgotten by the very soul
who'd let it drink
from every pool.

It lingers by the doorstep,
this confused can of nothing -
who knows what fills it up:
the shrinkage only grows.

The Canyon

Behind you
was a canyon,
steep and deep -
I couldn't sleep 
on your shoulder.

Naked, the darkness
bared it all;
spared our shadows
from the wall -
I tried to escape 
the freefall:
behind you
a canyon ...

I knew that the light
at the dawn
would melt the one kiss
that befell my eyelids.
And yet I let 
snow accumulate
on the roof.

But I couldn't overlook
your shallowness ...
Behind you
was a canyon,
steep and deep.

To Grandmother

Silver woman, upon us you had spread -
your face, a melting clock - you rose and fell
like tides.

I'd sail across the million wrinkles
and discover that you could still
carry the load of a smile.

To ride on the moons of your eyes ...
Your waning form,
your whines -
to know that I wasn't hope,
to know there wasn't time ...

I miss the rhythm
of your trembling hands.
And the square that made you walk.
I miss your silence as you watched
us talk and talk and talk.

How Does One Silence, Silence?

How does one silence, silence?
To prick a dreamless eye -
to unravel the growing fence -
to find nothing in the sky 
but a blackness dense!

Sometimes my breaths tangle
between my million bangles
and I look through the glitter
for lost life, time.
A nerve quivers beneath them ...

How does one silence, silence?