Monday, April 30, 2012

Stolen alchemy

Soft stone pressed in my palm
as a promise of calla lillies,
laced from our loam.
So calm, secure
the rock solid promise
lulls me -
I oblige;
opening for a pebble, my poem.
Lush oval warmth
becoming known, treasure,
a secret tucked in my center
ardently attesting you're not alone.

Til with obdurate pain,
having struck a ring of my own
(inscribed cold cobble of
father's memory, an
ancient artifact, dressed
deceptive in marital gold)
from the stone,
not a word.

And through fear's alchemy
the pebble freezes, fractures,
transmutes to air.
Silently attesting
the lost promise of carmot.

And I'm alone.

Wednesday, April 25, 2012

VIsiting Poet I: Christina Liu

Dearest friend, thank you for giving me this poem to post. I'll read it often - for enjoyment, but mostly to learn. 


Ophelia in Stasis


I won't imagine how long she's
been there -- in silver river,
or a bathtub,
with her head bent back
against the hard, white marble,
or fingertips slipping along
the edge of flood.
I'll try to imagine her body's
movements now, swept along
with the currents and eddies,
her hair seaweed waving for sailors,
her own sailor, never to come again.
She must move now
as she did in life -- flowing
with whatever wind and words
whispered in her ear,
with scarcely an afterthought,
propelled, always, by another's
momentum, by the sword
and thrust of another's words.
She could be ageless,
but most likely,
she's a girl; her limbs
are slender and white.
I would see the pronounced clavicle,
her throat opening to night.
Over and over, her drowned form,
this silenced transgression,
has been linked to waterlilies,
crowned by flowers and reeds,
surrounded by small, golden fish.
Captured in words and frozen
by the master's eye.
But I dream her core sometimes
as a red fist
ready to awake.
Shaking off the clinging flowers,
ready to eat the world.

Sunday, April 22, 2012

Song with Mary of Magdala II - draft updated

Draft. Reposting as I have updated it. Pieces in place but still torturing me....Telling a story yet maintaining the music... aligning concept and craft... The imperative of architecture...


Said Mary:
 
Even I, Mary Magdalene was loved
For my corporeal sin I
Was forgiven, anointed
In scripture appointed
A place at Jesus' side.

Said I to Mary:

That story was only pernicious fiction
Gloved Medieval sex affliction so
Your name conflated with whore
Celebrated
We all went along for the ride.

Yes, Said Mary:

My seven demons quietly cast
From a biblically accounted past pursue me
Still, mythic 
Grown monolithic as
The love of redemption abides.

Cried I:
Your story Paul emancipated, But 
Mine now a noose, my post desecrated
Discipled by hangman, by jury
By unyielding fury from Prophet's fear! 
A story of sin that misguides.

Said Mary to him:

Her story configured by external hand like mine
Through sleight of pain and graft of man
Encumbered by a catholic bent
You threw the hermeneut's perfidious cant! 
I ask you: 
The greater fiction hers or yours?
The one she wrote with financial cause
Or yours, imagined, paranoia born
Cast through eisegesis a
Woman scorned!

As he loved me, mirrored sins untrue,
Reflect love: what would Jesus do?

Friday, April 20, 2012

Three verses for U

1. Breathless

Oh you. You who, you
Who took my wind so,
So my hollowed breast echoes
Echoes so
So my wings won't fly.
Blow
Blow through
Through my chest. You
You who flew with me
Oh You
Breathe me to the divine.


2.
Though you fled, it seems my soul snagged on you, and as you fly further it unravels in infinitesimal glint,
spiraling your soar in a white love whisper, keeping you close.

or:
You Fled.
It seems my soul snagged on you
Fly further.
Unravelling in infinitesimal glint
Spiraling your soar in
White love whisper,
Keeping
You close

3.
In the middle of the night I cry out,
Who lives in this love I have?
You say, I do, but I am not here alone.
Who are these other images with me?
I say, They are reflections of you,
just as the beautiful inhabitants of Chigil in Turkestan
resemble each other.
You say, But who is this other living being?
That is my wounded soul.
Then I brought that soul before you as a prisoner.
This one is dangerous, I say.
Do not let him off easy.
You wink and give me one end of a delicate thread.
Pull it tight, but do not break it.
I reach my hand to touch you.
You strike it down.
Why are you so harsh with me?
For good reason.
But certainly not to keep you away.
Whoever enters this place saying, Here I am
must be stopped.
This is not a pen for sheep.
There are no separating distances here.
This is love's sanctuary.
Saladin is how the soul looks.
Rub your eyes, and look again with love at love.


Rumi. trans. C. Barks.

Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Tiny poems

During the past week or so, words have been clumping together in small quantities. Either I lack the energy or motivation to force them into more elaborate, longer strings, or the ideas themselves sit comfortably in small groupings. Actually, I think I haven't the energy to develop more complex ideas that require longer exploration.
Anyway, I've posted a couple of these moment-sized poems below. I suspect there will be more.

Ancient oil

Patchouli laced clove cigarettes
Your scent lingers lingual til
Word work works it out

To Envy

Not this time Envy, you will not win.
You will not unwind me nor knot
My arms outstretched in the embattling wind
Waving and laughing laughter



Sunday, April 8, 2012

Gull Song

I wrote this a while back, and know it's crap. I put it up to force myself to improve it. 


after Cohen


For an absent love. 


The shadow you left shaped the light as a quest:
Should I hunt you or let you fly free.
A figure that spun once as a man
Cutback, shift to swell on the sea

Through the pain of a day, cut short in that way
Cos you dressed your leave-taking with knives
I clung to the gifts of time, cyclic shifts
Wax waning still hanging on fives.

Others come as others will.
There are many fish in the sea.
In the calm of my gut I know I was right,
There is only that seabird for me.



Saturday, April 7, 2012

Violet Letter

This poem is far from finished. I put it up so my poet friends can read it and give me critique. Please feel free to help me with it - I know it needs it!




for D. 
whom I have not met.


At midnight's rise rapt of fleece we eased into talk of:
Phantoms
Devils' histories 
Unions deceased
Schools balls bats
Brooks
A child's fall a spell
Of a book

Then she surfaced.
Cemented with contractor's semen.

I see her scar on you you said
Etched reflective in my tarnish
I can feel her brutal assail you said
Echoed in my wanton rhythms
I can smell your abject defilement 
Lifted in her abiding vapors

But you were hungry
And putrid meat is yet meat
The purple decay cling-wrap protected 
(stanza incomplete)

Then I succumbed.
Husked with clumsy seduction.

Call and response of text and image. 
And after the strip-search laid me vacated
You made haste to the digital dump we'd ditched together.
Amid the addicts and desperate anglers
You search for an angel
Inviolate