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Saturday, October 29, 2011

FORTY YEARS OF THE AERIALIST

Feel free to leave me a message this time, and let me know how life has taught you?

Every stress leaves an indelible scar, and the organism pays for its survival after a stressful situation by becoming a little older. Hans Selye


Forty Years of the Aerialist

I am walking a tightrope
with abandoned recklessness
over a blanket of black.

My shadowed eyes will not deny
the shaking mirage of
shattered rationalizations found

in the sordidness of eroded demons,
as she creeps into my weariness,
into my soul’s sojourn, and

into my quiet solitude. I write.
I write

my abducted love letter to her.
I write in the red blood of salt
afar. I write to the double house

of death and rebirth—I write
of a simple switch from
distorted alternate layers

as the cold white morning
rises and the curtain is
slowly drawn.

Monday, October 24, 2011

IT IS HELD IN A SIGNATURE

The will of the human body and the mind matches the dignity of freedom a person has as they are fighting for their breath.

Freedom is the right to one's dignity as a man. Archibald MacLeish


It Is Held In a Signature

A man’s breathing is depending
on his signature.
A black and blue journey

of a hand that shook ferociously
on the 5th Tuesday, the day he
signed for his own life of freedom.

“I will scrap the inside of your
lung, removing the creamy infection
that is consuming your air.”

A strong debilitated body,
a straight-spine will,
a pen which respects his dignity
as a Dr. confirms yes sir and Mr…

His patient looks into his doctor's
eyes and prays for experience--
A gentleman slowly signs his name
and wishes the surgeon good luck,
not good bye.

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

YOUR WILES WILL NOT WORK ON ME THIS MORNING

The voices in our heads are stopping and starting us as we journey through our lives. I am blessed with the gift of crafting words, this gift quells some of the voices living in my head.

Every word written is a victory against death. Michel Butor


Your Wiles Will Not Work on Me This Morning

I sat on the edge,
on the edge of a
rectangular desk--
built of some kind
of manufactured wood.

I sat on the edge
of my writer's desk
and
thought of you
and the silent words you
say to me every
Monday morning.

It was a burning love affair
filled with
keys and locks,
clocks and steps,
backspaces and forgiveness,
still moving
in a thousand crazy directions,
and then you teased me with a tiny
mirage of right.

I sat on the edge
falling into your fray,
spiraling into your blind imagination,
unraveling under your
words, tempted
by your automated intention.

I sat on the edge of
feminine wiles
and searched for stars
too far
from reach, and realized the dark
reminds me of you,
of your masculine manipulations,
of a child’s need for deceit.

I sat on the edge
looking for the cause
and not the purpose
and know it lives inside
me and I returned to my seat
and I found a simple
love affair with the divine.

Friday, October 14, 2011

THE TRUTH IS...

It's no wonder that truth is stranger than fiction. Fiction has to make sense.
Mark Twain


The Truth Is…

The truth is...
Life does not kill you-- it makes you stronger.
I would rather be the crane waiting patiently,
or the sturdy branch the tall bird is meditating on, or
even the silver fish nourishing the white bird’s glory.

The truth is...
Love is not a choice-- it weaves itself into your responsibility.
I would rather be the full moon loving the morning,
the two slowly trading the seductive light shimmering on the lake,
or the twosome moving rhythmically trading day for night.

The truth is...
Time lives on, embracing the halo of the natural world.
The song of her breath trembles at your presence,
the turn of time in spokes of wooden rings, buds slowly opening,
a chance to climb even higher to broaden a borrowed view.

The truth is...
Life birthed something monumental for you.
I am carved in your soul, a mosaic helix of raindrops,
our initials whittled into the flesh of my tree trunk,
moving slowly upward, transformed over weathered time.

The truth is...
I don’t want to know the truth anymore.

Sunday, October 9, 2011

BLUE NIGHT

I wrote Blue Night in 2009 and just recently taught the poem to a college level writing class. The students were so moved by the words and I was moved by their reaction, I decided that I should post it.

Always be a first-rate version of yourself, instead of a second-rate version of somebody else. ~Judy Garland


Blue Night

Blue night,
I will not sleep, I will refuse you,
I will trick you and dream awake.
One hundred nights died for the truth of one day.

It is you I become in the night.
It is you I fade into the dark shadows with,
my heart swells in the shallow of my chest. I am
shivering inside, with no where to hide. A forest of
imaginary creatures creating fears in my blinded mind.

Swaying in the dark of the night, leaving
bloody footprints at the doorstep of my heart.
I fight to forget our last kiss,
I fight to forget our last touch,
I fight to forget your smell, I fight your image
as it drags me through hours of black hell.

Blue night,
I will not sleep, I will refuse you,
I will trick you and dream awake.
One hundred nights died for the truth of one day.

In the cerulean darkness,
lapping at the gritty beach,
your cracking sky emits truth over a
complex collection of hidden lies.
You know no other light but dark,
rejecting truth in favor of illusion.

Blue is my resurrection.
It is the color of my blood moving
through the rivers of my veins;
it is the color I turn when cold;
it is the color I will be when dead.
It is you I fight in the night.
I am what morning counted on last night.

Blue night,
I will not sleep, I will refuse you,
I will trick you and dream awake.
One hundred nights died for the truth of one day.

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

BLACK SPOT ON A ROSE

Note: This poem is a conversation in the mind of mankind, the parenthesis represent the whispers of the conscious.

"I am strong because I know my weaknesses, I am alive because I am a fighter, I am wise because I've been foolish, I laugh because I've known sadness!"


Black Spot on a Rose

The man walks as a ghost in a blackened dinner jacket.

(she owns a black spot of
resentment burned on her soul)

He hated the spotted red rose pinned to the cross of his left lapel.

(she was tempted by hatred
and ate jealousy’s red apple)

The man is judged by the thin blood from his heart on his white skin.

(she should know betrayal is
what caused her to lose faith)

His faith is the traitor in the verdict of the silvery night.

(her religion is the original sin;
the sin we are all living with)

The turning of three clock hands deems evil to the man's time.

(she staked an accusation to her soul
that haunts her throughout her life)

Each of the man's steps chews deeper into haunting eternity.

(her diseased rose is the collective sin
of mankind for which she has to atone)

The man falls pray to the mouths of triple-headed betrayal.

(running from a single ray of sunlight;
her growing black spot cloaks her soul)

The hollow man walks down empty side streets confused.
(she is the eclipse of her moon)