I played my part. I went to war
for you every day. I couldn’t foretell disaster.
But I knew this connection was temporary.
I provided an end to a means. I was the portal
to your survival. I was your everlasting god.
I took that as a privilege. I never withheld
support. You never needed triage or bravery.
Things were mildly disconcerting once,
but I did my magic. I stopped interference
quickly and valiantly. No one gave me laurels
or tried to hang a medal around my neck.
(But who needs a neck for this kind of work?)
One day, without warning, we were thrust
into the light, a scary premise for all that time
sitting in the dark, waiting. As I said, I had
a feeling this would happen.… ...continue reading
There is something sinister in the strings.
Brooding underskirts comment and rustle outside and between legs.
Invisible undergarments bustle and bounce making wearers levitate to the floor.
And on some days you can dance love,
And on others passion, or sorrow, or joy.
But today under uncertain cellos,
The waltz is forgiveness.
Love
Hate
Late.
I catch you in my blinking eye, straight ahead, a few comfortable handbreadths away.
An eye and face familiar, inviting, like a favorite overstuffed chair
Or warm quilt, heavy blankets, slip inside shivering and kicking until burning and have to stick one foot out into the cold.
Or a favorite story that’s been told over and over again until every inflection of every word is known before it’s said,
While I drift off and pull my leg back into bed.… ...continue reading
— After “What Goes Around” by G. E. Stinson
Drop a pebble into the water
Snap your finger, cry your name
And the circle
The perfect circle slowly leaves
The perfect circle raggedly finds.
One day waves click drums and hammers
One day waves will reach the shore
And the circle
Goes around
It comes around
It goes around once more.
Light a candle in the darkness
Somewhere someone finds a door.
You can will the rain into a stream,
Cry your words into the sky and floor.
You are the only one who hears
You are the only one who reads.
I can feel the water on my feet
The same as yesterday and last year,
Water of this river, of this sea
I can tell you I’ve have been here before
And have never been here before
You speak
The world turns around
I speak
The world turns around
Words turn into water
Streams run across the sky
And return to the sea
You speak and the words return to me.… ...continue reading
He offered me a free bottle
Cheap red.
Left on his porch
Late in the evening.
No strings attached.
He worked for the wine company,
Or maybe a bar.
We wouldn’t have to meet
Face to face.
He would never know my
Name.
And I,
His.… ...continue reading
walking down a new street
at night, I lost a poem.
Drizzle beaded on lampposts;
mist circled the bare bulbs
suspended like electric moons.
Silent houses crouched together,
warmed by glowing porch lights.
An airplane disappeared
behind cloud smudges;
dripping elms flanked
the yellow “No Outlet” sign.
In the sodden dark,
the vast alone had shrunk
to one block, one house
on a leaf-wet street
where someone once lived.
– Lynn D. Gilbert
Author’s Note: This poem started out with losing a poem I was writing and ended up by losing myself.
… ...continue reading
I wish I could live in a soap sud
And swirl in the off-white basin
Lit above by three bulbs:
Two warm and one broken
I would rise and fall and ride the thin film of water
Buoyed in a kaleidoscope of colors
But there’s a tremor in the delicate walls
Because a voice booms behind me
化学的东西不是好的
My own, much quieter
You’re wasting time
So I turn on the faucet
And let the stream of water drown them out
Once again I reach for the iridescent pink liquid soap
1-2-3-4-5
Once again I reach for the iridescent pink liquid soap
1-2-3-4-5
Once again I reach for the iridescent pink liquid soap
1-2-3-4-5
Then I dry my hands on my pink washcloth
Before retreating to my room with its pink curtains
Where I sit criss cross applesauce to confront
The piles of paper on the unforgiving porcelain floor
Is this how Psyche felt while sorting seeds?… ...continue reading
She. Is a red
door framed
against the face
of a white house,
but i am the bitter
tongue of a scorned lover
desperate to shield what
remains of their pride and yet
She. Is the light
of a Christmas tree
at 2 AM when
the house slumbers,
but i am the third
strike at home plate
of the last at bat for a boy
too scared to swing and yet
She. Saves me
from a reality marked
by the perpetual echoing
of a premature goodbye,
but i condemn and fail
to moderate the timeliness
of a greeting offered
too late and yet…
– Nolan Adams… ...continue reading