WHISPERS (5)

Simone's story beckons to be told,
or not told but discovered like a scroll--
cryptic graffiti faded & fatigued,
still expressing a passionate commitment
to a speculative phrase.

Is there something inevitable
in the avant-garde culture of a kiss,
the oblique metaphysics
of beautiful ambivalence in a sigh?

Abstract art is splintering the portraits
of divine sensitivity,
of magic beyond metaphor.

To play such games is to fool around with more
than youthful nihilism.

WHISPERS (10)

Between these two extremes
I brandished a drastically reconfigured
fascination for myself.
Tangled amidst large sections
of lost trust as if born there,
as if tied like the passive lover in some
strange erotic game,
I felt at home in the mix,
grew casual within the chaos, the calm turmoil
of falling backward onto the bed,
rebuilding romance from a cracked seed
or fractured egg.

Unable to deal with perceptions
as clear realities, I transcended thought
for action: a buffer between flings--
delicate & dry, a powdery snow
that moving water brings into the frigid garden
of essence & becoming.

Thin smile & a thorn in the flesh--
I grasped the night in gloved hands,
embracing a world far less congenial,
eroding on a negative frequency or an inverse wave.
I found myself within myself,
too small for colossal anonymity.

I should've thrown heat instead of flaring
inward.

FUGUE (12)

Improbable tapestry of night marks a relative sky
filled with flame. I strive to reach the embers
of a sword, to ride across that sky in a brazen attempt
to conquer the sun where it hides in shadow
on the other side. Would you follow? Icarus had
plastic wings. What would you use for yours?

We hope for a future filled with roses & honeycombs,
sans the thorns & bees. We hope for a life that
exceeds our expectations, enriches us in spirit as well
as status. We hope for dreams that are true,
& love that's profoundly real in space & time.
Melancholy blue, it suits you, drawing on your despair.

I'm sensitive to light
Won't you shield my eyes tonight,
from the moon & the stars up high?
Won't you shield my eyes?

FUGUE (16)

The saddest songs & those most vibrant with warmth
are the same from all sides at a distance.

A lemur is free in its secret forests, but not safe.
It finds safety in a cage, but not freedom.

With an inquisitive face, somewhat sad like a lemur's,
Hera asked, Salvage harmony in our relationship?

The caged animal cried after an oblique response.
As any contracts lawyer knows, sometimes silence calls the tune.

Most readers will find her enduring in the dimensions
of abject patience & concern.

She loves from every cell as all women wish to love.
The heroine grew up before she could love,

built a shrine to profound human empathy,
showed distinctive sentiments mourning for herself.

MEDITATION (5)

Dawn leaves enchanted,
collapsing through the branches
of whispering trees like a wounded eagle.
I mark its passing with an effete sigh.

Sharing a bottle of wine & the waves
that crash against eroded cliffs
& rocky shore, we ingest the atmosphere
of this tranquil time.

We devour the orange skies like apricots,
losing ourselves in soma from the sun.
As always, the moment passes
without pausing for a photograph.

Prayers for the Philosopher's First Child

for Chanya April Elkins

I.
Be ye not deceived by philosophers--
their lifeless gray wit in cynical rapture,
denial's easy spa. Step into
the same river twice if you please,
conscious & in freedom,
not a river yourself: awake,
dynamic, incorruptible. Your hope
is the madness of clouds --peaceful breath
collecting shapes, then letting go.

II.
Be-- as in To be or not to be--
strongest in that blackest heart of doubt,
that cursed blessed most wonderful melancholy,
whether nausea or sickness unto death
(for without God there is Nothing;
but if not Nothing, therefore God).
Believe in self, purpose, long resigned
sighs like love & laughter: sirens without rocks.

III.
Be willing to stare down that abyss,
smiling to earn its respect. Then,
should eyes fail, words reinvent themselves
as silence, grasp hold of your father
like a diver's last gasp before darkness,
first before new light, so that he
might teach you safety & learn rest.

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