Posts tagged: poems
I AM WATER
A kaleidoscope,
I bleed color.
I am the red
in my panties
the morning after
a grab
and a twich
and now
you must leave
(Now, now
and with me
unsatisfied?)
….yes, here
we are once
more, a reprise
Did you think
of it again, of
me, as the rain
prodded you
to stay in bed?
The shape of
my heart, a
pulsing bruise
eludes me
like the taste
of your tongue
the way your lips
would meet mine—
if you would
let them
but no
no, instead
we bite hands
lick teeth
Beneath your
languid cool
lies a shiver
(a quietshiver)
like the lifting
of a blanket
in the dawn
of early spring
And you thought
you could hold me
yes yes
I sense it.
It stirs my soul
from madness
the affirmation
of your need
into which I
breathed life
(I am Creator)
I can bite away
my want, keep
it caged behind
my teeth
Prove it, you dare
Trace the color
of need.
my mouth opens
and closes, desicated
in its solitude
you said you would
you said…
(Don’t you understand?)
as if I were
a thing to touch
no no
I will elude
you, eternal
I thought
we were one—
I am the soft
bud of a bloodroot
opening—o—o
pening
slowly
like your lips,
so wavering
resistant to my
fingers in spite
of your need
to part them
with my thumb
and let them
saturate
in the sun…
(Kiss me,
you’ve already sinned
at least once)
I undress, alone.
I let down my
hair, liquid
tendrils for
you to hold
I float,
wanting for flesh
on my diaphragm
I am the unborn
bud, needing only
a drop of water—
a taste of
your tongue,mouth
and more sun
no no
these forms
afford me
no good
I seek another
in which to cloak
this human form,
this pink flesh…
(Can you decipher)
me like this?
Will you find
a body amid
the shape I take
as I crawl
towards you
there
elbow by inch—
or just a shadow
in the sheets?
I myself am
not immune
to the light.
You will try
to find me
there
(my God, you will)
with no eyes
to watch
But
no esoteric mode
no meditation,
(though you
scream your
most guttural
plea through the
blinded dark—arrr
aahhhhh)
nothing
of form
can help you
understand
All the shapes
my body takes
when
I become
water
ON DRIVING PAST CONCRETE WORLD
pedaling backwards
down the interstate
past markers of
nothing, save home
the Apple Shed
Concrete World
Bill’s Guns
///////// old relics
from which
to seek and
breathe and
seek again
You are a
place-holder
in my mouth
which cuts
my tongue
I elongate.
I reach for
a branch to
grab your leg,
the taut bark
of your calf
a memory
I brush /////////////////////
Were you
the traveler
with no luggage
who gave your
heart, wholly,
in alms?
I cringe in
separation
of touch
from body
a paralytic
with an arm-twitch
A hole in that
canopy of trees
there
we were lost
amid the pines
that never died
a frozen heart,
lackluster in
the bleak of dawn
who will shoot
the apple and
watch it
fall?
We drove, we
moved—you
put your hat
in your lap
as if you needed it
twigs snap
as you whisper
and I?
collapse
I break the earth
with my yell
I scream
in a pitch
that will splinter
your arm
if you can
now feel it
like a prolific
breeze in the
wild of noon
I could have buried
myself there, so
out of time
my ears, my nose
protruding from
the ground
in ignominy
I am myself
no cleaner than
this dirt
I am the spring.
I resist //////////////
this burial,death
your hand against
my cheek is a
rear-view in
the dark
I squint.
No luggage,
no sway of
the trees
your hat gone
I ferry on,
a pedaler.
Driving in circles
to find my way
home
and while
the gentleness
of your fingers,
your palms
fan over me,
white phantom
sheets //////////////////////////
borne against then
against the past,
against you
I lick the air.
the hair peaks
on my thighs
pinpricks, or
rain drops
apricot-peach
my eyes flash
back to your
your chin, to
your teeth
so white
with the promise
of spring
////////// and
so much good
will soon ripen
I will search,
I will amid
Guns
Concrete&
Apples
pines and all
the fallen
be it though
the future, a
vine of grapes
d angling
above our heads
BRUSH-FIRE
You used to be
a lung full of air,
a red tongue
but
You are a cloud.
Your name is a cloud.
now
I must conjure
you out of sky—
I breathe you in
and heave you out
like a long drag
a cocaine voice
I remember when
we used to ruffle
feathers, your white
plumes and the flesh
of my thighs
I remember when
you died.
I buried you,
neck bent pale
without grieving
Your blue fingers
seemed to pulse
blood still, but
I was a swan.
I held you under
water ‘til you drowned.
I swallow.
I imagine something
sinewy like your
hands, made
intangible since
I flushed you out.
And now you are
ground after kindling
after brush-fire
after flood—
without even
the memory
of a start.
CITY OF PINE
My feet were glue
my shadow, angular
obscure
Beclouded by
the liquid in
my stomach, now
my eyes
My feet, I remember,
were glue and you—
You smelled of pine
You smelled of pine
needles.
Wetted to a stagger,
cup to the mouth
Crippled with a
brokentongue
You lean, you cut
the air clean
you look for
A Voice
To bellow out
in the concrete
“WHY left for
dead, polluted?”
I heard you fall
like some nightingale
out of its nest
You whimper.
You dig, you
seek the corpse
of a buried child
in stone
You search for
the words, “O God”
This supplicate prayer
Will do you no more good
than a walk through
the City
at night
I promise.
Such clarity there
amidst the murky
shade of sin. Yes,
this breath will
do you good
Such unholy baptism
in these streets
To bathe in your own filth
and come out clean
And you, I remember
you, smelled
of pine
THE PHOENIX
When I said
I was a galaxy,
I meant it
I wished it
I thought
nothing
of night,
or Death
but now
You come
with the
night-sweats,
the pale
thunder
a troubadour
of the half-light
You sing of
love, you sing
I sense
your voice
in the umbra
though
hear not
You are
a fool
and I—
I stumble,
a nebula
lying sideways
You come,
all white
bed sheets
on crooked
feet
And aren’t
you the One
who would
save us
Save…?
or the one
with horny
toes, Draco
A harbinger
of death
or just the
knot in your
gut, borne
long—foetal
that begs,
You are no
phoenix
“The Phoenix,” K.E.B.
OUT OF THE KINGDOM, I COME
I lost the keys
I lost the keys
In the shadow
of Heaven
The feather drops
but never straight
I am bloated
and thread-bare,
wandering creature
I row against
the current
I labor, a child
weakened
to a crawl
I lost my fingers
in the bone-chill
of the surge
Who will make
me a foundling?
I would that
I were a winged
cherub, look at
my ruddy face
the scratches on
my forehead and
On the third day…
I should pray
I should fall
prostrate, but
the Tempter calls
me home
I will not
enter the gate
if not in a
stumble
I testify
with my flesh,
I swear
I take your
name in vain
I intoxicate
myself with
the scent of
your cheek
I’ll be damned
for these things
And beg
my way back
into the Kingdom
“Out of the Kingdom, I Come,” K.E.B.
TRUTH-WHITE
Fingertips over those eyes,
lash line to lover’s brow—
The light reflects half-truths,
whole wishes and
the slope of your arm
where I could live
if I just could.
I never thought you would let me.
Contentment rests in
that soft slope of your
not-soft arm and hot skin,
the bow of your lips,
the truth-white flash of your teeth
before you sink them
Longing becomes the recreation
of a dream, your having been there
a myth—only I felt you.
I smell the palm of my hand
where your palm was.
We have been
only we are
Don’t say it isn’t you.
You are
the jaw line meets cheekbone
meets the temples meets the brow
Until dimples become loose skin,
age spots, pupils part from focus,
eyes recede into holes.
Everything left
is structureless—
like beauty
those eyes
the color of your iris
and the dewy hair
on your thighs.
I will live in that truth-white flash
of your teeth
of your eyes.
“Truth-White,” K.E.B.
THE CENTER
I am energy.
I am
the energy
that was
acted upon
by the force
not the force
that acted
The weight
in my ears
screams of
eddies from a
consummate
spigot, of
water pooling
generative
and without
color—a surge
of some
wet creator,
procreant
The way the
ripples flow
out from
the center
an opiate
which creates
but does not
move
And I think
transcendence
must have
something
to do with
the center
of the ripple
not the stone
that was thrown
that started this—
and then I
stopped.
“The Center,” K.E.B.
FEAR IN THE LEAVES
There is fear
in the trees
this autumn,
in the way
they rustle
and scream
apocalyptic
as my hair
tangles and
clings to my
lips painted red
I squint into
the light of
a clouded
not-sun
incandescent
a flaming
horse
and they say
the dawn of
all things new
my belly aches
fearing that
the leaves
smell of
the death
of a dream
and that the
jet-stream on
the horizon
screams
but screams
of naught
what, what
has happened
this autumn
amid all this
change, a light?
and I miss
the twist
of my legs
between yours
equinal
amid these
bruised knee
caps, these
seasons
if only…
this fall
would feel
less cold
and sprout life
“Fear in the Leaves,” K.E.B.
i like my body when it is with your
i like my body when it is with your
body. It is so quite a new thing.
Muscles better and nerves more.
i like your body. i like what it does,
i like its hows. i like to feel the spine
of your body and its bones, and the trembling
-firm-smooth ness and which I will
again and again and again
kiss, i like kissing this and that of you,
i like, slowly stroking the, shocking fuzz
of your electric fur, and what-is-it comes
over parting flesh…And eyes big love-crumbs,
and possibly i like the thrill
of under me you quite so new
“i like my body when it is with your,” e.e.cummings (from Complete Poems 1904-1962)
THE FALL
The rain is
dry this time
of year, and
the color of
phosphorus
and you too
are the sun—
As the leaves
fall and swirl
(I hold you
In my hand)
and dive and
grace the crest
of your brow
like little not-wet
droplets of water
I blink
and imagine
you—and
You swim
in them, in the
red-orange-
yellow surge
in the color
of beauty and
revelry and sin
like drunken
memories
like ecstasy,
or coming home
“The Fall,” K.E.B.
ELEGY FOR SEPTEMBER
And the sky
was blue-black
and the color
of her eyes
was ash
and the boots
were lost
amid the
birthdays a
son never had,
the father they
never knew
All those
half-whispered
prayers rise
up—a fog—
a suffocating
memory
like a hand
on your knee,
or the stranger
in some stairwell
who knew more
of you than your
wife even did
because she
sat there
and she
watched you
die—just like that
Not to diminish
the love, only
to stress how
unfair it is,
this life and
this death…
They mix
with some
human response
that screams of
who-gives-a-shit
in the unhallowed
dark (O, injustice)
…and I wonder how
we ever forget
in the first place
like our first
lover’s last name
“Elegy for September,” K.E.B.
(NAME) ___________
How do
you give
a thought
a SHAPE
or a word
or a place
to live and
(hide) in
I cannot
punctuate
or form or
what’sitcalled
…thinking
of you
so often
I’ve forgotten
how to write
but not how
to love—
only how to
articulate it
If the shape
of your lips
had a word,
would it be
soft or red or
thatthingilove
and I
know those
aren’t shapes
but they
could be
Think of it.
we almost
forget
that some
things have
a name
while
some things—
“(Name)________,” K.E.B.
