Begs the Question

I feel the tender bondage of our love
When our hands folded together
On our first mountain under a sky of slate...
Is this how Jesus felt when Judas kissed Him
when He felt the lips on His face
Wet with sweat and sealing His fate?
With the other disciples were the angels crying:
moaning hollow thunder across the lonely hills...
From Heaven was there automatic forgiveness
without even a glimmer or hint of hate?
Did He think as his friend leaned close:
"Your sins are killing me..."
Salvation surprises me like a sudden spring snow
If I am just willing to let go, willing to be free.
I'm learning what my Grandfather already knows...
Wind through the Gethsamene garden and trees
(Soft like the wings of a butterfly my heartbeat slows.)
Sounds like Pilate's uncertain sigh of relief
One part worry and three parts belief...
In my own spirit I hear it and I am overcome.
(Gold paper cut to make the shape of a tear or a leaf.)
Mist from Holy Water burns my lungs...
Get me out of this garden, I cannot breathe,
This fog I am fighting through is as thick as fear
Until Two are One I cannot stay, I cannot leave;
We cannot fight the future until it is here.
Leaning over, lips gently kiss, then
Words from a whisper widen to a wish,
and cannot wait to say, "I love you so much."
The circles of our own eternals have touched.
To the flat figure eight we make of our love
We add dimension, decision, and ambition:
Then your circle bends onto mine
and my circle blends with yours, entwined...
The wood ladle filled with well water
                      before she withdrew it,
Spilt from God's cup, this is our infinity--
This Present is our Gift
and a ribbon runs through it...

3.1.2006

dissemblance

we are guilty bystanders to a collison,
a witness to four bleeding colors for four corners
where we will stand in one place, (believing)
and be in four states...translocation
or dislocation...vicious, like a vision
of what we might see in eternity
when two find freedom, become one, yet
we are not always as we claim, with the same
Creator, and though often saying the same things,
in creation we are not the same, but
disparate: different but not indifferent
to the similarities in each other
a verisimilitude of rareties, feeling
again different and the same under covers
reeling, exultant, feeling exalted
in a light brown house with evergreen shutters we can
see the ruins around us where building has been halted
we cannot blame ourselves or others
for their pain we cannot be faulted
we can but try to make them better
pick them up and right them, or
write them so they will not be forgotten...
we can but try to not remind them
that giants walk this earth beside them:
our world spins on a different center
(they freeze in winter/ we are frozen in time)
a stranger sun meets our eyes each morning
each time we try to reassure them and
explain oceans as if we meant is as a warning...
stretch strong muscles then be still,
reach with your spirit, you can hear it filling the beach
bide your time and tide for the day when wisdom will
bind little minds and make them whole. Sand
falls from a broken hourglass, time's breach.

2.27.2006

weternal

the soft-spoken truths we tell each other at night,
after our bodies make promises and we are spent,
after we click off the lamplight, are like fireflies:
they blink yellow slightly for a second or
super bright for a longer moment, intense,
flashing in the rhythm of a previous arrangement
a cadence of concrete: porous yet dense.
come let me give you trinkets of my fingers
treasures of my hands, my legs, my arms
feel the gentle weight of me ease into luxury as
love and lust has come to ravish us: you and me.
this love is ours to call and claim.
shut starlight out with walls and blinds
i can see you better by the candles' small flames
while fireflies watch us walk the line...

2.27.2006

Undershade

They could not hide
The Man Adam or the Queen Eve
In the Shade of the One Tree
So bright beyond the
Tree of the Knowledge--
The Knowledge of Good and Evil;
They could not hide.

There is no sin, there is no debt--
All bets are off, all bets are on.
There is no way to tell if this is night or day
They think they are only Three:
The Father and He and She.
There is no daylight only a Holy Glow...
There is no Way.

The light does not change even in Eden
The light does not change even at sunset...
This is the eve of the fall,
The day before they take in turn
                     Bites of the bitter fruit...
The day they share shame
       And so many other things without names...
This is the eve of the road that will lead to hell.
In a little while dawn will knell a time when
Skin becomes thin and can split and bleed...
No longer the Man or his Queen to draw
                     From the Deeper Well...
Water now freezes and dries.
There is no way to avoid the truth;
There is no way to tell.

This dry riverbed so void of hope and trust
Runs closer to us today though so littered
With dead leaves and bones and dust and rot.
While the devil may care we are afraid that He does not.
Yet even ashes on the breeze
(lighter than leaves in the wind are ashes in the air)
even ashes have to fall sometime, somewhere...

2.22.2006

Fleeting

A malicious mystery: The tender tones
Of tension twine tenaciously. The
Searing sconce of suspense flutters
Frighteningly. The hologramic holocaust
Hovers near hearing... fearing lest
The world discover the hidden heights
Of horror lurking in the hearts of lovers.

The powerful pain of a paltry presence...
An eerie enigma. The nasty nightmares
Of night's long past; fighting the frightful
Pangs that last. What weary warriors
Waged as war the Seven Sons see as evening
The score. The marriage of magic and
Misty Myth adds to the long lost legends

A beginning to the ends.

1994

inundation

sometimes I feel like I'm drowning
in a lake thick with weary memory.
all I want is for hands to reach through holy water
find me shake me awake from my wet hell, my history.
I pray: please get these demons out of my mind
I cry: just get these demons out of my mind...
Don't let me sink like others before me...
sailors follow in the wake of apathy, unwanted
and unwashed, swallowed by the water they swallowed,
they leave vessels empty, ships unmanned...
one more time to rise, the third, I am allowed:
love from you to me flows undaunted
a river that rages more as it ages undammed--
with a steady will you make me slowly unhaunted:
the blanket of your deep caring covers a shivering me;
lines of cold water mix with sweat and cling to me
like dull drops of nightmares I cannot forget.
Every time I look at you I almost cry...
A fire begins to glow as light flares,
soon my body like my heart is safe, warm, and dry.

2.20.2006

White Roses at Noon

Church bells
Sound twelve
Chimes thrumming
Each pulse
Present with prayer
Moving strangers' eyes in the air
Hands dance from side to slender side
Fingers flow
Tracing tender circles left to right
Tai Chi moves energy gently
And thought moves wishes to worship.

A story of both joy and one of sorrow
Of endless night: no dawn, no tomorrow--
How the Jackdaw stops to sing...
The bird that stole the bishop's ring
His wife cries as a feather falls to the ground
No one notices, her sobs make no sound.
Rest your hands on the window
And watch them go
All earthly authority in a circle and a seal
Now he hears the turning of the wheel
The tearing away of his powers
He used to wear like faded flowers.

The True King brings an end to war...
Just as well--
We were born for so much more.
Shade fades and shadows retreat
To the edges of walls, the sides of feet.
Heat drifts slow across dusty streets;
Sweat on your lips is salty and sweet.
We shake from a sudden summer kiss.
Has there ever been any time but this?

2.16.2006

* Note this poem is best seen/read while centered on the middle of the page. The proper lineation and spacing will add to the overall movement and tone of the poem.

My Burden

I long to be rid of it
For it's too heavy to carry
I'm too afraid to commit
and it's too big to bury.
Make no mistake:
I do not perservere like Pilgrim;
This weight of regret and guilt and shame
Is crushing the shoulders of my soul.
I long to forsake it, this damn source
of a thousand heartaches and more.
Pain radiates from my neck and shoulders
to my back and my hip in lines of invisible fire.
No matter how loud and how often I cry
that it's just not fair, why now, why me, why!
I still know somewhere in the stillness of my soul
that it is wrong to shake it off and throw it away,
just as well because I am not strong enough to break
it off from my back then back away...
Try as i might, though, there is no way to even break
off little pieces of my past and spread it around;
others carry their own, so I cannot share.
Some days I feel I can no longer walk under the weight,
and those times I think it might be nice if I no longer cared
whether the burden crushes me, kills me, or not.
I have a feeling, something a little more certain than fear,
                            (but just as hot)
that if ever I could get it down off my shoulders
it would follow me down the long path of life and one day
it would swallow me with a mouth full of sharp knives
                                                     and dark nights.
Can a rock full of gold and clay
say to the Master, "Refine me."
All I know is whever I turn and search for it, trying to face it,
that I can never quite see it...but it is always behind me.

5.25.2004/
1.28.2011

Transept

What would I do if I were me, surrounded
By lines of invisible electricity that find us
Wrap light blue fire around and bind us tight
No hope of help from being grounded...
This fire faintly seen carries our souls
Soaring slightly heaven-bound
The air is clean and buries the past in distance.
We once who wandered lost are found taking flight
Broken stained glass brushes past as we pass through,
Mountains of cumulus spread heaven over blue:
Doubt with silver-lining filled with white,
Once you and me...now we: what have we become?
From fears riven, given release, peace and freedom.
We arc circles on skin with slender fingers
With whispers of confession and expression
In the dark, tender affection lingers...
Wind whips past spinning us in a delirious dance.
Just when we thought love left us and it was too late
Cherubim solemnly stare, dare us with one last chance,
And Gabriel's fire flares guiding us to the Gate.
Thundering horses' hooves and the tip of a lance
Defeat my defenses pierce my heart with an ache
Leaving me to bleed my heart an empty expanse
Snow turns red under the turning wheel of fate
And turning we find each other under the transepts
Of a stone church, stained glass, and soaring spires.
Our bodies all temples and gardens and free:
Like the holy place of Gethsemane where Jesus wept.
His Tears mix with the flame of desire and make steam:
Vapors hot and heavy weave dream in the air...
False laws fade in the sun and rules are over-stepped.
Turrets line the towers guiding smoke and prayer
To God's ear from candles, clasped hands, and altar fires.
We bloom and are not flowers but a field of roses.
Azure angels attend us sent by cerulean sires...
One window is broken, two wounds are healed, one door closes.

2.14.2006

Asunder

To protect me and project me I build
Shiny walls to keep out friends and strangers
That now have made a dam of steel and concrete filled
with distorted images of myself and dangers...

Fears and failures still keep many at bay
But those who make it through find
This massive thing: solid like my Will, strong as my Way
Standing against all but the Kind.

Scratches mark the surface in plain view
Made by the weak, angry god of my youth.

A vain hope for love is covered by
Gallons, tons, of water dirty with despair, dismay,
Rivers run riot then run dry then rot
Seraphim sigh, are sorry, say:
"This is all we've got..."

Then...a stranger's smile makes an impression
Generosity gives glimpses of friends
Chipping little niches with little knives
Even i-love-you's whispered with little conviction
Swing hammers steady at the steadfast wall:
Battering rhythm like a beating heart, brittle but alive.
God reaches through my pain, my grief, my hell,
Her arms hold me, she tells me it's going to be alright.
Cracks in my armor; I try to fight.
Tears on my face, water seeping from the well
Pools in hollows forming small brooks,
Bending downward like the Goddess' kiss, gentle,
Stars sparkle like freckles on Her face,
Letting go of my past and pain,
(withered fruit falling from a distant vine)
She does not ask me why i cry why i shake,
Her tears mix with mine...
Her stately saving grace a steady rain;
My world has become wider than this lake.

Now...the oceans are the floor of my house
And the wide blue sky is the roof
Trees are the walls shuffling from side to side
                            with restless roots...
Ask me what I'm feeling
     Lie down on this sand with me
             Look up at the cloud-covered ceiling.

2.2.2006

In-Between

The time when what is but felt can be seen:
It is the sliding away of night and day
Dirt on my sleeves mud on my knees
Praying in the gray twilight of spring
In the fading day of sunset green leaves
Like postcards from months ago look autumn gold.

The Spirit moves and wings take flight.
Squint sideways at yellow and watch them go
Every gap in the branches a skylight.
The Goddess pushes past branches, leans close,
In equal measure both Sage and Sprite,
This wind, Her wisdom, a Holy Flow,
She kisses my forehead, gentle, light,
Watch Her lead...see me follow...

1.30.2006

Evangeline

Eden lies cool in the dusk of an eternal evening
Something you think God would have seen coming.
The Two Trees sigh though there is no wind
Even the twin images of God are missing,
Gap from the rib now a distant spiritual suture.
We are become factories of our actual histories.
Write with a life what will be read in the past's future:
Make it a Mystery, not what will be required of memory.
And put a shine on any present misery.

A musical certainty sings calling us to two lines...
Take the unraveled strings of yours and mine
And weave me and you into something new
Something colorful (maybe green and blue) and warm
A tapestry of you and me, a couple re-born,
And covered in this blanket of ourselves we flew.
"...there is such a thing as Magic..."
This is our will made to call forth power
Cool like chill frost on evening flowers
The Way is made plain this North Road none but ours.

Lay by the path when rest is what you need
after the heat of the day suffered like Mar's wrath
Find shade under evergreen at Forest's border
Remember sweeping Sycamores were once just seeds.

Our love is earnest embers struggling to glow again
From forgotton fires...

Above us and now behind, burns a December sun,
Around us flow wisdom and the Wind
bends leaves backwards brightening the world in light green
shapes and shades of wide or narrow leaves
With soft silver whispers...Eve warns of storms.

If you listen to her voice in the wind it is not frightening:
Free transcendence. She's been where we are from;
We need not fear bending trees, thunder, or the lightning:
in Eve's ascendence...an Angel she has become.

January, 2006

Just Us

Hovering and fluttering
like white butterflies on a flower on a field:
Spirits sigh against a pained, bruised sky, jealous,
Humid hues of oranges and blues
With silence say they are envious of us.
And with a sound of thunder...
The guise of guardians of paradise crumble,
Angels weep wild terrible tears not knowing love.
Not even given a choice, they are the angry eternal,
Not even given a voice,
they cloak themselves in quiet regret
once they were giddy and glad they had not been cast out...
but now they doubt...

God reaches for the two of us...longing to touch and be seen.
Though new we see through a glass darkly
We are lucky to get that much.
Eyes open then stare (the light stark and white)
At a window, a wall, broken glass and the Fall.
Chilled ashes pile high in a broken furnace
Gray echoes of heat that if we glimpsed at all
Would bleed the truth that set me free and we
Would need nothing but the truth that would
do us justice...and just burn us.

This question haunts me at every turn
Taxing my awareness, flaring, burning
Am I in search of fairness or justice?
This is the Way of the Word
to seal and sear in lines on the skin as proof
with the hot blade of a Sword of Truth
"...the very flame of the LORD."

1.26.2006

Rain

is a spirtual, a shimmering shadow of the actual...
never meant to seem frail-- it is the widowed world,
reality in a veil.
A black daytime sky brightens slightly then is fast
followed by cracks of thunder.
God's tears cascade over
waterfalls and under bridges.
Fearing my heart may have lost its home, i cry.
God's tears mix with my own forming floods
that find cracks in sidewalks and gutters.
Men and women pile sandbags high to dam the tide,
while i damn the words i uttered but not the tears i cried.
God weeps with us sobbing against the sand.
Somehow with prayers and words we make it work.
She keeps us in the palm of Her Hand.
Beyond the flooded plains is the sight of the sea
And an expansive, expensive lake view.
Wet leaves glisten in the sun of one more try.
Keep the heart I gave you;
I will keep yours safe and dry.

1.22.2006

Vas NiMae (The Blind and the Siren)

sometimes she is my conscience

a faerie with gleaming silver wings

with kindly reminders of “…grace…

…mercy…” she’s whispering.

Sometimes she is my protector

Teeth baring eyes glaring out of sockets

Staring through white sheets feel the heat

She destroys my enemies like a rocket.

Sometimes she is my nightingale

And the sweetest songs she sings to me

faintest brogue and  lilting tones,

Songs that give hope and faith and rest.

Sometimes she looks with eyes of brightest blue

Catching, releasing every rainbow shade and slightest hue.

And if you caught those eyes looking at you

You would fall in love with her too…

Sometimes she strides in beauty not like the night

But like the dawn that leaves ribbons

Of pink and orange and red in stripes

Across the landscape of light…my kingdom.

Sometimes she sees with eyes of sea green

Shining like an emerald never shone

Into these depthless pools drop the stone

Of all the times you were alone…

Now she is the last and best Queen of my lands.

October, 2006

reflection

the day has faded to a dusty greenish-gray

like a tune I can’t remember anymore

from a song you won’t play for me anyway…

rain is squeezed like blood from plump

black turnip-shaped clouds

and I’m shouting:

housewithoutwallshousewithoutwalls

noshelterfromtherainnoshelterfromtherain

withoutwallsnoshelter

noshelter

no.

spin me with wind and gravity

till I end up undone…

sing me until I am a slurred song

with words and music blurred, piss poor;

and I’ll be just one more thing

you do not have time for.

My head is spinning even laying on this bed

Where you shoved me and

Everything is spinning and I’m sinning

against the one who loves me.

Each heartbeat thumps in my breast

Rapping solidly against my chest rasping

voice calling knocking on the other door

that should not be closed

            and should never be locked.

Did You dream of me

Before endless ebony was erased

During your eternal night without sleep.

Did you dream of me

When the Spirit chased darkness

Across the face of the deep?

Lord make for me a new shape

Poured with loving-fire into a new mold

One from which I can never escape

One that will not bend or break…one that will hold.

Make me new wine in new skin

From water freshly born again…

A miracle both molecular and medical

When I look at the mirror

(cracked stained glass smeared with blood and sweat and worse)…

When I look at the mirror what do I want to find?

That man who was so gentle, understanding, and kind

How has he changed?  Is he cursed?

Where has he gone this time?

9.19.2006

A Song of Palms

Our flesh brushes together making millions of tiny

busy bridges of protons, electrons, and intentions.

Our molecules sing a song of palms pressing together

Heaven’s harmony brings love and a blessing of forever.

Your heart line crosses my line of wealth.

My lifeline intersects your line of health.

Fair and darkened fingers rise and fall and find

One life made from two intertwined.

Holding your hand is something sacred, something holy:

something to write on my calendar and tell my friends.

I want to have you as close as my soul to me.

I want to live story after story with no more ‘the ends.’

8.22.2006

Afterain

I’m going to dye myself the color of flesh

And run until I am dry…

I’ve got to lie I’ve got to sell to get more and more

And run until I die.

When you can’t stand the pressure anymore

When you cannot bear even one more touch

This is a variation on deprivation…

Loving less, wanting more…having too much.

I don’t mind; I don’t even ask anymore, why,

I’m nothing but a spark in her eye sometimes.

Until she sends me up like a flare, and I am light.

Bringing bright that flashes day across the sky at night.

8.22.2006

Clearwater

It is a stolen kiss and the chance we take;

It is forgiveness for the mess we made and the deal we make;

It is the first time jumping naked in a freezing cold lake…

It is to dance when stillness would be a mistake.

I remember a freckled face wrinkled in a girl’s frown

Because I had to go home, because the sun was down.

I wish I had known

Just how not very far I could go alone…

I wish I had never found out

What it’s like to live in a world that’s round.

But back then my world was maybe four-feet-two

And we ran under a summer of flawless blue

Don’t tell me I can’t find Happiness

 I know how to get there…

I am no stranger to tan feet and long blonde hair,

Or how her azure eyes closed when she kissed a boy.

Don’t tell me I haven’t found joy.

8.22.2006

Madrigal

The man consumed by thirst never stops

To ask if the glass were half full or empty,

Even though half-way to freedom means

You are only half-way from slavery.

Black birds cross my path like black cats

Cawing ‘sorry!’ for all my black bad luck.

And again I will ask you to remember

That I once wrote what was needed, and

If you have to ask, you haven’t drained the glass

and you haven’t searched long enough to

Find me free in the place we used to be

Where we loved each other close

Where there was more shelter and fewer clothes.

Touch the face pressed smooth with lips and love

In a place where we used to be free…

Now in a window through glass darkly I am framed:

The evidence is all around me posted and paned.

Turn away from the sill

It is time to bend to the stronger will.

Come along now, it is time to meet.

Come up from your chair and out through the door.

There is so much to see: here is the world, and more…

8.22.2006/ 1.26.2011

Sen Fera Lyss (finding lost songs)

Find me free in the place we used to be

Where we loved each other close

Where there was more shelter and fewer clothes.

Touch the face pressed smooth with lips and love

In a place where we used to be free…

Now in a window through glass darkly I am framed:

The evidence is all around me posted and paned.

Turn away from the sill

It is time to bend to the stronger will.

Come along now, it is time to meet.

Come up from your chair and out through the door.

There is so much to see: here is the world, and more…

What is it about a surprise

That Christmas moment of sparkle

When a stranger’s smile touches my eyes:

It is a stolen kiss and the chance we take;

It is forgiveness for the mess we made and the deal we make;

It is the first time jumping naked in a freezing cold lake…

It is to dance when stillness would be a mistake.

I remember a freckled face wrinkled in a girl’s frown

Because I had to go home, because the sun was down.

I wish I had known

Just how not very far I could go alone…

I wish I had never found out

What it’s like to live in a world that’s round.

But back then my world was maybe four-feet-two

And we ran under a summer of flawless blue

Don’t tell me I can’t find Happiness

 I know how to get there…

I am no stranger to tan feet and long blonde hair,

Or how her azure eyes closed when she kissed a boy.

Now tonight I’m not waiting for the light to turn green.

I’m turning anyway…coming home because I know you’re there.

The stars are burning brighter and I’m trembling…

     This is joy.

8.18.2006

Blissless

ok for now.  How bliss is this?

How far from where I was am I?

She and I have been talking on

the typical, the topical, and the tropical.

Where is this conversation going?

While wicked wild sweat is flowing?

When you can’t stand the pressure anymore

When you cannot bear even one more touch

This is a variation on deprivation…

Loving less, wanting more…having too much.

I don’t mind; I don’t even ask anymore, why,

I’m nothing but a spark in her eye sometimes.

Until she sends me up like a flare, and I am light.

Bringing lightning flash day across the sky at night.

8.3.2006

The Thorngarden

This is it.  This is the life I won; the life I chose.  A garden full of thorns and not one rose.  I don’t need anymore people who tell me that is the way the cookie crumbles or the way the wind blows.  This is the life and that is just how it goes.  Bare branches are braced against the blue.  Winter provides a nice white backdrop for the long windows, turning fluorescence into gleams, then glares, then reminiscence.  Winter expands from the middle with clouds and cold wind that stings the eyes a little along the surface and in the hollows.  Finches, Sparrows, and other birds with brittle wings wing south condensation crusting ice around the mouth; like the cold hard truth.  Objects to the old appear further and further back.  The windows now return my sight back and forth to me for all it’s worth, as night grows.  When death ebbs; life flows.  Trees once silver, then green; now fade to black.

12.2.2002

wing and gate

feel the weight of glory and how light like ink upon my skin

once seared with small spears piercing my flesh

now it’s settled like peaceful surrender all smooth, soft, and tender.

“All we like sheep…” have spent all our pay on statues of silver and gold

building temples to this god or that god…we were going for baroque.

I have knelt at all the adorned altars, making peace, making war, making love,

making the bride of Christ an adulterer…and all of this for a quest, a search,

I spent and bought space in a barren Baptist basement, as cold as a tomb that church:

Seeking solace in a palace and absolution; using holy tap water for my ablutions.

as I back away from the window into the room the shadows swallow me whole;

the light in me grows brighter, as the blackness blends with soul

walk on hot coals set with so much fire

that it bends and blisters bitter skin

brown and black comes back to a withered sole…

for all I’ve been burned, and for all I’ve learned

not one penny…not one bit of penitence have I earned.

I want to be free and gay like a baby; I want to play with daylight like a toy

Wadding it up and throwing it away, as if he was a jaded girl or a bitter boy.

God has made time for us, and as cool as water from a deep well

For us He made time itself.  No one can even tell

How cursed we were, now how blessed.

But the sweetest dreams are sometimes the easiest to forget…

I wipe sweat from my eyes and struggle to rise…

I do not know what is worse the dry heat or the humidity

Clouds of faded gray seethe in the lee of a Serengeti tsunami

Not really raining but bleeding being hurt so much by the hellish heat.

The whole world is a wilted flower, leaning lilting to one side

a sweating sweltering delta, witnessed by a blind Creole.

Even with shadows and a light breeze, it is nothing short of Sheol.

Can you tell me how to get to a place called freedom?

Or at least can you tell me where I’ve come from?

But all I hear is from Jimi Hendrix or a hymn of David’s magic:

“Kiss the Son, lest he be angry and you be destroyed in your way,

for his wrath can flare up in a moment. Blessed are all who take refuge in him.”

All the while, angels argue with demons clamoring for my attention:

A cacophony of calamity and killing conversation claws

At my ears whispers at my eyes shouts at my mind

At every crossroad I find spiritual surround sound…

Let me go down, let me go down, let me go downtown;

Don’t let me go on.  Interrupt my flow…don’t let me go;

Hold me…I just might tell you things you need to know;

The bruises are not enough to make us stop or even slow…

We’ve got to bleed to show the stuff of which we are made.

                                    The blade.

What others call the truth.  Some say it may set you free.

                                    But not me.

I need proof…I need to see.

Your truth may be shiny like the solid gold dancers, but

Your faces are pallid, you are old and weak and have no answers.

                                    I will be free.

Let the cold dead lies of decaying religions eat you like cancer…

I will sail on through blue skies. Looking for truth in different eyes.

Looking for second-hand salvation with second sight.

            But Heaven will have Her Way

            Her Way is wise and kind.

And when I leave this world on wings on whispers may I find

The gate that stands on clouds of pearl and white.

2006

Accidental Angels

Shouting down the heavens and the sky, my

Prayers shatter the air like labored lightning

Echoes aching from my dry throat…

My prayer is an eagle with a broken bleeding wing

Sharing the air with clouds and thunder

Red drips in a stream

Making crimson stripes on curves of white

But my eyes are the blue of seas in a dream…

And my heart is a fulcrum of feathers

In equal measure both conceit and belief…

Do you wonder why I sing?

Do you wonder why I surrender?

I am not falling…I am clawing

Climbing steps of hot thin air.

The eagle’s hard black eyes are watering…

While an uncommon spirit grounds us

There is meaning to this life

There is peace that surrounds us

There is hope that shines in the night

How many breaths do my lungs possess?

How many miles left in my flight?

      How many feet?

See how long it takes me to meet

She who waits for me

Beyond the valley of this life,

Beyond the mountain of God,

Beyond the sunless sea…

And just before I cross the river

                  cross the flood,

Seraphim sent by Him

Will heal my wing, my hip, my heart.

I want to crash into the legs of the giant

When my sling fails to bring him down

                  (I will pull him down to my height

                  with cut and kick and punch and bite)

      He is my enemy, my burden, my “can’t”

And when I can no longer carry him

                  I will bury him.

And when

The hazy heat of jealousy and july

Clutches and rips apart black clouds

I want to make wild, savage love to the rain

and wind till I drown.

We are like angels only not…

      Our wings are a little too gone

Our skin is a little too hot.

      Our falling is a little too long.

But we are stranger than angels both

      when we sin and when we repent.

We are born of love and fire and lies and smoke,

      We from Eden sent.

How will it feel when we do not have to pray?

When we let our song ring on gates of gold and pearl;

When we are not bound to this world…

How will it feel when faith finally fades,

When we can look upon that face with our own eyes,

When we roll the timeline like yarn up into a ball,

Our gaze flashes pink and red with an endless succession

Of sunrise-sunset-sunrise…

How will it feel when we can send our spirit next to His,

Like the woman who touched his garment in the street

A blistering blinding faith and love we cannot resist,

And happy tears fall to wash His feet.

What will it feel like then?

And still we wait

While the star-streaked firmament gapes and grows weak…

Heavens gates wend wider than the sky

And the laughter starts even

as the last tears of sorrow end…

16 July 2006

Hold Your Fire

Like holding a live grenade in the face of the enemy
Is taking from Jesus the price He paid for me:
Repentant of the lies I've told, and the life I've been living,
Ungrateful, impatient, disappointed, but no longer unforgiven.

She believes I care and on most days I really do. Twisting
and turning/ risking and burning becoming something new.
I want to be free at least to forgive if not free from hurts.
And on most days she really believes in me more than I deserve.

I reach toward Jesus with sorrow in my hands,
I try to make a trade for joy but fail to understand
That with my hands full of pain, I cannot receive peace
That Jesus took my sorrow long ago, has given us winter,
summer heat has ceased.

So now i am tired of my ruined reputation, a life of infamy.
God wants to change my situation...first He has to change me.
And what I'm finding is that my heart keeps getting broken
Because God just wants my heart to remain open.

9.22.2009

Music

Music is
Music is a
Music is a place
Music is a place to
Music is a place to be
Music is a place to be free.

11.1.2009

Wind

The tender tempest touches the earth.
Wasted land and upended cars. And
trees left standing seem more like arms
of the sky sent to dig in the dirt.

But whether clouded in puffs of white
or shrouded in night the wood needs
no excuse. Yet all of nature stands
accused of deeds to dark for words.

Yet amidst the rubble of ruined lives
tips of aspen bend their ears to listen.
Desolation offers the peace that lives
in the heart of a night like this, while rivers
and streams rush to join the song of Heaven.

It sends stratus singing out across the landscape,
pointing at the tops of buildings and mountains.
It spirals cirrus out in wide arcs slicing blue sky.
It pulls the darkest nimbus and the whitest cumulus
together in a cacophony of silence and anticipation.

And the song reaches down to ruffle the hair of
someone late for an appointment. Finally,
the last verse of the day gives the city a little rest.
Breathing softly, it bats at pages
from yesterday's newspaper with the
long fingers of a summer night's breeze.

5.28.1989/
2.18.1996

The Wild Wave

A broken chain, bits of burnished brass in a pocket,
Words cut like knives when we trade blame
And love is a faded photograph in a locket--
faces we can no longer name:
Our hard times have exploded like rockets
Broken, with no money and less fame...
Without knowing why or what caused it we have
grown with this disregard that cannot be tamed
We are not shocked anymore.
We only want someone to rock our world
Clear our schedules for the party girl
Were we made for this?
Were we born to not resist?
Were we meant to choose over truth
                                  A dare to be kissed?
In the depths of the ocean they say nothing can exist.
But we want more than life; we want proof.
Before she slaps you grab her wrist,
And all we have to show for everything is nothing...
Nothing cools like the darkness of the ocean floor
Nothing much seems like dreams anymore.

7.12.2010

Shado

Blades of my own ego shout
                                   down to me
                              from all around
Shades of my own selfishness
                                   shout
                                   down to me
                                to the ground,
The heart is as full of spirit as blood.
Teeth and claws making ripping
                               dripping sounds
Avatars of animals, feeding on love.

5.19.2010

Good Light

the close-packed clouds look like lumpy mashed potatoes
smeared across the sky dripping rain like gravy
strained through skyscrapers and church steeples.
dawn is the barest hint of a glow in the east
just the difference between gunmetal gray and slate.
whether early light of morning or late light of dusk
and evening, simply trust that the last light you see
is not the least...

5.17.2010

In Time

Sometimes it is wrong to wait and pack
Sometimes it is wiser to just go.
On bus or train under sun or rain,
Any road takes you home and brings you
back... and love lies closer than you know.

4.18.2010

On Loss

We lose our way when we lose our sense of right,
We lose our days like we lose each night,
We lose whatever it is that we are trying to find,
We lose the struggle for sanity as we lose our minds.

An old man walked along the beach
Each day. He would walk a few steps
Then stop and turn to look out at the sea.
The ocean whispered to him in words
Created by waves... soft, slow sounds.
The wind tossed his thinning hair all around.
He thrust his hands in the pockets of his shorts.

People would talk about him, mostly tourists.
They said that he was looking for something he had lost.

But one look at him and I knew...

I knew they were wrong. He was not looking
out at the ocean for the answers he might find.

He gazed longingly at the water like a lover might.
He was throwing his heart wide
Hoping that the waves would carry a little
of his sorrow and grief away with the tide.
Yes, I knew,
because I have felt that way too...

9.30.1998

One Time

ten times done and one make eleven times
i've missed you in the last ten seconds
like driving gilded streets seeing 'Heaven' signs
but never quite reaching the right exit.
hearts burst when full i can't miss you one more time.
the next time we meet is the time i'll never forget.
the brown of your eyes makes mine shine,
like the sultry color of your lips, a shimmering secret.

10.25.2004