Construction paper everywhere. I feel the colors with my fingertips. A rainbow of raw, unfettered childishness and possibility. The garden of papers that was a rainy day recess in Connecticut necessity. I had castles in mind. Later on I would mug Baudelaire and I found the mechanism of “beauty is truth, truth beauty,” ticking away like a watch in his left pocket. On this day, though, raindrops trample over me. My glaring deficiency of virtue and economy are on a television for everyone to marvel at whether they want to or not. Some day in the not too distant past I will get up and turn it off. Fear is an organist playing “Bitch” by Meredith Brooks, over and over again in the corner.
Tag: writing
Amniotic Safety
Ebullient daylight argues with darkness at the periphery of my hungry eyes’ territory. All this bickering and no one brought me lemonade or pet penguins. Every time I feel a sour, sticky dream sliding through the folds of my classic brain, I take some pill that probably causes cancer and the manufacturer is just lying about it. In the clouds, a place wet with dreams and warm with an amniotic sort of safety that surpasses all knowledge.
Beige Women
Craving comfort, beige women line their cream homes with white roses. The thorns, being cut off by blunt scissors, bleed their chlorophyll dreams out in the trash can. Some perfect woman will dump them out in compost, saving the world wearing a cable knit chromosome and the greenest eyes. In cold mirrors, I stare back at myself. See the thorns coming from my finger tips, my hands clasped around my own throat?
This is What I Couldn’t Explain to the Aliens
Beneath a gun metal sky of trauma, which grows like a vine throughout all Creation, I play chicken with Death parked in my bathroom cabinet. Will I turn away, or will I succumb? The answer lies in the valleys of existence. This is what I could not explain to the aliens. We must die to ourselves without dying in ourselves, and our growth causes us to constantly crude crunchy casings of our old selves.
Body as Liminal Space
Body as liminal space. My wet and squishy soul waiting in chambers of blood to ascend to permanence. I am waiting. I am Waiting with a capital W. My shell expands and my soul exhales, but still there is not enough room in here. Behind me always, a crimson demon hiding in my dust as I burst through emptiness.
Ghosts Clamor
I wedge sentences into paragraphs like door stops. What do I really want to say? I mean to say that frostbite is the only answer to a love that wanders far afield, and that terror is a terrific thing to keep in your backpocket. The cold settles onto the land like a squatter in a fever dream. Ghosts clamor at the edges, longing to steal the living for their games.
Mary and I
In the blue light of her motherly vision, I glow dim as an ember. And yet she blows her gentle breath on me until I spark. Suffering weighs a ton and smells of gangrene. From the innards of stars I come, foisted out onto a world prepared to devour me. Because of her my flame will grow whiter, hotter, and guide the contemporary pilgrims home.
Hunting and Haunting
On the twilight purple river, wolverines hunting and haunting the dreams of rabbits. In the tundra of my heart, sled dogs running over frozen lakes. At the blue blurred periphery, a growing fire gnawing its way through the cold. The fire has a name, and hands like strength and pleasure.
Doubt and Death
Doubt has been my mortal enemy. Only one of us is actually mortal, and it isn’t me. In the pangs of horror or the sublime vestibule of bliss, there will be no room for doubt. My sister canoes up the Mississippi toward the cold, clean, clear. In the driver’s seat of my life, a three eyed monster with a palpable disdain for my happiness. I am certain tomorrow will rain diamonds, and Ambiguity will have his day in the lime light, finding his religion. Doubt trails me like Death, and even Death is annoyed with him and butts his head into walls like an unwanted kid brother. Death has no time for doubt.
Bee Hives into the Horizon
A flower never taunts a bee. Digging ditches in the prison of my psyche I find a sapphire. Quickly I put it over my eyes and peer through it to see the underside of this gossiping world – the truth quilted and fluffed and made by needles and violence. Stretching toward the sun is a talent of plants. Stretching toward the moon the predilection of women. And men? The men tend bee hives into the horizon.
Miniature Moon 