The Girl in the Tiny Picture

You are a statue

carved out of fortitude,

delivered to us

through a dark glass.

We watch the intimacies

that are shared

like tiny sandwiches

with tea,

brought on a silver tray

in the summer twilight as we all

sit ocean-side.

You serve us

kindly, and with principles,

aware all too often

of the shortcomings

and disappointments

that are often left as tips.

People pass by;

we smile, unseen.

Nodding together in a

moment in time,

as we watch,

the clouds reach down

and gather the rays of

the setting sun in a gasp

of forgiveness

at its leaving us.

They wrap tendrils of fingers

around the radiant beams,

painting the canvas before us

with our dreams

and our longings,

mirroring our laughter that

befalls us like the calm

before the storm of tears,

uniting us with a common

thread, and restoring our

smiles at the

sharing of it.

Summer Night

Wash over me

waves of rich

indulgence.

If I could taste

the feeling,

it would be

caramel,

hot and buttery,

warm,

it carries me

softly, with the motion

of a slow, melodic

breath,

a balmy breeze

that paints my skin

like silk.

Slow Poison

A wayward mind

crashed upon the shores of

realization,

dazed by the lies

that were sold as

“for your best interest,”

and, “you can trust us,”

and, “we are here to protect you.”

It is the worst

betrayal.

A path to isolation

and confusion.

Anger and deep

crags filled with

frozen despair.

The world is remade daily

like a cell that divides and

renews itself,

yet mutated by

the toxins

sold to us as love.

It is profitable,

after all.

They worship a god

dripping with

sweat made of gold,

his feet rancid with

the fetid souls of

the dead.

They were killed by

the greedy,

slaughtered in the human

corporate farm that

is our society.

He picks his teeth

with the bones of our

children,

already dead,

despite still walking.

It is a nightmare

we cannot wake up from.

Our bodies, our fate

invaded upon and decided

for us,

without our consent.

The story is familiar.

The question is,

what will you

do?

You Wear My Disillusionment Well

To think, that at one time I

sought you out;

considered your sentiments;

enjoyed your smile,

your humor,

your inane

configurations of

ideas.

A testament to

naivete.

Mine, not yours.

How the winds

blow cold in my face,

awakening my favor

of you,

and turning it to

sweet indifference.

The disappointment is mine

as well.

You promised me a great

potential.

You lured me to believe in

your possibilities.

Invested,

I was.

The questions that

remain

are:  to whom did you

sell yourself to?

And why were you

for sale at all?

Spiritus

There is a season

that is unknown.

Foreign, like a language

never heard,

from a land that

slipped away

into the recesses of

the crags of time.

It is a season,

primordial,

the fifth season.

It is not the beginning,

when life bursts forth

with shuddering vigor

and an ever seeking reach.

Nor is it the pinnacle of

radiant days,

eloquent in their balmy

assuredness.

It is not the swirling

bliss of carefree

winds,

rustling and rattling

through our afternoons.

It is not the finality,

that is expected,

that is only a moment,

that is only dark,

because of our fear

of it.

There is peace, and stillness,

and time for reflection there,

a bane if life was wasted,

a joy if life was invested

in one’s own destiny.

This passage

into the unknown season,

is but a gateway into

the time of renewal,

of altered form,

and reunion with

all that is forgotten,

when we cross the river

Lathe,

so that we can

begin again.

The Man of Steel

You sail around me in a sailboat of steel,

prancing on deck in a ritualized dance;

peacock feathers a mock tail.

A glass of Chardonnay in your hand,

or is it Bordeaux?

And though you speak to me

in stilted verse,

you do not see me,

for you are looking at a photograph

of a woman you suppose I am,

or is it wish?

Too bad you didn’t notice

that I walked away.

Soul Garden

I love when the Sun

speaks wisdom to me in

the early dawn,

when I am too sleepy

to be too busy

to listen.

He told me once,

that I should cherish

the pieces of my

broken heart.

He said that each piece was

a seed for a new beginning,

to be planted and nurtured,

loved and cared for,

and allowed to flower into

a new promise,

a new day,

a new beginning.

He told me he

would hold onto them

for a while,

and cleanse from them

all the ills that

had caused their

shattered fragments

to be realized.

He warmed them

from their frozen states,

and gave them back to me,

to plant within the

fertile valleys

of my soul.

I left them there,

and true to his words,

they sprouted and grew

into new dreams and

brilliant tomorrows.

The Pearl Necklace

There was a point in time

when I stood on the precipice

of the rest of my life.

A time when I made the decision to

not look back,

but only forward

into the expanse that I

chose not to be

terrified by,

but inspired,

with awe,

that I had the opportunity

to decide my own

future.

To hold my own

life

in my hands, like a

newborn puppy.

It may be blind and

deaf,

but it forever

seeks

the warmth, comfort,

and joy

that new life can find

in the tiniest of

places.

It was the discovery,

that meaning was not

the huge expanse sold

to me when I was young,

of industrialized dreams

prepackaged and sold

on the shelves of our undoing.

Meaning is a moment, which

though it passes like a

dream,

is forever strung together

with all my other moments,

like a necklace made

of shiny pearls,

and though they will vanish

when I am gone as if

they never existed.

I smile now, because

it is the creation of

each pearl that

feeds my soul.

Aquarius

Why do you hold yourself

locked away in that tower

of forged glass?

Permitting me to see you

clearly,

as if you were

accessible.

Yet, as far away as if

you were a figure

etched in stone

upon a monument

to my young self.

How I idolized you,

and how I cared for you,

and how I was left

with a hand full of

nothing

but ash.

It is the ash of you in

the future,

permanently gone.

It is the ash

of me in my future,

forever separate,

and impermanent.

I never wanted

the distance

you created.

I only honor it,

for you made the

decision.

I was given

no choice.

There are many kinds

of death.

All of them

create changes

that cannot be

erased,

and time does not heal

all wounds.

The Limnu

Unbidden, they come.

Great hoards of them,

Snickering,

or whispering.

Desert sounds,

like huge spiders

walking on dry leaves,

or snake skin scrapping

endlessly over scorched sand.

Only it is voices,

not sounds.

I hear them,

effortlessly,

though I do not

want to.

So I turn towards

the origin

of the apparently

silent rabble,

for not everyone

can hear them.

I smile at them,

unexpectedly,

and they are

quieted.

They are not used

to people

not being frightened.

So I snicker at them,

and go about

my work.