Honeyed Lips In Sour Times

I have no right to miss what is not mine,
yet my heart fills with a peculiar longing to breathe your air
in a surreptitious collective of two, undercover
honeyed lips in sour times, casting spells,
caught in the slow tranquility of  transitory thought
my mind muddling through daytime inertia,
walking in loops languidly never reaching higher ground. 

Verse may hold no significance,
broken promises held aloft on honesty,
heart strings dangled above unintentional landscapes -
with lens in hand, comprehending what I have found
pushed to the farthest edges of an ephemeral reality,
in an arc of revelation joined together
in every revolution around - tighter I am wound.

I fear these words as much as you, splitting myself in two,
disregarding webs shot through jet stream waves, drowned
relegating sentiments back to the vaults of sentient souls.
What am I but a fool, who believes life stores more
in our cells, mixed messages, scents leaving a trail
for others who hold the wind closely, breathe deeply
allow the universe to take hold, lose fear, become bound.

T'ween Time Filigree Seams

Breathing deeply, I search
anticipating catching a scent of you remaining,
hoping no one else will,
I bring different pieces of myself past my face
until I discover you upon my palm.
The place where your fingers met mine
fingers entwined in gentle after-glow,
your eyes, sideways across the pillow, smiling.

I find you mixed in the scent of my hair
sweet breath and skin as you pulled me in,
your hand pressed firmly against my crown
I breathed, buried into your chest, knees tucked
I find you on my shoulder
left over from the curve of your arm
enveloping me in embrace
soft-scented trace lingers.

You stay with me until morning,
if only in visions and reveries
honeyed perfume infecting my mind,
sweet dreams of daylight domesticity
situations that can never be,
conversations with no place in the darkness
grasping tween time filigree seams
lost in our blissful in between.

Unidentifiable Barrier

Sit in a crowd, revolve, split
are you found in stillness or noise
the choice always yours,
and understand that the whole is greater than the sum,
one layer in an entirety of parts,
stop spending time hiding pieces, throwing out small crumbs
scattered, divided
among a million, an unfounded sacred shell
be here now.
Replicated likeness irreplaceable
by person place or thing, fulfilling lightness,
the tiniest detail, clear threads
encircle the edges of your unidentifiable barrier,
propel your very being through the cosmos, on thin air,
I am energy, I matter, you are my serum, friend.

The Deep Breath Curled II

Everyone wants a piece of me
ripped open, thread bare
the love and tits of me
to feed and nurture, feign off insecurity
everyone wants the mother and peace of me
no one has the decency to lean in,
take the deep breath curled,
feel the pain and softness unfurled in me.
Take the meat of me
the marrow sweet spirit,
sour and divine of me
with my tears, see bravery
with blood and sweat
see this insanity
breath in, just me.

My Longest Love Affair

Poetry came to me like so many other aspects of my life, by surprise, at night, delivered by a curly haired freak that was equally charming, creepy and humorous.

 

She arrived in the early 90’s when an ethos of punk rebellion and DIY esthetic filled the air of my small central valley town as the youth steamed and stewed for something more, but sat clueless as to where to find it. The night of her arrival, I sat on the lawn of the only coffee house in town at the time, Java Jazz, owned by Harley Davidson riding, conservative Christian Republican Lesbians in recovery, which sounds like an oxymoron unless you have ever spent any time in Bakersfield, where one quickly discovers that the lack of clean oxygen tends to create a special breed of moron. I had recently experienced what I thought was my first love and consequent heart break and had simultaneously decided to not leave town for design school in LA.
 

It was here that I found my real true love, guised as a flyer for a poetry reading in the hand of a boisterous trickster delivered with the words, “You need to get up and follow me right now.” Normally, I would have responded with a quick and cool “fuck-off”, but that night as the breeze tucked under my knees, I asked “why?” and I let the wind propel me down the street, into dark alleys and off the beaten path to a café that had appeared like an apparition, arriving as quickly as it would depart 5 months later. 

 

My first poetry reading consisted of an audience of 15 people crammed into a tiny make shift café. Five of them were poets, 10 of them queer and three of them girls, one being me. I had read about poetry readings, dreamed of being on the road with Kerouac and Ginsberg, but this was my first taste. Smoke filled the room, espresso machine hissed as boys pretending to be men hunched in the corner in half embrace, spilling over journals and scraps of paper debating each other’s relevancy. I stood against the wall, so scared I thought I might disintegrate, so intrigued I had to be first. Quickly flipping through my journal I found a poem writhing with anger and sharp tongue, a quip to my stepmother and our relationship that was done. As I stood in front of my peers I grabbed the mic and (the same as now) all of my fears disappeared, in her place a fierce warrior woman able to speak her truth like a rapid firing pistol, riddling the crowd with words so fast in the end, sometimes, it only brings silence. But this night it didn’t– it brought slack jaw cheers as I was approached and asked for more, offered tokes and sips of 40’s brought out from coats. 

 

That night was the beginning of my most passionate love affair, the one that brings the clearest truth and the darkest lies, the one that I can always rely on to carry me through my opaquest nights.
 

Days and venues changed and eventually the poets began to converge at a coffeehouse called Chaos, aptly named for the time, filled with a momentary renaissance of culture in an otherwise cultureless wasteland – here we laughed, loved and raged poetry, music and art, until seeking more – most of us went our separate ways.

 

I had more firsts with poetry along the way, my first slam, my first bomb, my one way love affair with Allen Ginsberg’s biography on the mountain tops of Yosemite, my hidden years, and my most recent return  - here with all of you.

 

Poetry saved my life - I brought pen to paper instead of knife to skin. When my demons told me to slice my soul, hold flames too close, hang tight from ropes until life bled out, it was poetry that reminded me I could do it all with words and be free to begin again in the morning.

I want to send shout-outs to those who have helped me along the way:

Big Poppa E – Erik Ott, poet and friend, my long-standing pen pal, mentor and muse

Johnny D – John William Davies – one of my BFF’s, pen pal extraordinaire, English professor by day, sultry Goth romantic poet by night

 

Bent Under Pressure

Drifting off to sleep,
our room showered with golden-coral light reflected, slumber welcoming
sheets skim my bare skin, and I embrace pillowed comfort around me, sweet scent
my aroused surface, powder soft, hair raised anticipation, invisible
fixed for touch, open.
What feels like moments is probably hours, enough time to dream of you close -
I awake, lights dim, blankets lifted with stumbling silence, golden light gone,
sour scents – your breath – sweet acrid  fermented spirit, clouded visions move
I waited, this time
hours alone again, no longer surprised –  long gone, other times for years.
I would always hope one day you would choose love over substances, lost hope
nightmares, those false voices of home reflected in your isolation
controls you alone,
chained to your vices you hide, afraid of shameful secrets that block your love.
Bitter notes hanging fragrant in the air, with silence stumbling, you remain
hidden behind self-created walls, my love a rejected chisel, prods,
bent under pressure.

Rough

In perfected silence, brilliant stillness
the swelling of my heart built pressure,
frozen emotions, unspoken words
hardened enough to burst forth diamonds,
those unconscious clarifications,
shining a falsified perfection
from my coal-blackened soul
shredding all evidence of truth in its wake,
all that glittered, a fake.
Make no mistake - this love, my essence
fought to toss aside numbness
fed on my desire,
exists.
My soul tumbled, a burnished stone
a million times too big for its home
denied access to share borders with others
tried to smooth out deals of transcendence,
words that could pretend,
rub away my very existence.
If I caught the light, a façade of shadows
clung to me, haunting words
created interwoven filigree,
only those with keen eyes look into me
see the hidden kiln within
stare into the flames, feel heat
without fear.

Still Reeling

Days of clouds created haze, doubts
poured through soul to soul
mist drifted - penetrated pores
sifted through sleeves, up skirts
no discretion,
a lazy daze fashions a beautiful mess,
of cells, blood, bone,
put the good foot flat down
grasp the edges of the earth
rearranged certainty
embers stoked ardently
hard enough, hot enough
stoked smoke, billowed
licked the roof, sparked flames
dazzled dancing on the ceiling
still reeling, caught in light
fought shadows, burned for home.