the endless sea

for Susan
and those who have lost a love
death defeats only those who forget



bowed low beneath the onset of the north wind,
shuddering,
the sweet banshee’s howls scrape at the heavy moon low on the horizon,
drifting upon the sea
the scent of Bermudan flowers on the gales
a taste from far away
amid the torments of the pounding rain
into the endless sea of fear…

the loneliness is deep-rooted in cold soil
dawning
drowning
a darkness that cultivates a life in repose
the rain hides the tears in staring eyes
the halo of hair kiting on the sea of stars
reflection of the endless sea of fear….

we are mocked by foolish storms
the sky’s filled chalice runneth over
weeping
seeping
the day lost to the dreams of night
everything and everyone lies below the endless waves
sweeping
waving
in the endless sea of fear...

when it cuts,
deep as pain
lightning flash
falling
shattering
thunder…
then the tranquility of emptiness
the endless sea of fear…

thought in perpetual dead reason.
the blade kisses the night
there is no life for me watching the sea
waiting for he
this is no life for me watching the sea
waiting for he
the tears that i have bleed for thee
into the endless sea of fear…

and of love?
the harvest is a dark pool of blackness
ripping
dripping
devilish and cruel
forever in the night waiting
the rush of the dream is the sweetest pain
the clock is made of flowing tides
the endless sea of fear
helpless
endless
lonely

my dinosaurs

The monitor screens glow…the clicks of micro circuits barely perceptible… the hard drives switch over… a fan starts… the CD players is on… just before the music begins there is a static crackle… then the sound… I am silent at that moment, fingers hovering over the keys… anticipation…

Books are scaly dinosaurs climbing the wall with evolutionary intent escaping their revolutionary ways… messenger RNA knocks at the door where in another time the pizza delivery person will stand… their rictus grins in statuary dignity… you were here they tell me… your eyes glancing across their hidden secrets… your fingers tantalizingly brushes their spines… you were here in blindness… a mute amongst my demoniac cabal…

The Muse On Line is plugged in…

the past is present…

the future an immutable possibility on the edge of eternity…
if I open the window shall I soar into the thermals…
there to scrape against the frozen face of the sky…
across the icy altitudes...
to gaze down in forgetfulness…

A Mother's Passing

I spend a good portion of my free writing time online at PanHistoria.com which is a form of Community based upon writing play as it were. The opportunities for both creative writing and social writing are amazing. Once in a while events occur in people’s lives which touch us all, for that is the nature of empathy and friendship.

This morning, a friend’s mother passed on. Though I grieve with her for the loss, I rejoice in the strength and compassion that she shared with me of the love between people.

*****

Because you have shared with us, and with me, I would like to express what that means to me. Though I never met your mother, I too have been touched by the power of the love that you two shared. It is a bond that even in passing can not be broken. I can not understate what a beautiful thing it was that you did for your mother, and in that to know what a beautiful person your mother must have been to have been so well reflected in you. Mere words are all I have… and I give them to you freely in thanks for your sharing of that beauty.

She nurtured in the soft failing light
with dignity and gentle grace
And there in heart she brought forth love
which shone as bright as to displace
the shadows of the coming night.

A touch of sorrow and muted loss,
how empty seems the heart at last
Yet love does yet draw forth the light
for in my heart I hear her laugh
beyond the shadows of the night.

From you who learned the art of love
compassion forged with dignity
Whose strength of love speaks testament
have shared your mother’s love with me
to push against the edge of night.

canvas

Dear you;

Hi. How are you doing? Just thought that I would take a moment out and say hello…

This? Oh, that’s just a bandage… it ain’t nothing… I’m good… no it doesn’t hurt, just looks bad though… can’t have the roses without the thorns and I am not sure that I don’t love the thorns just as much as the blooms. Not that I got it from the roses as such… I was picking the raspberries... tripped and fell. There will be fresh berry muffins later.

We all know truly talented and gifted people… those who have the knack for whatever the task is… and at times maybe we get envious of what seems so easy for them. Or, conversely we might get frustrated when that which we find easy they find so difficult. The true conclusion is that a good life is a team sport.

The painter paints with colours, with shades, shadows and light.
The poet paints with words, and the then spaces between them.
The musician paints with sounds, volume and tempo…

The canvas is the same… we all play on the emotional responses.

Hiding

When I last felt her she was a drifting wave of charm
Spinning and dancing on the unfathomable head of a pin
Quivering with raw anticipation and desire
Dreaming this world and hiding from the same

What song she sang was a ribbon of mysteries
Velvet caresses of the river’s flowing
Silky celestial reflections gilding the silent waters
Dreaming this world and hiding from the same

What smile she gave was a rainbow below the full moon
Shadow cast hard during the solar eclipse
Shades of brushing souls dancing around a kiss
Dreaming this world and hiding from the same

What laughter she spread was the sounds of the forests
The deer in flight to the cool lake edge rushes
The sparrows riding the tops of trees towards infinity
Dreaming this world and hiding from the same

What tears she cried were the nectars of fragrant flowers
The slivers of dew in streams upon the leaves
Rising mists beneath the sun scraped bleeding skies
Dreaming this world and hiding from the same

What breath she breathed was the essence of the roses
The winds lashing the mown fields
White blossoms on the breeze
Dreaming this world and hiding from the same

What stare she gave was the eyes of cruel winter
The lightening edge of a thunderstorm
The eye of the hurricane crashing to shore
Dreaming this world and hiding from the same

What heart beat hammered with raging anger
Thundered futility towards the deafness of the void
Bombarding repercussions in magnificent amplitude
Dreaming this world and hiding from the same

When I last felt her she was a lover rising in the morning
The drape of sheet warding chill
The coolness of the hand after the parting
Leaving me dreaming this world

You see things if you look

I went fishing… which is really not so important as the result… we caught no fish but we did get soaked and smile-stretched cheeks. I am sure that purists will complain that we were too noisy… laughing and splashing about as we were. To that I say “tough”. What is it about running waters that invites such folly?

With my hair still dripping and a sloshing in the boots we set off on the motorbikes along a small country lane. The mottled effect of the sunlight through the trees… the fields well kept… the occasional group of cows munching away. (Yes, I broke the helmet law… and if asked I would tell the truth… I was drying my hair) Pastoral Simplicity. Peaceful escapism perhaps… but also needed distance.

Jenny walks over and feeds a few cattle the long grasses from our side of the fence with nary a care or concern… rubs their faces and talks gently to them. There is something that happens from time to time… a magical moment when the veil is lifted from my eyes. I see her differently… clearly… not as the close companion or the caregiver, provider etc… but as who she is… the person that she is… and I fall in love all over again.

short truth

No one is going to be happy about this but I am back but for all the wrong reasons… my usual support area is MIA… and I am feeling a little antsy.

I think that I have fallen in love again… which does not mean that I have fallen out of love with my current partner… just there is the added complication which is not entirely needed in my life.

railstorm

The stage lights go out and I return to who I am... I start to wonder at just how insane life really is… there is a glass of scotch waiting and the cushion between friends to protect me… how do I become so vulnerable?

I speak from the stage in urgent appeal... with an unspoken promise… off the stage I retreat behind the veil of flesh and struggle with identity… which is the real me? Where is the union?

It is early morning and the long drive out of the city is quiet… she smiles a slight smile and sighs while I gaze into the bright lights of the oncoming traffic… the question is moments away…

Is it unfaithful to still hurt now?

Jennifer grips the wheel and drives through my silence…

Is it unfaithful to hurt in love?

Nemesis

Conversations drag on from the diner to the salon… across the surface of days and through the depths of nights… they are but mere remembrances… for time is Nemesis… it is a verity that comes with an easy complacency. What we know or what we say of tortured souls resides in the distance between orbiting dancers and the strength of the bow across the strings… through our stationary eyes the room spins and whirls. All things are relative but the relationships can get perverse.

Intelligence is the access to the grey boxes of the remembered… sorting through the piles and selecting correctly the required… brilliance is to assemble the whole from a smattering of the few… intuition is to set aside the boxes and simple know… but what then of truth or faith? Those are but trees in the natural forest… wavering boughs tossed upon the winds of temptation… the shadows of the blind across the azure.

Absolute is a stone tied by a chord of folly to the neck in a graceful swan dive into frigid waters… absolute is an anchor secured in the sea bed… absolute is the folly… the harlot… the illusion in the mirror seem through wanting eyes. Verity dispels the absolute from the eyes, from the heart, and from the hands.

The neck is a curse for it elevates the head to the belief that thought is above the heart…< we look with our eyes yet we see with out heart… the thin spindle of the throat chokes the flow… the gurgling loss as darkness descends is dispelled… I thought… I felt… incoherent memories… the absolute truth is mere veneer… mere illusion… the strangled vision of desire and want… the lost illustrations of a closed book.

The grey box of absolute lies open and empty floating of a river of remorse… the effluence of regret carries the drowning memories to the sea of despair… the ice flows of abandoned love shattered of the shores in fragments of sun drenched glitter… melting away from shattering shards to smooth pebbles… dissolution towards oblivion… the absolute rendered inert and temporary. For time is Nemesis.

Love, cast your glow upon my path

Love, cast your glow upon my path


every day, exotic
as long as the rivers run
don’t let me dance alone

honey-eyed
and held tight
looked to the skies holding breath,

when I hold you..
entwined as one
let no day be without love in my life

no longer can I deny,
hide my desires
my deity - love is a voice that wakes the wind

why am I breathless?
butterflies, be with me
love... forever and a day

shadow of light
dance of satin skin
walk these sands of time

lost in the consuming fire
enchanting
with verse to recite and songs to praise
love, cast your glow upon my path

A Short Story

Henry’s fingers bleed through the torn calluses as he sips Irish coffee and grimaces with the pain… “you are a poet” he says “how can this be beautiful?” as he pushes the finger stained cup towards the salt shaker and sugar…

I say softly, “He left his bloody fingerprints on her throat, with icy hands on shoulders bare he won her heart…”

Quote Me

The pauses in conversations speak in the common language of mistrust. In them fear and uncertainty prosper when all that is required is to wait. There is nothing so terrifying as silence.

remorse

I got shrimped… in the cool light of that failing sun… I got shrimped and sent away… dragged away by words… oh sinful words uttered on that accusatory breath… tempest tossed on past remembrance… there but for a fluttering illness I choked… sputtered… and should have faded into the frozen distance of celestial weather… a murmuring of a heart valve… a skipped pulse… then the vacancy of the flesh departed.

How small… how coldly cruel… how petty when demeaned with malice aforethought… to stand filleted and open… grilled in the sharp cryptic lemon sauce… sautéed in the heart of a careless moment… served, then scraped aside for tastier morsels…

Silence… oh you golden idol grasped after the fact… the reaching hand touches thee only in reflection of the ought to have done… that this Midas touch turns the flowing wine into remorse… cursed that e’er did words of times passed by… polluted deeds of abandoned youth e’er did cross these lips into those pearled ears… would that I could make lies of what was once the truth.

the dance of fire

The weather people are talking about a storm… lots of snow… or maybe not as much as they are predicting… you never can tell.

A candle burns with a motion to the flame… a dance on the breath… a touch of bronze on a cold winter’s night.

I love these quiet nights by the warm fire… a glass of wine through the moments of simply being… outside the furies of the weather… inside the comfort of companionship… and the warm glow of friends.

Let Sunday pass to Monday in peaceful rest.

PS My reading went better than ever before. I left feeling really good about it.

Pierre without Kevin

Pierre’s laughter is a bowl of tropical fruits in shallow waters. This is piracy for he does not belong in the Caribbean, but he smiles like a slice of mango… reaches across the table… it is the gravy boat again. He shouldn’t, he knows it and we know it… weak heart they say… pills and chills… he smiles anyway. Between us there is death - both as the barrier and as the common bound.

Death sits in the empty chair… invited?… uninvited? There is the empty chair to my left… the empty plate… but I pour the wine anyway. Jen sits to my right and smiles like butterscotch… warmth in slow motion… listening… watching - her steady hand at the ready. Pierre speaks.

He stands, unfurling like a flag from his chair… “As the last American I salute you upon this feast, upon the warmth and generosity of the moment, and upon the love that fills this house and welcomes all who cross this step.” He turns to Jen, raises his glass, “A toast to the provider of the feast!”

Amid the murmuring of ascent Pierre taps his glass. “To her companion, the conduit of affection.” Again more murmurs and smiles… then, the moment… he turns to the empty space… “To absent friends, loved ones, cherished souls released. Gone but not forgotten.”

a leaf upon still waters

the idea slips from my mouth,
drifts through my fingers,
somewhere vanishes and is gone.
i wake,
struggling to recall this fragile moment of the darkness.
beside me she dreams sweet smiles and tender caresses.
silence is a horror,
and night but a leaf upon still waters.

upon my back i drown in tears and so i roll over gently.
the mattress gives in silence
and takes with a furtive sigh.
the moon peaks through glass curtains
then dashes blushing behind the clouds.
the night’s fury comes on the breath of a gale.

she wakes amid the flood,
rises angelic in the dark,
then hovers momentarily.
beneath her gaze the ice melts
shatters into glass splinters dropping to the floor.
from feathers the scent of cinnamon and apples
breathy restores the garden of tranquility.
night passes as a ship to destinations unknown.

is this love? i cry,
oh my god! is this love?
god is silent, still;
the unseen presence is dark and blind.
she,
in calmness gathers the shattered remains unto her breast.
there,
the child yawns,
and amid gentleness falls asleep.

dail tone hang ups

The conversation begins with smiles and knowing understanding then breaks, or shatters… the surface splinters letting what flows beneath freely rise in currents and settle in undulations… the stream of words slip across the now shattered ice surface of personal projection... I look at my watch not for the time but for the reflection… Yes, I am still there.

Midnight MSN messages pour… momentary lapses in conversation flow in eddies like the river’s edge… there are halos in the waters and depths… hot beverages and the slowly rising steam streams up from the depth of cups… I type in whispers… the threads of conversation disappear into a failing light as the last remnants of spider webs…

If we, through motivation unknown drift…
as we, at the touch of the unseen, bend…
should we, on the breath of the wind, rise…

With what manner of light shall we illuminate those around us? Are these the bright feathers of angelic wings or the drab greys and browns of the common moth?

She is small and distant huddled alone in the dormitory room… I am small and distant huddled in my rooms… we are joined through the thin strand of uncommon thought… we are abstractions singing the body electric… all the while for each a river flows… cold ice waters of passage…

With a light and gentle hand I touch the screen and wonder….

let it snow

So it snowed… let it snow… let it snow… let it snow. We’ve got firewood… sort of. It happens to be iced together because that is the cruel nature of November… snow melts… ice forms… wood is like really stuck together. The solution is of course an axe… a sled… and frigging mittens. Or we could wait until later.

I am not a Lumberjill… though I do happen to have awesome axe skills… thee are those who will drop a brick just thinking about what that could lead to… heh heh heh… I like that. Beauty has its charms of course but there is nothing like an axe to get the point across. Accent should have been spelled axcent.

So there is snow… which means that there is sledding to be done… there is walking along the path to be done and there is extreme caution as our footbridge is narrow and icy at the moment. Treacherous when towing a sled full of wood… but that is a side issue that does not matter as we shall get the wood up to the wood shed where it will thaw and be ready for splitting and the fire place.

Sitting by the fire makes it all worth while. It may not be an efficient use of the old BTUs but what it lacks in utility it makes up for in artistry. Ain’t nothing like a day out in the sun and sun to be followed by a jigger of scotch sitting on the carpet by a nice inferno. It is a quality of light thing… and a quantity of heart thing.

Oh the weather outside is frightful,
But the fire is so delightful,
And since we've no place to go,
Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!

beauty

There comes a moment when time and space unite, when hearts are one, and the band plays your song… though you may not know that it is your song… it could be an Argentine Tango, a light breezy French Minuet, even a Viennese Waltz or a clunky Music Hall Box Step… it does not matter… the music lodges in your spines and the moment is upon you. You are one in motion… and one in emotion.

It is a waltz; the hand lowers on my spine and draws me close, held tightly to the words "you look beautiful because you are so beautiful." It is a hot Arabian breath, a sirocco, the blast of the furnace of desire… it is the voice of love, the embrace of security… the lingering moment of wordless unity… it is a religious experience, a human experience, a momentary experience… the fleeting purity.

The band plays on, the beating of the heart and the pulsing of the veins… our songs… our moments… and the dances change but always this is us together.

*****

The morning sun has yet to rise and she sleeps. Beneath those closed lips of her eyes the sparkle that diamonds can never hope to achieve burns in her sweet dreams… in her soul… the fires of her heart. It is a whisper, a breath, an acknowledgement of a truth… "you are so beautiful."

pa rum pum pum pum

Reading before writing is risky business… gumbo with word salad… you get words, ideas, and then that moment of thought that drives through the skull much the same as a migraine without the pain. Memory.

Memory rises and I do not speak then. I know there are those who will find that upsetting. They will not understand. How can they understand? I sit still… fingers cease to be poised upon the keys… the clatter of the typing stops. Time shifts… freed from the hands of the clock… time drifts on the warm flat seas of Memory… and drowns like puppies in a distant sink of another place.

Is it a tear that calls attention, or the change of breath? Do I shudder as I sit or am I still? She is there swiftly and without a word, emerging into view. It is an intensely personal moment… a surrendered portion of my life to her…a permission granted though need and love… a permission taken in solemn trust through desire and love. What is this marriage if not the union of two into one through need, trust and love?

How hot the flesh and yet so cool the touch. Memories… a moment… drawn into an embrace and sheltered… a world pressed upon me… the world pressed upon me… fished from the drifting seas with the torn mesh of a net of love…

I meant to talk about the small towns and their peculiar ways… to talk of gumbo in the form of tuna fish sandwiches… to talk of the jam that goes with toast… the small little memories. I meant to offer to scarecrow something in exchange for the gumbo with word salad…

Shall I play for you, pa rum pum pum pum,
On my drum?