Verse Versus

 

Thank you, to whomever it is

that anonymous thanks belong,

for making the scratching of pen on paper

sound productive by default

so I can look like I am working when I am really

indulging last night’s thoughts and leftover bits of song;

of elbow patches on worn professor jackets

made of woolen tweed.

Lecherous, indeed.

Thanks to you for useless business meetings

that would be a waste of time except for

this sacred stolen opportunity

to withdraw, to leave my body here

and scratch my way back to lasers dancing

on layers of oak branches and their leaves.

Now back, I am relieved.

Thank you for the Mason-Dixon line that separates

the frosty numbness of my unprotected spine

from the golden-hazed warmth of the fire on my legs,

and thank you for the bodies sitting close

and leaning in,

for the words said under breath

to light my ears and incite sin.

Thanks for the ability to lay back

my head in solemn ecstasy,

my every breath a prayer wrapped in grins

and soaked in guitar necks next to me-

thanks for what this might begin.

I will not thank you, however,

for another entry into the annals of the bittersweet,

as if I needed more disdain for desks.

I already knew that elsewhere there are wooden decks

that lead to marshy water streets -

you didn’t need to rub it in.

You really didn’t need to remind me

of art farms and babies sleeping wrapped up in our poetry

with lumbering canines drinking sips of stolen wine

choosing my feet to slumber under – mine.

But thanks nonetheless for name-dropping peers

and multi-colored mason jars hued by Belgian beer.

Thank you for a row of twenty-somethings children

dangling drunken feet from docks

too skinny for things like mortality

or ticking hands on time bomb clocks.

Demons

I don’t know why I weave the webs I do - for sport or perhaps

some greater desperation bubbling up from oceans deep

where demons pace prisons and dead things sleep.

So where do you come in?

Are you among my demons now, rattling bars and hoping to run free?

I listen close for loose chains and faulty locks...

...or do you hold the key?

When you growl low and close it grows hard to tell

if it’s demons or sirens I hear -

it grows hard to tell if I hear demons or if I am one.

Or maybe the panther slinking

through the night has golden eyes like mine

simmering with words of caution

as the thoughts of a predator run rampant

through the dark jungles of my mind.

Each toss of my hair is a flick of a tail,

flirtatious and devastating, inviting and deadly...

but you creep closer anyway, with muted murmurs

and calm stealth, trying not to scare me

with slow hands moving sure and steady.

Is it demons, or just the impressions

of your feet on the sidewalk behind me?

I turn to see, meeting eyes clouded over

with lust and uncertainty - eyes that want it all -

to grab with both hands this mystery

and shake free all of the secrets that you have for me. 

Just like the water

I become something different in the water. 

My arms are stronger, capable of pulling the combined weight of me and my watercraft. 

My senses are sharper, tuned in to the sights and sounds around me.

My soul becomes visible again- if only slightly discernible through drops of water falling from my paddle.

And as the flask of whiskey is passed around, 

followed by the heady scent of earthy smoke,

my body warms and whirs to back life.

Wordless Wednesday: A Sea of Me

Sitting for a watercolor portrait workshop

On my mind

 - the bass line before the drum kicks in

 - the crack in the sidewalk with the green grass splitting the concrete

 - the compilation of loops on a page that you call words

 - primal urge in its finest, most basic element

 - indecision at the XXX adult store

 - a red cup filled with intoxicants

 - an enlightened theory, scoffed at by all

 - a retro junkie at its most literal

 - the kings of civilizations and empires past, who names you don’t recall

 - a hushed whisper, right next to your ear

 - the head you clutch to your chest

Macabre

3-4

Acrid smoke sneaks through the vents into my lungs,
vapor leaking out from under the hood.
You said you'd fix it but I got that feeling you never would.

And the barriers shatter silently in anticlimax,
I doff my hats at invisible lines marred by soft soled shoes.

I knew it'd be me. I called it, me not you.
Words from the macabre, a tryst or two-
I knew it'd be me. Not you.

Hearts of Palm

2-21

Suppose I asked you if you would have done anything differently and you said “yes.”

You, who have been my adopted mentor for about longer than I’ve been a functioning human and I realize even now how wholly I would accept your teachings, granting “words of wisdom” as a tag to any that you’ve thrown my way.

Explain the pang I feel then, being outside looking in, watching your sidekick scribble by flashlight as the music surrounds us, drawing us together. I can clutch the hand of my sweetheart but yours is at home, and I presume you are separated by the mundanities of adulthood that can now only be escaped one at a time, with someone always left behind to shoulder the load.

Do you wish for full escape?

I wonder if you are here only halfheartedly, the residue of responsibility ever simmering on your back burners, making your time here bittersweet.

Or, perhaps, this is everything you’ve dreamed.

Perhaps the dancing ponytail of a ten year old girl was the perfect date,
the fulfillment of twinkling eyes now by your side for Thursday night blues rock shows.
I do like to think you’ve always been meant for old houses filled with guitars,
the loudness of happy children, dusty books of poetry
with spines bent and bent again.

I’d be lying if I said that same arrangement didn’t lay heavy on my mind.
A halcyon dream, a vision that once filled my skin with excitement, the blood lust for a baby of my own... but now I wonder when I place my lips against my lover’s if one day our union will cause the same separation, that these pockets of weeknight outings will be experienced alone.

Your date dances with the apathy
of youthfully ignorant bliss,
but I wonder if you’d rather kiss
a lover’s lips.

Valentine

Sometimes I think I purposely avoid writing about important things that occur, in all of their many-splendored levels of absurdities, because these moments don’t even feel like they belong to me. As if during these moments I am living someone else's life in some other era.


 

I guess that’s what happens when I encounter situations that half of me, greedy and instant, hungers to be a part of and signs on enthusiastically only for the other half to cower in fear at these brazen occurrences that rip me out of my comfort zone.

I am a toddler edging closer to the laughing edge of the water with only the dim recognition that at any point the waves might surge and, well, take me.

I am afraid of the water... but I am more afraid of missing the wholesome warmth of sun on skin, of smiling seagulls cawing after the crusts of sandwich lunches, the freest of feelings.

So as my car pulls up to driveways and my hand hesitates on the gearshaft with a clear and immediate “what the fuck are you doing right now,” I try my hardest to think of cool pink lemonade on salty lips. If I can just imagine the feel of sand between toes then I can gather myself up from the beat up Kia and go knock on a stranger’s door.
 

Hustler, Baby

   

I must admit, as I look on the things I have seen and done this weekend, that I must be an abnormal person.

Surely a normal person would get upset at being charged twelve dollars for two thin hot dogs and then watching as the Canal Street vendor tried to shortchange me, “just another tourist,” but I can’t. I can’t be mad that I got to participate in such a swindle as even that interaction feels so beautiful, felt so beautiful as the parade floats rounding the corner turned the street into a chaos of color and sound, casting glows onto the dark weathered face of my hot dog vendor. 

Perhaps I was just intoxicated on revelry and merriment but I stared him in the eye, waiting for him to divvy up the rest of my change, watching this schooled hustler’s face for any sign of disappointment, watching how quickly he recovered saying “oh you handed me a 20, that’s right that’s right.” How could I be mad at such a skillful artist? 

I stood there with a grin on my face, imagining all of the stumbling-slurring fools that ended up paying 15-20 dollars for a hot dog that was already marked up to a ridiculous margin...

Sleepy Feat

2-8

We pulled into the slowed-down city
at 4 in the morning but we -
eyes wide with weariness and wanderer’s blood lust -
stayed up a little longer
lingering through half deserted streets
until the shining branches dripping down
with disco balls sent us the call
to find our set of sheets.

Porch Swing

2-10

I have to try to do this justice.

I don’t know for certain how long this house has been here, this renovated New Orleans farmhouse, but the thin long lines of wood flooring on this porch look as if they have been here before brick buildings and planned city grid lines though I know they are incapable of having such an age. I feel as if they have watched as the creatures of the swamp pooled together and rose, forming such a city as this - watched as the neon-colored bulbs of smoky jazz clubs gave way to the hollow glow of so many LED lights, as the alligators slunk back into the mist and the sorority girls claimed the streets to roam at night. 

I feel just as old as this house, awake unreasonably early and settled into a porch swing, listening to music and setting myself adrift. Everyone else is sleeping, cloistered off in solitary pockets of unconsciousness, and I am here staring at the way these roses wrap through the old wood balustrades painted white with a hint of seemingly-intentional dirt and grunge.

Figures

 

written 2-1

I can see the pages lined up before me,
blank except that on closer inspection I can see
the faintest lines of sketched charcoal begin to emerge.

The word “emerge” begs the question -
have these lines been etched into my skin already? Have they always been here?
I am trying to train my eyes, taking care to note the details of each and every thing I see...
including these lines, hand drawn by Clotho herself.

The word “emerge” begs the question -
have I simply been submerged? Perhaps the lush valleys and stretched out mountain ranges,
supported by my calcium deposits and fault lines,
have owned this shape forever and I am just now touring the countryside.

This is how I feel today.
I feel like a walking composition of thick and thin strokes,
contoured and imperfect but art nonetheless.
I am content with this smudged canvas full of hand drawn shapes
marked by experienced distortion, proportions ever so slightly skewed.

I am content because I know that this pen is not held by only my hands
but by the collective of schooled hands that have written these same words,
sketched these lines, fingered these melodies.

Hands that are smooth, gnarled, hairy, dainty.
Such different but unified hands that work with the strength of laughter and impulsion,
the obsessive desire to connect through creation.

Large hands that hold old guitars just so,
roughly belying a grace that explains the glow
rising like steam off of golden-haired fingers -
small hands that lovingly press reality into amorphous blobs
of compacted dirt, singing the female form electric and
imprinting heartbeats into static clay.

Hands that hold my face and brush back my hair,
hands that speak louder than any voice I have ever heard.
Hands that sketch through touch, creating a portrait of my landscapes.
I will wear these fingerprints for all to see.

Spoken Word

1-24

The first wobbly step outside of my comfort zone has been taken - not just reading my words in front of a group of people that I know, but reading in front of one of my adopted mentors in writing...

It always takes me off guard when my physical reactions are completely out of sync with my emotional status - take, for instance, the heart of mine that began to pound against the walls of my chest in excitement and panic and no small element of “what the fuck are you doing on stage in a fur coat right now?!”

But, like I know would be,
I was proud as shit of myself, and inspired.

my one picture from that night

 

 

 

Me mid-sentence: taken by GM Palmer

my friend Alex: taken by GM Palmer

The Faces: Frazetta

I want to wrap you in words
the way you wrap the white spaces
in vibrant colors that jump
into multidimensionality
at the guidance of your focused tongue
between your lips or
the precision of paint splatters
on fingertips.

I want to configure these thin black lines to match
the muscular curve of shoulders
that flex and knot under such concentration;
as if your directed intensity of gaze
could see into the bold lines and shadows.

The spotlight of attention is intense, indeed.

Intense, the way that respect raises hairs on my arms,
the way that curves of fertile hips
birth echoes of smiling lips.

It is intense when a subject that I have studied,
transfixed and starstruck
by the beauty of differently configured atoms -
the very glowing center of a forming constellation
slowly and heavily drawing in all of the heavenly bodies-

turns to affix an equal gaze upon my shell shocked face.

Mental Richochets

1-19

But where to start?
And how should I begin?

This has been a week of revelations, of spiritual visions and verbal revisions.
I’m not sure which I should address first.
The problem is that all of it seems so far away in comparison to this moment of morning-coffee peace.
The smell of toasting bread and sweet rolls tantalizes me but I will resist the temptation and choose instead to focus.

So basically I let my spirit fly the other night, through meditation.
I dug deep and was taken over by spirals of abstract thought,
letting vibrations of light and sound carry me as far as they could take me... and then some.

I keep continually coming back to this Saul Williams line:
“Through meditation I program my heart to beat breakbeats
and hum bass lines on exhalation...”

That line has resonated throughout the caverns within me from the first time I heard it and every time I have come back to it since, gaining new waves of meaning for my life with each visit and revisit.

In the darkness of the brilliantly patterned light, voices of mine sprung up from the deep.
I never knew I had such fear hidden away, such clear and perfect fear.

“I’m never going to be able to communicate all of this, to anyone.”

For a split second I was terrified that all of the beautiful thoughts and all of the mental ricochets therein would be trapped, forever. That I would never speak again, that I had gone too deep and lost my voice forever because in the time it takes for a second to split, to light sparks with flint, I had already bounded off into the ethereal..

I haven’t decided quite yet what to do with this revelation. Obviously my voice came back to me after I was done floating up amongst the constellations, after I remembered to breathe - after I remembered that breathing exists - and settled back down a smidge. I regained my voice and retained as clear a memory I could of what it felt like when I thought that no one would even know I used to speak.

Up until that moment, when my identity and honestly my existence was lifted off of my shoulders, when I came face to face with the pure and distilled essence of my personality and all of my hopes and feelings, I had no idea just how much it means to me to write.

Apparently it means a whole fuckton.