Parting the Veil

Strawberry eyes drawn grey,

awoke in nights ruined black.

Awake, roused from cobwebbed dreams,

and so little light to navigate the spongy floor.

A diffuse beacon reminds,

but so much faith required

to move through the thickened air.

A tickle, a quiver, a bowed back stands rigid,

and so small steps quicken—

then STOP.

What is this unseen motion

running like static charged fingers

through bed-sheet stamped hair?

And then there’s the thumping,

rushing from chest to ear,

throbbing like a conqueror worm

feasting on coiled grey tissue:

run and it will chase.

The beacon reminds:

chase and it will run.

And so movement comes with reluctance,

the cloying atmosphere

gummy and resistant.

Yet something stirs the solar plexus,

pulsing out,

grappling with some undefined point

near the beacon,

things become clearer.

This unbearable push and pull,

so the pace is perfect.

The moment blinks blindness from its eye,

nothing so raw as being here now.

And this notion robs the past of its future.

Be here now,

as if there is a choice. 

Bee Shaman

It pulls a flaccid mask of skin away,
empty sockets without eyes to stare.
It is revealed,
glistening in honey and wax.


Its call brings the bees,
swarming they enliven the mask. 
It pierces me with a gaze
that cleaves my thoughts,
stopping them.


Should I thank it?

The bees percolate out its mouth,
just a trickle at first,
then a fountain.
Billowing yellow smoke
they take to the sky,
defining intricate patterns 
and writhing constellations.

The crowd sees a show,
and thinks it's a performer.
They throw money.
Just another gypsy street artist,
a bee charmer.

I know better.


Curious words fill my mind:
teotish stammish,
tombayashi,
and others I can't write.

I'm invited back to its trailer.

As it dons another costume:
radiator face
and eyes with no whites,
it shows me its wares.
These fuzzy cones
aren't just decorations,
crafts and curios.

I don't buy them,
but they already own me. 

Compelled

Late-night hours,
contacts shrink-wrapped 
over my eyeballs.

Gummy lips
prodded by
my darting tongue.

Four fingertips: asdf  jkl;
the building blocks
of my creation.

Before the Flood

My hands are overstuffed
Mickey Mouse gloves -
numb and enormous.
Paralytic poison
seeps from the seams,
stitching tingling tendrils
up my forearms
as I roll onto my back.

The door to sleep creaks shut.

Everyday awareness infiltrates
my sanctuary, 
reminding me with the dull ache
of blood starved limbs
engorged once again.  

Spirit becomes matter.

Something scurries away,
slipping into the murky world
I've left behind,
where my overstuffed white gloves 
now lay in wait. 

The Morning After

Sunlights paper-thin orange leaves-
flaming Japanese lamps.
Dappled Monet droplets-
sprayed lemon juice
onto the ocher desert floor.

A mourning dove descends,
a flurry of silver before 
it regains its regal composure
atop the coyote fence.

Dog's upturned nose
robs the wind of its scent
and the distant hills burn red,
leaving in their wake jagged charcoal tips.

High Plateau

Coyote's laughter peals
through the night,
folding the darkness
into aural origami.

Lightning dawns on the horizon,
eyes drifted upward
breath in the glittering show.

Skeletal clouds
exhale smokey siblings,
lit by the kiss
of a waxing moon.

Labyrinth of Penumbra

Shadows and uncertainty,
mazes of the mind,
what meanings do they hold,
these worlds from inside?

Flashes bright and brilliant,
and achings of the heart,
these cobweb shrouded worlds
that haunt us from the start.

The labyrinth of penumbra
exists inside our souls,
to transport us to worlds
wrought with the unknown.

RoadShow

Oily black tar strips
like freeway tapeworms,
writhing beneath four rubber shoes -
my spinning feet.

Concrete dust rising
like volcanic ash,
backlit,
awash with violent electricity.
Stadium street lights
hacking iridescent phlegm,
rumbling up from the depths
of hulking generators.

Nocturnal trolls
in orange jumpers
busy themselves
with intestinal hoses
undulating from the backs
of iron lung tankers.

Craning to see more,
passing at sign sanctioned speeds,
a dream,
a movie I once saw,
a moment alone in time...

Santa Fe Fall

Cornflower wings flutter,
dancing upwards,
defining a double helix,
painting the cerulean sky.

The throaty voice of Raven
pulls my eyes from their place,
fixes and feeds them
on juniper and pine.

Somewhere in the distance
a woman walks her dogs,
her humming to the melody -
the jingle-jangle of dog collars -
as the sun slips silently
through the coyote fence,
painting warm bars on my arms.

Magic in the Mundane

Light fixtures with fingerprints
like moth dust on mirrored glass,
high above head.

Chair fabric tattooed in diagonal lines
by the pressure of a waiting room occupant.

Changing room door laminate
scored in a parabolic curve,
a dangling plastic tail
swinging on the end of a freshly inserted key...
...pay attention they scream!

Pay attention...

Intimacy

Complicated,
this puzzle of flesh,
this Rubik's cube of emotion -
an ever-altering riddle of expectations.

At once what was right
now becomes wrong,
and that once was wrong
evolves into right.

There must be a place
where desire is whole,
          where wants and needs
find a middle ground,
where the machinations of this beast
bear fruit both can stomach.

I could be anything
if I knew just what to be;
I could do anything
if I knew just what to do.

Yet as I pace this enigma
it stays one step ahead.
I chase and it runs,
never tiring of this race.
I stop and it waits,
lets me catch my breath...