transit

through the night of my window
sounds the deep three-toned signal
of a passenger train
the grate of metal as the motion renews
like love and loss drawing near
or away, there is no point of compass
in the dark.

16 feb 99

I recognized
from paintings of the mind
his slender ponytail
and legs
that topped wide stairs
of alternating brick and slate.

Layers of leathered fern
framed the unknown silhouette
through panes of pitted glass
antebellum window lenses keeping
secrets from a hundred years
and countless wintry nights.

Coolly I spied
elbows propped against a tabletop of tile,
as I sat between
new chins and mouths
and voices serving words like aperitifs
in a warm dark room of teal and wood.

The fire was lit.
Saxophones sedated open space
as he walked in
and claimed an empty armchair
shouldered next to mine.

A dream was hung up in the air,
caught in the verge of unraveling
where limbo dressed in white
meets earth
and the boyish face of a greying man
looks straight into your eyes
and says
We need to talk.

24 nov 99

a valentine

how I came to be here
in your arms is
of no consequence.
The passage
is the dance.

You who knelt
with alms of song
of fantasy
and falling stars
Of words
that dropped
like syncopated
rain.

You, an august
sunset, intoxicating
silent skies
with neoteric paints
You hypnotized
in murmured tones and
with the breathing
air they rushed to find my
lips, and seep into my soul.

I watch the rhythm as
you stir the watercolored
ambiance. I memorize
your skin's cologne for
other nights like these
When only
shadows dance.

6 feb 99

brunch

You want me to go where,
to Mexico?
Flipping through a leather book
(one hundred percent man-made)
I work that week, I lie,
and design a casual pose.
Sipping mimosas, my
eyes mesmerized
travel his brow
to sculpture of lips

to cobblestone entryway.
I fantasize a private board in
sidewalk schoolgirl chalk,
close to the corridor, where it blurts
to me this man is attached
and I write fifty lines of the cost.
Pastel powder colors cling to
a long black dress.
Red Herring
Special of the Day
fish under glass

displayed for my delight
Sitting squirming restless in my chair
the white cotton towel shifts
(which way is the sea?)
from one fingertip to the next
as if answers
(toss this one back)
were embossed on one side.
Excuse me, valet?
Do you still have my keys?

12 oct 99
novblndr99

summer lair

The air is hot -
dry and rising from the crusting leaves it
almost stirs to dapple greys
across her skin
and shadows on the
footpath she engraves.

She nears the edge
quiet and alert
up from the distant woodlands nigh this city of men
rabid with desire for only one
She lies in wait -
hungry as a hunter for his love.

08 sept 99

unblindfolded

A sparrow unearths a thistle seed among
a thousand blades of grass. Surely life
can find self and soul, but a stone's throw
from its own shadow. Listen closely to your echo
when the pebble falls.

27 apr 99

bonding

attach
unattach
attach
una t t a c h
the adhesive wears
thin.

24 nov 99

a slender magnet

I thought about your soul today and painted
an iris on it. Deep chromatic blues with
softer shades of powder
spilling over to be
touched. You tilted with the wind.

I flicked the light on in the day
and walked down the hall to the green
room, looking through the window
for words to mark
the boundaries of
how beautiful you are,
as if I could sieve them
from water flowing to the
caves, or dancing up
from the winter garden.

I thought about you as
you sat behind your laminated
desk, waiting the
three o'clock trumpets to
slay the sacrificial lamb
on the third floor
breakroom of Microsoft;
your pipe, the
hole in your heart that
matches mine. I slip in and out
from it, as from my own.

I thought about your
soul today and painted an iris
on it. Deep chromatic blues with
softer shades of powder spilling
over to be touched. You tilted
with the wind.

blndrsep02

not thinking of you

your cocky grin
its edges lit with kisses
and island rum cigars
toying with the cogs
of my machine
your curveball smile
I count to ten
and focus hard on anything
but you
concocting makeshift dreams
to pour you from my mind
extracting thoughts like mango pulp
to sieve and put away
eight nine
and there you are
my abacus
my slow counting beads
pressed between my hands
I stand on scaffolding
and paint the chapel ceilings red
with leitmotifs of you
your cocky grin
its edges lit with
island rum cigars
I count to ten.

4 nov 99
decblndr99

angel man

if I want to smile
I tie my thoughts to paper kites
and send them to the water's edge

I remember where we stood
toes kissing toes
set like concrete footings in the sand

to steady frames
to hold our arms finding backs finding fingertips
beside the ocean floor

if I want to smile
I turn your brim around
just as it was that day

making way for faces nesting faces
lips taking lips
and somehow salt marsh anchors

kept our souls from lifting past the morning sky
or digging in like pebble crabs
away from light

I can almost touch the linen twine you thread
as I hold still for you
your coral beads are sewn into my dreams

Angel Man with ocean eyes
I sigh for you
your soul - gently woven to my own

if I want to smile
I hear the birds that called your name
overhead overland overus

along the shore they spy
to find the end of sea
looking for horizon walls to wing

if I want to smile
I tie my thoughts to paper kites
and send them back to you my Angel Man.

9 sept 99
novblndr99

soundprints

I imagine
your voice as it speaks my name
craving the deluge
of its immutable solace
closing my eyes
sound is inhaled
and issued to places of mind
and soul stored for
the winter's cupboard of silence
from each other's sounds
and scents
and arms
daring to breathe out again
and lose in exhalation
the overtones and undertones of love.

20 apr 99

Standing in the Living
Room on His Birthday

Young eyes peered
through cuts of lace
Ecru voile behind the still piano
Strings stretched
out of key
like his suckling hope
My child, my son.

He stood, a monolith
in a space where
indigo blue lines had marked
his living room
Sketched, rolled and
dropped
into a drawer.

Expectant ears like
brides at altar wait
Open-eyed his giving cups
pound the empty tables
and still he looks
for headlights
in the drive.

The dogs will bark
beside the row of postal boxes
The rattle of the foreigner
They'll stalk the square-eyed truck
its growling throat its smoggy musk
Tonight
the dogs will bark.

An open window puffed the folds
of lace like hollowed cheeks
around a cigarette
Yes, your hair looks right
he'll notice how you've grown
and Yes, he will be proud
My child, my son.

This is where he waits father
This is where he turned fourteen
When night had fallen to the ground
and fireflies had given up their post
He waits
My child, my son
My fatherless son.

2 mar 99