Song for M

past lives

disintegrations cloud

       rain

storms and ages

when we could not touch

     echoes

floundering in vast waves

yet here you

    we

are – cast anew and gasping

to meet again.

Art: Leslie Allen

Dis Integrate

Pieces of me float away leaving emptinesses

everywhere, gaps where butterflies

have flown the page. Their outlines remain  

but I’m preoccupied with the sheer not-thereness

of these spaces, their “oh shit, what-nowness?”

Perhaps, in time, wild pansies will seed, grow through

ragged gaps, flaunt colours like mad-windy wings,

deny the edgy, brutal emptinesses.

Maybe the missing butterflies will find themselves

drawn to crazy colours and return, settle briefly

before remembering that journeys  

mark each fragile page with a million leavings.

for Mary Frances Heaton (1801-1878)

Devoured by the crazy of my own-times,

I did not hear her or the others.

Screaming into rain and snow I froze

in my asylum. Blank walled

but for mad replays of my debt to sanity.

She embroidered letters to a future lost,

sewn in wild hope-coloured samplers.  

Water lilies cast adrift on wishes

while her spirit burned at the stake for

speaking, writing, feeling, expectation

beyond know-your-place restraint.

Writing on the backs of burned-out bills,

echoes join the price of anger.

Outback

Moon-cold, a patch of grey-lit grass

repels all but monochrome.

In the pale late-time, stars balance

restless on my reachy fingertips.

Even the water’s thirsty round here.

Smooth as “I don’t need you”

land recoils, buries energy

well-deep, beyond touch. Safe.

Straight up as an “I don’t want you”

big red soil says no to my sky-tracks.

On ancient dim-lit rock ochre draws

the sorry times, the hero times.

It maps how snaky water

slid away, called ancestors

to spiral out, spin wider journeys.

Finale

Clouds full of fire, wild colour,

rolling heat.  It is the end but

shall we see it through, love,

make the best of it,

burn amazed in red and yellow,

purple tangled in this kiss?

how does the moon speak? (for Naya)

I refuse all her secrets,

whisper up a whirlpool

panic, peel apart

last echoes of my voice.

 

Intuition’s moon

has no pull on my tide

while I think

and think not, no way.

 

No more choices, stop

the choices

reckless and confused,

unloved sirens

rushing to the water’s edge

but never mind all them.

 

No-one finds me anyway,

still water’s urge to flow

cools this insane

battery of sorry dreams

that are mine, me

drifting

clean again.

 

“What I never did

is done.”

Dreams & Reality

Every new shame sinking

into fire and hope

for the rising new thoughts

yet untouched by

clouds – to dream again.

 

On repeat, endurance

held the key.

Another hand on breast

unchosen, fired up

silent isolation.

 

A visitor in coincidental

flesh, I was already

bargaining

on a battlefield.

Trading acquiescence

for new dreams.

 

*art: JW Waterhouse

 

 

who are we?

Illusions of Truth 3

it’s complicated

 

Beyond your view of a worthwhile

profitable life, here is mine:

 

spilling grids of right and light

around the entire globe

night after night

every minute of the day.

 

Like the witches in world wars

I bleed my earthy soul

transfuse this tragic timeline

try to make it heal.

 

In the dark, silence is free of you.

Your wretched fallibility

and greed gone viral

cannot touch me in this cloak

though I may yet have to let it fall.

 

 

art: susan seddon boulet

Illusions of Truth 2

mechanical heart

it ticks and tocks and counts

relentless

every death by abacus

 

solitude or suicide

noted – ticked and tocked

relentlessly

the unpaid cost of every

life unopened

 

shoved beneath

a shabby sofa hidden

in the broken stuff

papers burned

in the yard

on the balcony

 

unaffected it continues

counting tick-tock

death

relentless

 

 

art: Kurtssingh on DeviantArt

Illusions of Truth 1

leap of faith

 

Fear can make out-spaced fools of us all

in a fog, fragile numbers spliced with death.

The thrill of a wild cliff dreaming sunset

and gull cries; adrenaline fires crazy breath.

 

Yearning swells, a weightlessness on wind

(bets laid with reverence on warm sand)

tips us blindly over summer’s edge into fall.

chaos

Tonight, magpies are on one with the starlings.

Dusk is noisy, battered by self-righteous

claims to air. Trees support them all.

Blackbirds scatter thoughts, wild chaotic dreams.

 

It will be dawn before I’m done with all the hate,

collisions between light and dark shading

into one disgusting mess of crazy bird shit sticking

to my ribs, tongue coated with the startling aftermath.

 

Waking is a tangled glitch of sheets wound round

and through the echoes of birdsong.

Sometimes it makes sense but mostly I am lost

while robins tug my hair to remember.

 

 

*art: Diana Turner

freedom

Tears bleed your eyes. It’s a red moon, love,
twisted out of shape. Caught in the dying of a strangled knot’s
cloudy dream of freedom; choice lost. Cemented.

A grave sheds me every day, heavy with adversity, moments
born in wish-tanks full of touch out of touch with reality,
a million dreams away from peace. Starry.

Tears bleed my eyes for both of us. It’s a blood moon,
Love, we’re gasping under concrete. Dreams that don’t make sense
haunt obsessions, make ghosts of habit. Trail drag

to a dead end. Listen for wild birdsong, Love. Forget all this.

disconnected (draft)

my type, feather

light in quiet

breath, drifts

on a whim of fancy.

nothing

              but a song

half formed on a fingertip

dream in a mad breeze

              promise.

sent, like a road sighing

somewhere

             beautiful and real.




lying low, daylight hangs

between us

there is nothing but nice

chit-chat and the memos

that remember everything




                              but this.

changed

 

every door slam raised voice barrelled in a fist,

every time you dragged me to the ground,

kissed me on the up-curve of a crippled howling no.

 

how long ‘til the echoes of your will crushing mine

say no more. say no more of bone or break

or song strangled in brief light. no. don’t touch me.

transparent

you said you’d only let me down
which you did

soon enough i knew better
than to take you back for more

still

i miss hearing you play guitar
though you can’t sing

or echo

the waste of my embrace;
you pretending to be the good guy

independence

I can’t see the moon. Beyond dark tree and thought branching
out into the universe, each busy with itself – She
has locked me out, left me to fend as best I can beneath her
awesome vacant space, lit only by the garden fairylights.

Too busy for my needs, she has a chaos of new stars to teach
about the destiny of planets, constellations, souls and all
the rest that can’t be named outright in word or song,
because everyone, absolutely everyone, is running scared

that everything might well turn out to be nothing but a technicality;
an aberration of the tick-tock let’s invent whatever
seems to be a possibility and worry later if it all goes wrong.
Stars too should know how to fend for themselves, so I accept
the obvious – tonight I’m on my own with the bloody fairylights.

in difference

Your touch doesn’t drive me reckless-crazy,
I don’t hear stars pound in your veins
but sometimes you’re a perfect shallow
anchoring my complex depth.
Calm when I am all wild moon and moor
screaming for the lost who spin and cry
like wind-chimes clashing in mad chaos,
you are measured, careful with my breath.

almost haiku?

your gentle touch a life-raft
sound in water pounds
deep silent blood – we float

—————

your gentle touch a life raft
rain pounds the placid water
in deep silent blood we float

target (died Sept 14.2014. She was 24y)

knife found its way into
guilty skin to paint
one more fine blood line

not allowed
to draw
breath
live

without fear

you still cut your way into art
grieve for the children
hope for nothing

but a door that will not give
at the first fist crush

Lost

Dancing in the car park, I’d have liked that,
music balanced on the car hood.
You and I working out how to move each other
slowly, one step at a time, without pain.

Watching meteors power through night sky,
I’d have liked that too; sparks and destiny
crashing in the frightening void, me
curled into your shoulder, everything and nothing.

I was quiet and you could not hear my thought
or count my heart’s pulse; could not feel
my desire to kiss a falling star    you
and share a precious waltz in time’s chaos.

 

voiced: http://forgetmenow.podbean.com/e/lost/

i’m struggling with free recording stuff .. there’s a glitch here but did my head in uploading never mind re-recording!

 

summer song

Easy to attract kind-less control, swallow it
for healing later. He asks if I could drop
the poetry, emotion, joy and soul
that compel me to drive storms, make
love in stars and smile at random
black holes trying to be bright. Lighten up,

I reply through clouds and fuzzy dreams.
My beat’s a crazy crow in a quantum heart;
I absorb sunlight intravenously, dance
in the car park to a rhythm that defies you
every time. By the way, that’s my flame
melting your achilles’ grip to ironic dust.

 

 

voiced : http://forgetmenow.podbean.com/e/summer-song/

 

delete

art: Pino

If anyone should look for you on my phone for emergency,
blackmail or the paparazzi, there would be no trace
but for a random number which you could always say was
some weird mistake because, for sure, you never knew me.

I deleted everything. It was stupid, thinking that you meant
for me to hold your words, thoughts or, goddess
be amazed, feelings. So my phone is empty of our contact.
The rest will take a bit more precious time but I’m sick

of being someone’s secret and I’m gone, never was kept
more than seconds on your soul or memory card.
Yet, for a while, I dallied in your palm and felt happy, safe.

quest-ion

Waiting for a word from you – city tyres spin,
tread shining magic into rainy roads.
Sensing a storm horses scream on the moor,
churn dark earth toward clouds, gathering
freedom can get furious.

I want to love you – but it seems cannot –
when the smoke clears, will you still be here?

*yes, linked to previous poem ..

swan song

photo: Lars van de Goor

At night a heavy rush of wings
over the deep lake disturbs everything.

I long to touch you but cannot
temper my approach, a complex desire,

crazy to break through
your glossy surface, blurred with gravity.

in awe

art : Pinot

a collision force rushing towards impact
I crash through fleshy walls, climb into space
and disappear until the sun explodes
blind           crazy             dreams of sanity;

your hand is calm and steady        creates

thunder in my ocean pulse ready to go wild
and fall, complete and heavy, curving into glassy sand.

your logic’s beautiful to my windswept soul
though I fight it sometimes,  just to know more of you.

magic

xalatarielx@deviantart.com

I’d hoped for stars but after all that you denied
outright knowledge of their names.
I tested you, what’s this or that, pointing out bright
patterns in black sky, fingers glowing
moonish magic and pure expectation only to be
grounded like those garish toys in your garden
where the vegetables failed without explanation.

I know you lied because you said that you could not,
your fury at the garden was irrational, contrived.
Rejection of each star was worse.
You knew every one but refused to share
anything that might shine too close;
like the photo on your dresser,
just another nameless piece of spinal pain.

sweet nothings

1
On deck the man is cradling a large fish for the camera; its silver skin flows lightly over heavy hands. He talks about the fish, admires form and muscled ocean-art. The fish is calm, moves like it’s breathing. He extends one curving gill, careful with the structure raised now like a wing about to catch the wind. Arced like a wave about to fall. The fish is breathing, drowning gracefully.

2
There is no space for me in yours. Not really, not even in imagination’s optimistic scanning of the broken clutter. Headless gothic lamps support two dolls and pictures of your love, lost in suicide. Your morphine tablets lie, scattered seed at her goddess feet. Her dainty feet, bare and fading, behind dusty glass. She stands alone for the camera. Her gaze is always to the right of you, no matter where you stand. No matter where I stand. No contact with the past,  just the constant thought of it. You talk about her carefully. Admire her nature, note how her essence shone when you took away the colours that she loved to wear. She never needed them to be beautiful, you crow. I am flowing from your hands, trying to remember why I will not meet your eye, why I hold my breath when it seems that you might speak.

intimately unknown

re-write:

The moon is hanging there with that look –
like I should know – alone and wild –
she’s a blinding mass of ancient art, forgotten.

Her dark side’s vicious, grave with dream
debris and angry space.
Next door, savage voices power-up
fire shots at what their coupling means.

That’s my point       he shouts
what’s it to you            if I get smashed?
Beautiful and still     she’s a bell
in-toning          when struck hard enough.

————————————————————

Adam’s precious rib hangs there, a mystery
with that look – like I should know –
but gravity’s a blinding mass of ancient art
and I’ve forgotten every star-story.

Savage voices next door power-up,
fire shots at what their coupling means.
That’s my point     he shouts,
I can be out less time and still get smashed.

There’s lightning on the moon, some say,
hiding fear in hollow laughter.
Under veils of dusty lore she’s a bell
in-toning when struck hard enough.

reach …

I am trying to climb, trying to heave soil,
hands – curled like cups –
ache and sting below birdsong, among roots.

Crows wait up-there, patient sentinels at ease
with accidental chaos;
the car is inside out, one wheel spinning air.

Sparrows calm down-here in the muddy ditch,
their flighty pitch a somewhere
I might reach, a chattering of  hedgerow

life that might mean nothing, tiny pointers
whirling giddy sound.

——————

written by way of an image challenge from Magpie Tales

—————–

the last two lines aren’t right but i’ve lost the plot so they’ll have to wait for now *lol

grave-goods

Are there more of you and me, pissed-up
in a few dimensions, wondering if this
thunder strums each sky the same as now?
Whatever, I am not about to lighten up.

Later you will kill for dinner and I’ll watch,
awed that life can boil so fiercely –
pray those crayfish reappear
in a world that you can’t stake or drown.

Let’s forget about the ring you found for me
while you teased another girl
in the cemetery – she’d have liked to die
but you had no urge for idle merriment.

We won’t talk about that I don’t like it
moment – words set in
obsidian against silver  – turning.

 

————————-

My thanks and apologies to everyone who commented on the drivel that I posted late last night. I had to send it into trash. This is a re-write. Possibly just as bad but maybe not as embarrassingly so lol …

the moon’s not dead

exile made ice-work of all caress

you couldn’t bear to be touched
so i kept the tide low-key,
waned almost out of reach, love
knew you would not drown
my intuition
that you were hollowed ground
scrying craters, dust and loss
for the times you killed

yourself and felt better for it

urban torque

next door’s noise is rolling in while they move out.

door-slamming conversation doesn’t slow the church bells striding from street’s end, blunt-axing through neurotic wailing car alarms.

decisive click-click-clicks of next door’s switches fire at will, kill all but this headache, wondering if it’s early for red wine or just too late to stop

the noise.

on the path, beside the furrow ploughed by motorbikes last night,
a random concrete slab is resting.

i count finite tap-tap-taps of rain.

on the rocks

2014 rewrite:

No matter that a gull screams
yet another invocation,
tears the rain apart,
dives at my smoky silhouette

spinning into distance.
I am a simple thought,
drifting in the wild
crazy flowers, colour
reaching for a sky to climb

 

——————————–

out of time’s disguise i’m not on the rocks,
no matter that a gull screams
yet another invocation, tears rain apart,
dives at a smoky silhouette

spinning in the distance; i am always just
a simpler thought – drifting
in wild-crazy flowers, colour reaching
for a sky to climb

barely sentimental

broken glass tumbled holograms faking 
love on our ragged bed

         rain's overhaul of reality
         wept into pale dawn

cloudy thought in skin's delusion
traded hours for leaves

grounded …

past lives glower on this current wake,
shimmer fades - dying in the dive
while stars turn in slow burn;
    such a gorgeous smile in your dark
    spider thoughts, my love

that red-back in your soul simmers
like the land - waiting for another
storm to be free of grief;
   passion's urge is cruel, stark,
   frightens what survives - love

un-titled 2

That comment on my shy undress
was merely observation;
much like the way you study ants,
find them cute, an acceptable diversion
since Olympia’s out – on the lash again.

Still, I felt like shit when you deigned
to view me once – I did not stain
sole’s level or your world, so full of it.

un-titled

You cage-fight words, make them scream,
wrestle like bare knuckled children
cloned and bartered for a crowd that caws
         "win,lose, give it more of that" 

and when they roll - promiscuous in heat
from your wagered tongue
you are exhausted, heaving and amazed
         in a void that still-lives 

ache - for all your pounding disconnection
words cannot Do but fail - framed
in cruelty your slaves are bound to starkest
         principles - of cause.

third eye

Tern circles – airy arrogance – leaves
me spiked on its final shriek
wondering how to dress a sudden vortex
whirling at my brow.

You won’t notice that the sky has fallen
and I’m wearing a bandana.
You’ll retreat as always – flight
is all that we agree on.

Day’s imprinted – bad news coffee
out of taste and time,
I growl with reckless intuition
skirling into cloud.