You Brought me a Smile of Clarity

It seem when you come in thought
I welcome you in
Like a mouth of nectar
Like a spiritual distance
Getting closer
Like a forgotten melody
My heart calls you
Between our lives
There is room for you
Here in the open-space
Of quietness, and longing
It seems there is a tingle
I am enclosed
In my awareness of you
Feeling you at a distance
That which creates
A strange proximity
And a shelter, or
An imagined intimacy
Tonight in this room
I’m more aware of you than ever
But, you are not here
Only a rumour, a whisper, an after-taste
Of somebody I barely know
I have thrown your blouse
To the floor, in my head
Like a gentle darkness
That I want to wrap myself in and devour
A blanket, or a feeling, or a sensation
I cannot tell what you truly represent
As a suite fantasy, a moment, a lost token
Of an experience of subtle exactitude
That my life cannot embody
That my youth cannot taste
I cannot lead you here
I can only hold you like this, in my mind
The sun will come through
The white sleeve of the plum curtain
And in your eyes, I know the sun will be gold
Folded, melted, like cotton drifting down
To the fountain of spring
And into your flesh, where the world
Is joyous, free, ecstatic
There is no longer room for my self-pity
I must discard it like an empty dream
Replaced by the gift of your longing
Poems held naked waiting for you, on the floor.

Divorce, Death & Taxes

I’ve come to realize, the day will come
My mother will die, maybe
Before my daughter is even born
It’s a cruel world, where this is possible…
Sometimes I wait for something

Special to occur, especially to me
And then I stop myself –
Feeling guilty for those with serious
Disabilities, in war-stricken countries
I’ve come to realize, my ability

To practice social justice, is limited
Like altruism turned on its head
I’ve grown weak with failure, rejection, poverty
Whereas I once wanted to change the world
I’ve come to realize, I’m not so different

After all, my mother will die
And then all this abandonment will know
That this truly is a cold cruel world
Where we are bodies in transit
I’ve dreamed enough about bodies
Maybe it’s time to be spiritual again.

The New Girl

One month left, before summer
I feel the weeks before Flowers
As an epiphany of dead grandmothers
Lost love, the usual things, that matter –
My life is being swarmed by little necessities
The aches that creep, the particulars
That make the years blur, I know for you
It’s hard imagine such a day will ever come
So lucid with your youthful form
Bursting in on ideas, hitchhiking your way
To maturity, every word you say
Lives desperate in me, for unanswered clues
To the meaning of life, hidden in your smile
I haven’t yet organized your impact upon me
So I let it simmer there, while we study
The unknowable truth of why I crave
The Philip Glass shattering of the insides
Of hope, that I relive destiny in you.

A Would-Be Love Sonnet

If I die before love, strike me
With the purity of footsteps of karma
That in the next life, my holy force
Will flash the incredible whispers
With poetry, and warm affection
Since, in Love I’ll die a second time
To myself, once so selfish and conceited
I will serve my kin, as is ancient custom
Wooed by joys so terrible, biological imperatives
And then I shall say, ‘Whoever loved like we did’
And I shall boast, with irrevocable delight
Those roses I shall burry in eternal months
And with the light that endures, with the love
That consumes all the fruit, new lives will be made
To love again, with burning hearts, subtle flower-kisses.

I’ve Swallowed Distant Pollen in your Kiss

No one can reckon what I owe
To the wonders of this world
I am grateful for, your wilderness
Like a young girl becoming a woman

You brush your hand over me
And I rise, from the Sea to your Joy
Like the fields being watered
I surge to life in your hands

That know the creativity of Life
Like a blind bird with still so much flight
I roam for continents of your touch
Where wandering lightning might strike

In these loins, yielding in penetration
With the moisture of all that is yielding
Feeling with body, my ceilings of pleasure
Emotional in my lonely house, like a lover

Waiting for you, till you will see me again
No one can reckon what I owe
The brief devouring hope of flesh & soul
My body to rub your kiss, with certain pangs

Stealing the key to my innocence, my blood
On fire for you to continue your pleasing
My wineglass drunk every drop of your moisture
Sipping the roots of your womanhood

As if in your flesh I might find time, salt, whispers
The rumor of wood, green, growing things
No one can reckon what I owe
Life begets life, women bring joy

I am grateful, for the shadows in your moods
Like a young girl becoming a woman
I dare not trespass too close to your curiosity.

The You of a Secret Kiss, Like Stolen Bread

Someone said they had a word
For music of feeling, for longing
Sparse as the stripped light of youth

You are my bamboo grove
On a late afternoon, where I feel nothing
You are as a mouth struck opal

A divine surrender to infinity
Someone said they had a word
For longing, pure and simple

From the gulfs of crazy waves in rain
There is such stillness and movement
In my being, when I think of you

I believe your moist hands are
Like some indefinable South, some symbolic
Fragrance I cannot quite remember

Tangerine moisture and liquorish lush flavor
Some sensual spirituality for which
Invades my obscurity, like life to the artist

Like femininity to the protesting solitude
Of a monk, scholar, orator of surrealism
Someone said they had a word

For the breathless state of strange desire
Before sweetness, before thorns, before union.

Dreams of your Photographs

Sweetheart, you are my river in paradise
I understand that destiny, more than anything
Is how we come together, like when you
Take your nature walks – I am transported
To the inner places you have been

Our nomadic beauty could wander the world
Because love cannot always fly
Without resting, I am such a place
Where you can be freely, without expectation
Or obligation, A calm root where you can belong

There is no formula of clay in our lives
But when our minds and bodies come together
You are the turquoise piece that fits in me
Like a gem to my stone, like a bud to my stem
And I yearn for your like mineral wishes

Emerald-longing, as sweet as the earth
We open celestial capsules in our minutes shared
Hours that caress us from afar, the spiritual wonder
Of so much discovery, you bring me alive
As if I’ve been invisible to every gift, before you.

You With Your White Energy (River in Heaven)

Sweetheart, was it you who told me
To Love all, trust a few
And do harm to none?
I’ve loved enough in twenty years
To die a lifetime of heartache

But your Sapphire summer-soul
Are the drifting forests of centuries
Of intimacy trapped in time
I find a dark honey in your words
When I touch your hips I feel

The opaque petals of my hurt subside
Like the sun multiplied in water
Sweetheart, I have modest dreams
Of a simple life, the epiphanies
Are getting shorter, more rare

Some of us will achieve greatness
Only in the quality of our love
To catch kisses in clusters of fruit
We know intimately how grapes might taste
But the tongue arrives at raspberries

When we touch someone whose soul
Is smooth from the waves, from
The caress of doves, intricate contemplation
Solitude, suffering, dearest I want us
To transcend mortality, for just a brief moment

And quench the scrambled blankets, feathers,
Sweet naïveté between us like soothing horizons
Why, O’ why do I trust you so implicitly?

Cycles of the Clear Bright

The cities will be ruined
And what will remain will be
Heavy dew, thick mist, dense grass
Fields, far as roads once ruled

The drunken parties of men will be gone
Fled into the fifth watch of
Galaxies, tunnelling into oblivion
Somewhere near the speed of light

Passing are all ruined palaces
Empires will crumble, as if gladly
To make way for the new
The coasts will swallow peninsulas

The skies will perform cleaning
Volcanoes will erupt
And broken gates will ease in
New wild gardens, waterfalls

Over bridges, time renews all
Life does not question, she moves
While we rest in moments of snow
Beneath migrating rains

The gravestones of Earth will be hidden
Only the voice of screeching owls
Will remind the lantern light
Of Nine Spring mornings
What all was once, can be again.

Last Words of a Poetaholic

The moon sets, like an anchor
Of the Stars, a tide of white silk
Floating down to the Oceans
A tree by our house waves
In the milky light of Tonight

Reaching as far as the little boat
In my dream, I am the river
Of light coming down as a bird
From the mountains, swift as
Time, the moss covering my youth

These rustic windows look out
On to flowers by the shore
Spring never needs to hide behind the sun
Steep cliffs block the Moon
From my view, hermit-clouds

I envy you Nature, so masterful
I am only a guest in your blooms
Not even the path that leads me
Up to daybreak will remember me.