stinging the sin

 I chisel away the plaster
with that blindfold
I need to find that mirror to scry
before I hear someone cry 
of untold horrors just round the corner
a chill runs through me
and I recede to a corner
I can hear the rattle of a train 
passing by that creek

I know I have to find that mirror
instead I find a webcam
hidden in the recess of that wall

no wonder, foreboding had taken me over
I was catching up with someone's sin
that sin which invades the privacy of others

I hear a crushed soul crashing to ground 
with that drumbeat

"let me be blindfolded and smell the flowers
or is it smoke I am swallowing?"

hide me within you

near that river,
close to the railway track
a body is revealed. 
is she alive
did she collapse there?

I can see the longing in her face
imagine her radiant smile in better days
and gnash my teeth at the waste
where did she emerge from
now almost skin and bones

a mask, 
isn't it what we have always?
is it reel, is it real
who will answer
above that silence

media has all the answers
one needs only post it there
no respect for the alive
even less for the dead
but let her rest in peace

"let me close my eyes and rest for a while
while she lies in the shallows"

weeds sprouting out of your mind

I pick the mouthpiece
speak secrets into it
you think I will gossip
but I read out a poem

stanzas as sharp as razors
when I wrote it in the bath
a storm was brewing in my heart
(my skin so bronze, not that it matters)

why do you have a lopsided view
your thoughts always sour
you find blemish in all that touches you
as you always have been doing

I will always keep that fence erect,
now that weeds are growing around that
obsolete phone. 

"I am still speaking into it, assuming 
my poem might inspire you to write a few songs"

when thoughts muddle with heat

in that bowl of ice cream 
I try to find some coolness

I am frantic in this heat
random things springs in the mind
sultry weather, no one's fault
nature's way of testing us
to make us absorbed deeply into it

that man in that tiny birdbath
is that too much?
he can only skim the surface
not touch it without pain
his shirt discarded now

after that stain of salt shows in its grain
that birdbath can't contain his length
I shake my thoughts
scour that bowl with all my strength
I ache for more

"when the sky finally falls
I will hide under that now named manbath"

I want a red planet of my own

photo by Toni Frissell 

I need a nifty hat to keep me afloat 
just outside of my watery grave 
don't ever assume I have the privilege of misery

that thought is but stale 
where is my shoe, 
it is too late to contemplate 

remind me the chain of sequence 
(I was wearing white with five carat diamond)
 how I fell into water or was I pushed 

I am all mushed up in there 
akin to a boil in a cherry 
abhorring yet fascinating 

in the light of day 
don't let anyone get away 
I am not hidden in darkness 

"not again. never again. I will float out. 
I will not suffer the fate of Pluto"

spectacular in the jagged edges of mind

Still Life, 1907 by John Frederick Peto 

steaming earth burns the feet
jagged edges of rock bleed them further

I am so intimate with my hat
yet I have that umbrella too
merciless sun hits me hard

I trudge along all alone
on that lonely dry path
my feet dragging in that forceful way

I thirst for water, to sustain me
but I fall flat on that ground
which embraces me to its breast

all my stuff now hooked to a nail
while I am but dust in the Universe
my soul walking any place it wishes

no bleeding marks anywhere,
no dried out bones either
not even a photograph on that wall

"maybe a memory in someone's mind
not that I expect that as I am gone now"

where the night is without wind

Artwork by Ulrike Bolenz

stuck in the mud
her hands and feet

suppose she is searching 
the geometry of her origin

the lines, that curve, and an angle
throw her a lifeline

netted wings, broken at places
urge her to fly

her tears wet the ground
cementing her fate

"a seedling, perched on the earth
needles the mind, to prod, to incite"

smoky trails

smoke, not nuclear debris
blows into the air, acrid too,
tickling my nose. 

I watch the train on the bridge,
fascinated by the train of smoke,
a dark trail in clear sky

the seeds of toil on the ground-
a much needed respite from drudgery-
I touch my nose yet again

burnt ground, folly of merciless sun
or something unknown buried deep 
by black suited man

in the deep dark night-
all so hush hush,
where thoughts too are censored

on a clear day, I look at myself,
almost translucent skin-
nothing so spectacular

"mutant life abounds where I live
isolated, but for the train.
even smoke is a welcome diversion"

rainy illusion

when the fiery wind sings

Old Bank Street, Manchester, UK by R.A.D. Stainforth 

you hold my arm
(it makes a nice frame for pictures)
you have mastered that craft
to create illusions

just a deal, that show of caring
it can't repair the damage,
fathom deep, cracked to the edges

such a close call
why would anyone add to it
those redundant emotions
I want it back, I want to exist
I don't trust chance anymore

"the billow of clouds, 
cloud my mind, 
and I let you hold my hand"

broken like that venus

the ghost of a sky opens up for us

showing a glimpse of its mighty anger

by the way of thunder 

but lightning is really the path
if a circle can be called that

fear of the unknown tears into us
when the howl of the wind rises and rises
veins go icy cold despite the heated flesh
I place my hands on the granite table,
empty and cold, through and through

you fill the bathtub for me
yet I feel so abandoned
when the howling winds call out names
I can sense the weight of loss
of something as yet un-named

"a fallen tree, its broken twigs, all speak of chaos out there"