lungs

the wall of machines behind me
beep-beeped with every skipped breath
a swallow or yawn sent an electronic chirp,
that grew more insistent
until i complied and in- or ex- haled.
They have given me a new lung and
a new level of resentment for noise

The human face -a lovely woman,  so young
so responsible and duty bound, with syringe and IV
tubes and charts she resets my path
to rest and morphine-sleep
as I close eyes
her loving dark eyes remind me--
you can see Angels  before you die.

Narco-dreams come with a buzzing ear
spots before my eyes and floaters,
the air is alive with motes and specks
so many little dark things
as the bright lights fade into hazy rings
i fall...

near a flame-red wall with steps of stone rising tall
above as far as only  i can see
the next landing and a fire bowl
whipped in the winds
i climb, as there is no choice
the wall comforts me against a fall
the wall now turns amber then gray
and red again as the fire bowl lights each etage
i look up and there is more of the wall
and more fire bowls-- the wall
grows like my fear and yet -- it calms me

Somewhere else some time other I lay in cold morning mists
a flat roof with thick ochre  cover
like skin, this warm clay
gathers sweat in the morning cool.
I am determined not to move
as the sun rises behind me and whisks water away--
the clay begins to dry then wither, and now ..it peels
Such quiet.. i don't breathe.. listening to the paint die
I hold my throat in  lock-- until
they beg me to exhale-- the noisy chorus rises unceasing
Chirp-chirp-chirps me back to breath.

little epiphanies

like a flash of lightning in the dark still night,
we see so much by the brief stark slash of light
we see the deep meaning of little slights
that add weight to each minute of every day
for millions to bear, like an unseen scar
from an invisible wound

a little epiphany...and I shudder
in the thought that we have yet to see,
so deeply and so many,
the hurts she has born,
the thousand cuts to the lost children,
and the strange fruit in Southern trees---
the little epiphanies, yet to be

The Dreams

The Dreams

His blue overalls never tied,

One strap hanging on his dingy gray;
he moves silently and with purpose.

His face always a-slant, brown skin never a smile

He is a large mound of a man.

[ a purity of spirit wears He
like a cloak upon his broad shoulders,
if he a warrior of the Iliad be
His worthy epithet would speak of quiet grace
and the wives and children with happiness
for the men He'd saved]

 Never still, as He blinks

Into one brass ring challenge after another.

He is deft, oddly focused.

The brass nut matched perfectly to the brass screw

 All over the house in so many sizes

Carriage bolts to eyeglass rims

Always he is there matching and tightening the bolts

But nowhere as assiduously and concerning

As the great sliding file cabinet.

Some say His mind is dim—to me, there is an inner light,

a being content to flourish in his world.

[For faith comes when there is doubt
it pierces like the  burst of dawn
that dissolved the solid wall of night
 as if it had never been]

The mahogany wood panel 

Has a centered and ornate handle

and so many brass screw heads

They make a pattern – if you let your mind step back

Step wa-a-a-y back, it is star cluster

No…the Orion Nebula—bright young stars

Gleam as if on their own 

The great file sits in quiet shadow—it is a quiet place.

~ The next Dream~

The great file with glistening brass screw heads,

The gleaming mystery sits ajar

As I pass I stop involuntary, the air gone missing

I see within the drawer a woman’s face in profile-

She has dark hair and eyebrows, the brown skin is soft

and seems somehow new

“it’s His Mother..” my host speaks to me at last

“She was about to die—and He placed her there—

She is not gone and she is not here—she rests”

I turned to ask the first of a cascade

And I was alone again—until He came in

Adding a new brass gleam and carefully tightening it 

He gently, lovingly closed the drawer.

~ The last dream ~

I sit at the table, a quill and ink my tools

The flickered candle breathes as I do

A slow and steady state—and I wonder

Why it is I that must divine

The life within God’s last tear

The universes that hang in the wells of her eyes

As the last feather floats towards the floor

The end of her patience- the unimagined

Fall

I raise eyes from my task

And he has returns with a sparkle and a matching ring

He adds this latest gem and leaves – the drawer is open

And I see, fluttered eyes, lips that move…

My host springs forward to open the drawer.

Now, the landing below - barefoot in basement hard cement

on stair my alabaster host, her long white hair- stare at me as she

Is the crutch --- Mother walks now

Unsteady but smiling- step down by step down

- Decensus Averni Facile-

And now Mother sits, skin a glow 

and He scurries down with flowers and starred eyes

Mother at a bare wooden table, She gleams—

My host and He go upstairs; leaving excited sounds—

I turn to Mother

She is younger—she is un-aging

 as I watch, time flow backwards

In her hair, skin, and eyes

She is young -Mother,  now girl-Mother—

My lips open to exhort to all-

“Come see this—she is going to heaven…”

Sweet child, on the wings of Love

~ Denouement~

in the morning when I woke

I had a lump in my throat

A pain in my chest—I felt empty

The dream was gone and fading-

My dream, was un-aging, going to heaven

And God’s last tear—remained on my pen

In the endless wells of her eyes.

Sweet child, on the wings of Love

Light carries you into boundless realms

In time and space you fill a place

Ordained for you

before the first feather, until the last tear.

a delicate taste

The summer brings stormy nights

When earth and sky cannot be still

For the heat rises and calm descends

a struggle in the steamy air.

Near ground the faraway sound of the clash

And random flash like nerves on fire

Until we feel it in wisps of near air.

As thoughts wander above the covering clouds

I slowly inhale lotus and honeysuckle

And miss that delicate taste--

Moonlight on your skin

justice-ku

my coffee is bitter
not worth the price charged...

in star bucks

no place to sit and wait
for mocha choco-lattes

unquiet night

The woman in my bed

a smile that spread like dawn

filled crevices in the crumpled pillow

and spoke to the places

within my thoughts, that make and re-make

the woman in my bed

Unquiet, as was never in plain day,

Her insistent whispers churn the air  

passions under breath

her body translates rippled thunder,

as lightning on wet lips met my skin

The woman in my bed

Wraps me in arms and thighs

As her deep blue eyes close to the dim lit room

and open to her heart