underneath the star of david

Wed, 09 Jul 2003 06:33:51 GMT

Featherpennies

Yes, perhaps I should write a little
Find that pen I lost a few months ago,
The one that would stick under my nails and hang
From any tide of thought like a forgotten luminary.

Write a little,
No matter whether it be on empty canvases
That border my slave walls and vomit
With unparalleled color on this horizontal slant of time,

Or along the edge of a napkin,
The one I stole from the heaven’s market.
I’ve kept it in the chest pocket for centuries.
Perhaps I should just scribble memory's syllables
Until it becomes a Roman empire.

Though, I could merely smoke glass,
Inhale a green field until its dust hallucinates a new sun.
Within there I can write epics about ink and feathers,
And how they climbed classicism’s walls
Awaiting the unforeseen poet pumping inside my veins.

Possibly, it may be easier to just cut off my fingers
And separate the private handle on words.
I could send each on a raft to every corner of the galaxy
Or together down the stream behind my house.
There is no difference.

No, I should let go of my bottom lip and just write a little
And tell the world how this moment is like every other.
This is nothing but a ruin of time parted by hesitancy’s whispers
When my hands were found shackled behind the stupor of a restless night
And my mouth caught the glimpse of light before the novella of dark.

Fri, 27 Jun 2003 04:16:45 GMT

Everything
  everything is fleeting
Except when the shoes overflow with water
When one lace    is Love
And the other    is Death

Wed, 25 Jun 2003 16:38:15 GMT

A bus station is where a bus stops.
A train station is where a train stops.
On my desk I have a work station...

Tue, 24 Jun 2003 03:23:20 GMT

You see, the roundness of a lip
Resides at the curve of every dead end
And the brush-tip of fingers
Can erase the panorama of a star’s demise

Yes, when I close my eyes
Angels kiss my forehead
And open wide an embrace
While I scream out with my fists
“Lies!”

Mon, 02 Jun 2003 17:18:05 GMT

(inspired by the riveting morning combinations of pather and translucid)

For self is a sea boundless and measureless.
Say not, "I have found the truth," but rather, "I have found a truth."
Say not, "I have found the path of the soul." Say rather, "I have met the soul walking upon my path."
For the soul walks upon all paths.
The soul walks not upon a line, neither does it grow like a reed.
The soul unfolds itself, like a lotus of countless petals.

-Kahil Gibran

When One Becomes a Whore to Night

Sat, 31 May 2003 07:55:00 GMT

I cannot give you the time, sir. Understand, my head is wrapped around my watch thrice and all I can see is the words dropping from your lips like lent balls.

What’s that, you desire another ride on the merry-go-round between my legs?
I do apologize, the horses have lost their saddles.

You know, honeybunny, I once measured the world with the drop of a man’s pants--but then I realized how often even the insects fly around nude while crunching on each other’s hearts. Therefore, you must know, I walk only along the minute-hand with a stiff spider and a staff of silkworms.

No, I’ve not fucked the Great Wall. However, I have twisted the twigs I found between murder’s breaths so tightly that I’ve created a perpendicular world with the cocking of tweaked melodies that line the baseboards. After all, aren’t all walls great if they remember to always brace themselves for Mr. Eternity’s hot rod?

Well I don’t freakin’ know, slick willy. How many times have you been able to cream corner yourself into the factory line of liberals? Personally, I’d rather read a caulk-her-clockwise-spaniel story about how the bird met the bee and decided to shit all over it.

Please stop talking, I already have traces of blood left on my mute step-sister’s hands.

What? Freedom? You don’t have freedom. You’ve already been sucked into the black hole of me and spit back out again beside the stack of six fingered carpetbaggers. If you’d like, I can give you the ten hundred number to pi. I’d suggest you call and request a refill on tongue-whores. And then, eventually (somewhere along the fall of the soul in the photograph) you’ll be able to remember how I tasted while you watch me from a distance until the passive attitude of this stranger over here slams the door in my face.

Wed, 21 May 2003 14:56:51 GMT

"There is more money being spent on breast implants and Viagra than on Alzheimer's research. This means that by 2020, there should be a large elderly population with perky boobs and huge erections and absolutely no recollection of what to do with them."

Sat, 17 May 2003 14:27:32 GMT

forty five years ago today
the existence of every flower bowed
and the pathway to her endless life was revealed

forty five years ago today
the earth trembled and split into halves
each arm carrying her into the fulfillment of tomorrows

forty five years ago today
she began to create us between ebb and flow
and still she stands, embracing
all that this world may ever know of love

happy birthday, mom
i miss you and i love you

Fri, 02 May 2003 05:29:11 GMT

An Unsent Reflection to Kahil Gibran

I am a stranger in this world...I am a poet who composes what life proses,
and who proses what life composes. ~Kahil Gibran

And therein this world foreign the internal beat of breath,
Exiles are created for words,
Destined to the veins of mother's leaves,
Left skimming the surfaces of a lake she sails.

They shaped me under the orange blossoms of her hair,
Twists of branches grounded a lifetime’s era.
The union of their fingerprints,
Reverberated lucidities from clasped hands.

I learned to sleep with the sun,
Closed eyes grabbed at its tales of stolen stars.
Rain was a reminder of pain,
Soiling itself into silhouettes.
And every glimpse of feather upon wind
Whispered a location of open doors.

Still, fire infuses a loyalty to dream.
Golden streets of yesterday’s love beg presence
As if memory’s need is to create a city in the flicker of bliss.
Even when, it is the indigo flame of a forgotten avenue,
That speaks the true radiance of silent victories.

Having been trained to create
From the hallelujah of nature,
I’ve found evolution can be swallowed whole
If one listens closely to the moon.

For everything is a melody of faith.
As the mind hops over moments like river-rocks,
I can outdraw the mirrored song of any destiny.
It’s nothing less than a chameleonic gardenscape—
An arbor of a father, ornamented
By climbing ivies of a mother.
All randomly pierced with the color of God
Then framed, with barks of unfolded paths
That splinter discovering flesh.

Now grown I realize,
How the world elates itself into spins
When its habitués force open their eyes between gray
To see the veiled faces of shade
Adorning thoughts of rapture.
A fresh scent of citrus,
Can write a collective biography of one day.
The spitfire of stars--is an appetizer for tomorrow.
And oh how the twerp of a bird crafts an unmarked poem,
Balancing itself on the wire of air to fingertips
Until we hear the next word.

Once new to this world—
Knowledge of the unseen
Bled itself into arteries like an exhausted tide from Titan.
Religion wilted, and I found even the spirit of a lily
Can write itself into the Book of Life.

Once new, but old when I was born again.
And now, at the bank of every river's bend yet to be seen,
I’ll find myself in desperate pieces
Lurking between shadows, waving arms
Like prideful war flags whirling to surrender’s white.

A stranger to this world I may be,
But I was raised on an eagle’s wing that hovered above it.
The prints of my steps were hunted naked
Before life dropped me to its dust.
</font>

Tue, 15 Apr 2003 20:57:40 GMT

Iowa turned Black & White

Fri, 11 Apr 2003 04:44:32 GMT

i've been placing dogwood petals among a fluid of flames
each, a cupped counterpart of a threaded quilt instilled in me
it folds between veins and sinews in the same rhythm of a storm-blanketed sky
and i've been staring into the indigo base of this fire
believing to fall in love at every flicker when my mind snaps at the thought of yours
i would become a nameless wind to extend this light
if the sound of an acoustic sunrise to your voice beckoned me
or if the hand of a small child would turn itself just enough
to show the world how starfish were born in the glory of a child's imagination
i could withstand the joker's snare when i bow to the bells of love
if someone would tell me how the watchtower is only a myth of perception
or that the restlessness of a soul infatuated with the moon
is merely the point in life when blinders must peel from the crevices of flesh forlorn
i've been extending hands outward to invisible lands flooded with screams
each, a certain destiny that stains the throat with daggers of adoration
they burst at the seams, these palms scratching at the glass of your face unknown
when i realize i'm dreaming life into a wilted flower

Thu, 03 Apr 2003 06:03:08 GMT

i have, for very obvious reasons, been quite silent about my opinion to this tragedy blanketing the news 24/7. though, tonight, a special catalyst got my motor running as he posted this and i replied.

in fact, this may be the only time i dare indulge in correspondence to the matter. which is not out of selfishness or denial, but because pessimism and/or optimism won't change a thing at this point. we can not move backwards because disagreement desires us to. it has started, it is happening.
we must deal with it.

Tue, 01 Apr 2003 16:42:43 GMT

i've had this fear, breathing deeply throughout that has been whispering to me, how there is no possible way i could relate through words the last few weeks, the last few days with her, the last moment in which i had to say goodbye. and i've had this need, to write novels--pages and pages, about how amazing and irreplaceable she was. how time stopped and faith shined every time someone came into her presence, how she could turn every frown and disappointment into a smile with victory. how she touched literally thousands of lives without even knowing it through her veracity and strength, with her courage and impeccable love for God and every human walking this Earth. i could speak endlessly of accomplishments and dents she's made. or on how she is the prime example of living a full life, it matters not how many years. my time with her here was a glorious example and guide for the woman i pray to become. and yes, she molded me, probably more since the battle began two and a half years ago than in my lifetime. still, there are those memories in childhood never to be forgotten. until i was in school, we'd take a nap together everyday...and we'd not be able to fall asleep unless we were holding each other's hand. i, by God's grace, was able to do that with her once more two weekends before she went to the hospital while i took care of her when dad was in iowa for grandma's 70th birthday party. she taught me how to dance to her and dad's "song" when i was 7 in the living room of our house on red hill road. she'd send me flowers on valentine's day just because everyone else would receive some silly roses from a secret admirer while i would not. she'd call me at work at random just to tell me that she loved me. there are so many more i don't even know where to begin.

i miss her so much. every other thought is of her, its a derivative of "mom? you're gone? you can't be gone. mom, i love you, i'm sorry i wasn't here for you enough. mom? will you forgive me? show me some sign you're with me, mom. mom, daddy is crying- he lost his soul mate. this isn't fair. i dont want you back in pain, but we can't live without you. it shouldn't have happened to you. no, mommy, please...mom....mom..."

i can't walk into another room without some remembrance of her. i can't watch a movie that has mothers in it. i can't listen to james taylor. i can't sleep. i can't sleep. i can't sleep.

i hear him cry in the mornings. he tries to release his tears before his three girls wake up. he said it hurts the most not waking up with her by his side, he's told me this many times already and always breaks down mid-sentence. i cannot imagine his pain, they were one...half of his spirit departed before him. at times, it makes me afraid to love so deeply. how does one handle absences to this degree? "one day at a time," he says. constantly, he prays for strength for all of us.

the doctor had told us she seemed to be improving. she felt it was necessary to admit herself to the hospital on sunday night (march 9) because she felt an infection in her lungs had returned. they began her on anti-biotics but had to place her on the hospice floor, supposedly because they were running out of room. still recovering from the headaches and spinal taps myself, when i went to see her on monday i could barely walk into her room to give her a hug. actually, i don't think i was able to even do that. i sat down immediately and closed my eyes, dad called for a wheelchair and he took me down to the first floor ER (again, 3rd time). they pumped me over and over again with drugs, i was there all afternoon while dad shuffled between mom 8th floor, heather 1st floor. then into the night, waiting for a neurologist and steady on morphine. but mom- mom insisted on seeing her babygirl and made the nurses allow dad to wheel her down to see me. mom, in much more pain than i could ever imagine, had to come see how i was. i don't remember that we talked of much more than what the doctors were saying and planning on doing with me, i didn't realize that was the last time i would get to talk to her...

i leaned over from my bed to her wheelchair, to kiss her on the lips and say 'i love you, mommy' while she held my hand...

i stayed with anna and dave that night in town, closer to the hospital and i, of course, could not drive myself home to the girls. tuesday morning around 10:30-11:00 i was trying to contact mom's room but no one would answer, or i'd get a busy signal- i worried. over and over i'd call that number or dad's cell phone with no answer. i didn't know that at that time, she was in excruciating pain...pain to the point that she told dad she wanted to commit suicide if she had to endure this pain any longer. morphine was given to her three times, over dosages, before she slightly calmed down and when she did, she went into code. over the course of about an hour they had to resuscitate her three times. she was placed on a ventilator and monitors. her lungs had stopped working but her heart was still beating on its own. from then on, she was heavily sedated and unresponsive.

dad finally called my cell phone to say "heather, you better get to the hospital right away" i froze, i insisted on him telling me what was wrong and he couldn't answer me..."just get over here now." i woke up anna, crying, and told her i needed her to get me there right away. i think she stayed with me, i don't really remember anything until i saw my dad in the hallway outside her room. as soon as he saw me running towards him he broke down and cried so loud it seemed to have echoed throughout the whole floor. i thought she was already gone until mom's doctor's nurse, deanna, started to explain what was going on. about 15 nurses and doctors seemed to be crammed into her small room, i wasn't able to go in there with dad until after some time. i can't begin to express how it felt seeing her, lifeless and depending on machines. a nightmare, all a bad dream. i wanted her to sit up and speak to me. tell me to get my hair out of my face, mom. something, mom...please...please... i was holding her cold hand, fighting denial and shudders of cries when dad had to pull me away.

we told anna to drive to orange to pick up the girls, called mom's parents to come immediately. local friends, scottie and george soon came as well. (scottie had been visiting with mom earlier on that morning, while dad had to get some air...he was becoming frustrated with her and had to recuperate she could not accept that she had a catheter and didn't need to get up to use the restroom, drugged as she was, she couldn't understand were her actual discomfort was. recently, she had always been so anxious and unable to get comfortable. always in some sort of unforgiving pain, she was.)
the following days started the fog of memory. tuesday and into wednesday i stayed at the hospital with dad, never leaving his side. i think jenna and mary rose (18 & 12) stayed with anna and dave tuesday night. dad and i slept in the hospital with other friends and family that had shown up. my mom's brother steve had flown in immediately from minneapolis and her father and stepmother were coming in on wednesday.

when i'd go to visit her, i'd see an unrecognizable shell. she was pale and drawn, extremely swollen from all the fluids and chemicals they were trying to keep in her. they were trying to rebalance her bloodlevels and she seemed to be responsive to that, but her lungs still depended solely on the ventilator. her eyes were half open but she couldn't see me. i so wanted her to see me, to know i was there squeezing her hand. to see in the reflection of my eyes how much i loved her and wanted her with us. in icu the nurse said that she could hear us if we spoke loudly into her ear, though she wouldn't respond in anyway, it seemed to be a proven fact that she could hear and it would comfort her.
dad leaned over and said "i love you, julie ann" and immediately i saw her eyebrows raise in recognition. it was the most beautiful sight and comfort i received before she left us.

she remained stable though in very critical condition through wednesday. the girls had gotten a room with dale and kathy at the redroof inn two blocks from the hospital to get some rest. my dad's mother flew in from iowa that night and arrived around midnight via some friends in richmond who picked her up from the airport and brought her to charlottesville. dad needed her there and he cried like a child calling 'mom' as soon as he saw her (his dad died 14 years ago, grandma understood what he was going through). the three of us stayed the night this time. dad and grandma went in to see mom shortly after she arrived and everyone else left. i stayed in the waiting room by myself crying, so i could, too, dry up and be strong before they came back. grandma said she was in shock of how mom looked, it wasn't the beautiful julie everyone knew. it just wasn't her. grandma held her hand while she talked to mom and they told me that right after she let go to leave, mom picked up her arm and brought it to her chest, almost as if to touch her heart and tell grandma and dad she knew they were there.
about 4:45am the icu doctor (who looked amazingly like you, pather) walked into the waiting room. i already knew the words that would fall like holes in the sky. her blood levels suddenly were plummeting, platelets dropped from 81 to 15 in an hour, and her kidneys had completely stopped working. she was doing nothing but retaining fluids, her heart was still beating at a rapid pace but her lungs still not coming back...

"there is nothing we can do"

nothing we can do? how can there be nothing? "nothing," i thought, is a life without her. "nothing" is an excuse to give up and let go. but she fought, don't you know doctor, she's fought- so much- how can you say "nothing?" stop lying to me. wake up, please, from this nightmare.

we called all the family to come in to the hospital right away. i felt so incredibly numb that i didn't even realize i was shaking and wailing like a lost child. together we were to all go in to say goodbye, to turn the machines off and let her go. together we walked in, so heavy footed and full of disbelief. we were assured she never felt any pain, since that tuesday morning, and she wouldn't as they turned the machines off. there was a silence masked by a grace i could never illustrate in words. she was beginning to be set free.
the three of us took our turns in giving her head and cheek a kiss, telling her in her ear that we loved her, telling her how wonderful of a mom she was to us, how we knew she'd always be here with us now. mary rose, cried apologies...'i'm sorry mommy' she would break out between sobs, 'i'm sorry i didn't treat you better' she would say. jenna could barely stand, and at some point her cries destined her to fall to her knees and almost pass out. dad did not cry at this time, but he whispered to me in my ear when the doctors motioned to him that she was officially gone and i lost all control and fell to my knees as well. i cannot express that feeling, so outside and beside myself that i've not been able to revisit and accept it as truth. i cried "no", i cried "no" again. i held on to the foot of her bed, crying uncontrollably and bowed as she was set free.

i kissed her lips once again, "i love you, mommy"
and walked away from the most beautiful person i'll ever encounter in this lifetime.

Mom

Fri, 14 Mar 2003 01:30:52 GMT

Julia Ann Hobbs Thill
May 17, 1958 - March 13, 2003

I have no ability of thought or words now, this is just for those of you who have sent compassion and love in this battle she has now overcome. She lives forever.

Fri, 07 Mar 2003 15:41:08 GMT

Nothing more could happen, right? Nothing more could send this poor thing into a shameless agony of minutes passing like needles interrupting her skull.
After physical therapy on Wednesday, I returned to work for a rough 45 minutes or so, when I received an IM from my sister to return home. Why for, because she had gone to the doctor today and he had told her she may never regain her strength, she may be in a wheelchair her whole life, and we haven't even sent the cancer away or into any sort of remission. So, my parents have been in much prayer and thought about the situation, and they've decided to stop treatments. She no more wants these drugs alienating her body, she no more wants to feel so weak and horrible and not of herself. As a daughter, I have no choice but to support her. I simply want to see her and my family out of the pain we all endure day-by-day. I simply want them to know how much I appreciate all they do, when I could be seen as the "lucky one" that doesn't live here. I feel guilty about that, but at the same time, I feel like there has to be one of us still grounded for the others to lean on, perhaps I should explain that somehow to them. Someday. It is her body, not ours, it is her decision, not ours. I can't say much more about it at this point in time.
But Wednesday was just beginning. I had a headache all day, meandering on the pain of a migraine. After returning home to have the family discussion on this decision, my migraine worsened...and worsened...and worsened. I was at the point of uncontrollable tears and screams, the pain more piercing and strong than anything I've ever felt before. (I just had to interrupt this post to take a Vicoden, the hint of pain is returning as we speak). Eventually my parents felt enough helplessness to call 911. My dad was worried it was something much more complicated than a migraine, perhaps bleeding in my brain, or a blood clot- which I was thinking as well. The next couple hours were somewhat of a blur, they arrived to take me to the most local hospital after asking questions upon questions of my recent car accident and history of headaches. Upon arriving, my youngest sister in tears riding in the front seat of the ambulance - which I was told was siren and flashing light-bound) and my parents following with other sister, I was placed into a dark room with a lame excuse for a bed for quite some time before I even saw a doctor, pain still enduring strong, no one could give me anything until he saw me first. He insisted on a ct scan first, then perhaps a spinal tap to make sure there wasn't any bleeding or other cause for this pain. After the scan, they did give me a shot of Demerol to my hip. After about fifteen minutes or so I was out of it and placed into a different room with a better bed, with vital sign machines hooked up to me in all places. The test came back clear, but he still insisted on the spinal tap to be positive, since this was, in fact, the worst pain I'd ever felt. That procedure in itself was excruciating, I cringe to think of that needle meandering about my spine...I could feel its every move. I finally made it home with Dad (he had taken the rest of the family back home after we knew it would be a while before I could be released) at around 6am. I was there for 7 hours and I recall about 2 of them. The doctor requested that I see a neurologist within the next two days. I've missed work yesterday and today. I am too see my regular doctor today, then have him recommend a neurologist and give me some pills to last the weekend through.
I also dont have a car, or money, or positive outlook on anything right now.

Wed, 05 Mar 2003 04:07:16 GMT

Sunsets of Absence

If I could show you this sky
This breast of earth, strewn about a virgin’s valley
I wouldn’t interrupt her horizon with pictorial flash

And if I could show you these colors
Those that hum before the flatline of sunset
I wouldn’t place faith in windswept palettes

I lived alone long before I separated these shades
Now, I draw it in like a tenant of moment
Gunsmoke stilled and wrapped in vanilla

I would deny myself this vision
This breath of heaven’s incense before sleep
Rather, I’d send you into its folds of fleshed clouds
Turning love into a valediction

The lonely pair of sight and self, would break into a shattered mirror of days passed
With falling glass tuning itself to nature by the resonance of prayer
And my upward glances would become its ovation
While its undeclared parables, write themselves into my diary

This must be when the earth hesitates to evolve

If I could show you this sky
How it’s something familiar, a dream fallen to forgotten gods
I would hold you above the weight of ancient forests
While divisions of eras beg you close your eyes
Until you felt this field of apparition flowing from vein to memory

Its spine is weaker than yours, drowning itself into the shades of Athena
The shadow-twists between trees are like the structure of your eyes
Accented by the clarity of morality with the last dove hovering above your crown
Your arms are an echo of its flesh-colored sails
Sent out into an acoustic harmony of invisible sea
The stretch of your fingers are a lofty invite to the moon
A beckoning, like star- painted piano notes on the tinroof of time
And the heat of your lips extends into a reminiscence
With the last hint of a crimson sun surrendering to the lovers of night

I would give my last exhale
To tell you how this sky has always been you
Before I knew you existed

Mon, 03 Mar 2003 20:45:25 GMT

Perhaps I know best why it is man alone who laughs;
he alone suffers so deeply that he had to invent laughter.

~F.Nietzsche

i never can hang up the phone first

Tue, 18 Feb 2003 05:57:20 GMT

every night i call and tell her i love her and to say goodnight. she answers with hushed tones i can barely make out. but somewhere within the mumbling of struggled lungs, lingers the first time i remember her saying that she loved me when i was a child; it rings in my ears like piano notes from heaven.
that is where a prayer begins.

Sat, 15 Feb 2003 20:55:08 GMT

I’d like to strip this red down to the beginning, to the first
Snow that fell from the hands of a god still unfamiliar. And when
I arrive, I’ll dance into the eyes of ice that rest under flaming stars.
I’ll skim the circumference of snow made angels; those which
Murmur harmony under sneezes of wind. My hair
Will become the blood of a field, undiscovered by foot
Yet dangling in the dreams of lifehunters and orphaned nature.
I should etch myself into an invisible hibernation, where the only sting
I feel, is the threshold of spring tasting the yawn of flesh. And when
I awake, I will be reborn and challenged to fight any soldier of silence
I’ll argue with songbirds until my voice reaches another octave of existence.
It is then that I will become the photograph echoing eternity through
The rattle of my veins, as my chin turns upward—begging for some promise.

Fri, 14 Feb 2003 20:47:50 GMT

Artistas de la Noche

steady
as if it were numbed
a likeness
of still-watered palettes
   draped
over new moon canvases

pink flesh
scorched by a madman's flame
an embodiment of his outlying palm
like a silk tattoo
born
yet tattered
by leopard manifestations,
    the quid pro quo
of venetian blind ceilings

rhythmic timid sighs
shred naked
sheets
into the hysteria of passion
destined
to be fused in contour
    as limbs
become windswept forests

Thu, 13 Feb 2003 16:27:35 GMT

there always seems to be some siren,
singing us to a shipwreck.
our arms are counterfeit,
signing S.O.S on quicksand.

this island of ours,
reeks of forgotten repose.
even the palm trees bow
when the grease of fingers--
scale the roots of these holes we dig.

we're nothing more than fugitives,
constricted by the venom of loss.
but, we're nothing less than survivors,
ignoring the messages of a lighthouse--
shining on our ancient nights of tribal solitude.

our arms are counterfeit.
we create our own quicksand.

Sun, 09 Feb 2003 17:25:02 GMT

A harmonium is being played somewhere, a woman's laugh rings out, a sword rattles on the stone flags of the pavement, a dog yelps--but all these sounds are nothing more than the falling of the last leaves of the day which has blossomed and died.

-Maxim Gorky

Fri, 31 Jan 2003 03:43:38 GMT

The Cure of Reminiscence

My fingers clasp in some search for a prayer.
One that will play like a flute’s communion with the wind
And again press into your face, a smile.

This pair of angled flesh
Has become wrinkled with frequent visits
To moments of comets icing breathless skies.

The forest would speak to us in forgotten languages.
The limbs would unnerve our bones to awakenings
Beyond the living decay of light.

Nothing could surrender unto itself.
Homage ruled this season, and we laid our hands onto its pages,
Imprinting the present into the past.

We were anchored by the high tides,
Freed from dream by every willowed fossil,
And the sun inscribed our names in the sand.

Saying “I love you” fated itself there,
When I glazed this impression into memory,
And whispered it under the rapture of your laugh.

mo(u)rnings without you

Sun, 26 Jan 2003 15:16:36 GMT

1.i'd prefer to make some sense of time

in the background music of taillights
stories are told of women in red
lips parted in confessionals, and legs
etched in the back of his throat

between street signs, crucifix
life is left, death is right
and oblivion is grounded in the ditch
with bloodveins attached to an echo

2.i'd prefer to make some sense of crime

i used to flip through your fingers
like a centipede on lsd
but your eyes batted me into some outfield
where everything is translucent
and forced forgotten

someone find where it says:
to leave or not to leave, that is the question
whether 'tis nobler to pretend blindness
or become so unattached
that your heart is foreign to your body

3. i'd prefer to make some sense of climb

outside this window falls a decline
unseen yet inevitably hellbound
on what assumption should a crow
be allowed exemptions, for he has wings
and i, merely feet to be stepped upon

and should some formation of sustenance
still the sky long enough to reach a pinnacle
without stormed precipitations of tears and bruise
perhaps i could prove change
is not the now being moved

4. i prefer to make some sense of prime

where, when words are eaten
they're not stolen from the starved
holding genesis in their hands
and carving 'god' in their souls

or the symphony of a star
whose story could find a tangent to my own
its fire my cries, its oxygen my lungs
its ability to survive my fears
its beginning my end

5. i prefer to make some sense of rhyme

the candy of a book's edge
laid horizontal on a sunset with your print
between its sheets, alone
sleeps bound and shackled to my knees
bowed in prayer

i am the psalm of self
where i scratch at these days with assumptions:
someone still listens and sings
endings to my verses of sleepless nights
while i live in a word--undiscovered

Wed, 15 Jan 2003 02:50:43 GMT

The Eve in the Moon

I don’t have to bite mirrors
These medications are falling to blindness
And yet, I still can see the inferno
That burned holes in our days

When flames turn sapphire
I kiss devil voices screaming near
And turn your face into a remedy
I cannot resist

And it’s only between shadows
That minutes become years
As I rest, waiting for some splash
Of sunlight to find this glass eye

Then I find that it’s you, night
Bleeding onto life’s pages
As I justly slip into
The first Monday’s dust

I should arouse my own Eve
Send her delicate hands out before mine
To prick these proclamations foremost
So I may bandage excuses with venom

I could have her sing to you
Drive you into some endless sleep
Where love resides as an earthquake
And flesh passes over eyes like stars

And she could teach me
How to fill vacant spaces
Of ribs and lungs, flecked
With symphonies of an era
Where I can breathe