poetry – Page 38 – Poétique

Plastique

The stars were out
The sky was pitch navy
An inexcusably audible voice
Came through me to
Make a wish when I realized
Plastic flowers never die

All backed up against the wall
Akimbo in the corner hot lights
Burning at the back of my neck
Sweat but not enough to quit

I made a wish to be like
Plastic flowers last night
I could be my own Brahma
Create myself in the form of an
Inflammable anima
Psyche made of steel
Look pretty all the time
Never withering to feel

Eternal and majestic
Like the fantasy in a fairytale
Where dragons and warlocks
Are just a part of the background
No need to achieve more
Because the summit has been reached
Frozen in color timeless shade
Hanging or basking in the
Inability to fade is remarkable

No reaction to actions friends
Have haplessly made
Nothing is ever personal it’s just
A part of the story that the world
With two moons has accepted
As fate in the triumph of
Letting go of the blood
If commitment like chlorophyll
Runs through the stems and the veins

I made a wish last night

Hiding

So what if we’re hiding beneath the sheets
I lost my zeal, maybe it’s back at the
Restaurant we were rendezvousing
Who knew, I’m still at the altar with you
My forehead on the ground
I don’t ever want to leave

Plowing through giving up to
What’s not for me is not for you
Then we say what we say
Free spirit but I cannot
If the ramp is closed
Stops signs are red
Salivating is dead

What’s up what’s down
Do you have eyes that work?
Talk less breathe more
When it gets slow
Open it

Can you hear our laughter
From across the courtyard?
When the sun goes under at four
Will you find more time to
Say what you mean and come clean
Most people don’t speak what they feel
I get why it’s hard to peel back the
Layers to display it vulnerably

Sometimes we say goodbye
But we have no choice if we said hello

Inevitably there are
A lot of leaves on the tree
Any one could drop

Peach clouds and whipped cream
It takes awhile to melt
But a slow burn feels good

Mechanics

He was more than just a piston
Brain control seeping in trying to
Creep into his mind what’s the reward
To be eighty years old and prove
“I too can be a hard nose!”
(He exclaimed)
Whoopee.

Life is so condensed fitting
Our parts into smaller and smaller
Shapes and sizes to accommodate
Our lives into finite dimensions we
Float away and around
What brings us back on track?

In the order of all belongings
Tallying before we lay
Beneath the red marbled stone
That reminds everyone who we were
Do they drink tea in our absence?

What is it to be nineteen again
Learning the world before we knew
Anything grasping at love like
We were running out of air
And knowing almost nothing
Except for how to get from
Here to there
Oh and…
How to make out with a pear
I remember having no clue about
How to pick one out the Bosc is
A true delight in which one should
Have a romantic affair
Lips curled around
Delicious juices filling his mouth

But that was college and now
The ground is thirsty again for
Knowledge and experience
Getting out….

He was doing the work to remember
A recompense for painting instead of work

Raised in a jerkwater town
Moving away was like holding ground
In a place where culture was hidden
Until he lifted the lid one thousand
Four hundred and ninety-two miles away

And the incense was different
The smell of the future unlimited to his
Slippery imagination

A train car is running only a foot away
What’s under the hood?

Autrement

Unfortunate rainstorm
Forced us inside for the night
Summer stars were holding onto
Us even in cold winter
Tired of pushing the sled uphill
Treading water upstream
Feeding the endless fish
Deep in the ocean throw me
A lifesaver quick overestimating

Man is there something in my eye?
The world is changing and everyone
Seems a little bit crazy
It used to be you got your drugs
On the street but now you just
Go to the doctors office
Whatever you need under
A different name
That makes it legal

Blindsided by friends that seem well
And suddenly you can’t tell
What’s up from down
He was taught to keep his mouth shut
To observe and hold his tongue
To know the difference between
Right and wrong and to
Mind his manners
Take the trash out
Make the bed

These basic steps kept
His shoulders back and
Firmly placed his head
Neck strong no doubt
Hurt feelings in and out but
Man can I say it again,
Is there something in my eye?

The world is changing and everyone
Seems a little bit crazy
I’m looking around to find
The people who are like warriors
From a time before but even
Those folks appear to be
On their way out
Almost saddened that
This is what they’ve left us with

It’s not your fault

Miracles

Can you reassure my mind
That it didn’t mean broken pieces
Of flint and petals in the wind

Miracles sing:
A window opened up
The breath of life cries
Over a hill to travel;
in a moment that will
Quickly be forgotten
Living with him, dying inside

A flute sings up
From downstairs travels
Into his ears and turns
Downward the heads of
Tiny blue flowers in the
Harmless garden
with jumping conclusions

Miracles song:
Many footsteps I have walked
Sun flares danced to
Flicker close to my fingers
Each digit
Hungry to feel powerful
But the energy is drained
Green eyes filled with tears

Chilling echoes
Everywhere reverberating,
Is there a prayer that could
Safely encircle us in protection?
His intelligence was flying away,
Pigeons were scattering
Screaming out loud
More than one day of peace

Then on his knees
Please he pleads
Must I lay prey to
Imprudent circumspection
No father to call to be had
No mother to pet his head

A miracle song
Is hiding under a blanket
Somewhere in the back room
Passing by the mirror in the
Vestibule to look one last time
He writes a fast note
On a piece of yellow paper
“Osmosis is my safety net.”

Diffusing carbon skin
What question could be asked?
All the walls were rattling
Inside crawling with spiders
Words on their backs,
It’s not your fault
You didn’t design life
While creating yours
Connect it to ours…

Meaningful to meaningless
Hand in hand
Instead of the same kind
Two fish swim away
I plant a heart on a rock
No more solving mysteries
Broken candles
Lights no one’s pathway

Giants

Guttural sounds came up from the ground
Bellowing out and roaring around
The rules of the planet are changing
And the stars are sending messages
To the mechanics of the underworld
Rearranging the shapes of the seeds
And the roots and the flowers of things

Giants that shake the earth from inside
The quakes and the rattles all the
Cracks that come out hold a message
Much longer and stronger and purer
Than tiny human ant like minds
That can only concentrate and
Conceptualise how to do surface
Level analysis unlike moving the tides
Of the oceanic atmosphere or shifting
Revolutions of the days on Mars
Neptune or Saturn as the universe
Has the strategy to do the rumbling
Continues to shatter and jangle
A plan for a future the flesh
Cannot wrangle considerations
For what we pretend to control
Makes laughter for the Gods
Like jelly on toast no more
Powerful than raking leaves

Push your pennies around
Make your constable proud
Do the things that you think
Are worth doing if paperwork
And recording your silly decrees
On differently colored notepads with
Stamps and seals ignite your appeals
Go ahead with this

For the atomic energy of a nuclear
Existence that catastrophically outweighs
The bureaucratic persistence beyond
Even the ideas and concepts of our
Minuscule minds can conjure has the capacity
Of that which no creature crawling
On dirt could predict and derelict
Is the actuality of any vital creation
Or essence to be of importance
When nature expresses her gift

Contending

There was a war going on tending
Over a peaceful land full of roses
That was once mostly fruits and vegetables
A small crop of edibles plentiful enough
Shared to produce and feed a few families
Though the garden was peaceful
And the caretakers loving the
Overseers that taxed the property
And issued all of their hear ye hear ye’s
Didn’t really care about what the
Land was for; looked like, whether it was
Beautiful or loved it was stone cold emotion
Most of the villagers living there
Played by their rules and paid
All their taxes and swept all their porches
But everyone was still putting up their
Precautionary dukes for fear that another
Battle would surely ensue left to endure
At any moment on any day the magistrate
Trumpet would blast and blare
Stridently a new proclamation to
Shake the knees of the humble town beware
And then the officials would all
Send their minions out somewhere else
To set tiny fires ablaze on someone else that collectively
Could effectively incinerate the hearts of
All the people who were just trying, crying
To live their lives right peacefully, civilly
And in harmony but there was no
Beautification or manifestation
That would aid the peppery proprietors from
Experiencing emotions of compassion
Attacks were practiced which would disrupt and
Enrage the sanctity of this precious plot
Inevitably on an outside space no one cared about
Before until someone finally did
And it became a war zone a rock to fight for
To be sparring on by tyrants who showed
No appreciation or gratitude for
What the village had become in self contributions
For it was not about the whole of
Humanity but the financial sum
Fuming inside the farmer pledged not to
Take it personal for his own mental reprieve

Chirping

Red blanket wrapped around his
Shoulders in the windy air outside
What is culturally okay there
May not fly here so where are we
When we’re both in a different
Part of the world entirely
Multicolored lights together
Chocolate and coconut on my tongue
Half a universe away the stars
Are blurry observing from behind tears
There is a palace in this heart
That is eager for your visit
No timeline or privilege
Easy to know that you’re coming
Difficult to predict when it will be

I took a bicycle with spokes
Full of intentions pinging
And rode it through the house
The hardwood floors were creaking
There was a God standing in the kitchen
And the cat chased me into the yard
Out the back door in between
Two cherry trees stoically unpicked
Rustling the fruit I was urgently
Splashed with the sweet blood from its pulp
On my face like love spent
From the pit hiding in the edible flesh
Rich with delicious possibilities
The stone beating with zest

In that painting a fire burns the canvas and
Linen ashes float flaming cotton into the sky
Orange embers on almost olive pale skin
Tell the truth of frogs hiding in the grass
All chirping with certainty to the cosmos
As a testament to descry our future and beyond

Chastise Me

Knock knock bang bang
We come clanging at your gate
Said the imperial voices
Every astronomical element
Standing at your corners
Unsure if yet to open the door to see

The more that we dug in
The closer we got to the core
It was like saying it’s not you
He didn’t like you because you are
Gentle avid and kind

Several castigates moved into
An empty room to decide the eerie fate
Of what was once an alarmingly
Charming fellow who had been
Bent over a knee or two and upbraided

Tiny drops of water with mirror like
Reflections told the story he couldn’t see
In his obsidian balled future
What to behold the light and dark
In one glance was to be also
Awake and asleep simultaneously

Though there was no excuse for the walls
Or the invisible prison bars that
Castrated the milky fogged portal in a
Breathing space around him
There was also an answer to why
He could feel it peeling away
At his spirit euphemistically speaking in tongues

If they want what you have
But they don’t understand what it is
No one will be able to confiscate it
However certain devices to stretch
The origin out of you might appear

All the solutions for salutary guidance
Hovered overhead while the eclipse
Of his karmic gifts rattled the sky
Like ancient maracas from a colonial
Africa that held the key to forbearing
A doorway to a path that persisted
Not to continue to create contention
By walking towards the obvious
Fateful intersections of demise
Dressed in colorful garlands attracting
Footsteps towards the imperceptible plank
Instead to scatter mythological roses
On the ground in the opposite direction

So he turned around

Imaginare

In love with the imaginary
Making the most love to anybody
I don’t even know…
I could swelter you with
Hot momentary pulsating
Delicious majestic lust
No harbor for hate
To dock our boats in

Standing in the traffic of a busy sidewalk
I plaster myself against the concrete wall
Behind me stands a bigger building
For stowing people away when they need
Rest and rejuvenation in their condos
Hardly affordable these days
What a lifestyle planted next to the water
People walking around barefoot
With sand on the bottoms of their feet
You could journey from here and achieve
That shoreline destination with ease

All the accents traveling around his head
Korean and Chinese spoken in the same
Breath from breakfast to sock shops
Fiery red hair passes by like an emblem
Something should be signaling his legs
To follow that embered light but he doesn’t know
Them at all and it isn’t his neighbor
But to make acquaintances would be nice

The fallen limbs from two days of rain
Are reminiscent of the unused well of
Love that’s been swallowed whole
Useless arms unclaimed and flailessly
Hanging around wanting to be useful
Like the branch that smacked down against
Raw concrete was to its tree prior

So many new faces and no one to
Be concerned about meeting who he
Hasn’t yet nor seen; no facial recognition
The ground is sloped and the air
Is calm here stands a quiet moment in a big
City this is a treasure like the fantasy
Hunt that keeps dragging his eyes
Into the cars from across the street
Enamourer to the unknown aphrodisia