Reckless

Breathless in charcoal grayness,
your eyes closed, do you recognize
my caramelized sugar kiss,or my scent
emanating from seared skin,
flesh that burns for your effusive eyes,
a fever that resonates insidiously?
I am incomparable to most strangers,
can't you see, you absurd, myopic
fool, especially in matters that concern
even a whisper of you, a vision
I have memorized wholly,
the curves of your languid lips,
the traces of agonizing lines grown
from harrowing lessons to ravishing
rewards, the raw vulnerability
you display when you are timorous
of disparaging shadows?

Give me a crystalline sign, anything.
Inch closer to my judicious eyes
or copiously fade away; you choose.
If I vanished, trees forming fences,
canopies of branches banishing
the feverish sun, taking me captive,
would you take heed when I vociferously
proclaim your name? Your muted,
baritone voice, unique and succinct,
could echo for a thousand summers
if you even dared to summon
my scattered ghost, but perilous
doubts haunt my tethered soul.

You, the ultimate aberration I fear;
I embrace your pathetic presence
even in cobalt darkness, I derive
what is tangible by what I perceive,
how I interpret the present,
how it contours my auspicious future,
allowing erstwhile wounds to melt
like a stick of butter in a greasy,
blistering pan. Yet, you recklessly
steamroll over liquid emotions
like a crop-duster spraying fields
of corn full of toxic pesticide,
making them inconceivable to consume
without concern. Indifference
is your Achilles' heel, your merciless flaw, .
your blind-spot, Jupiter's red eye glaring
at your baffled facade.


The time is now to proceed, displace
these languid hurts that cause entrapment,
like a housefly pressed against the wall
by stubborn, sticky fingers by a playground bully.
You can not know me, truly comprehend
what is at stake. Your dismissive eye speaks
volumes, so I slip through satin fingers,
and fly to distant lands. Now, I avoid
your tainted, defiled love, by choosing
to sidestep your unconscious ambush,
and venture toward the milky, misty
future...without you.

Faithful

Feverish heat slyly covets
incandescent skin, as midnight
plague envelops languorous,
brittle bones, and the faithful
disintegrate to merciless mulch.

^ This was a challenge to write a poem in only twenty words!

Carve

The winding road map and rigorous crevices
of our ever-changing facades are lined
like an atlas, carving rickety roads
we must journey, like the topography
of the great Rockies of Wyoming,
how succulent river beds organically
slice a meticulous path, a pure beginning
that leads to a delta of smooth self-acceptance,
much like every wrinkle we earn:
and the tears that flow into emerald gullets
where misty memories are seared and buried,
changing us irrevocably...these are lessons
learned, internalized, coveted.

I encompass the satiny snow caps
atop the Grand Tetons, and I solemnly revere
and simultaneously collate our salty scalps
to those shimmering, glistening mountain tops...
it is congruous, and our parched parities
have not dissipated...worldly wisdom
occurs often in discordant design,
ones which we heartily desire,
just like the clay-red ridges,
the way they sculpt a niche,
a specific path that is consistent.

We are conjoined with maternal nature,
and she with us. It is inevitable,
if you open cynical eyes,
reflect upon this grave planet,
how the enveloping grass
transforms into milky mulch,
a mannered metamorphosis,
to compare how our singular bodies
decay and turn into whole earth.
It is the precise process reversed,
and hallowed death becomes rebirth.


* This was completely out of my comfort zone. I had to really dig to get this to pop, and I am not sure it was successful. but it is what it is at this moment in time.

Letter To A Clown

Dear Mister Duplicity,

Your smile is great, grating,
feigning sincerity, authentic
only in delusional conceit,
proud of your voracious
prowess. Your supreme
convictions appear electric,
vital. On the salty surface
you give the impression
that you salvage dilemmas,
with the stealth of a stallion,
but in reality, you abandon
desiccated river beds, and parched
spirits, depleting all of honorable
humanity. Your perverse perspective
presumes you are daringly adept
in offering contributions
to this dormant world,
even innovative, or inspirational
ones, implying that dowry
ought to be exhibited
at your precious altar,
debated by even remote
cynics. Even untainted shamans
shake their apprehensive
heads collectively.

Bless your brazen heart:
colorless, gratuitous, apathetic.
I record your lethal obsessions,
but there are too many traits
to consider. You are consumed
with your fanatical ego,
you narcissistic clown.
At a whim you arbitrarily
obliterate sacred trust,
devouring withering, weary
worlds in your path without struggle.
Instead you satiate your hedonistic
appetite, taking pleasure
in your repulsive reflection,
while I yearn for peaceful
valleys, cool, gentle nights
and bright, luminous days
where I can soothingly relax
my anxious brain.

So please, do not fret
over my pallid perspective.
I've got your precious number,
and I will keep in cheery contact
the moment Saturn kisses Venus,
or pinkish pigs fly golden kites.
Until that occasion surfaces,
let me just testify for record’s sake,
that my eyes will trickle
titillating tears of misery
in your infamous honor.
Now cry me a river.

With gratitude and a migraine,

The Sardonic Poet

This Time (Rewrite)

This time, you say. This time things
are different, because I have evolved,
you repeat, to my fickle ears
and piercing eyes. Fool me once,
shame on me. Fool me twice?
I won’t go back there this time.

This time, you repeat, I’ve grown.
I’ve read. I’ve prayed. I’ve taken.
I’ve given. I’m living. I’m prepared.
This time, I ponder. Sigh. I get it.

Get it? Is it plausible? For our precedent
was like flying on a boisterous magic carpet.
We had not a soul to cling to ensure
our safety, and it was crucial to trust
that it lands in heather valleys,
or dry river beds. That was last time.

I’ve read. I’ve prayed. I’ve heard.
I’ve taken, I’ve taken. I’ve taken.
Those last utterances are what trigger
the thunderous alarms raging
in the velvety fog of my mind.
It is essential to concentrate
on every syllable testified by valiant
lips before becoming seduced
by your (snake) charming ways.
I won’t go back there this time.

No, this time, I’m the one who ensures
that this pristine knowledge
does not slip under fragmented
floorboards. I recoil like a tabby
just beyond your soul’s access.
I retreat so that I am capable
of pouncing, if imperative,
at the blink of a cow’s eye.

This time. No, this is the last time.
I heed what you have regurgitated,
and scrutinize those translucent eyes
streaming icy pools of water
down glossy cheeks disguised
as insufferable crocodile tears.

Please forgive me, you declare
earnestly, and I truly believe you,
but you cannot accept providence,
and what has been whispered exposes
the entire story, not in the way
that you think, but in what is actual.

This time. This time is the last time.
Not next time, just this time, the last time,
time to end things all together.
I won’t go back there this time.

One

Dissolving into eternal light,
you provide me a beacon,
as tangerine sun meets lemon moon,
radiating warmth, casting a spell,
sharing, beckoning, fully connecting.

We two become one, the Siamese twins,
appreciating each other in the molecular,
sharing cranberry secrets, something intrinsic,
intuitive, unspoken, pulsating,
attesting, conjoined, one.

Stuck Trying (Rewrite)

I didn’t invite you to my kaleidoscope world,
but you entered through the front door,
black-eyed Susans in one hand,
with crystal champagne under your arm.
What was I destined to assume?

Change, you said, is a state of perseverance,
a solid maturity, a judicious investment
in grassy meadows and tomato sunsets.

An investment, you said.

You’ve changed. Yes, I have to agree.
At your finest: kind, warm, endearing.
Then you turn your caramel cheek
and I am suddenly trapped like a fly
against the wall, held down by stubborn
fingers, as you snarl, allude to sour trickery
and crimson lies disguised as ginger truths.
All untrue. I begin to scrutinize amidst
fragmented lines to expose the essence
of just one clear, crimson conclusion. Just one.
Is it foolish to canoe over raging waters
full of angry snakes and stingrays?

No, no, no. Yes.

In the end, I am stuck trying. Stuck. Trying.
I plod through sinking mud, plummeting
slowly. I am hopelessly stuck. Trying.
Trying to emancipate myself, purge
the brain of pretentious excuses
and condescending fantasies
of your life satiated. I may be the character
purely present, or some other tender
trainee could assume my maladroit position.
So I descend into treacherous quicksand
withering faster than a faded daisy
carelessly tossed in a dazzling vase
deplete of nourishing water.