Pomegranate

Maybe not an onion,
layers peeling back layers
of the same;
maybe something webbed,
many-chambered.
My heart is a pomegranate.
Crimp and crenellation over
seeds bursting with secrets,
every wish wrapped in
tissue like skin, skin like
tissue.
Every fold a layer between
me and the world.
Me and myself.
Unwrap me and I unwrap
myself,
spilling secrets like seeds
into my hands.
I'll offer some to you.

~November 2009

Constellation

I turn out the lights
in my old room,
after packing up my things,
and the stars are lit up.
I remember the sky that night,
the grass sparkling at our feet,
the way our minds form
a constellation.
The brightest star has fallen
from the ceiling,
but that is you,
glowing steady at my door.

~November 28 2009

Dream

You write words of me,
of soft, and sliding
deep, like fish in your mind.
I read your words and
silence slips into me,
my eyelids closing like
a smile at you,
reaching you in my mind,
holding your hand in a dream.

~November 28, 2009

Resonance

I miss you in my bones.
Bones which, when you're near,
form a cradle to rock us both.
Bones which when you're near
resonate on a frequency
I've never felt before.
You are some substance,
pouring through me -
joy distilled, perhaps,
the better to fill my body.
Quench my thirst.
I miss that resonance
when we're apart,
that fulfillment...
but if I'm quiet, I find it there;
find that, even from a distance,
you are humming in my bones.

~October 2009

Petals

You held me up like a garden,
offering a place to take root,
and I felt a shift like petals
under the sun.

~October 4, 2009

Pack

Some nights I am a pack animal,
separated from the pack.
Even the crickets will not
keep me company.
The empty sounds of my apartment
make me too alert;
I can’t sleep
if no one is on watch.
My bed, my body, is restless.
My mind wanders,
lonely as a wolf.

September 18, 2009

Thread

I would reach into my ear,
all the way into those tiny
bones and muscles,
and pull it out. A long red
thread of electric sound,
constant aggravation and sleep
deprivation.
I would pull it out,
look at it and shake my head,
throw it away.
If only my fingers were
small enough.

~September 19, 2009

Sunset

This time, I was driving
toward the sunset
and saw it for myself:
a fan of pink into the blue,
watercolor shading like
an Easter egg being born,
then the evening star,
pure in purpose, set in velvet.
I didn’t need your eyes
in order to see it, but...
I thought of being underwater,
and imagined the colors
reflected in your gaze.

~September 13, 2009

Heroine

What does it mean
to lose something you never had?

We place so much faith in fairy tales
they're bred in our brains
from about week two

Show me a girl who
can't place themselves in one,
be it as sorceress or heroine.

A promise no one tells us can't
be kept by our desire
to make it so

Knowing, now, that you were never what you thought
doesn't ease the blow
only makes the farce much fiercer

Because
"what could I have done differently?"
nothing
just nothing
predestined
predetermined
either way, out of my control.

January 2007

Weathered

Today I walked across
a patch of earth like
fresh-baked brownies - soft, dense,
cracked on the surface.
The best kind, warm on my feet.

I walked past the wooden platform
(for a “scenic view”)
past the broken orange construction fence,
to Whalon Lake -
a man-made lake
which the birds and insects
will never know was made by men.
I tried not to step on
too many reeds, budding in the marsh.
I tried not to think about the leeches
that might squirm in the mud on my toes.
I tried not to think about
the problem swamping my mind and
I tried to think that maybe if I let it
flow away from me, like the waves of wind
over the water, I would be okay. Better.

I went to the wooden platform,
intending to sit on its warm weathered
planks, and listen to the birds
that sound like Iowa -
only to find that it was not
wood, but compressed plastic.
Of course. Man-made.
It just looked like wood from
far away
weathered wood.
At least the fence surrounding it
was real. I touched it.

Weathered,
like my soul is,
like I hope my soul to be.
Which is why I write
and walk
and think
and let the mud
dry on my toes.

~Summer of 2006

Laundry

The laundry I saw bleaching in Mexico
floated, an unrecoverable grey
but routine had your grandmother
setting that bucket out on the patio
stirring the limp t-shirts and socks
and the sun almost convinced them
to look white again.

~June 2006

Violent Death of Dessert

drawing up my breath in its descent
more of a crackle than a crack
as it kisses the floor so permanently
a mumble jumble
inextricable scrumble
of sticky pudding and
slidey ice cream
plumped-up raisins and
bone china
china bone
sharp strong teeth of it
scattered spattered
undeniably shattered
against the cement
and my little-girl ‘oh no!’
a slip in my demeanor
because of a mess
a disappointment
a violent death of dessert.

~Fall of 2001

Desert

I’m splitting like a drought desert
cracks up and down my body
bloodied lip like a punch
heat-stung fingertips under band-aids
soles of my feet too dry to walk
and pretty soon
you’ll see bone
through my sand

~Winter of 2001

Strange Fire

this strange fire
burns its way up my arm
jagged crimson flames
tumbling wet sparks
to the floor

~Early spring of 2003

Bones of My Life

a world where words
are bones
bricks
the building blocks
of a dramatic design.
feel too much?
I feel too much.
think too much?
I think too much too.
you never knew
what power
your words could have.
sticks and stones--
never. bones heal.
my words, my words
heal the bones
your words break.
and when written properly
uncover the buried form
of a previously undiscovered
poem.
I am an architect.
I am an archaeologist.
I make words into bones
and with them build my life.

~November of 2002