Open the floodgates and everything welled
bubbles over, dazzling blueberry blue
and cast in the water, feathers he meld
oh Icarus, whatever did you do?
Category: Poems
Mimed Cries of the Calliope
I hang limp on the strings of my own frayed loose ends
doubled over and back again to taunt me
and I watch them cut into the flesh of my throat and my chest
in the reflection of the stilled grey sea that unfolds
before me:
numb and almost serene.
My apathy breeds a mangled hatred that I plunge, ever faithfully,
into my gut like the teeth of a knife, twisting, over and over
and if I pull it out there will be no blood
no color at all
an absence, a lack
just an empty hole.
In another world, I sit backstage in the dressing room of a circus
and the white paint on my face drips down and it’s because
I’m crying at the choking scent of daffodils thrown down at the stage
and the scream of laughter
and thunderclaps of applause
that follow my false acts.
Scent of Wine From High Branches [Loss Poem]
I was born in a body not mine
and at first, I thought,
the real me must have been taken away, somehow
like an Irish child stolen by the fae with a flutter of gossamer wings
and I left in their place —
rude and hateful and wrong;
a poor imitation.
Continue reading Scent of Wine From High Branches [Loss Poem]
Shapes, in Rhyming Couplets
Itchy cloth that wraps to my skin in sweat
leaving red weeping welts behind and yet
it’s the only thing that makes me feel a little more sane
so forget it, peel it off, and don’t mind the pain.
Merry-go-round [Emotion Poem]
Blind trust wrapped in quixotic disguise
bedded in comfort and married to lies
canary yellow, and dripping from better times
from its beak comes the high carnival whine
of a calliope.
Its sound twists the breeze, pulling the clouds
their white threads into yarn-piles unbound
shapes you can’t hold, though you lean and reach
its birdsong now akin to the screech
of a calliope.
Desolation in April
A boy looks out his window on an April afternoon
his room is quiet
there are cake crumbs stuck
in between
the keys
on which his fingers rest.
To Set Fire to Fate [#2]
Pretty doves, with golden-spun
hair and thread— does their
presence not rip through your
heart, in dread?
Singing songs, with clear high
voices and aim— is it Odin’s
fault if on the blood-soaked
field, falls a sveinn?
Through them, with romanced
health and mind— who is to
say love’s war, not a game, a
dance, to their kind?
Lovely Beast of the Seas [#1]
Ripping themselves from salt and sea
to dry, mossy land, where humans be
birthed from dark waters, leaving skin
slick with oil, their dark eyes within
moonlight dances
watching you, idly.
Waves crest and break upon the shore
marriage bands tossed overboard
seven pearly tears riding white mares
kin returning to his mother’s care
once boy, then fish
but see— now gone.
(fin)