Seasonings

On the cusp of my winter
you’d arise marigold
in your late spring light
debating my theories on blue in C minor,
I your bold and errant knight.

We’d talk through the dawn
as the back bay lit
with the key lime and wounds of carnations
my silver deep in your hazel eyes
as you parried my naughty flirtations.

Every season turns
leaves and blossom churn
sun dances end.
innocence falls away.

Every reason spurned
is a scar that’s earned.
December takes us all
despite the color in the day.

On the cusp of my winter
you’d arise marigold
in your late spring light
debating my theories on blue in C minor,
I your bold and errant knight.

We would laugh until the pillow was wet,
our grins blinding the stars.
The sea rocked us
as time clocked us
sipping Cuba Libres at the bar.

 

Cancel my Calls

Clouds banked the sun
in venetian slats
letting only pale vanilla into the room,
a soft kiss of heat.

Your skin lay in an ivory quiet,
a silence of anticipation,
poised
still in that pregnancy of morning.

As a storm wall grew,
it’s violet shadow slipping
the crest of the hills,
a furrow knit your brow

I covered you in lemon percale
and your eyes began to dream.

Five Bars

I glisten around you,
I am an old April thrumming,
dried blossoms falling out of your arms.

I hold your heart like old lace
tender times,
its days like old faces
beyond me
tatted to names
to once upon a times.

You are winter coming,
You are days frying,
our garden dying,
lips cold as we’ll falter to stone.

You crackle around me
in the fire of ideas,
embers sparkling,
that garden so fertile,
a five bar signal
dried loins fit to scream.

YOLO

Dip your toe in that sauce,
taste the tamarinds,
the dark spice bite.

Feel the spray off the prow,
taste the brine,
the shit of ten trillion fish.
YOLO.

You only live once,
take the chance,
this dance with me off the Dry Tortugas,
‘neath the breach of humpback whales,
as the world drips its angst…
the breath of dolphins in our sails.

 

My Release

Five decade of syllables,
of thoughts shared and passed about.
Fears and stimulations,
sores, tenderness,
recriminations, doubts,
canvases,
cascades of moments.

A tome of an eye’s exchanges
between the tongue and the heart,
riffs and diatribes,
capsules of confession,
corruption and bribes,
a lifetime of word and paint,
loose… emotions,
speculations, impressions
rumination running…

a lifetime of hues
swirling
in fitful smears,
fountains of pigment
brushed onto the spit of joyous rebellion.

My cacophony of release,
my spike in that fucking dragon’s eye.

Sky Tongues


Little moves in the heart,
in the land
if the brush,
if the pen,
should the chisel run cold.

We are creatures of paint
we are heartbeats in ink,
our words,
our portraits
pivotal dreams
on the ravenous tongues of our skies.

Short Sights

No more redwoods here.
Some corp. wanted
to boost their bottom line.
Some legislator
got a Malibu home.

Frack until you drop.
Some corp. wanted
to boost their oily dime.
Some legislator
got gas for life.

No more tap water here.
Some chemical corp. got a blank check,
Big Coal said sure,
the West Virginia said sure.
“There there little puppets, just drink.”

No more dead babies here.
Just dead ends for kids,
for raped or poverty mothers.
Because everyone has birth control,
and after all it’s always the mother’s fault.

No more planes into buildings,
yet bullets into children are okay.
Some gun corp. wants to sell them.
Some legislator
can be re-elected
on “People kill people, not guns”.

No more death to the atmosphere,
No more cities under siege.
They just pump it and we buy it,
as the glaciers cry
as waves lick our boots.

 

 

 

 

Facing the Sun

You are facing the sun
as it rises behind me
tanned and laughing
as ripe as the season
while the wind stirs the gold on the sea.

My prime is long behind us
I’ve just the twinkle in my eyes
my ‘go for it’ grins
and the devil in my kisses
and loins as we rise.

You are facing the sun
staring it down
while I turn my back - concealing my face
the grizzle, the reminders
that every time wanes,
every sailor drowns.

You are facing the sun
as it slips from my grip.
I have no illusion,
no spell I can cast
no clever magical quip.

My prime is long behind us
I’ve just the twinkle in my eyes
my ‘go for it’ grins
and the devil in my kisses
and loins when I rise.

You are facing the sun
just as mine is setting,
I can sense the quiet
the tears and the letting
on our altar of love.

My prime is long behind us
I’ve just the twinkle in my eyes
my ‘go for it’ grins
and the devil in my kisses
as he taunts me when we rise.

Our days held our wine
in a brilliance of psalms.
Your hands held mine
in our heart of palms.
in the breath of the calendar’s eye.

Songs of the Bone

Was there ever a song
heard in the halls,
on the curb,
from that ass worn stoop
of Cecilia Avenue.

Was love that long gone
from the corridors,
where that olive drab wallpaper curled,
and the shower dripped
with echoes of your off color croons.

Was It was just how that June
kissed your lives,
how you sang those old songs
we all absorbed on twice painted porches,
from blue haired women
rocking on a cracked white wooden swing.

Was there ever a song
heard on in the halls
on curb
from that ass worn stoop
of Cecilia Avenue.

I heard them,
hymns…
You Are My Sunshine,
Oh Susanna,
Five Hundred Miles,
like Bob Seager’s Turning the Page.
songs of the bone
that called us home.