In Living Color

He stood there
a B&W August day
in a strap tank shirt
his war service done
just a husband with a toddler to raise.

The pictures stopped on Cecelia,
no more patchy dirt
five feet from the street,
no more B&W guy with black curly hair.
I remember a red pedal car,
Ma, was that when we got color?

 

Momentary Bliss

That summer
we were love,
in love,
Te Amo!
Ek’s lief vir jou!

Those mornings
that summer,
we were love,
silent actors
dripping lines unspoken.

That week,
that August,
those pregnant afternoons
when sun swelled the room
when my cheek touched your hair,
when the motes seemed to stop
and love had no more words,
and tomorrow held no fear.

That moment,
when I knew you,
when you came in my mind.

Swallowing

If you listened on the twilight
you could hear the swallows
fall like WW pilots,
a falling, whir
a whining sound
a fuselage hit by enemy fire.

Short bursts,
then the whine of falling bomb,
as they scoured insects from the air.
Short sharp straps
like fireworks falling.

If you looked closely,
just as the plum turned to black,
you could see their shadowed Vs
saving us, one mosquito at a time.

Rain Dance


Today the rain
danced upon my heart
a joy in the prance of its rill of drops.

A celebration of blue,
crystal balerinnas
toe stabbing the walks,
whirling life into the greens,
chatting with the ponds,
each puddle spitting bullets
back into the sky.

Today the rain,
held no threat,
had no mission,
it just fell with April joy,
a flamenco
a Bach staccato
a trill of Gene Kelly notes
stepping out
until the silence smiled.

Today the rain just danced.

 

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.

Four Steps to the Ocean

Four steps into the ocean,
tangled blue with its whispers,
its ligatures,
note to note
its bindings to you,
our ankles to ankles
toes somewhere grasping
steadying the chantey
holding fast
to each pulse of the song.

Four feet into the ocean,
six feet from the insanity
from the scalding sand,
squawk-boxes of virtue
from someone’s morality
another’s way to live.
from swaggering Dicks
and their sabers of war.

Four steps into the ocean
Morocco in the shore-mate expanse,
the same song shared
ankle to ankle
toes out there grasping
for the purchase of life,
holding fast to each pulse of their song.
I feel you standing
four steps in the ocean
kindred skin with me.

Birdman's Lament

We all live to flourish,
to sprout,
to spread, extend our span,
to burst beyond the full of sky.

No one loves us as we do,
nor should.
No one sees us as we are...
these great gossamer blossoms,
rose pregnancies of light,
some song never written.
some thought not yet voiced.

You are a darkness unlit
unrevealed until you've stepped,
spoken up.

We all fly
in the wash of our dreams.
We all seek relevance.

Soar.

 

 

The Return of Love


The return of love
is a shadow unfed,
an open maw of hidden hunger.

The return of love
makes joints run old movies,
seeds the mind to quicken
seeds the heart to rain.

The return of love
alters the light,
storming the canyons, surging,
purging all reason.

The return of love
burns away the artifice,
the veils of sleight,
the harness of necessity.

Petey Sweet-Louie

Light outlined him,
as the sound defined him -
dem scrawny stricken bones
that master of rosewood
Petey sweet-Louie.

He once had three
wooden women on their perches.
Bonita, Thel, and Lucy Rae.
Come that her’cane in 94,
only Lucy Rae endured.

Light outlined him,
as the sound defined him -
when that skinny legged bitch,
the master of his wood
the Mistress of the mister
of Petey sweet-Louie

Lucy Rae could walk his sin.
She kissed his blues
talked sweet to his skin,
they tipped back those fire-Jacks
looking back from old soul eyes.

Light outlined him
as the music defined him -
the master of rosewood
Petey sweet-Louie
up in your affliction,
playing you home.