1. abuzz. i am an incandescent bulb, naked and exposed. moth-like filaments quiver with invisible heat. the meaning of it all lies in the silent, imperceptible in-between. a question mark. slipping in among words and glances, a silent inhale where eyes meet and and your eyes listen deeply and my ears are more than a sea wall, pounded by the waves of everyone else’s needs. 

2. i am here and yet i am gone. my whole body electrified and now residing somewhere else. the air in my lungs is thinner when you’re around. each inhale pauses between an anxiety attack and pure adrenaline. i’ve gone missing in the secret rooms of my mind— a space where my deepest desires reunite. with my first love, music, and then all the other passions rise up to follow, like children waving their hands begging to be picked out of a crowd. all the things i first loved are flayed from my insides and suffocated by salty floodwaters. as the waters fade back into the sea, the house will survive (i hope) but all the rooms of my mind are still occupied and my children are bobbing around in the sea of discontent. 

3. i air out my feelings like last night’s party clothes. waiting for the second hand of time to swallow up the second hand smoke and sweat, to dissipate back into the ethers of everyday. to break the molecular bond that so silently, so stealth-fully caused me to spin out of control. 

4. i miss the things that never were, never could be.

5. i take a shower to cry in secret. i turn the faucet but no tears come. is this moving on? a returning to? coming up for air or just another attempt to drown my feelings for another decade? 

Unmade Bed

My life, my unmade bed.

Comfortable and incomplete.  

With blanket half-hung.

And sheets speechless in white cotton mouth.

Like newsprint waiting to meet the ink,

Storylines keep me captive in the “wanna-be” writer’s head.

My life is waiting for words unwritten,

A lull, a pause in conversation,

And the bed becomes a part of me.

I am wrapped in the embrace of the one I love.

I am tucked safely in between.

I am climbing onto the rectangular pyre of love-making.

I am becoming an object participating in the motion of sleep.

I am taking up residence in the world of dreams.

I am waking up.

I am putting feet beneath this body of mine.

I am beginning again.

Bed unmade, still.

Left like a crime scene,

A still shot, frozen in former motion

Waiting for my return.

Bird Song to Baby on Blanket

Why the obsession with birds?
To fly.
To sing.
To swim and dive.
My baby lays on a black fleece blanket in the backyard.
His panorama is the sky in grandest blue.
The crows, like specks of dust
Enter and leave his point of view.
Sometimes I want to fly up high and escape the fire below.
The turmoil of an earth half-hinged.
The murmur of mankind filled with rage.
Why does a yell take up more space than a smile?
Why are we so silent to those teeming with the same elements?
Why do we feel so helpless and hopeless and all alone?
My baby gazes with innocent unknown at the bliss above
while I hover nearby with guarded eye
and words whispered behind raised tongue.
You will fly.
You will sing.
You will swim and dive.
You will become aviary.
Free.
In spite of this cage below.

She Was the Fig Tree

"A man had a fig tree. It looked dead to him. It seemed dead to her. "Cut it down," he said. "Burn it up," she said. And with that, they found an ax and were about to begin."

******
She was the fig tree.
He was the ax.
Waiting with hands gripped white and arms extended.
Taller than normal, they were never meant to be.
Smaller than the rest, she became winter's past.
Breath crouched under tender bark waiting.
Hidden and moist, held tight for solstice fading.
But he-- with vision short
And she-- with patience thin
let limbs meet the ground.
Metal upon woodland.
Rust and decay.
One they held and one now thrown away.
She was the fig tree.
He was the ax.


  

I Am Water

I.
Cold to hot and then back again.
I am a faucet fickle in temperature and pressure.
The gentle push of the hand and it burns
but to pull it toward the center brings coldness once again.

II.
My face pressed agains the pitcher still.
I am water-- soon to be poured out and consumed.
Bubbles form on the inner surface of glass,
microscopic eggs of imaginary life un-lived.

III.
A burp--a bubble inflates curbside.
Aired up for a moment and then instantly exhaled,
Like the neck of a summertime frog,
singing and breathing and looking for new life before it expires.
The rain silently explodes in synchronized beauty as each drop dives into the next.
As I dive into both you and me before we too expire.

fight or flight? at the end of the day I'm still the bird.

He Chose to Fly

I made a nest with cradled palms extended.
I gently wrapped a bird inside.
I tried to carry him to safety
But he broke me and claimed the sky.

A short-lived flight, he ascended and then sputtering fell,
Kamikaze in acrobatic descent,
the pavement now left him floundering.
I stood at a distance,
paralyzed with bewildered sadness,
Knowing I had tried to save him,
but was now horrified witness to his last flight.
I became the undertaker unbeknownst.
Unable to end the suffering,
lifting him up,
then leaving him to die.
I became the accomplice to his final attempt at life.

Why did he fly?
Did I scare him?
Were my hands foreign and thus fear forced his flight?
I was gentle as I gathered him.
I saw a sort of trust in his little red eyes.
A helplessness that comes from knowing there is no other option than to trust.
He didn't try to fight me but rather fit quite perfectly in my hands.
I had no idea that he would try to escape them.
Why did he fly?
Was it in lifting him up, that I gave a sense of height and courage which compelled him to try?
And as he ascended skyward, did he know it was his last act of inherent aviary glee?
Did he believe for a moment, as he surveyed the parking lot,
that he was going to be okay?
Or did he know this was his last time at height,
measured out in moments and broken wing flaps.

Why did he fly with broken wing?
I should have held him tighter.
I should have kept him close to the ground.
I should have just taken him home and clipped his wings but saved his life.
But instead, he chose to fly.
And I had no choice,
but to let him.
Fly.
One.
Last.
Time.