A Taste of Paradise



- Stephen W. Cote, July, 1995
(Copyright Fantasy Writers, LTD, 1995, The Writer's Gallery, 1995)

Foreword

A Taste Of Paradise is a poetry manuscript modified from a poetry chapbook I wrote under the guidance of Dr. Ricardo Sanchez.
     - Stephen W. Cote

Read as a whole, this manuscript takes you from darkness into the light, and roller coasters you back between the two. As a whole it is a positive statement of love, and in places, creates a knuckle of anxiety which demonstrates the swings in emotion that can only be felt by a person deeply in love. The whole includes visions of predators and the timid victims, the past and future sing back at you. Excellent reading, if you wish to take the time to read it in its entiretY.

For those without the time to download and read the entire collection, we highly recommend that you take a moment when time does permit, and use the sectional reading capability of your WorldWide Web browser to peer down into the emotional well.

- The Editors of the Writer's Gallery

Dedication

In memory of Dr. Ricardo Sanchez I wish I had let you know before you left this world how much you influenced and affected my life. A Taste of Paradise has evolved from that twenty five page chapbook I wrote for your poetry class into something I think is amazing .. simply because it had one of your helping hands in its creation. I don't think any of these poems could exist if you had not breathed that special kind of magic of yours into me. Through this manuscript, and in all of my poems, that spark you passed into me will spread and grow into everyone who reads, and understands in my words, what makes life so very special, and why those of us who feel we need to write, resign ourselves to this arduous undertaking.
  - Stephen W. Cote






A Taste Of Paradise

A collection of poetry by Stephen W. Cote



The Index


Introduction         

My Conscription To Writing
A Taste Of Paradise


The Works 

     Clean and Sober

          part i:        Intro
          part ii:       The Man
          part iii:      The Woman
          part iv:       The Me
          part v:        A Life Of Addiction
     
     Embryo

          Introduction to Embryo
          part i
          part ii
          part iii
          part iv
          part v
          part vi
          part vii
          part viii
          part ix
          part x
          part xi
          part xii
          part xiii
          part xiv: Afterward
     
     The Masquerade:     a lyrical opera of sorts
          
          A Puppet's Strings
          The Photographer Man
          Painted Faces
          Childhood's End - The Fantasy (part i)
          Childhood's End - The Fantasy (part ii)
          Standard Heroes
          The Masquerade
          The Masquerade: Boys and Girls
          Nightlife By The Gaslight
          The Masquerade: In Retrospect
          Late In The Rain: Pornographic Water Dreams (part i)
          Mystical Water Kiss: Pornographic Water Dreams (part ii)
          
     The Mohem

          Introduction
          The Mohem
          South of Mohem
          The Mohem: Letters and Numbers
          The Mohem: Angelic Embrace
          
     A Single White Horse
          For Karl and Jamie

          A Single White Horse
          The Awful Surrender To A Moment's Revelation
          Things That Love On Wings
          I Need But Nature To Humble Me
          The Beast Of Loneliness Raging Raging Raging
               (Or, Finding A Single White Horse)
     
     As I Was Raised Upon The Cross

          part i:        From The Pool
          part ii:       ... and I saw that I was armored
          part iii: ... through her eyes I became free

The Collections

     Holding Grace

          part i
          part ii
          part iii

     The Laces

          Baby Blue(part i)
          The Blue Of Our Lives (part i)
          The Blue Of Our Lives (part ii)
          Baby Blue (part ii)
          Baby Lace
          Barons

     The Sandstone Cemetery

          part i
          part ii
          part iii

     Predators Of The Meadow

          The Sunrise
          Awaken The Lion
          Prey Prayers (part i)
          A Tiger's Lament
               Tiger Eyes (part i)
               A Tiger To Her Mate
               A Tiger To His Mate
               Tiger Eyes (part ii, revised)
               Tiger Chimes
          Warden Of The Wolf
               Warden Of Wolves
               Prey Prayers (part ii, revised)
               Afterwards

     The Leaf Collection

          Leather Leaf
          Pine Needle
          Maple Leaf
          Grass Blade

     Morning Free

          Morning Free (part i, revised)
          Morning Free (part ii)
          Morning Free (part i, original)

     Desert Visions

          First Set
               Desert Visions
               Desert Visions (part ii)
          Second Set
               Desert Visions
                    part i
                    part ii
                    part iii
                    part iv
                    part v

Singles

     Rib Of The Chapel
     Eternal Shadows
     The Bee Keeper
     The Bee Keeper (revised)
     The Seduction Of Words
     Children's Anthem
     Dreaming .. In Technicolor
     Romancing Applesauce
     Porcelain Savior (or Visions In My Toilet Bowl)
     A Personal Note
     Gothic
     Whatever It Is, Pay Attention To It
     Egyptian Reflection
     Terminal Walk
     Why I Don't Like Texas
     Quality Photographs
     Runaways Come Home
     Passionate Visions
     The Rest Of The World
     Independence's Cameo Appearance
     Standing Aside From Yesterday's Hero
     Fiber
     The Moral Fiber (adapted from Fiber)
     Rapture (adapted from Fiber)
     Janet Of A Thousand Storms
     Alone In The Dark
     Christi Hayes Has A Birthday
     Empty Faces
     The Ascension
     The Clinical Mr. Lackamor
     Red Rose Wine
     Over The Rainbow
     Archael
     Home
     For Equal Rights - Believe It, Or Not
     ... yonder rests eternity
     Green
     The Rose In The Snow
     A Cafe Rose
     To Be Female
     Somehow Magical
     The Man Outside
     Naked Angels
     The Nature Of Somethings
     Natural Born (in memory of Debbie Simpson)
     Memory
     Another Memory
     Wild Orchid
     Wild Orchid: In Memory's Time
     Prayer
     Another Prayer
     Queens Of Fashion
     A 2 O'clock Quiet
     Razor Burned Legs
     The Regal Couple
     The Rubber Ducky Of Life
     Feel For Me, Feel For You
     Streetlamp On Wicked Bridge
     Janet's Swing
     Wild Wolves
     a reflection of a woman's age
     The Loser
     Natural Selection
     One Day
     Frady Cat
     Discrimination Is One Hundred Percent Universal
     The Lord Of Discipline
     The Decay Of Sand
     Tall Boy
     Innocent Miss Magic




The Works

                             Clean and Sober

Part I: Intro

Sacred sorority insobriety,
Fraternal organization overdose,
Dorm room drunkards
Apartment narcotic apparel,
Narcotic abusing administration,
-drunk, high stoned
-lethargic, depressed, apathetic
-suicidal...

-the man who dreams of rape
-the woman who has to fear him
-the female who makes a man's heart ache
-the man, insecure and stupidly loyal

And we, those politically free
Away from confinement and council
We are the ones-
        -who are clean and sober.

Part II: The Man

Her lips were wet and cool
And through the glass I saw her picture
Yet the one whom I kiss is here
An attention vampire
She loves me like no other
And in apathetic loneliness
I dared love her back 
I did not have to say a word
Nor did I have to promise her my soul
        -she already possessed it
And when I had suckled from her lips
All of the love she had to offer
I was still alone
I was still depressed
And to everyone else - for they could not see
I walked on water
I was clean and sober

Part III: The Woman

She did not know I was male
For I could spin a yarn
And in this electric ladyland
I was a very convincing electric lady
And I learned the secrets of the woman
        -a man and woman are the same
        -a physical difference
        -But in a place where it did not matter
        -through a lie I saw the truth
        -we are only human individuals
        -neither man nor woman
        -and simply compatible with our like

Ah, she sucked on my life, an electric lesbian
For she did think I was female
-an attention vampire
And she loved a man, and a man, and a man
        -and a woman and on and on

And she knew the warm comfort
Of the lover us addicts know as the blade
For it is our best friend
        -it is always there to love you forever
        -it is there to take away your pain
        -it shall never leave you alone
        -and it will always give you a way
        -to leave this miserable world

I could feel her apathy and depression
For I am an addict also
Through the almond eye of this state of mind
Money, rape, PMS - they are nothing at all
When there is something in your heart
And no one to give it to
-when you are alone
And to the world who is blind to her
She is clean and sober

Part IV: The Me

In the laughing almond eye
Of an addicts alcoholic lie
I can see and touch my world
-my momentarily gelatin dream
For the want of love and life
I have felt the friendship of the knife
-why is the animal howling in me
-why can I not say to her what I mean
And there I walk slowly
As I return to my home
And dream of how things could be
If I were not addicted to being alone

Loneliness is my love life
-all I have to do is try
-and in my mind I can always find my love
-I can always find my hope
-in my mind I am never alone
-and there is always someone for me
-when I come home

In reality, how I wish I could but touch her
-but I am addicted also
And in my mind
I am still clean and sober

Part V: A Life Of Addiction

Is an addict one reliant
Or one who desires that
Which they cannot have?
-does it really matter in the end?

Perhaps someday, I will
Be more realistic
But I will also be addicted
I will still be alone
And to a world in which I don't think I could ever know her
     -to them, the other addicts and all, I am just one more faceless person
Who is clean and sober

                                 Embryo

(introduction to Embryo)                          

Lest mistakes once made haunt us as prophecy                
Humankind must be felled from aristocracy
Of where they once prided their place                       
Over the world under an unholy grace

part i

Winter, viral innocence
Decaying, fashioned hope
Dismaying, the providence
Waylaying, the coasting slope

Strongly, snow-fallen fears
Wrongly, on ancient ruins
Wandering, into uncertain years
Strangely, soldiers dropped truncheons

part ii

Passing soldiers of the Providence Social
Traipsing through the uncultured "garbage", forestalls
Trussing the savagely free beast
Praying to their officer "god" on high, pedestalled

Marigold, fragrant oils of the field beyond
Walled, their glasses raised high, blinded eyes
Wallowed, blank versed, lead through the pond
Marred, mud caked boots and bloodied lies




part iii

Earth weld
Once, a moon, waxed, then lay
Raping the sun of the light she held
Human way

Embryo held
Sins, for all kind of man
Animals, shackled, skinned and shelled
Virtual land

part iv

Told what she would need
- always "god's" toy, the angels held her to their elitist lies
Her hopes abashed, told she would never succeed
The simple reflection of their eyes

She fell to her knees, beginning to tire
- in despair, weeping and hurting, damnation called
Her heart burning with rage, her mind on fire with desire
She could shed no emotion for the soldiers at all

part v

Screaming, she heard her own warning
Preening, the circling vultures spied
Peeling, she fell back, her heart warming
Scathing, she died

part vi

An embracement of reassurance
In seasons of the flower
A bird makes love with a bee
What we dream love to mean
Is only foreshadowing
What love for you shall always be



part vi

Have you heard -    the prayer for words
               and tears falling unjustly

               the cry for the meek
               and the unbeliever's advice to the world

               the pain of desire
               of a damned soul on fire
               - and a world humbled in ruins

               for want of a cause
               and a belief in it all
               - the soldiers burned the runes

Were you told -     it had all gone to hell
               and you would be left behind
               
               it had all been sold
               for face of a soul's reverie

               the rain of the cloud's
               fell all around
               - drenching the dream's embers
          
               the "god", soldiers and clowns
               all jested around
               - with everything you held dear

Why were you told that
You had been promised the world
And if you had suffered you
Would one day be healed

Why did they tell you that
You only had to close your eyes
And ears to the sins that
They had baptized over you

Why did you listen
And hear only the call of them
- that the sound would
Hopefully deafen them all?

part viii

Sweet savory spawn
Evermore, effervescing embryo
Prayer for procreation

part ix

Savory, the sweet nectar
Blossoms, petals sanctified in dew
Bossomed, entwined in vine and root
Glorified, in a life renewed

Coldly, the steel embryo bleeds
Warmly, the birth cries scream
Wrenching, the virginity from machine
Birthing, the cybernetic dream

part x

Once upon a time, a flower
Bloomed through the ruins
Once upon a fantasy, however sweet or sour
All of the nightmares road through
And the pebbles of the stream beds dried
And the sand of the beaches lied to the seas
And the seas prayed for salvation, the cried
Once upon a long lived tale
The world gave up and died

Deafening, the beat of the boot
Of the soldiers of Providence Social
And the "god" wept in fear, his prayers moot
In unison, their single last word crucial

"please ..."
They faded away

Once upon a prayer, in a dark hour
Tolled for the new land
Once upon a day of salvation, and a god's unruly glower
Something rose at the beckon of his hand

"Arise new child"
"Mother and daughter"
"Bring forth new life"
"My Embryo"
part xi

From leftover memories, embryo suckled upon the lactation
Angel's milk sweetened, vine and ivy decorating, the new nation

The decisive spawn arose, from the ashes of the new world
The na-"god" keeping records, every unruly evil and administrative lord

A melancholy wave of bitter air blew, extracting Embryo's hope
A myriad soldiers of Providence Social, antagonizing all foreign remaining hope

part xii

Real minds once real bodies, mere shells now driven with wind
Providence Social's specialty, the na-"god" demanded and extracted his loyalty

Automaton's weeping and grieving, begging for more, evermore
Soulless devils lost and alone, abandoned of their own lore

Embryo observed and listened, ever vigilant as a scarecrow
In their despair and hell, she looked upon them and simply whispered "no"

part xiii

Summer, spring's benevolence
Becoming, beauty's paradise
Stunning, dream's reality
Winter, wasting away

Na-"god", Providence Social
Embryo's, for the saving
Embryo's, for the taking
Embryo's, for the raping



part xiv: afterward

Melancholy, all final cries in Zen
Everywhere, the remains of a human world
Everyone, Embryo's children
Finally, lost for words

The Masque                        rade

A Puppet's Strings

          Warmed neath porcelain dreams
          Through open ears and eyes
          - a babe cried and sighed
          Feeling taut pulls from puppet strings

          Cradled in powdered arms of white
          Perfectly pristine parents hiding
          - ready for an evening of living and lying
          They delivered their child that night

          These designers and architects painted
          Sculpted this fleshy clay
          - layer upon layer, peeling away
          Birthing a facade trussed up in strings

The Photographer Man

          Remember - the photographer man

               He played by ours rules
               And made up his face
               Learning to dance in our mahogany school
               Capturing faces and souls on a negative's lace

          Do not forget - the photographer man

               Like a mirror in my dream
               There is my face as I might wish
               - comically, I laugh at who I am
               Is this me or someone I would miss ?

          In a prayer to be strong, one of my will
          Oh God, may I please forget him - please

Painted Faces

          Ceramic masks
          And painted faces
          Hiding emotions
          Genders and races

          Beneath tears
          And ripening grins
          Covering fears
          And bleeding-heart sins

          Ballroom masquerade
          Courtroom of clowns
          Giggling marmalades
          Mimes of frowns

Childhood's End - The Fantasy (part i)

          Christopher wept that night before the mirror
          - without the honesty of the dream's thrill
          Happily, his mother tucked him unknowingly in
          - the safety of the home up on the hill

          Studying his means for a childhood's end
          - he felt the embrace of a lonely fear at night
          He reached out to touch his friend, a white glass mask
          - it knew the face he would wear at night

          The banded hand he is destined to hold
          - will have its own promises to be told
          Safe in the status of a masquerade cast
          - a soul once warm, now twice sold

          Like the angel ice sculpture
          - "Will I ever return to it," he sighed
          "Never, I never can" he cried
          - "No one showed me how"


Childhood's End - The Fantasy (part ii)

          (Christopher)

          My mother and father awoke me
          - inside their life as it began to start
          And the only memory of the silence
          - the beating of a heart
          Is my only safety at night when on my feet
          - though when my mind is at rest, the path is too steep
          Lucifer, if I am with you, where am I ?
          - my life is far from worth to weep
          And for a sake that I may try
          - I am now before the man of sin, forbidden to be kind
          So many people who know my face
          - know there is nothing of interest behind
          Wet with sleep in comfortless dream
          - dancing together, alone in a quiet cry
          A clap of sound ... a flash of light
          - I am alive with a deaf ear and a blind eye
          I am only human, I can only lie
          - hidden in a mask that deafens years and blinds lives
          Loving caress of a porcelain grace
          - mother chose this particular face
          Sensual tidings in a ballroom ecstasy
          - I can only dream of childhood's end, my fantasy

Standard Heroes

          Somewhere down on the outskirts of town
          A couple dressed in tuxedo and gown
          Smile in a gale of echoing laughter
          Though the child laughed no more

          Their lips buttoned, their masks affixed
          With a fresh hand in their pockets, where fingers mix
          They hold brave faces in a straightjacket love
          With nothing on the water to float their goods above

          The days of innocence lay dwindling
          Before the children have silenced their singing
          All of their idols, everyone knows
          Are one more sect of standard heroes

Feelings

          (Katherine)

          Would you please state
          Something before I leave
          Perhaps if I'd sedate you
          You'd say how you feel

          If I walked with you, my hand in yours
          Would you occasionally smile
          Perhaps if I said I'd care more
          Would tomorrow last longer than a little while

          When the dance is over
          And the night is done
          One leaf gone from the clover
          We're in a game no one has won

          Children laugh in our ears
          And as we may dream by the moonlight
          Under our made up faces we will feel our years
          No longer looking into the sunlight

The Masquerade

          In the silence someone is screaming
          Down in the township tonight
          There is a masquerade ball in these very shadows
          And the masks are shining ever so bright
          Down through the gutters
          Where the lonely arise
          Stanching the rabid night's heat
          There is no escape from the street

          With ghosts lighting their faces
          They will be gone when the light of day comes
          And like a sainted lover
          They are only accidents on the graveled road of life




The Masquerade: Boys and Girls

          Girl in white
          Nice, so cute
          All trussed up
          In your birthday suit
          Locked up tight
          A china doll
          Face made over
          Can't see you at all

          Little boy, don't cry
          You've scraped your knee
          All bloodied over
          All covered in your mask
          All your sighs
          Tucked far away
          From mommie and daddi
          And everyone else you met today

Nightlife By The Gaslight

          Stepping out into the shade
          Into the nightlife by the gaslight
          Each glass grain of the masquerade
          Frightfully revealing an all to lonely quiet

          Teeth and nails, locks and barrels
          Under a reign of lawmen
          All too cute in busybody suits
          The storm it seems has been appeased by them

The Masquerade: In Retrospect

          Only light from above
          Will shine on me
          And make a shadow
          Into a facsimile
          Only light from above
          Can take from me
          This freedom of expression
          Masked in my anonymity
          Masquerade

Late In The Rain: Pornographic Water Dreams part i

          (Christopher)

          Standing out on my porch
          I watched the weather change
          One winter morn long ago
          Listening to the sky begin to age
          I remembered a time one night past
          When I knew that I'd only to try
          I kept the memory of your face close
          Listening to the echo of a long ago lie

          A tear cascaded and cleared
          The white away from my face
          It flowed unhindered and mirrored
          Against the ceramic grace
          Now I find myself standing
          Late and alone in the rain
          The cold bleeding and kissing
          Late, late in the rain

          (Katherine)

          Later on a night I remember
          My face clean and made up white
          My parents safely sleeping away
          Warmly embraced by night
          A rose-colored picture of you
          Decorates my desktop drawer
          Ruffling the feline I cherish so
          I wish I could feel more

          The weather has gone winter
          And the day is past due, done
          The night is finally over
          But the nightmare has only begun
          The morrow, perhaps I will dare
          And stand before the mirror
          As long as no one looks or cares
          Without my mask, I will have nothing to fear


          (Christopher)

          Standing on the corner
          Between two roads of a dream
          Watching the beasts of burden
          Happily bound into the team
          Your heart embossed on my mind
          And though the eye-holes I can see
          The way that you walk without fear
          Masked in your translucent bravery
     
          (Katherine - Upon seeing Christopher from afar)

          My heart skips and frolics
          But how could he ever love me
          A man who cannot bare to look into a mirror
          How can he dare say he could love me
          Tempted by faith and the crucifix way
          Sacrificing want and need for vanity
          Perhaps one day I will open my eyes
          And walk into the sunlight of sanity

Mystical Water Kiss: Pornographic Water Dreams part ii

          (Christopher to Katherine at the Masquerade)

          I would die for -
          For almost anything -
          But never, I would never -
          Die for you.

          I could dream -
          Of loving and -
          Caring for you, living with you -
          But never until death.

          I have but one life
          One life, one I choose to lead
          I have one life
          One life I have to bleed
          I have one wound
          One wound that impairs my heart
          I have one love
          One love ... until

          .... my mask shatters apart
                .... shatters apart
                        .... apart

          (Katherine to Christopher at the Masquerade)

          I would cry for -
          Many wishes that -
          Wishes that may come true -
          But never for you.

          I could cry for -
          Cry for a lifetime -
          Until I died for -
          Died since I forgot how to live.

          I can do anything -
          Anything I set my -
          Set my heart to -
          I could never love you

          I can dream of many things -
          Anything I want -
          That I want to dream to -
          But I could never dream that I love you.
                                     
          (Christopher to Katherine at the Masquerade)

          Listening - to the fall of the rain -
          Glistening - in a way that the angels play -
          Kissing - my mirror, pretending it's you -
          I wish, how I wish it were true

          - a night will come, when I will dearly miss you
          - a time will come, when I will never forget you

          Standing in the rain
          I made a promise, I made a wish
          Watching my white face finally flow away
          When I felt an angel's mystical water kiss.

          and then my mask fell from my face
          - and shattered from the task
          leaving an impression of the grace
          - my face only one more mask

The M                             ohem

Introduction

Close (furrow brow) your (mine ?) eyes (darkness)
                                        Open (delete) your (enter) mind (heart)
                                                        (life)
                                        Step (running) through (into) the
                                        window (gateway)
In (somewhere) a land (the Land) of dreams (broken hopes)
                                        A reality (possibly) beyond (next to)
                                        reality (is it really ?)
                        Where nothing is real
                        And reality ?
                        It is everything here
                        The Mohem

The Mohem

Bountiful bodies collide
-time? is it ours?
Electric ladyland's virtual bride
-under a lover's moonbeam
Caught with a red hand,
A palm raping a mouse
And in the light I saw a land-
Gone when I blinked twice!
Cursing, my temper arose

        "Let it be, keep it down
        "It's only a game, only a game
        "It's only a lifetime"
         Or is it ?



South Of Mohem

Always springtime
And just approaching day or night
Dawn to dusk, dusk to dawn
Never quite finishing
Always the plateau,
And Beth's discouragement from afar
And my dear, shy Timber, such much like I
What did I know ?
I never did leave that plateau,
To meet you.

I read Rhen a word
And she saw it as my sin
I think they would have hurt me
If I had been real

How do you spell love ?

The Mohem: Letters and Numbers

ENTER:
        
        
        Garbage love (sigh)

                                                
ENTER:
        To: i8442449@wsuaix.csc.wsu.edu
        Fr: 

        
        
        Speak to me
        Sing to me
        Make it real for me
        Just don't leave it all to me
        Garbage love (sigh)

          


The Mohem: Angelic Embrace
        (Outside Of Mohem)

For the first time today,
I feel it's really over. (Roger Waters bleeding in the background)

You made such the perfect excuse
Was I really so blind ? (Waters again, sort of)

And who would have ever thought
A means for an end to come so swift.

From the world of mlange sands
Where God decides your fate
By the proximity of your tongue
To his boot band

And seventy years into the Shadowrun zone
Crying in my mind - no one is home
        In my mind
        In the reality
        Of my kind

Settling down neath a tree of dreams
I felt the pain of a crazy, lazy sunbeam
Impulsed to tell every VR song
How do you spell heartache 
        - until it won't be spelled wrong ?

Nothing is so glorious as a heart which bleeds
For a lost, treasured love, part of a miracle need

The special times - they can be a chore
How do you shake a hand 
        - when the torch it holds could have been yours ?

                "The flames will die die die
                 Was this so important, so important to make me cry ?"

                The screen can print TEAR
                But the true saline of our fears
                And the pain in our years
                STOPS! - Still on our side

                "How do I hold a friend tight,
                 When their hand screams and seems to gleam
                 With a killing knife's light ?"

Softly, so softly the leaves fall
Somehow, I can't find comfort in them
        - they do not love me back

Silver wings spreading
Cherished dreams ebbing
Life road winding
Simple sunlight blinding
Angelic soft embrace
Baby astral lace
Into starwind's face
Quiet angelic embrace

                "Angels, take me home tonight
                 I don't want to feel the pain
                 Everytime she turns on the light"

(sniffs softly)

I'm going home .. alone
        - it's still home
In the reality zone.

A Sin                        gle White Horse

A Single White Horse

     Sailing down the destiny river
     M'lady luck held my cards, I shivered
     Well beneath a canvas of stars
     I realize my dreams are just as far

     The river blue turned gold by the bayside
     As I walked the shore of the sandy tide
     Across the Land of amber and acorn
     My heart bleeds for my love forlorn

     Little angelic fairies whispered the way
     As I drowned away my sorrows one lost day
     In the pasture of soul, a single white horse
     Awaits a rider bitter with remorse

     Wild Horses!
     In every single drop of gin
     Wild Horses!
     Deliver me from mortal sin

     On a crossroad between meadow and mountain
     One repulsing the other long forgotten
     A single white horse in the meadow of the damned
     Awaits the arrival of the wicked man

The Awful Surrender Of A Moment's Revelation

     To but watch the natural grace of a heartache
     Is to drink of a liquid as sweet as honey
     For in the taste of the bittersweet victory there is a wake
     Of the distant golden dream that you can only see

Things That Love On Wings

     Fowl cry over ice
     Airborne upon a winter breeze
     Eager eyes searching to chastise
     The holy grace of geese
     Ivory and ash, saintly doves
     Enslaving the hearts of the land bound
     And then are lost in the clouds above
     Leaving us with nothing but an echoing sound

     Eternally embracing a troubled sun
     Well beneath the sky ever so revealing
     A mossy rock feels the pull of motion
     From its hundred year stationary sitting
     The amber and acorn fields unfold
     Into a free and wild Land
     Leaving a bitterness and decay untold
     Of the lonely woman and man
     Through a mountain pass sheltering dawn's light
     The river Destiny feeds the grains
     And in an event of the Lord's unholy might
     The bleeding heart is forgotten, leaving no stain

I Need But Nature To Humble Me

     The flower laughs through leaf and thorn
     -a life to be savored, never disturbed

     Adorning wrists and lapels 
     -nature embraces me with open arms

     From its home the flower is enslaved
     -I can still hear its laughter ring

     It does not take more than a glance
     -all I need for nature to humble me

The Beast Of Loneliness Raging Raging Raging
[Or, Finding A Single White Horse]

     I was able to dodge
     Every single drop of rain
     That dreary cloud ridden day

     But to what avail?
     -I was still cold

     The light - yes, YES! a light?
     Painful, hot and angry
     -and it blinded me

     Free me-
     -a guttural growl-
     From the primal animal of heart and mind
     FREE ME NOW !!

     -and the light
     It is so painful - raging
     I hurt, I rage RAGE !!

     Can the two hear
     Each other crying
     Can the horse bear
     Each of them needing
     As they receive each other
     In the open arms of love
     And then do not care to bother
     To worry of the gray clouds above
     Or the distant thunderstorms
     Or the tidal waves
     Or the plates of land well worn
     For making it summer
     Fashioning an emotion so bold
     For finding me when lost
     In a place never before known
     Finding me the passage most
     Likely to bring me home
     For sharing your dreams
     When I prayed for a sin
     For embracing me, it seems
     When I had no reason to live
     For playing the game
     Of a friendship charade
     Asking questions that maim
     And are answered the same
     For knowing the limits
     Of a bottomless heart
     Finding a way to love it
     So it would never break apart
     For crossing the land
     With worry and remorse
     Finding emotions at hand
     And a single white horse
     And by the everlasting grace of God,
     You know that I thank you
     In my heartfelt prayers I hope you both will hear
     My dear, you know that I love you.


A little hopelessly romantic and very very vague and symbolic, but 
after all...love really isn't something I  think I can ever understand completely.
Can you?




                     As I was Raised Upon The Cross

Part I: From The Pool

From the mercury pool of dream
I rose ashen and solemn,
The nails scabbing my palms,
And for the moment
I contemplated ...

Only for a single moment.

About me - a haze of misted remembrance.
A derelict recital
Of one more cattle truck
Deciding to drive one more mile -
And I awaited for the next ride.

A ghost of a downtrodden smile -
Thousands of hands
From the fallen refugees,
The politically free
Of this astral land.

And I was only a child
In the body of a man.
Each hand beckoned me,
All from a thousand directions - 
Each sleeved in tattered rags -
The nails mending the seams,
Each remembering how they used to be.

And in their open minds
They cried individually
     "Upon the cross, I'll finally be free."

Part II: ... and I saw that I was armored

When I finally opened my eyes,
Though I was only one of the few -
And when I saw that I was armored,
I made up my mind to make them all believe,
That I could make them do,
Whatever I wanted them to.
I could make them all laugh
And if I so chose, make them all die.

Neath the armor,
Clad in this metal skin,
My primal mind raged to be free -
To finally be free,
And I could not hold it in -
So there I stood
Upon a floating mass of land,
And the whole world sailed in splendor,
Yet I was alone, a single island -
And I could fly anywhere I wished
If I could only unlock
The painful memory I had tucked away.

Burning in my heart
The embers smolder the dream apart.

From the metal, the beast raged.
And broke free.
From the beast, the metal contained.
And restrained.
And the beast was captive again.

Part III: ... through her eyes I became free

I took a hand, the nearest to me,
And I felt the empathy flow.
I knew she was curious,
And that she knew I was scared.

I knew that she had sewn love together,
And had suckled upon the breast of hatred.

The bells tolled.

I held the hand and became the beast.
The black timber wolf.

Why a wolf ?
I am not a wolf.
I am a man.
A man.

The beast bit the hand,
And when I returned,
I could only hold the hand
And watch it bleed.

I hungered for the blood.
And so I drank.

I could feel her thoughts as my own,
Though the primal animal in my mind
Knew who it was, and thus,
I could not be controlled.
I controlled.
And I looked out through her eyes,
And through her eyes, I became free.

                             The Collections
                                    
                              Holding Grace



Part I

The decadent mind can fathom
An imaginary sun painting a summer's day
Where each soft, dew-stricken petal's a gem
In a so basically simple and natural way

A smothering anguish passes overhead
In a rolling vapor of white and gray
Yet the silvery water's that strengthen the need
Cleanse the arms holding grace today

Part II

The steeds of the lonely
Cleave the ground under hoof
And the dew-stricken petal is homely
In the darkness beneath the star's movement

My light in the sky is blinding
Wrapped in a blanket of gray mist
And tucked inside a candied-apple dream
It is my embrace of grace that I dearly miss


Part III

Where are you?  The rose thorn I've broken
     - lost in a courtyard field
     - in the sand of a castle moat short

Where are you? The binding device for a heart wounded
     - sailing away on a sea
     - a peaceful mind guided in a shining light

Winds once biting now smiling down
Through a blizzard of snow, and a darkness not shown
Though I felt your need for me for what is true
I knew there was nothing left to hold you

Will I witness a setting sun?  An innocent light slips away
     - through the murky shadows
     - of storm laden clouds on high

Will I wish it true?  My prayers actually listened to - slipping away
     - left alone in darkness
     - nothing to embrace, nothing to miss

In a meadow after my life, sided by mountains
That bear down and hold me to a frown
Under a single sky, remembering the angel of death's face
I cannot wish for paradise, but to once more hold grace

                                The Laces

Baby Blue

From every street corner of the unknown cities
Locked into the eyes of atrocities
That we have committed after our baptisms
Are the baby blue skies of our sins

The Blue Of Our Lives (part i)

Those tears you cried
Each aching in your eyes
Stinging as they cascaded down your cheek
Spell out your silent thoughts
And hidden feelings
The quiet sigh you uttered
As you fell from his arms
Leaving behind the one prayer answered
Shattered upon the ground
As you wept over each blade in pain

The Blue Of Our Lives (part ii)

A slap in the face
     those words
Hurting and burning
     like a healing friend
We open our eyes
     we bleed and we sigh
Rejected by parents and friends
     we live alone until we die

Without a single memory to surpass us
   
Baby Blue (part ii)

Simply answered, they are carnal sins
Ones we project into a free world and begin
To craft a certain exotic disease of simplicity
For in the lack of desire
We left our sins alone as heaven rose higher
And it was all so much further away from you

Baby Lace

Baby astral lace -
Did you know
It was all beyond mother's embrace?
Why did they always say
You would be
The golden child they meant to be me?
Now you are stealing
The hope from their eyes
And everything they treasured of their feelings
You could raise
Friendship from ash
And set our sky ablaze
The rain fell from the snow
And it took the purity
From the sadness you let us all know

Barons

Measured remorse and indignity
Fell as flachettes, leaving behind days
Of a war's insignificant glory
As the fallen's kin knee the ground
     - they pray
Birds, predators of a place
The rest can only hope to dream for
Knots and is tied up in it's vain lace
Now, today locked behind the rich man's door
Fears stowed in cargo holds
Your fingers freeze, itching to release the bomb
Watching humanity, wax works 
Melting into the mold
Now beneath the lace
The lives are gone
And no one sings the song

                         The Sandstone Cemetery

Part I

The rain fell down, against the stones
Shadowing the field of the eternally alone
With a dull and murky shadow

Through the seal in the door, one we've seen before
Echoes of footfalls and trumpeting horns implore
And erode against our minds and souls

Wax molding our fingers, thorns burning our feet weak
Torch scars change expressions from brave to meek
Once well contained spirits now all to prone to leak

Part II

I had withdrawn, alone, to be with my own calamities,
The ghosts of glory days past, looking up at me
Feeling older and mirrored grayer, I knew I had many enemies
Now against the sandstones embossed with their names, I have only memories

If I raise my spirits, I raise my eyes to meet the horizon
I cannot hope to meet those insurrections of your absence in me
After your passing, the darkness is a little bolder, my heart is a little colder
And each day I must face only your memory, I feel that much older

Comforted in broken moments, my children prancing in joy at my feet
For they have not learned the same thing you and I have of defeat
Nor could their pure and innocent minds fathom the fantastic liaisons
We formed as brothers and sisters,  as we all made our prayers to the horizon

Part III

Preached too, the people zone alone
Six feet under the life force zone
Feeding worms and daisies

Yet there is a certain aptitude
That I, the living, cherish
For I lay my flower down
And throw my head back
Feeling the hale of the wind
For in the misery of night
The wind howls in anguish
And I can taste its hunger 
Slowly ebbing into the embers
Of the fire that I live by



                       The Predators Of The Meadow

The Sunrise

          I awoke in a meadow
          Under a mourning sky
          The lions yawning a show
          A wolf howling a cry

          Dew drenched blades whispered at my heels
          As I knelt to watch the cubs stretch
          And in a cloud ridden sky I could feel
          Eagles preening over me in search of something to catch

          I brought a brook's water to my lips
          Feeling the onrush of its cool liquid
          While in the distance the tiger's flicked tongue tips
          Over each other until they rose to hunt, now cleansed

Awaken The Lion

          It was just after dawn
          One beautiful morning I had seen before
          When the lion awoke and eyed the faun
          She knew what the lion preyed for
          She ruled for a time
          Some prey sleeping
          All the rest .. dying
          And the dogs of the sheep packs
          Protected no other still sleeping

          A foul sent mother a call
          When he saw father go down
          He didn't understand the lion, not at all
          He was the prey's next in line to take the crown
          So I ruled that the day may forgive
          Every stone we had been crying upon
          And I decided to take and not give
          Next time I felt the call of the lion

Prey Prayers (part i)

          The bleeding heart of the lion
          It called ...
          And told me it was time to fall
          I was deafened by the roar
          In the canyon ...
          When I was alone with only death's call
          I raised my ears high
          My antlers crying
          Trapped within the predators wall

A Tiger's Lament

     Tiger Eyes (part i)

               In meadows and green mountain tops
               In soft safe holes of rabbit dens
               And rebels, and little moles with no chance to attack
               In tree limbs and within a vast field's crops
               Inside a bird's nest which longs to be cleansed
               With the egg shell, and the runt cub throw back
               I can see my soul in every tiger's eyes

               A monument to the crippled doe, a fallen foe
               To a predator who hungers with age
               A weary pyre of the cast aside bones
               Are tossed aside from behind into times ago
               With a lacy smile, a tiger's wage
               I know that I have entered the show
               And I can see my soul in every tiger's eyes

               And now in the meadows and lands
               Upon mountains and fields made for the cruel
               I took their eyes, I made them blind
               I still must shade my own eyes, I have been so unkind
               And I see the sun, in long forgotten prey
               I hear the prey cries in so many anguished ways
               I realize that is myself in every tiger's eyes

     A Tiger To Her Mate

               Training means
               I know I have to pay
               - and I am still paying

               I'm so scared of the water
               And across the river
               The other other side
               I'm so scared of the water
               And if I could only walk on that water
               Which it seems I must do

               To get to you

               And rip your bloody throat out

     A Tiger To His Mate

               Lick your wound
                    - it will heal
               Will mine ?

               Hunt your prey
                    - they will feed you
               Cannot feed me!

               Let your cubs nip
                    - and suckle your nipple
               It's not mine!

     Tiger Eyes (part ii, revised)

               For a breath's moment
               I witnessed her eyes
               And the tiger within
               Left with a heartful lament
               And a worldfull of shies
               I faced the tiger's cries

               The tiger's roar rang
               Like the wind over water
               A natural beauty
               Lacing the growl she sang
               A child's gulling laughter
               All so close to me

               For that short breath
               The tiger arose
               And I felt her heart beat
               I sat back bereft
               Of what she had to show
               For I feared I was weak

               I blinked my eyes -
               There was no tiger to my shame
               I'm sure never again
               For rare do we see tiger eyes
               In those we choose to blame
               For that which they have not sinned

     Tiger Chimes

               Mates tussle and growl
               In natural love instincts
               - scenting fur and tawny purrrr
               Of each other's tongue drinks
               Germanic echoing tails twine
               - hourglasses eyeing the world
               Well within the rind
               Of the meadow glade

               Bird caws, lion growls, tiger chimes
               Tiger tail friends mingle - tiger chimes






Warden Of The Wolf

     Warden Of Wolves

               Howling it seems
               The pack is in formation
               Hunting they preen
                    - the prey

               Hunting eyes that flash
               Stalking through trees
               The pack armored and brash
                    - in fur

               Through forests of green
               Leaning and swaying trees
               The predators do deem them
                    - the prey

               Lead at the head
               The leader fanged and hot breathed
               The prey falling dead
                    - pack leaders

               Dreaming sweetly in anger
               Under a canvas of stars
               The prey slumbers in danger
                    - for a lifetime
     
     Prey Prayers (part ii, revised)

          Absent of word, the mist rolled, fog concaved over me
          In the silence of regret, they pooled together as a team
          Their burdened mouths filled with prey, their ears perking higher
          The country roads and forest paths burned it seems as their howls lit on fire

          Wisps of branches hung just a little lower, the rain pouring down
          The fur on their manes drenched in the shower, their eyes still hunting around
          A perplexity in their motion devoids the eyes of their stare
          In hungry silence and prayerful need, they stalk me to my layer

          The owl on the tree top lied, it told me where to run
          When I turned my back to it, I found I was again where I had only begun
          A mirthful silence deafened my ears, I felt a prey's need
          My feet could carry me fast enough, but not far from fast to bleed

          Looming in, the darkness of the storm, launched a new fear alive
          My knuckles white, my heart ripping my chest, Lord knows I still have to try
          The damnable leader closes on me, his teeth beckon me in
          I watch in a burning quiet the rain baptizing away my sin

          Hope beating through me like blood through a wound, I heard the hungry growl
          I wished I could live a moment more -- and slaughter that bloody owl
          I could taste its blood and feathers filling my mouth, emotions, my eyes
          In the blistering fall of the storm rain's silence, I knew that I might die

          An angel came down to me, seething like a worm in the rain
          She saw that the pack was hungry and that I might soon be in pain
          So I lied to her, and I pushed her as far as I could go
          I yanked the wings off her bloody back and flew home to a place I know

          In years of healing and watching my own pack grow
          The brilliance of a manipulation allowed me a place to show
          That I was weighted down with a guilt to win, and I knew I had one more sin
          For if I ever felt the need, I'd rape the angel of her wings again

Afterwards

               Warning lights flashing with natural grace, it seems
               Easy as a springtime breeze
               Sickly sweet gray in their eyes
               God know it is a hunger to appease

               They hunt and bring down innocent prey
               Their family is all they care for
               When the winter comes and there is no light of day
               They will bring down just one more







The Leaf C                      ollection

Leather Leaf

Leather leaves
Of blooming trees
- spruce and vibrant
Suckle of me
Like tangerines
Sour and unbecoming

Leather Leaves
Of a spring breeze
- without barbed thorn
Lifted by life
And a natural knife
Gentle and free

Pine Needle

Distant scents
Tumbling through trees
- prismatic green
Through branch vents
Falling slow and free

Snow green needles
Brush my face
- naked natural embrace
Making steeples
In the undergrowth

Maple Leaf

Spider's silk
Tree's silver milk
- veining and webbing
Falls like stars
From sky to ground
Over honeyed weeds

Maple lace
A nectar's grace
- marbled marmalade
Adheres to leaves
And finger figurines
Honeysuckle condiment

Grass Blade

Grass blades
And golden days
- both long forgotten
Cushion feet
And a natural retreat
A home burned down

Grass blades
And ancient ways
- weeded and tilled
Bed us down
And embrace us around
The only home we have

Morning Fr                         ee

Morning Free

Let them believe
Everything they want to be
Let them spread their wings
Answer your wish softly
     - morning free

Let them count each second
Dangerous moments mark the rising tide
Let them ride the wave
Share the fantasy, one hell of a ride

Let their hearts touch each others' mind
As the shackles close over their regret
Watch where they drop the key
And take it all back
     - when you want to forget

Sowing their wild seeds
They appease the bloody, aching wound
Were was she when he had a need
Into the shining dream he let his hopes balloon

Come away from the imprisoning terrain
Embrace everything - morning free
He will help nail her cross
And watch their lives flow away
     - morning free

Morning Free (part ii)

I crept over rocks, into the sea
Leaving behind solitude and the hopeful part of me
Sinister eyes probed me, forever hungry
My silence rebelled for my life
     - morning free


Morning Free (part i, original)

Moods inspired by inner beauty
     Reassuring from our tranquility
          Radiate from us

Feelings encouraged and nurtured
     Ushering in our oneness
          Embrace us
          Morning Free








Deser                           t Visions

First Set

Desert Visions

The most beautiful place
          - painted out of nothing
     shaped out of sandy mountains

Our war wagons rumble humble tunes
          - five tons and ten no ones
     all alone and forgotten in the war zone

Hot, hot, moments of time
          - melting me away - drink water
     the sulfur and quake of the ground are everything

Life living in the lifeless land
          - and leave it to "Arch" to kill it
     a parade of fools, we held a funeral, burying it

All there is, all that can be in this unlikely paradise
          - I dreamed as my mind left
     yet I awoke, because I had to hold the IV

Days that lasted forever, eyes blurry and face mud caked
          - my blouse white with salt
     one hundred degrees and midnight and I was cold!

The most beautiful place
          - sunburned, my friends airlifted away
     I only wish it had not robbed me of my dreams

Desert Visions (part ii)

All I remember of that night
Is the forever loneliness
Of being tired
And the only one there left
From my section
The heat had killed us
And as I stood
My arm hurting, holding the IV
I could only remember
How they writhed and puked
And at how natural war had become
As the chopper flew my friends away

Second Set

Desert Visions

part i

A vision in my mind
Through sun-blinded eyes
Water is never enough
To quench the thirst
And desire for green

Stars that never end
Mock the night sky
And I embrace them
In my mind
And think of what I have left behind

part ii

Complications have been reduced
Until they are simple survival
Through gangly laughter
And unknown generosity
We dismiss fears
Leaving behind our shadows
For only the light is seen
And anything else
Is to heavy to carry




part iii

On a distant shore
Many miles from water
A thorn reveals
Its gay laughter

It scrambles through sun-scorched sand
Thriving green
Reduced to a willow
A memory no longer seen

part iv

Long grains of sunlight stream and weave
From the wide, impossibly pale sky above
I find myself thirsty for more
Than the sour, thriving kiss of the canteen
I am lost in a desert vision

Without warning, the sun shimmers
Languidly casting scarlet and gold bands
The incognito stars now unfold
And incubate us in their aged light

The days goes without saying, it's hot
Sapping our ambitions, thus we lay in lethargy
The same thistle once a sore sight of beauty
Now barbs itself in my flesh
And my dreams are reduced into desert visions

part v

Far away
In another world
Another day
Passes away

Desert visions
No longer haunt my dreams
I wonder at times
What I really did leave behind

                               The Singles

Rib Of The Chapel

From the first celestial vision
Through the corridors and causeways of time
Beyond the common corner crucifixion
Of someone drowning their dreams in wine
The very staples of our prayers are fulfilled
Everytime the hunger of need is quelled
In the broken down church where our golden dreams are beautiful
Behind these panelled walls aches the rib of the chapel

Hands linked and mend into a circle
Old foes relinquish hate to the wind
Everyone vows to work until
Their kind can compose a worthy message to send
Life-blood pulses within the walls
In a place where the inanimate bares knowledge of the apple
And now when the prayers are not answered with a saintly call
They break down and crack the rib of the chapel

Eternal Shadows

Eternity
- the prayers unanswered
Indemnity
- the sin unforgiven

And I pray
- each night, under the moon
And I say
- God, will you answer me soon

Heaven
- the prayer is answered
And then Hell
- the reality that no one listened

The Bee Keeper

The rocking chair at dusk
- in a field of flaxen fulfillments
Where the honeybee befriends -
An orange and yellow cloud
- wanes with the light of the sun
And then I reach cognition
And realize I am - human

The Bee Keeper (revised)

A world can be most beautiful
Where no spectrum dares limit the colors of the sky
- the air so sweet with pollen and a life so bountiful
Caressing an autumn auburn field of an acorn's amber cry

The rocking chair meadow just outside of everything right
As the wicker filters falling sun and crescent moon
- the meadow dusk a golden sunset between day and night
I felt myself at liberty to stand outside and watch from memory's room

Bouncing, buoyant and babyish, the honeybee flies to and fro
Carrying the sweet nectar of this land
- and I, the beekeeper, watching the honeybee of the rocking chair meadow
Realize in reality and memory, I am still only human

The Seduction Of Words

Seduce me my Queen
Seductress, my wine
Embrace me in the arms
Of the words on a love letter's lines

Children's Anthem

Sign post on the causeway
Another bird's song is gone
Seashell on a sandy beach day
Loved in a six ring plastic line
I toast god with a chalice of gold
Drunken in the street, my mind broken and sold

My children will dream in this anthem sweet
Embraced and fixed to die in this time so discreet
And little can I do to mold them a paradise
Blinded on the highway by the oncoming headlights

Gray clouds in the canvas of black
Of the painted stars above
Seeping life through a sidewalk crack
Snubbed under foot - the sin of it
The crucifix I prayed by once, now is obscured
By a gun insures my life, swinging on my shoulder

Lost hopes on a river boat
A one way ticket on the Styx
My generation lost for want of a cause
One new, one we could accept
The stars are lost in a hollow black
I exchanged my cross for a gun

     - and now I can never get it back

Dreaming .. In Technicolor

There is a part of the mind
Touched by God's grace
- painted in colors of a heavenly kind
That I call simply -
               - the rainbow place

Knowing no race, color or creed
The rainbow place is a home
To those of a mortal need
- alone in the material zone

And standing all alone
I can sense someone else knows
For his absence of color is shone
- his creed shatters peace like a morning crow

And I do not know
Which grieves me most
- that my rainbow place is -
               - a transparent light show
Or that Lucifer tried to hide in its shadow

Romancing Applesauce

I married an apple from the tree
With my insightful words of humanity
Lo, the serpent encircling my mind
Venom in my heart and foreshadow on my mind

Expediently, I clothed my nakedness
In a warm cloak of temptations bliss
Away I fled from paradise's embrace
The serpent and my spine still interlaced

Miles down the trailed of the damned
So gentle and kind was a man
Who spoke unto me words soft and sweet
I knelt before him, the apple at his feet

"Stranger," quote I to his grace
Though he broke my quote with a gnarled face
"Death, decay, corruption," he softly versed
And I stood and left him speaking things worse

The serpent tightened around my spine
And with the apple outstretched I raced for time
Down a path so black and dreary
And a woman I met, her smile surely was weary

Courtly, I bowed with majesty
And placed the apple at her feet so quaintly
She crept a smile across her face
Optimistic vengeance giving her words a bitter taste

"Happy love-joys and nosegays
And thank the Lord for each sunny day."
And yes the sun did shine, and
Her words seemed lost in this forested land

By the grace of God she saw the apple
And how it gleamed in a color so supple
Alas she only let it go to waste
As she thought of how delicious a smashed apple would taste

And of all those people, one happy one glad
The other lonely and mad
I thought of them as I fled to the garden in loss
With a new idea of humanity
     - and a pulpy applesauce

Porcelain Savior
     (or Visions In My Toilet Bowl)

I remember beauty
     - and the gun in her eyes
     - and the hate in her hands

Bravely I spoke to her
     - words of friendship and desire
     - through the waves in my toilet bowl

With smurfy intentions
     - a rainbow bright chastity
     - my little pony, lovely, cellophane dream of mine

Without a sound I pray
     - speaking through my toilet bowl
     - another vision in my toilet bowl

Despair, despair, hating apathy and despair
     - I felt so clumsy as a whale looks on water
     - her tongue lipped shinning lips, all in my toilet bowl

A cartoon, surreal perfection
     - a modernist's neo-cubist vision
     - a drunken pleasure in my dreams

I drank of my dreams
     - intoxicated by desire
     - hungover when reality hit me

Am I too scared
     - is she just another blind bitch
     - or is my porcelain savior just deaf to my prayers?

A Personal Note

You can say something
Ten thousand bloody times
And it will still mean the same thing
You just know they won't understand it
Until they receive it with open arms

Perhaps on that note
We wouldn't have all this pain
If we weren't
A Siskel and f***ing Ebert
Who cares if you don't like it
You do it better
At least I tried

Gothic

Once bitten ...
Every woman, every man
Every face on the street,
Each blessed chalice
And fallen cross at my feet
Are like song birds to my eyes

Lo, Gargoyle please
Protect wounded hearts
Pride our lives with safe passage

Clinging to a nightwall
Under a stained window, love of a rose
The suckling upon my loved ones and all
Has left me without a parceled care
Sweet nicotine and alcohol can't appease this thirst

Decaying after a thousand years
Lo, the gargoyle stands - watching
Locking my heart up tight

Deafening, the scream of the eagle
Her head a plume of white in the sky
Let me live, just one more night, just one
A black cat crossed me on my side of the border
My flying buttress is my saving grace

Lo, Gargoyle of my dreams
Gargoyles, please
I've been bitten
Put this soul at ease

Whatever It Is, Pay Attention To It

I shed no tear for the parting
     - somehow, it was not appropriate
I never assumed she would lose
     - the tiger I saw in her eyes
Perhaps it was only a reflection
     - of the beast in myself

Egyptian Reflection

Golden eagle land
Voices of the sand

The Cyprus lady's hand
Is lame to the band

Dusty echoes whistle 
Through sage and thistle

Though the sphinx lies
The air breathes and tries

Terminal Walk

A succession of a pool
Milling mindlessly, silently
And helplessly

I listen - soundlessly
Deafened by the echo

I saw the fat lady dance,
And yet, she cannot sing,
In the silence,

Only milling and searching
For the gate
And the next ride.

Why I Don't Like Texas

Deep in the city
A jungle of steel,
Where vines of angled concrete
And ant farms of feet
Are all wandering -
And I wander, and wonder
About the Alamo - and the glory
For inside it holds history
Imprisoned by Texas' principality
Of the Queens
Of fashion
And industry
That they exploit the dead
To be the biggest something or other.

Quality Photographs

Quality photographs
Like memories left behind
Each moment saved
- a wish to go back
And live it again

Quality photographs
Of red hair and
Sweet dreams alive
- sweetness of lips and soul
I slipped a rung and fell

I kept a quality photograph
Though no longer
Does it seem worthwhile
- for it is only a memory
In the sadness of absence

Once I felt lifeless
And with apathy
Then depressed without sensation
- now only a quality photograph
That I may look upon

To take away the story
So that I can no longer
Sing the song
- I am without humanity
And without memory, I am without love

I wish I could go back
And kiss you for the first time, again
But I can't go back, I know
- I wish I could prove I love you
But I can't say that, I know

Quality photographs
And incandescent feelings
Mythologically wonderful memories
- of how we used to be
And how I wish we could be again

Runaways Come Home

The night is cold
The weather wet
And with nowhere to run
While you start feeling old
You wish for a home
Anywhere you can be loved
And never be left alone

The shepherds wept
And the sheep bled
You had no one to talk to
Hunger gnawed and the scraps you kept
Just weren't enough
To carry you over that night
To bring you home

Runaway, go home.

Passionate Vision

The vision transcended
All of time and space
Cosmic in its array
And theatric in its grace

"Caution," warned the wise man
Whose rouge lips were stained
And whose ears listened only to the sound
Of the words of love he never spoke
Unto the one that really mattered to him

The time lock to the vault broke
And the wisps of mist settled
Revealing the final treasure for all of us
A trophy of gold - for the fools

"Aching," cried the wise man
Whose temples flared in pain
And whose chest glistened with water
Of the fluid of red life he bled
Unto the floor of the history of love he once made

The lesser gods blessed
The child with the vision
Of electronic friends
Absent of memory and feeling

The Rest Of The World

Invalid steps on the stone
When she is walking home

Calliope - her dreams
Her breath a misty sheen

Invalid steps on the stone

I recorded a vision that never sold
No one read it, even when I died alone and old
Fantasy fairies and warrens of animal machines
Estranging human nature, but no one knows what I mean

Once, one single time, my prayers were answered
And the invalid read the word and understood
Am I to simple to be worth a song
Or to complex for the rest of the world to sing along

Invalid stepped on the stone
As she walked on her way home

With nothing to excuse
But a mere memory and a single moment in her life

Independence's Cameo Appearance

On a dry and graveled road
She is burdened with bags
- of seeds to be sown
Calling, crying for a drink
Of water from the sky

Only from the heavens
Will the water sweetly kiss her
Like her lover laying in her dreams
Only in the form of this rain
Will it not casually dismiss her
Like the man who lied to her heart

Independence declared
Throwing away everyday friends
Preserving her glory hour
Of just her braving the rain

In an amber acorn field
Running away to the lovely embrace
Everytime there could be something to feel
Crying out for the rain
For the soothing, cool rain

When the thorn pricks like the sword
And her shield is only a thimble high
She has no rose tint to fantasize her heart unarmored
Her heart is amored
Thirsting still for the cool rain

Standing Aside From Yesterday's Hero
     (A contemplation of Ken and his guitar)

Mellow bridges
Melting madly
Flowing under fingertips
Sound resounding
Words rebounding
Echoing from our lips

Mellow bridges
Falling red
Kissing sounds of wind

Fiber

It encroaches us
It surrounds us
We feed from it, or
It feeds of us

We aspire from around us
Or we aspire from within

An effervescing life form, we begin
Stapled by our creative friends
Until we are inspired from within

The Moral Fiber (adapted from Fiber)

I alone lie
All of you embracing me 
From inside
My hands weeping angel's milk 
Because their hands are screaming
Crucified cries



Rapture (adapted from Fiber)

We, a one based 
Creature enraptured
And defecated upon our
Own self identity
Reach out, reach out
And touch the sky - far from
This apparition, we cling to our
Belief
And no longer see
What we truly are
Inside

Janet Of A Thousand Storms

Janet of a thousand storms
Embrace me in your windy arms
Don't forget for me your night's love
Just shine for me from your star above

Janet of a thousand dreams
There's only one I'll be keeping
My heart bleeds in me, a love bitten man
Let me sing a song no other can

Janet of a thousand miracles
An angel that's seen foresaw an oracle
A shadow of love that always lingers
Yielding to the time that slips through our fingers

Alone In The Dark

Fingertips tapping softly, overworking active thoughts
And formulating words and worlds for others to enjoy.
Thick digits, massed and prodding through pudgy hands,
Coldly key consonant and vowel into an electronic order

Dark amber, a honeycomb of stingers and sweets
Mirrors her swollen face, her mind clouded in anoretic dream
Her chair sagging, dilapidated as she rises,
Silently creeks and squeaks with the whistle of her wheezing.

The amber screen sighs a soft blessing as she turns away,
Rewriting the story, taking away the sweetness that disgusts her so.
Drear blades of thankless light radiate from the night lamp,
Pouring and wasting over the book she reads.

Never once would that light touch her face,
Under the force of her weight, the bed creaked and groaned,
Dying          -    springs popping .....
          .....
               ..... light fading.

At first in terror, then tears of melancholy and grief,
She clutched skeletal fingers to her chalky face,
Nothing more than a reed overwhelmed by her plush robe.
Somewhere in her the truth was left back with her primal obesity.

Christi Hayes Has A Birthday 

Dazing dandelions
Spreading fertile and far
Ingratiate the land
In a blanket of misty white
And in memory.
Memories mesmerizing
Dear and true
Of amber days and Acorn hues
Infatuate our sight
With impossibilities come true.
Yonder yearns the willow
Weeping of nature's ecstasy
With the day done, sun going down
And friends rest to your dreams
May you cherish the littlest graces.
Happy Birthday

Empty Faces

An empty face peers
Back at mine from the
Shallow abyss of a mirror

A face encumbered
By lines of time and unease
Counts through days numbered

A dawn mist grows
Over an endless river
Into the ocean's flow

An imaginary face is painted
Next to the empty one
Another empty face that has waited

Both faces wait forever
Although the chance is never
That they will be real together

The Ascension

The ignorant gazed to stars, awash with hope and religious fervor.
To the seas were cast sacrifice, yonder the mountains, so chaste in purple
Beckoned and climbed, high, high into a royal blue sky
There came lands and wars
Industry and factories
Pain and suffering
Space travel
And computers
We were left
With
Simple
Intelligence

The Clinical Mr. Lackamor

Said the lonely man one misty night
Through an amber filtered world of wine
"That lingerie clad lady is of such succulent sight
That any decent man would curdle his blood and chill his spine
And any detestable cuss would lose his drunken might
For she is a challenge - she'll fall for no man's line."

Now the clinical Mr. Lackamor recognized the dare
With all due logic of a loverless man
"The very best stud cannot be with every suitable mare."
Over the brim of a stein of ale, he then began to stand
Feeling the dry warm weight of alcohol and a rather benign stare
For there sat a woman of all proportions that there was silence from every man

"You agree then that she is a sight to behold, Mr. Lackamor?"
"Nonsense," he replied, "There is more to a woman than just the size
Of a ripe brassiere and feminine curves they now sell in the store.
For in every woman's heart is a special truth masked by a man's lies,
And the only perfect woman can exist in a man's eyes, what's more
We men cannot hear the passion in their hearts over our desire to hear their night cries."

"Now that is a very clinical love you have."
But the tavern closed and the conversation died,
At least for one more night, and these topics of love could make you laugh
If this lady hadn't been the last to leave and without a ride
Through the dark foggy streets employed with a criminal staff
And Mr. Lackamor was all that was left to take this lady's side.

"You are very kind," she mused as she stepped inside his carriage
"Whether a woman is dressed in a straight jacket or chains
A man will always see her in lingerie, perhaps that is why I never entertained marriage."
"Not every man is a fiend, " said Mr. Lackamor, which was rather strange
Because he felt that every man's mind had a devil that saw all women in a perpetual lingerie age
And believed every woman saw this devil in all men of every color spectrum and race range.

"Take the next left," she guided, "what is it you do?
There was no reply, and so she asked, "Do you have a name?"  - "Mr. Lackamor."
"Then the stories I've heard of the clinical Mr. Lackamor are true?"
She smiled, he gloomed, "stories?" he replied, but listened for more.
"Of a man as quiet and gentle as spring, but with a price in lieu
That though something of a metaphysical romantic, he was a single man to the core."

The clinical Mr. Lackamor stopped on a lonely street
The lady said, "we are here," and stepped to the roadside.
"You never told me your name, miss?" Mr. Lackamor never missed a beat.
"Miss Maples, Mr. Lackamor," then she was gone like a setting sun or a shrinking tide.
Years passed and stories were told, "Aye, she turn out to have hot lips and cold feet?"
"No," he would say, and though with a heartful of words, left that as his only reply.

"The loverless man and the porcelain lady are famous tales here."
"Robert, you and your brother, Salty Bob, are rumor mongers."
And Mr. Lackamor rose, gathering his things, finishing the last of his beer.
"Mr. Lackamor, why do I feel I won't be seeing you here any longer?"
With a sigh, he turned, "There is no loverless man or lingerie lady, years ago I wed her."
And though there are open lies and secret truths, Mr. Lackamor's clinical heart only made his
     love stronger.


Red Rose Wine

Huddling hands
Around the cup
Of wept and
Bled away tears

Nail upon nail
Hammered away
Flogged the zeal
From our years

In the pool
Of red rose wine
Spilt over 
The mosaic tile -

The crazy brave
Faces of the fortuned
Winced against
The light of day

The altar man
Prayed away
All of the sins
Manufactured today

Over The Rainbow

Life can be empty
And we can remember
Every tale once told

Teach me to be
Just another sinner
Save me before I grow old

Striding with every lie
Lying through every word
We're only humans, encased in stone

I want to be
Just another heartbeat
I want to feel the wound

If I could heal
Everyone else's pain
Perhaps they might let me live soon

Archael

Sun breaks sky
Light droplets plummet
Willowing green plants feed
Quenching thirst in my eyes

Distant bird's song
A summer breeze carries
Humble echoes into valleys
Where human voices hum strong

Upon dew-ridden knolls
People cluster and gather
A tower graces the horizon
In splendor, Feie flows without lull

Sight kneading dreams
Sound weaves into song
Wanting time to live forever
Feie flows through the tightest of seams

Erase angry thoughts
All gather in band
Silence falls, watching the tower
Memories long but not forgotten




Home

In a sickly shape
A branch sways overhead
As the needles fall upon my cape
I toast my mug of lead

A harmony of sound

From where my dream has run to
Damn, get back into town
Leave me here, with or without you

Settle down on the road again
Leave me under this tree
How can you stop what could never begin
A symphony of green, a flower, a bee

This is my everyday excuse for my dreams
To keep it alive when I know not what it is
Rivers run in beauty, as does this stream
They all live with laws, without cause

A hook overhead leaves me distant
A passing thought becomes my new dream
The chirp of a bird, loud, everlasting, persistent
All here is never as it seems

Gently, my friend, with your promises
Life runs with, on or over us
Dreams we live until the end and then dismiss
Brown bark overcome with moss

Thoughts to erratic to dream of my own dream
Action to reaction and all is lost before it is known
The rain falls silently and the house is clean
And it has room for me in its undergrowth





For Equal Rights -- Believe It, Or Not

The city is trapped in a blistering cold
Where roads spire to unpleasant ends
Brinn hikes her skirt and becomes ever so bold
Walking the miles of oppressive men

  ... yonder rests eternity

Pestilence, famine and disease
Breeding insane new life, alas
For life's glory, rest in peace
When all is gone, we are left with blades of grass
Yonder rests eternity, the glory knight
For under the fire's sun, the new garden grows
Fueled by the hate and corruption of night
The knowledge lost is the survival that grass knows

Green

Nature's last colour is green
Over the red and blue now unseen
Beneath a sun so serene
Comes the everlasting cold, nothing seen but green

Earthen land soldered deep
Waves of seas crash and seep
Feeding seeds to be reaped
Green subsides beyond oceans deep

Above the sky twinkles the stars
As I throw my gaze upon them afar
Burning and shining in seminar
Nothing lives forever, only green outlives the stars

The Rose In The Snow

The icy morn brings death
To a life as lovely as thee
In each drawing of breath
Nothing but white do I see
                                    
This chill seeps into my soul
The winter white has expunged
Life for this white cold
And the rose's song is sung
                                    
The trees sway in the winter breeze
As leaves fall in the afternoon
As a rose, lovely to see
Longing for it's loss quite soon
                                    
Nothing survives save that of the snow
They have found a homage in death
And I long to witness the rose in the snow
To fully understand life's breath
                                    
 I must be in dream, for this is not real
Your hand in mine, and this I know
Only a kiss and our love will seal
But that is only a rose in the snow 

A Cafe Rose

a cafe rose
lonely and old
rests upon a table
she's seen, she knows
the coffee's cold
The bread just a little stale

she wonders why
she hasn't seen a blue sky
in so long, so long

they call her wind
she'll blow her breath again
she's been a sage
everyone is at her age
they call her old
they call her cold
she is what they say
as the doors close
left to stand alone
petals in wilt 
thorns mellow
a cafe rose

To Be Female

From these breasts
Milk shall feed the hungry
From this womb
A child shall be conceived
Through these loins
Life shall grace this Earth

From these nipples
He shall taste my secretion
Into this womb
He shall invade, erected
Through these loins
There will be a red heat of passion

Ears to hear
Words of love
Lips to speak
Baptized vows we shall cherish
Through these eyes
I gaze upon the life I love

And yet, something amiss

From these breasts
The milk is soured
Inside of my womb
Something sick and twisted grows
These loins no longer allow
The erect male passage

The world crumbles
Becoming shards of a shattered mirror
Gods word is but an echo
Deafening inside my ears
Against the cold floor
The woman dies in prayer

Leaving only a man

Somehow Magical

When magic licks the earth, it seems
In dream you hear the angels scream
As fire burns the seas, you look in the sky
When you needed him the green dragon lied

Hearts thick as mud
Antimony pentaflouride for blood
Nightshade on their breath
Dirt for life, dust for death

Unicorn, unicorn, whinny to the wind
If it bends, magic won't come from the virgin's hand
Leprechaun, dressed in Geia's green
Gold weans young hearts to life from years as teens

Godot and Poe
The "Kubla Khan" Joe
Byron and Joyce
Somehow lost their voice

Hearts thick as mud
Antimony pentaflouride for blood
Nightshade and opium on their breath
Dirt for life, dust for death

Waiting, waiting, waiting for a wish
Licking the ground for the taste of magic I miss
Cold skin to colder stone
Somewhere back there I was left all alone

Nightmare, nightmare, carry me away
One day it will never again be this way
Fairy elf, oh god not today
If I may, I will love you another day

When it will be true
When it will be new
Not so old
Somehow, magical

The Man Outside

With hearts so warm
They mellow to music
Without remorse
To the true sickness
Awaiting them outside

While I listen
To a heartbeat
Without recourse
To the Lord, our God
I pray for salvation

Hitherto, the dream
Beckons me further and further
Beyond the call of sanity
I can only feel the silk
Upon my skin

Naked Angels

Are angels in the kingdom of god naked?
Are they gay?
Do they love like we love or as I love you?

I had a dream many years ago.
I dreamt of ghosts in my mind and life.
They taught me to speak their language,
called the "So".  So say the ghosts, for all words
are only metaphors for pure thought.
And that is the only way an angel can ever be pure
is in the nude.  But, of course, that is only
what the ghosts say.  In many forms of
prayer, the so-sayings remain of the strongest,
for they reach out to the spirits closest to you,
the ones playing the most important parts
in your life.

Silver wings grace clouds,
So said the herald that cried out loud
Clothed in the robes 
That hide thing exposed in Eden,
So said Job, who in pain 
Of loss, had every right and reason

So say the spirits
That dance through the night,
Where every human limit
Is exposed from the flight
So say the angels
Who are naked from time to time
They wear their clothes for the devils
Who wait quietly in our minds.

And there are things I'll say
In the quiet and peace of my time,
That proves I can be death to the so sayings,
Because the hill was just too high to climb
- on my own.

The Nature Of Somethings

whispers through trees
     of you and me
echo in the breeze
     with a playful tease

I say my love is true
     but you are gone
before the sound reaches you
     my words echo on

standing in the shadow
     of the past morning light
hope is means only the somehow
     it will be alright







Nature Born

(In Memory Of Debbie Simpson)

A leaf is natural born
Of the mother tree
Acorns blot out the ground
In an eiderdown soft memory

The derelict echoes
Of homeless birds, dampen
The blunt explosion
Of the mother tree that's fallen

In peaceful reverie
She lays under a halo
Of children and family
Home to squirrel and crow

When a tree falls in a wood
And no one shares the elation
All of creation shall hear
Her immortal salvation

Memory

Remember a memory                  rememory a thought
Inconsequential harmony            a pain your love bought
The smoking chimney           black despair, smokey and hot
White picket fence reverie              the countenance we forgot

Sacred order we will not profane
Important feelings which bring such shame
Kiss the mirror of memory's name
Embrace the cold floor in a lonely lover's game

Another Memory

Natural harmony
In as much as can be found
Rests in a prayer
Where we reveal
What we've truly become

The sole memory
Of my soul's memories
Is that it needs to be
More than the flesh allows
Something that must be released

If the gods would only show me how

Wild Orchid

Exotic, exposed
Into thick gaseous fog
Shadowed overhead
Sewered at foot
Erotic, embraced
Feathery petals nurtured
Beautifully, golden trimmed
And white in full
Ecstasy, orgasmic             [chorus of reeds]        perfume the air
It pulses and throbs                                   she knows you're there
Heated and hugged                                 she knows you care
In a thick blanket                                smell my air
Solitary, isolated
Darkness washes away light
Moon shining down
Stunted by clouds overhead
Wild Orchid                                       perfume the air
Blossom for me                               she knows you're there
Come to my hand                                   she knows you care
I treasure your love                                   smell my air

Wild Orchid: In Memory's Time

Saturate my petals, embrace my thorn
Cutting through your callous hide
Until you bleed like a babe freshly born
Your wails as loud as when you first cried

- A whisper of wind blows
  over you each time you touch me;
   it feels good

"I want only your mind
  every moment of your life
  in memory's time
  I could even be your wife"

Blanket my loneliness, I am no rose
But place the stem inside the vase
Upon the sill, keep the window closed
And I will preserve for you my heavenly grace

But now I am cold, where have you gone?
There is no one to protect me
The only sound is my own willowing song
Is love lost what true love must be?

Prayer

There are dreams
and then prayers.
The line between them
A crossroad and the marble stairs.

Late and alone at night
I steepled my hands
God had somehow forgotten
To watch over this land
And a man without a prayer
is a man without his destiny
A woman without her hopes
is a woman without her family

Through astral eyes
I made way over marble
With all dream left behind
And in the sleep called night
There was no startle
For I awakened as I had slept
Alone, afraid
And in need

A mad cat lifted his head 
And sponged milk in the August twilight
His needs had come true
But ours were unheard of, locked away tight

One night I flinched back
And gave the Father no name
Instead I looked into the heavens
And made a challenge for a god to claim
Answer this prayer 
I'll know my soul is theirs
But only silence rung in the hallways
Through the crawl ways called mind
I prayed long and hard
For nights and years
Believing in something 
That never believed back in me
The friendship tool was broken
The door is locked and there is no key

Pray, fold your hands, close your eyes, pray
Pray for each other, for you and me
No God should claim your soul
When they aren't giving you what you need

Hell is pain for a lifetime
Suffering for all your years
They tell you it will come if you sin
And I say we are already there

Aphrodite, Venus, Athena, Jesus, Mary and Yahweh
All know my needs
So I pray, in the name of the father,
And I awoke, tired, lifeless
A cantankerous old coot

Praying is asking to get what you need

So I don't plan on giving anyone of those 'so called gods' my soul
Until they make up their minds and ease this aching heart and mind.

Sure, I will ask


Another Prayer

Malcontent, this minstrel
Menstruates music
Of another kind
Shortened of magic
Each prayer more tragic
God left someone behind

Whispers in the dark
Once balanced the world
Now mean nothing

Boy, male
Father, son
Drifts apart
Until only scattered shards

Girl, female
Mother, daughter
Blends together
Until only a fade blur

And the power of prayer
Has no one that cares
At least on the listening side

Queens Of Fashion

Pray, say the Ones
The royals of fashions
Kilted and bloused
Their heads highly glossed

A precious few laces
Gather their scripted graces
Arm to ringed hand
Deafeningly loud in their band




A 2 O'clock Quiet

Down the stairs
South of everything held good
Someone slipped their share
Someone missed their chance 

Wind singing before the window
And a gusty face through the door
Package in hand, prize to show
With tears in my eyes which I try to hide

Two O'clock and the silence grows louder
On the other end I heard you breathe
A place where the lonely share the rent
Then the madman cried with no place to live

Razor Burned Legs

Lithe beneath the silk
They twist and turn
Drift and dream
In pools of honey milk

Sleep offers dream
With love and hate
Soap operas and drama
All through the night it seems

Almost every man has hairy legs
The kind that are thick
And rubbery when in sleep
Feeling like a lady's razor burned legs

The Regal Couple

Eyes stole the blue
Out of the sky
A voice deafened the life
From the green mountainside.

A black, rank tar
Pitted in my stomach
Crept over my throat
For I could no longer breathe.

I took the match,
Holding it to her eyes
Watching the reflection,
Looking into her soul.

It was lonely in there,
Like a desert flower
That knows no rain,
A life that wants just the same.

The musky air was hard to hold
With each labored lungfull
And as I held the icy hand in mine
I wondered why I had done this at all.

The Rubber Ducky Of Life

Life is like a rubber ducky. 
You sit and bob in the bath tub of life,
Subjected to the waves of cellulite thighs
Plunging into soap-scummy water.
Sometimes your head goes under 
Or you plug up the drain, but you never really
Have control over how you ride the thunder-thigh waves 
Or how well you last in the steamy water. 
Sometimes your own squeaky-hole gets fouled up 
And you have to wait until 
Someone steps on you to get it cleared out.

Sometimes you have to put a leash on your rubber ducky 
And let it pull itself around the bath tub.
Sometimes you have to squeeze your own sides 
So your squeaky-hole is loud and
clear and fresh from bath tub soap scum.
Sometimes life is like a rubber ducky,
You just have to sit back and smile
and thank God you weren't made an inflatable Barney.

Feel For Me, Feel For You

Occasionally you'll stand alone
Sometimes stand without fear
Times will come and times have gone
Times we share are growing near
We met so many hours ago
And the words you said so loud
I simply want to hear your voice 
And the way you feel when you scream it loud
How does it feel, how does this feel
To know you are wanted in more ways than one
How does it feel, how does this feel
To know you could share your life with someone
I felt the cold far too soon before the storm
These friends I have are like soundless ghosts
Tomorrow I may see another girl come
But just let me know how you feel when it shows
Sniffing eiderdown blossoms in a desert heat
It has to make for a busy day
There is a warmth in me that is another heat
And I want to know what you feel everytime I say
     goodbye to you
     goodbye to you
     hello again
     tomorrow
     and each new day
     I love you
     in some new way

Streetlamp On Wicked Bridge

Love
Consumes a thousand words
To digest a pure
Wickedness
Poets
Literary pawnbrokers 
Have sold their souls for love.
Oh yes,
They are the ones who define
It as cantankerous
And humiliating
But they at least experience it
Like neither you nor I may
For they see how powerful
This love
Can be.
We work for our bread
And hard, leaden water
While we are told 
What love is.
Love, in a thousand words, more or less,
Is a light which shines 
When no one looks
And no one cares
Over the single woman
Who has thrown herself from a dreary climb
Into colder, lonelier waters below.
Life,
The Wicked Bridge
From birth to death, spanning death
In all of its natural beauty
Yet still we fear it,
And it leads nowhere.
It is only a moment away
From eternity.
And love is the streetlamp
Which lights our way
Just before death consumes us,
Saving us from the
Wickedness.

Janet's Swing

Janet left work and walked
Homeward bound, fettered
Imprisoned within the shackles
Of memory and thoughts
Regurgitated dream
Vacancy boring her eyes
Hollow mind and spirit
Humming Buffet absently
A token short 
She misses the bus
And is forced to wait
For her next ride

Green in a steel jungle
A park spread
Weak and weary 
She stopped 
And sat down 
Upon a swing

With a push of her legs
Higher she rose
Only to fall
Backwards again

When she went up
The world went down
And when she went down
The world was again

And she went up
And down
Again and again
Rising to freedom
Sinking back into a rheumy world

When she went up
The world went away
She continued until
The end of day

And her ride took her away

Wild Wolves

unchain my heart
like a stray ray of sun
peaking over mountaintops
leading rabbits on the run
through pastures of green
and gay screams
of perfumed flowers

unchain my heart
dear friend of royalty
crowned with trees
and your speciality
i will never be lost
or forget your name
titan of the woodland

unchain my heart
and i will send to you
the color of my love and
my very soul it's true
and we shall dance
and howl in fame
alone in wild wolf love

a reflection of a woman's age

Woman, you're old
Like time, and stone
No longer warm
Blood curdled and cold
Forgetting things always known

Woman, don't cry
Quiet tears, it's all gone
Long ago he died
When your hearts couldn't fly
You've only a faded memory to show

Woman, there's no time
To grieve for lost ones and sin
Prepare to receive
Punishment for your crime
Of being true until the end

A splinter has rekindled
The embers of your kindness
In debt to those you remembered
You've one last time to dance


The Loser

"What the hell,
All I can do is lose."
Or win.  Or begin again.

But I had lost.
And what a cost!
Nothing but an ounce of pride.

It was all I had
And I should be glad
That I have finally been humbled.

Until they come 
To humiliate me once more.

Natural Selection

Loose in life
We falter at each pebble
Fearing some knife
To separate us from that
Which we love so dearly.
We embrace natural selection
For it escapes society's choice
And a woman may love the voice
Of another woman
Or a man a man
I tell you they can 
It is natural selection

One Day

Somedays I forget to thank God
For a new day, to begin again
And yesterday's triumphs
With each new pain
The healing heart takes it away
And sometimes I am too busy
To ask help for someone else
So when I pray
And hear no "Amen," it's okay
Because He can get busy too
Help other people enjoy
A new day

Frady Cat

The frail cat
A skeletal billow of fur
Falls down, down, down
Scratched and scented by catnip stars
All around, round, round
In a chaotic, anarchial blur

Discrimination Is One Hundred Percent Universal

From shackle and shame
Have my eyes opened
Bound to words of skin tone
Told what to say, not to name

A wave of sea grasps
In firm, antiquated reverie
I reign supreme in silence
Imprisoned within my own tasks

Pale caution catch not my mind
Though with Solomon's seal at my neck
And a warm hand and knife at my back
We are all a mortal kind

The Lord of Discipline

He frequents fairies
Fine whores a finger high
Naked ladies that tease
But do not satisfy

Yesterday the scribe came late
Today not at all
Upon his knees he begged
Until all was silent

Until his fall


The Decay of Sand

Somewhere a foot print
Follows another and another
Leading to Heaven
Somewhere the sand decays
And the footprints vanish
Forever

Tall Boy

I remember being
The small one
Who knew only
Her freedom as a girl
Soon to be a woman

Until I crept
Far, too far
Into the water
When "tall boy"
Took me in his arms

Cos none of us could swim

Innocent Miss Magic

Mother, memorize my laughter and longings
To tell them of my miracles - magic
Carefully and closely caress hands of healing
This world will call me
     - Innocent Miss Magic

A young woman with stars in her eyes
And friends down roads she has yet to go
Through blue skies, on wings of magic will she always fly





Copyright 1995, Stephen W. Cote and The Writer's Gallery.
Comments
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