Sunday, December 12, 2010

The heart

She came home with a snow-white rose,
Its petals bleached of color and power and all that
there was left was flower, no scent, no memory,
just pallor.

She stole the thorns, whittled them down,
and placed them with a frown in a Valentine crown over her heart because,
because...she wanted someone to touch the rose,
the rose, and not her heart.

Then he arrived, and all he had were baskets of needles,
acupuncture needles, knitting needles, chopsticks sharpened
to killing needles,
And she was a ball of wool, a love-sick fool, and she let him,
No. She begged him to be a tool to knit
a tapestry, a travesty, a tragedy,
out of her,
and when he did,
she became
what he made.

They wore their creation, her and him.
They sat on in at their picnics and wrote on it in their dreams
and made love on it and wiped their mouths on it
after dinner,and sometimes used it when she shivered
and everytime she touched the cloth she lost a part
of herself that she'd sworn she'd protect
with the rose-thorns over her heart.

Over the years, the tapestry tore,
and their love wore out to a pout of a
rose bud when all its petals fell out and
she did not cry, did not cry
when the tapestry unraveled and
he drifted. He drifted, she stayed and replayed
the years of togetherness and oneness and wholeness and ownness
and when it all crumbled like the ashes of a burnt rose,
she smiled because she was safe,
she was safe.
He'd loved the tapestry, not her, she was still safe,
with the rose-thorn crown on her heart,
all he'd gotten was a part,
of her that she'd let him use,
the outer wool,
the shell,
but not her heart.

Sunday, December 5, 2010

Timothy runs

Timothy runs, he's ignorant, that child.
He's crisp white ice on a stained glass aisle,
He's the aimless banter of a thoughtless brain,
And he's lost in the canter of a mind untrained.

Timothy runs forward and the world runs back,
He's fast on the heels of faster facts,
They're colorless, tasteless, depth-less words,
But still, Timothy chases them for all they're worth.

Timothy runs through a gold-gray field,
A field of corn, a field of steel,
It's a man-made marvel, an acre of gold,
It's a yellow-gray field of heat and cold.

Timothy runs, and his shoulders scrape,
The gray-gold grass with the corn-steel blades,
His words have died in the oddball field,
And Timothy's sad--he's ignorant still.

"Where's my knowledge?" Timothy demands.
There's a dent in the earth where his still feet stand.
"It's that way," a source-less voice then says,
And Timothy runs in adamant chase.

Timothy's feet begin again to thunder,
And the once-dead words die again asunder.
But words don't matter, Timothy decrees,
He sees the shadow of running feet.

The shadow runs back to the field of steel,
And Timothy's as sore as his poor feet feel,
"There's your knowledge," says the gray-gold land,
And now there's one more dent where Timothy stands.

A lifetime later, Timothy's gray,
His gold has faded, and his feet have frayed,
But Timothy still runs and the field still stands,
And there's fifty thousand dents where his still feet stand.

And then one fine day Timothy sways,
And falls into the grave that his still feet made,
"You've found your knowledge," says the field to none,
But Timothy's happy, he no longer runs.

Sunday, November 28, 2010

Someone to hold

I dropped onto my empty bed,
It's so empty, that traitorous bed!
"Choose!" I demanded haughtily,
"between the jealous air and me!"
By God! that lecherous bed said naught,
Why would he? He's always warmed,
By my willing body in his arms.
If not, the naked air is in his folds,
So he always has someone to hold.

Musings of a died soul #7

The placelessness of paceless time,
Is but a graceless wish,
You see the more you crave unstructured time,
The more structured it is.

Friday, October 22, 2010

Musings of a Died Soul...#6

My coffin smelled like scented blood,
Like sandalwood grown in warrior mud.
I torched the case in murderous rage,
And lit my bones with fury alone,
The wood then burned and the ashes soaked,
In the orange light of the blazing oak,
But it seemed as though the fire was broke,
Because while there was fire, there was no smoke.

Sunday, October 10, 2010

The China Man

There once lived a China man,
Not chinese, a china man,
His hands were oh-so-hard.
But when he broke,
and became but shards,
His hands, I saw, were far from sharp.
They were china hands, not chinese hands,
Their texture was not like silk.
Ragged, yes, and rough enough,
But much like words, they were blunt when sharp.
They were, I'm sure, like all things glass,
Made of pain and fragile past,
So that when they broke, they awoke,
Memories that had long been ghosts,
And now, newly born, they made soft,
The porcelain womb of the shattered sop,
The sop who once was a man,
A sorry affair, known for his hands,
And when he broke his hands awoke,
Memories that reshaped his worth,
And now the broken china man,
Sits on my desk,
Without his hands.

Thursday, September 16, 2010

# 5

When I was still alive I'd thought,
That being good was better than not.
But as I slept, good but dead,
A lightning notion struck my head:
If Life was time to do my good,
And Death a coffin to rest within,
Then perhaps Heaven's been misunderstood,
And is, in fact, reserved for Sin.

# 4

Once I owned a flawless face,
So perfect that it had no place,
In a world where beauty was a waste,
Disgraced, I had my face erased.

# 3

In my hand, when I awoke,
Were remnants of a heart that broke,
It was foreign, cold and made of stone,
Still, I stole it to replace my own.

# 2

When I died I took with me,
The life of something sacred, see?
The secrets that I'd hidden deep,
Disused, fell into deeper sleep.

Musings of a Died Soul

# 1
I killed a man and soiled my hands,
And then I killed again,
Except this time when I killed,
His hands, not mine, were stained.

Sunday, August 22, 2010

Whispers and tattoos.

It's time to ask a task of you,
Write me a verse and tattoo it to,
Skin that no one can ever see,
No one, not one, not even me.

Ink it in feeling, pitch it with love,
Stroke it with fingers bare and ungloved,
So that in sleep I'll seek its touch,
And when out of dreams, I'll miss it much.

Tailor the letters, fashion the words,
Forge the phrases into my girth,
Let them whisper what you won't say,
Words of passion, caution and sway.

Now I ask a task of you,
Make me a necklace of morning dew,
Crown me with secrets made of pearls,
And remind me why I was made a girl.

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Doorbells and date nights.

Dirty nails.
Pristine clothes.
White, too, and silk, with bows.
Black leather boots.
A riding crop.
A studded bra.
A pink jock cup.

A date! At last, a date.
Chocolate, maybe? Or Chardonnay.
A tux? A dress.
Black or red?
I'd go with black...
But red's a Siren!
Red it is. Hot attack.

Long, curly hair.
Buzz cut, tailored with care.
Two cute?
Too cute.
Blonde? Brunette?
Perfect is insecure,
I like defects.

Shoes. Of course, the shoes!
Haha, why not?
Hooker heels.
Soft leather loafers,
with sheepskin insoles.
Shaved legs?
nah. Razor burn.

Detract! Distract!
What a mess.
The doorbell's ringing.
I wonder...
is my date...
a guy?
or a girl?

The jock cup,
for the pretty lady,
The studded bra
for the alpha male.
But what if...
it's both?
like...
me.

Sunday, August 8, 2010

Crazy talk.

I walked headfirst into a gate,
And fell, distressed into the drapes,
And saw, outside, a cat with hair,
And a furry man with two eclairs.

Beside him lay a faceless dog,
Who indulged in wordless monologue,
And ate, presumably, the cat,
Who'd vanished while we'd had this chat.

The man, instead, ate eclairs both,
And made the dog shed off her coat,
And added to his furry skin,
A pelt of finest, canine lint.

The naked dog then ate the man,
Grew fangs, fur and attention span,
And earned a surely feline face,
And along with that, canine disgrace.

Certainly, something was amiss,
What respectable dog would meow and hiss?
And what the deuce possessed her throat?
Her barks came out like wordy gloats!

And then, alas, the dog had died!
Her abrupt demise all sense defied,
Her stomach was twisted all in knots,
And the people claimed it was the pox.

Some argued that she had been beaten,
Some said it was something she'd eaten,
Perhaps it was the cat with hair?
But methinks it was the damned eclairs.

Monday, August 2, 2010

Hunger

Two bits of burning, blazing coal
Sweep over heaps of offal wealth,
Consuming all that baser gold,
In a yawning gaze where Hunger dwells.

Eating years, and now in her twelfth,
A girl--a rat?--a vulture-child,
Slave to stealth and fading health,
Rotting apples ate and thus defiled,
What human nature she had left.

Beside her sits a broken doll,
Tied to her spindly, bony fingers,
As if unanchored would devolve.
And about her, putrid perfume lingers,
As a scented sign of her coming fall.

From the sky, in mocking rain,
Pour dregs of wine and liquored relish,
Plates of yester-dinner remains,
Noodles in oodles and half-eaten fish,
And the girl below a meal attains.

She grasps her food in a bone-grown bowl,
Imprisons her life in her hand-walled cage,
That one mouthful can free her soul,
If she opened her fingers, a lifetime she'll age,
--if she let it slip through her bone-grown bowl.

But Hunger decides, not her, not Him,
And she holds on tighter to her bite,
Raises to her lips and her hunger dims,
One more day she's eaten, one more night,
She'll live till it rains again: wine on a whim.

War

Sit down, Madame, take a seat!
Stay your hands and cross your feet,
You see those drops of crystal rain?
They're tears, madame, tears of pain.
The clouds thunder, with rage replete,
While the skies light up in white defeat.

A storm, my doll, a storm is here!
The clash and clatter of woes is near!
The swirling red among the white,
Is naught but blood shed in the fight,
But hush, now, don't cry, my dear,
You disrespect them with your fear.

You see the frothing ribbons there?
Those once were men, tall and fair,
Now all that's left is pus and flesh,
Poisoned, speared and cut afresh,
What? You find it hard to bear?
My dove, you're yet to have your share.

Can you hear the wailing cries?
It's the sound of man as he dies,
And as life leaks out from cracking skin,
The killed becomes the killer's kin,
And the fear you feel is but a lie,
Do you know what it's like to die?

Do you know what it is to hate?
To wield the metal of a blade,
And to damn yourself either way,
Whether you take a life or give yours away?
Hands once bloodied, bloodied remain,
What hasn't been broken will have been maimed.

And while you sit beside this hearth,
Those men return into the dirt,
Having fought for you, my heart!
Having ruined themselves, their souls depart,
The Devil will embrace them all with mirth,
And God will frown upon the earth.

You, My death, you've made them sinners,
You've taken their homes and poisoned their dinners,
You've turned their blades on fellow men,
You've begun a game that has no end,
A game that never can yield winners,
But only men, and those men, killers.

Sunday, July 25, 2010

Seventeen stones

Seventeen stones I have today,
Each one's a different shade,
Every stone's a stone away,
And each shade a shade too gray.

The first three came in a wicker bowl,
The next two floated on the wind,
Five others swam through winter cold,
And six more were to satin pinned.

At once I cast them into a fire,
Who doesn't fear unnatural gifts?
But driftwoods make a poorly pyre,
For the stones returned the fire to drifts.

I placed them in an army line,
And painted all a glorious hue,
But color's only on whiteness fine,
The stony gray bled right through.

I swallowed each and every one,
Till sixteen did my stomach flood,
Their stoney essence came undone,
And ran, like ink, into my blood.

Seventeen stones I have today,
Sixteen live in me as parts,
What once was red now is gray,
And the Seventeenth is my heart.

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Adam and Eve: incomplete.

"Wish, wish," wailed the winter wind,
"The earth can't see her feet!
The world has thinned coz the Sky has sinned,
And poor Adam's incomplete."

"Incomplete?!" I gasped, aghast,
"But Eve's not even here!"
"Eve?" The winter wind recast,
"That's why he's incomplete, my dear!"

Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Father's day special.

My teacher told me earnestly,
"I can only give you knowledge, see?
And if 'smart' is all you want to be,
then I am all you'll ever need."

My mother later came and said,
"Knowledge alone will swell your head,
I'll give you love and teach you care,
Use them well, and well you'll fare."

My sister then knocked on my door,
Said, "I'll teach you not to be a bore,
To share and cheer and entertain,
And how not to be a pain."

My friend, who'd heard all of this,
Swore that something was amiss,
Said, "All the things your lists have had,
You can find in just your DAD."

Friday, May 14, 2010

Health and Death

Dreary Death and Hateful Health,
Knocked upon my door and knelt,
And, "choose between us woman," said,
One exuding faith, the other dread.

"Outside it rains and our bodies pain,
From lack of human life to claim,
Neither the other one can stand,
So a choice from you we demand."

"But why?" I asked, perplexed and vexed,
Health couldn't be won nor death annexed,
So why choose when choice changes naught?
Ought Death be the one that's shunned, or not?

"Choose me and forever live,
All sins I promise to forgive,
But if you're not strong, you will belong,
With naught but what had done you wrong."

"Ignore His ignoble ignorance, do!
He knows not what his mouth had spewed,
Choose me and I shall give to you,
A life reserved for a favored few."

"But why?" I pressed, panicked and stressed,
What host can refuse a guest distressed?
But what host held in her hostage hand,
The power to doom and to be damned?

"If Health you house you will condemn,
Your brethren to the Under-realm--"
"But would you harbor Death instead,
Who would have them live but have you dead?"

"I am but a lowly being, I confess,
But upon your souls I must impress,
That albeit moved, I'm hard and shrewd,
And would have the both of you removed."

Aghast, amazed, the Immortals gaped,
I smiled and spoke as I escaped,
"Suffer like humans and realize,
That pain by pleasure is neutralized."

I watched as Life descended then,
And tied them to the land of men,
And Health and Death bowed to Life,
Who then pronounced them man and wife.

I can live without you

I can live without you now,
I can live without you.
The way I've managed uptil now,
To live, not just exist, without you.

I've breathed, I've eaten and I've slept,
I've laughed and joked and sung and wept,
Never, not once, did it occur to me,
That I'd be bound to you, and you'd be free.

Like chains that drag me out to sea,
Not to bind, but neither to free,
I believe you've dragged me out to be,
Someone who was never me.

I can live without you now,
The way I've always lived,
I don't know why, or even how,
I let you tell me how to live.

I'll teach myself what I already know,
Know but pretend that I don't:
I'll re-learn to live sans you and go,
Somewhere that I know you won't.

I can live without you,
I can live without you.
The way I have till now,
The way I haven't uptil now.

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

House of Sin

Welcome, stranger. Enter, please!
Embrace the sleaze and fine Disease,
Besides, Outside made inside you,
A creature spawned of monster slew,
Why deny damned demon needs?
So welcome, stranger, and enter, please.

Go through the open doors, the gates!
Skate the blades, defy the Slates,
And please amend that awful trend,
Of honor false and pride pretend,
Rid your soul, your skin, of Weights,
And go through, stranger, through those gates.

Can you feel the satin skins?
The velvet veils and the wanton winds?
Un-temper the tame, un-labor the lame,
Do shed that shroud of shallow shame,
There are no losses where there aren't wins,
So...can you feel those satin skins?

Step into the room, the room! my friend,
Discard the sense of doom, of End,
Bathe in the blood, in the red, red blood,
Un-quench what Outside had slaked with Mud,
And thirst to spend and on spirits depend,
Once you step into the tomb, my friend.

Look, my guest, look, it's Him!
The clouds of smoke His figure dim,
Oh, how handsome! Oh, how fearsome!
Oh, how terribly, awesomely wholesome!
Why work when one can wield a whim?
Follow His caprice, His avarice, Him!

Enter, stranger, into the House of Sin,
Note the noise, the moans, the din,
Are you in Heaven? Or are you in Hell?
You mayn't know, but if you do, won't tell,
Because the House is what you are within,
A demon, a beast and a House, for Sin.

Tuesday, May 4, 2010

The girl with the blue-gray eyes.

Under the stone-paved bridge there knelt,
A dainty lass with blue-gray eyes
--eyes so blue they mocked the skies,
and yet so gray they shamed away,
the storm clouds and their thunder belts.

She reached a fragile hand to stay,
A wild daisy, bedewed and cold,
whose silver petals then turned to gold,
But gold to petal's like rust to metal,
And leeched the daisy's life away.

Then a bullfrog bounded boldly up,
And her oak-brown skin did admire,
But his own marred hide invoked her ire,
So she glared, and he promptly flared,
and into bits of gray-green frog blew up.

Then came the rain, in torrents great,
She ran to the womb of the upward flood,
To dance insanely in the water's blood,
But the rain stopped dead, and the water fled,
She smiled at the earth's dark fate.

A slash of oil stained her face,
Then one and one and one more came,
Till the earth choked upon her shame.
She took a breath and blighted Death,
and then besmirched all earthly place.

And then she cried. Fat, rounded tears,
Fell on blackened ground to undo,
The curse she'd confined the earthlings to,
Then with a grin she banished Sin,
And rebirthed the earth sans the smears.

Sunday, May 2, 2010

At night.

So silent the hush, so violent the touch,
So achingly tender the pain,
Like a scalding kiss, like a bruising bliss,
Your touch burns like a flame.

Midnight strands slip though my hands,
and I gasp as I feel the weight,
Of heavy muscle as we toss and tussle,
On a bed till the night grows late.

My breath hitches, my back arches,
In barely controlled fervor,
I gasp and pant, and your name I chant,
In a scandalous, ravenous murmur.

The moon's light-beams, like milk-white streams,
drench you and me so whitely,
that we brightly glow like the winter snow,
and the Night blushes so divinely.

Hot caresses and sweet addresses,
tumble from thirsting lips,
and with a wanton moan and a wild, wild groan,
We fall into hidden bliss.

The mist takes all, the raindrops fall,
Like a chagrined mother's rage,
And still we dance in a manic trance,
Like Passion's puppets on a Stage.

Because at night, we're free to play.

Saturday, April 17, 2010

The bird with the broken wing

A bird fell from a maple tree,
His wing, I saw, was bent.
I meant to soothe the sorry thing,
But the thing would not relent!

I stepped away respectfully,
noting his agitation.
He'd learn to respect his wings and fear,
laws of gravitation.

I stayed, to see, not touch,
To see what the bird would do,
Had I not crossed his path,
Had I ignored him too.

He limped away to a mulberry bush,
trailing gore and glory,
His prideful little body,
nursing the injury.

Did Nature do the same for me,
In my hurt did she place pride,
so that when her children injured me,
I could heal when cast aside?

Going home

I went back to my home today,
the one I'd left behind when,
unable to endure I had,
run away to never return, again.

Later, finally grounded I
felt the need for roots and so
I upped and headed home,
having never forgotten that route.

I knocked once on my wooden door,
And then I knocked again,
I knocked until my knuckles bled,
I would not force, but neither would I bend.

An hour later, when my arm was numb,
I glared at the stout doorway,
It had never quite occurred to me
that Home could also run away.

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

The night

The tombstone cracks, 'tis but a stone,
I lay awake and watch it,
When the moon comes down to rob the night,
I smile at it and watch it.

Yesterday I'd cried,
Perhaps tomorrow I'll bleed,
Today is already yesteday,
Maybe tonight, I'll sleep.

And when the Sun rises to punish the moon,
I'll hide from that whiteness,
I wait for the night, I wait for its darkness,
I wait for its white thief.

Maybe tomorrow, when I'm tired of light,
I'll go out and embrace the dark,
but for now, I'll ignore the sun,
the moon shines gentler and whiter.

I touched that tombstone today,
I laughed when that cold stone crumbled,
My hand is living, I scolded myself,
It would burn through the deadened marble.

I caught a moth in the crescent night,
I seized it by its wings,
It screamed at me silently,
I smiled at its captivity.

It fluttered furiously, that speck of life,
as I observed in fascination.
Tomorrow, then, for those without it,
Is borne on fluttering wings.

Friday, January 29, 2010

what matters.

The Sun will someday set,
and bring eternal night,
The stars and moon and earth will all,
one day give up their fight.

The mighty seas and human trees,
Will crumble to earthly dust,
And all that's gold and in precious hold,
Will like iron rust.

Not riches, not fame,
not trophies will stay,
Our proud possessions one day,
Will all wither away.

So why live life? Why endure?
What plants from dead seeds 'rise?
What but ashes does burnt wood bring?
What morn is born without sunrise?

A kind word dropped in a hurt man's path,
A smile on a rainy day,
The haven of a hug, a heartfelt gift,
These things will always stay.

Sunday, January 24, 2010

Remember.

Think of all who love you,
Think of those who care,
Think of all who'll miss you,
And remember, they are there.

Whenever you feel like crying,
Whenever you feel alone,
There's an angel always watching,
Life's not set in stone.

People come, people go,
Friends are friendly men,
Swim along the river's flow,
And see what happens then.

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Forget

Everytime a breath we breathe,
We let one go that's stale,
Everytime a book we read,
We forget an older tale.

Tomorrow, everything we know today,
Will have been lost in Yesterday.

Precious

Do not fear, do not curse,
The sufferer's not for suffering worse,
Forgive the sin, remember the pain,
Remember for when you get hurt again.

Do not resent, do not hate,
Lovers love and are loved by Fate,
Laugh 'cos laughter joy will bring,
And Joy'll bury Hatred's sting.

Saturday, January 9, 2010

Life???

Hate lives in many ways, Love but in few,
Life shoots poisoned darts and Pain pierces you,
Time always wants to leave, Memories try to stay,
Death gathers broken hearts, and friends fade away.