open mouth

I open my mouth, I open up wide
For you to sink into the cracks
And pour into the hollow bones
To every poisonous place I've tried to hide.

I am hungry, hungry like a newly hatched bird
Wondering how it ever got so high,
Watching all the others fly,
Finding a nest-view of life quite absurd.

For I am just a helpless thing tossed by the wind of this city
And despite what you've proven again to be true,
Despite what you've promised,
I still find the hideous glitter quite pretty.

So purge me of all that I've held up so high,
Adored on the lofty pedastle of my mind.
Feed me with manna and not tainted truth
For the world's lusty stars burn the eyes of this youth.

royal sunday*

Somehow the patterns of my mind collected
As I travelled through my day,
But I never saw you sneaking in,
I never saw you enter,
There beneath the open sky
And all the freakish fray.

Though God knows you were only ever thoughts away,
In any fleeting moment
Of any patient day.
You never were my best thought
By daytime or by night,
But always a morning's fantasy,
An evening's melodic delight.

Somehow the balance of my mind turned over unexpected
As dream-skin hugged reality's bones
And everything just melted.
And all the Venice colours burst,
My bloodlust unaffected.

The ocean smiled as its hands caught the wind
And they both pushed my feet to make sandal-prints there
Where the beat of the drum-circle raced with my heart
And they met with your own in the air.

Your vision kept flashing and tearing apart
As my eyes blinked to see you,
As the sun dazed my mind,
And before long you passed me in lone regal line.
I couldn't ignore you, oh where would I start?

So I turned and I touched you and disturbed your rhythm
With dusty brown words like sand stars in your hair,
To hold for you some faint, lasting confession
And leave its imprint there.

And soon enough I closed my mouth—
And bitter taste upon my tongue,
I ran ecstatic into the sea.
With some odd hunger, wandered aimlessly,
Ever tied like a puppet to my destiny.

Oh to play her Majesty, the Queen, on royal Sunday!
Sweet, limitless, my dreams,
But they'd trap me again one day,
Shoeless walking in the sand,
With empty hope in empty hand.

lioness

Her feet slipped and pattered;
Slowly, haphazard.

She never felt more in danger
Than in the presence of this stranger.

His four feet down, her two feet in--
The more she longed to shed her skin,

The more she raced to keep his stride,
The more she felt he tried to hide,

And now the woods seemed like a cave,
Echoing warnings to the brave.

Though tangled under roots and wire,
His footprints spread like wildfire

And burnt her soles as swift she tread
And left the dead to bury dead.

For more than once she died inside
And wailed for the earth to hide

Her deep within its shifting sands,
Like water drips through open hands.

And more than once she caught a glimpse
Of his golden tail as evidence

To warm her heart and push her deeper
Into a jungle that could not keep her.

Then suddenly the light went black--
Aware there was no going back--

She sank into the cold, wet ground
And hurled a most ferocious sound

From deep inside that startled her
In wordless patterns, familiar.

And suddenly the Lion appeared
Like radiant fire and darkness cleared

As he bid it die, as he bid it flee
As he roared in awful majesty!

And stooping down to me he wept,
For never a girl so frightened crept--

Stripped of all her bravery,
Helpless in her slavery.

I gasped to breathe the breath he gave--
Released myself that he could save

My carcass collapsed upon his mane
And with my tears flowed all my pain.

I tried to speak, tried to explain.
My tongue was numb, it moved in vain.

He silenced me in tenderness
And all he said was, LIONESS.

thoughts in captivity

My time is ripe but my hour is dim--there is poison in my bone.
My swell is clean then I crash and burn and my thoughts stand naked, alone.

Oh my thoughts they look a lot like fears, a lot like trails, a lot like tears
--fleeting moments and hopeful years!

My time is bitter but my hour is sweet--I'm a wretch in the lap of peace.
My creep is frail and my coat is shedding; scaley skin in painful release.

Oh my thoughts they come disguized as sages, disguised as lovers; freaking golden cages!
--choking ideas, battles of the ages.

Oh that I would take them captive, instead they trap me behind bars.
Oh to feel the earth beneath me and grasp at life under the stars!

For there my lines were sewn and written, welded in their shining rock.
And there Love gave me all His blessing when I wailed for the breath of God.

Oh my thoughts they sound a lot like questions, a lot like shouting, a lot like digestion
--patient processing of information!

Oh that I would take them captive and plunge them in the deepest sea!
For then I think I could discover why God ever thought of me.

vladimir and the show*

Dear Vladimir you've put me in a rage.
You strut like a peacock but you're stuck in the zoo.
And I used to believe them too
Until I saw the cage.

There is one thing that I know
Though they think they have style with their toy cigarettes
And they think God creates and then He forgets
And they think mocking Him is new intelligence...
There is one thing that I know:
They are just shadowed marionettes,
And I am so tired of their show.
Yes, I am so tired of this show.

Ah Vanitas Vanitatum!
I would be one of them.
I would be one with them.

I have had my doubts.
But the earth still turns and waxes green
And God still moves and makes me clean
And life is more than this dastard scene...
Yes, vanity gave me all her doubts
So shut up your puppets with their strings!
For life finally means something
When your play has been played out.

Dear Vladimir I would be kinder to you
If you weren't ever taught how to unloose the fetter
If you didn't know better,
But you do.

branches and fruit

You have fruit growing out of your head, figs in your heart, apples in your hand.
You are abundant like I've never known, joyfully rooted in a Strongman's land.
You are like shade of green leaf and rubber, your sight is a refreshing scene.
You are like lifeblood bursting forth, producing fruit that is rich and clean.

But I am like a branch in winter, barely holding deathly things.
I cannot bud or fruit or blossom a fraction of what your branches bring.
My heart is like an apple core, my arms are barren, shriveled trees.
I cannot move for I am frozen, unshaking in this winter breeze.

I wonder why some are given more sun and some more wind and rain,
For wherever shoots sprout, they are pregnant and full with a hope that they'll sprout again.
"Abide in Me, abide in Me, as I abide in you,"
These things you whisper longingly to my very favorite tune.
And I am hungry for your fruit, I never taste enough.
For I grow nothing on my own, not even this skin so worn and rough.

on my loyalty to rain*

I love the rain because it quenches my bones. It makes me feel alive.
It falls on a whim to drench me with home from that same foreboding sky.

When it rains, everything is clean. Everybody stops pretending.
You can wipe that silly smile off your face—that frozen sunshine so offending.

Because rain brings winter clarity, and falls with spring-drizzled hope.
It opens my eyes, it washes my face, it wakes me to what I don’t know.

I will never wish for sun as long as I have rain. For sun will creep behind my back
And blind my blinking eyes; sweet rays of golden lies, covering all that I lack.