Meeting the Bar: the Word is not enough

i mostly find them lying somewhere,
could be on a city sidewalk
smutted with a hard day’s dirt,
spray-washed by smooth summer rain
or bleached in the september sun

no one seems to see them

on the way back home from work
i pass them with my bike &
sometimes hate it when they call,
yet i stop, pick them up and then–
don’t know what to do

some feel heavy in my hands,
others sweet or ugly and they mingle
with my heartbeat

i put them in my pockets,
feel their pulse against my thighs &
then forget how much they move me

in the night i hear their breath
swaying tenderly towards my sheets,

with tousled hair, i rise,
pour them on the floor,
light a candle, spread them on the carpet,

for a long time we just sit and talk
moving them around, i
try to understand,
press them soft against my lips,
weighing how they feel–

some never seem to fit &
those i like the most

when the morning dawns i’m naked,
wounded & enraptured on the floor,
never make it back to bed,
never make it anywhere–

But i already knew that
when i saw them first
. 

this is my entry for today’s Meeting the Bar: Critique and Craft at dVerse Poets Pub, hosted by a wonderful Emmett Wheatfall. Gates will swing open at 3 pm EST

a hundred charcoaled letters later

thinking of your notes,
i dream of you,

sitting next to me
with ink smeared lips,
hands caressing your pen
as if it were my breasts

i think of words, ripe,
falling from your tongue -
plucked and squished
to juice by summer fairies

and i want to preserve their taste
for scentless days

Don’t talk
or think or even breathe
you smile  – just
close your eyes, drink, trace
their patterns while they fall
to rest,

melt with the graphite of your pencil
and let the words
invading you,

splitting your bowels
with a crimson spear,
cracking you open ’til

you can’t be sure if you -
just dive, die, dance or drown

in a HundredCharcoaledFountains,
spilling your life like ink
across the barriers you have built

.

.
Anton Gourman wrote a wonderful poem, based on this one and I can highly recommend the read – you can find it here
.
and…it’s one shot wednesday again…gates open at 5pm EST ..let’s  flood the place with poetry…hope to see you there..

places no one has ever heard of

in warm nights
i drink your words like scotch and
step into you,
hoping to find myself between
your lips and the tip of your tongue

you taste of lemon and brown sugar
and across the bar
waits another day
of another life
with a different reason to breathe

we drink to the words
and bleeding pages
spread across your skin

we drink to what’s left,
to fragile letters on limpid sheets

and we drink to
endless carpets of white blossoms
that may never make it through the rain

your eyes are deep with danger
and full with what no one should see,
touch
or feel

your lips shine wet with ink

i long to kiss you empty and
explode in your mouth,
on your tongue

until we both are bleeding – to gether, to life

on the floor of a bar
no one has ever heard of

…it’s One Shot Wednesday again and i have the pleasure to be your host for tonight’s poetry party…come write a poem and join us..sign up opens at 5 pm EST

in the dead of the night/ jaywalking the moon

while you were sleeping,
i moved on,
filled bits of sunshine
into tiny bottles
and squished some
of the spring ’11 rain
into my trenchcoat pockets

find me sitting on a bench
i’ll pour you wine from
new blown glasses
my walls will soon be
smeared with ink

between my teeth the graphite
of a well worn pencil
when poetry’s invading me

i’m spraying graffiti on you
and watch the wet paint
running down your neck and

from my tongue drip words,
form puddles on new spaces and -
whistling with color blotted lips
i’m jaywalking the moon

you’re in…?

don’t even think about it..

don’t even think about it
’til the words pile up and
you can’t stop them any more

unless you’d kill ‘em,
every single one with the point of your pen,

unless you would drown or die
if you’d refuse to let ‘em come and
come like lovers in tight nights – but

you got stuck, the escalator
is not moving, blank steel laughs
into the poet’s face &

in your eyes – still warm,
the remnants of last night.

out in the kitchen, oldies on the radio,
no bridge to
never ending metro lines and
faceless crowds with long expired tickets -

you smile and i think of Bukowski’s words &
take another sip of coffee – black -
the stairway starts to move and somehow -
i feel drunk

This is my entry for the one shoot sunday picture prompt over at One Stop Poetry. The photo was shot by photographer and poet James Rainsford.

>your heart’s iambic – a Rondel

>your heart’s iambic all the way
da DUM, da DUM it grooves – you hear
sweet tapping music rolling near?
upon your chest, a tender sway

of rhythmic waves, they flood your bay
wade into you, then disappear
your heart’s iambic all the way
da DUM, da DUM it grooves – you hear

their scuttling feet dance vast astray,
go stressed, unstressed without a fear
tip-toe the beat from then to here
i’ m wrapped inside this rap today
your heart’s iambic all the way

Rondel:
ABba
abAB
abbaA

This and next Monday at One Stop Poetry Form, we’re going to have a close look at Rondels – some history – some technical information – some writing tips. Jump over there to read and join us..

>when i read Rilke

>it’s the beating of my heart,
pulsing distant drums
through the fog of artist’s words,
which feel like coming home,
 
when reading tastes
of being fed
with delish-ious blackprint noshes,
watching moist ink drip
from quivering lips,
bewitched with wondrous treasure,
resonate ring, wide wing bells
from your heart’s cathedral

do savor them
until your eyes shine bright
and passion blows upon your fields
as wind-swept hay before it
comes to rest in tousled hair

I want to lick the letters from this page
they, melting like chocolate on my tongue,
flooding my veins with cutting
edge imagery, traversing red corpuscles
to every far out orbit,

forever trace you with my fingertips
like a demanding lover,
sensing mad sensations of exploring foreign ground
until you scream and melt
into my labor pains
and ink has mingled with my blood
in some mysterious, secret dance,

i start to breathe again,
the world has changed

Rainer Maria Rilke is my favorite of the old poets in the German speaking landscape. I’m doing a spotlight on him and the “A Year with Rilke” blog over at One Stop Poetry today and with the above poem, I try to describe how I feel when reading his fantastic work..

Linking up with Oneshotwednesday – sign up opens 5 pm EST – would be great you join us..

>literary fights – a Rondel

>

wild circling dots dance mad inside my head
whirl pirouetting ink into my night
like wack, black drizzling shade descends my flight
on thin-print, spill-tint letters overfed

and white gowned sheets, soaked blue and pink, drip dead
in copious and literary fights
while circling dots dance mad inside my head,
whirl pirouetting ink into my night

swarm life towards me, turn my broken sad -
tuned song, tie-dye those night knit writing plight
let broken warp threads glitter with delight,
twitch, groan and scream under the words i bled
while circling dots dance mad – inside my head

Rondel structure:
ABba
abAB
abbaA

Together with Samuel Peralta, I’ll be teaching Rondels on March 14th and 21st at One Stop Poetry Form – hope to see you there

This Rondel is my response to the One Stop Poetry Sunday Picture Prompt Challenge. The prompt was shot by photographer JackAZ, featured today on One Shoot Photography Sunday.

>poets

>hunting words to fit a viscous,
fragile mood – fragmented sky and
messy clouds, we’re tastin’

ink, touch my skin – tornado,
cobweb or a twinkling eye, the
artist’s brush, wet oil, alone – we
fly, dark dancer on an empty

stage, crave, make ‘em love us, no
regret, so tear my flesh, press heavy
on my soul and move
inside the turbine of my breath

these verse will win us, tear
our seam and spark; ejaculate
into our heart, splash torrents, lust-
washed cries, we scream the words
that toss and flood our aisles -
whitewater – clingin’, squirmin’ – short

of breath we close this bleeding gap
of unreached stars
to shattered smallprint
amongst rumpled sheets

A special request of all tweeting readers…we are in the running for a Shorty Award over at One Stop Poetry…only some days left to go. So if you tweet, please tweet a vote for us in the #art category…matter of fact, go HERE and vote for…
@OneStopPoetry in #art because…(you must give a reason) we create community in art, we promote youth poetry or whatever you think we do well…

i’m linking up with One Stop Poetry – come and join us, meet some fantastic people over there, dive deep and get breathlessly poetic. Sign up opens today at 5 pm EST

>..and i write brown to stay earthed

>

want me to read it to you?

suddenly i can’t
see the world any more, letters
pile up like a storm surge,
pressing hard

against the walls
of my heart, shouting
for release, colored
black, blue, red, green, pink and i

write brown to stay earthed, watch the ink
drip, flow, emerge, forming streams,
puddles, rows and the birds in
my head start humming, all drunken and

easy feathers, wings against my brain,
long to fly, surf, conquer
vast skies and i open, open
doors, bind letters to balloons

with purple thread and watch
‘em leave, yearning to join
and drift, attaching, hoping, longing
and kissing, loving, i bond,

release, let go while brown ink
keeps flooding
my fingers, desk, heart and touching
the wind, words fall back, bouncing,

tumbling, pulsating and i
net ‘em like insects, pinning them
to white sheets with tears full
of salty deserts cause i know, i know

they carry the scent of rough winds
and blue skies, of thunderstorms and
untamed wildness, of bird’s croaks and
lover’s cries, of hoping & losing like

a hero and dancing like a child
behind a plain & unimpressive
brown-inked veil.

i’m linking up with One Stop Poetry – write a poem, join us and meet some highly talented people over there. Sign up opens today at 5 pm EST