many languages-for Misty

yellow flowers painted on
her heart, she sings songs
in her sleep of pretty birds

plain talk is her favorite
but her abstract mouth blooms
words and pictures we can only dream

she makes rain fly across the yard
one way, then the other
something magic in the

photograph she sees in her mind
Kodak paper that grows tentacles
of light and bright water colors

red for the long way home
yellow for the candlefly fluttering
green for her feet

and in an instant, death comes to
life in a postcard or swimming pool
where steam rises from the warm

water into the cold air
snowflakes melt before
hitting the water

her face is long like a shadow
and we don't know what she is saying

but we still like the way the words and pictures look

feather bed

she sinks slowly into
her bed of
cancer, ignoring
the pain that is-

looking only at the delicate
feathers wedged
in her organs for protection

white silken plumes
translucent shaft pushing
into tissue

whatever was, isn't now

every day is new

so she can listen
to wind and song
float on the breeze

make dinner for her daughter

even if she has to sit
cutting board on the floor
to chop the vegetables

she knows that now
that's what to do

skeleton poem, inspired by Dana and ReadWritePoem

IMMORTALS

We hear grandfather clocks
chime on eons
take liberties with time
elongate days and pinch nights

in the ass smiling nicely
in circles and lines, hands
drip of hours, faces
of generations.

Today, we ride a second
hand. Tomorrow,
the pendulum jerks, a piece
of creation severs. We sway
in time to the tides.

We're not lost here
in the ocean of mortals,
where fish drown in the sea.

We transcend
the ancient idea, time.
Those damn fools the astronomers
thought they could measure us
with the gauge of orbs.
Please.

The mothers and planets
know better.
We transcend the fabric of
home hole
haven and heaven.

I took some liberties with the skeleton.
dana

the truth

it's not written where you
can read it, so stop looking

it's hidden under piles of eggs
a nest no one can find

it's not the appearance of saints
locked in half-witted minds

it's not halos robes angelic
faces without flaws

you can't rescue it from the sand
it's the oil-covered

creatures in distress
laughing at your kindness

it's a lunular anomaly showing
signs of congestive heart failure

it's a place that has feet and hands
paws and claws, canines for biting

it's more unearthly than dreams
that take flight when you wake

it's the white head of a
Mississippi Kite lost in Louisiana

drunk tank

jack-hammering
a sound that's
hard to ignore

now you're tight in the concrete
screwed in

demolish the glass,
cask, and barrel
smash the flask
jug, and bucket

scaffolding's not permanent
only a maze of metal and wood
volatile steps

the world glares at you
you picked the loudest tool

scream from the driver's seat
forget that there is a world but

hope it won't forget you

fuck you

the world stares you down
and you flee

"What does an alien feel like?"

dad asked this after
I told him I felt like one

they (all the not-me's)
are wearing faces and bleeding

under their noses, red and yellow
sunshine pokes from behind their

clouds on a TV not far from
their faces, eyes dried and frozen

they saw pieces of wood from a half
broken home to make a new one
(makes bedtime easier)

but the not-me's are facing ground
constantly walking deeper into dirt

cutting the limbs they stand on
putting together puzzles on the linoleum
(forcing pieces that don't match)

I want to tell them to look up

she has layers

lives in a molten place
heartburn infests
her innards

her skin is new and
bright like white-slate
paper

doorways open

scars on her fingers
swell, reek red

face ruddy, black-pored
wrinkle-ridden

snakes spiral
up her legs sexy
she steps
into the night

breasts droop
stretch like balloon
animals

she scratches with
remnants of fingernails

is taut
is tired
her eyes dance

she feels the veins
on her neck
caresses them
with nimble fingers

puts the fire out with her
arms
embraces what's
next

(I guess this blog has become just as much of a need as my have-to's)

busy busy

Hi folks...
I know you drop by, and I know you have plenty of other work you read on blogs, and I know you will be around until I get back. I want to be producing every day again, but with the amount of work on my plate (5 classes of grading and planning anew), it is just getting to be too much.

I am tired of putting up mediocre work just for the sake of putting something up...I was doing so to get it out, which is good, yes, but I have to slow down for awhile. Doesn't mean I might not be here tomorrow posting something...just means I'm not being able to write as much in this realm right now.

Hope all of you are well, and understand that is why I'm also not reading or commenting on your work as much. I am thinking of you all and your inspiring work. I enjoy reading all of you! I had no idea that blogging would open me up to such a new and huge world of such incredible writers with such overwhelmingly good work!

American Sentence for the day-on privacy

Kitty nuzzles my leg as I pee, reminds me I don't live alone.

Dear Life,

are you trying to scare
me?
cause it's not working

your long sharp claws can
slice and pluck

all my eyes are ready
I
will
still
see

you don't have a chance next to
my family of trees,
roots and branches stronger
than your brittle lies

dying dying dying
I have the arms of
a mother gorilla

to embrace all death

cause there is laughter
in the afterlife

and I choose to
learn from the dead
how to dance

(love, Holly)

my muse

uses letters formed from
light paint
to find her
self in a poem room

she figures on yellow scrap paper
scribble scratch cross dot loop
(numbers and letters look the same)

division signs
plus cross
subtract circle
multiply (exes)
equal signs

writes by rote

she punches keys
brightens the room
one
l e t t e r
at a time

little pleasure

coffee ice cream from the container
scrape around the sides
get the melted part

a glass of water
waiting

American Sentence for the day

Hurrying makes me a bobble head stuck to a dashboard; shit, hang on.