Matins

It's too early for the day to have a face.
The field is littered with fallen stars.
I am hungry for everything yet
live in a pinpoint space in time.
A single stone is all of heaven.
It is yet a half-hour to the sun.
Birds sing matins from trees.

flowerings

the curl at the edges
like postcards

from eternity
felt as a softening

a communion of beauty
and time

in a late afternoon
thick with whisperings of dusk

the astonishment of
this slow slide into light


photo from "The Life of Flowers"
a photo essay by n.m.rai at
http://www.pbase.com/nmrai/flowermacros

coiled

we wake sometimes
coiled in dread

we have read too much
in the news

and horrors appear
lit like stars in the night

we need the sounds then
of distant trucks

the night scratchings
of birds

reassurance

I sit in the silence
of darkness

catching words
with my tongue

fallen early out of dreams
waiting for the reassurance

of the sun
that I am alive

that the world exists
there is a color called green

that birds do sing
and the walls of my mind

are not the edges
of the universe

terror

terror sits like a toothache
in the brain

stoking fires
till the sweat comes

dissonance

for hours
without my knowledge

I walked out of myself
on the squeaking shoes of words

time swirled
like wine in my mouth

I was a surreal play
improvising dissonance

finally the cathedral bells
in my alarm clock

broke their vow
of silent fears


image: KConnors / http://morguefile.com

as if

the day seems
vaguely unreal

when you're away
as if the world

had caught
the flu

or frogs
were reciting

Shakespeare
in low water ponds

maw

I step like Jonah
into the maw

of endless
yawning hours

choice-less
slid like some

fin-less creature
some spiny self

down the lips
of the moment

barefoot
hobbling

on the crutches
of words

crumbs

dawn darkens
back into night

as hard rains
drown birdsong

and sleep lingers like
crumbs on my hands

rain

rain
washes dreams

down mind walls
as if thoughts were skin

we run inward
in storms

and land in places
unlit for years

tarpaper

if we miss each other
because of sinking boats

or unconnected phones
I will peel pieces of tarpaper

from the day and smell you
in damp walls

Venice

I touch this photo
from long ago

like a footprint
buried under leaves

memories of Venice
in the haze of summer

the way the shadows
of your hands

rippled in the wakes
of dark gondolas

how we watched
our laughter

curl around
the marbled feet of gods

while we sipped the sun
from a wine colored glass

Intrusion

Deep in the backwoods
of my mind

my tongue furs
with the taste of images.

You walk into this world
turning on the tv.

Sound rips the air
an assault rifle of intrusion.

Noise drops me to the chair
deaf now

to the voices
of my silent witness.

Faces recede
like trains on a track

or like tracks
that have forgotten trains.

high up

a round dark shape sits
high up in the crook

of the drain-spout
it wasn't there

an hour ago when
I looked for rainbows

I knock it down
imagining angry wasps

but find only an orange
punctured by squirrel teeth

and smile at the thought
of furred and hidden delights

centipede

my room is a candled cave
where I hunker down

in the pre-dawn
where the sounds in my mind

mingle with the groans
of birds in nightmares

and the creak
of a floorboard

feels like an omen
some rising dragon

or werewolf laughter
leaking out of corners

I forage poems
under memory leaves

from the scent of words
the voices that speak

beyond hearing
the images that float

till the lines arrive
on centipede feet dancing

pretend

time's up
almost

you will arise
and we must leave

and I need
to pack up my head

fold myself
into the day

into outward words
and smiles

close the door
on the wilderness

in my mind
as if it didn't exist

assume the position
this reality

we've long pretended
fits our definitions

images

images flow like sweat
from my mind

in this unregulated morning
allowed to tumble

down my fingers
uninterrupted

untasted
by my tongue

till they puddle on the page
and I meet myself

wicks

we ran away in this long
and convoluted dream

looked for a place
to be hidden

the others still waiting
and wondering

our hands like bombs
tearing clothes from flesh

our mouths like
the hungry maws of whales

devouring and
leaving no marks

till we smelled of each other
scented body candles

burned to mere wicks
and then I woke

stunned in the physicality
of sheets

hunches

we don't think in straight lines
like rulers on a grid

we think in the roundness of sounds
the panoply of words

exhales of the unknown
along the bare skin of the mind

gut hunches
like the burrowings of feral pigs

on long afternoons
in unmapped fields

Mother

I remember her smell
that warmth of roses

diluted by light and sun
and how it was still there

when I bent over
to kiss her forehead

for the last time
her body already cold

now this morning
in the early dawn

there's a scent
of flowers in the air

soft as a flute note
in the distance

a merest whiff
that teases with surprise

though there are no roses
planted here

landscapes

I am surrounded
by the landscapes

of other people's minds
quatrains and couplets

and paragraphs
like dead leaves

till I read them
and they set up cities

and jungles in my head
long trails

like marching army ants
great rivers like the Nile

and planets that roar
as if on motorcycles

through night skies
I am seeded

by their words
in this inner terrain

I only think
belongs solely to me

sleepwalking

I get up hours ahead of you
and wander around

like a sleepwalking gull
dreaming of clams

and the scents
of sunlight

I leave trails of words
in short lines

that we read aloud
with your morning coffee

dancing

I crumble dried fish in the mortar
try to imagine these hard brown bodies

silver bulleted and swimming
like commas of grace caught in light

not headless in a crowd in a jar
salted and hot with chilies

they look like the bodies
of mummies without wrappings

or peat men leathered in bogs
or how I imagine we will all be

given enough time in the ground
and I wonder if anyone will see us

full-fleshed and dancing
caught in our unutterable joys

you

I forgive you
for not seeing me

at those times
when you are deep

in your sadness
or high on your joy.

I stand at the edge
of your moments

with hands cupped
like an empty bowl

too embarrassed
to be full of myself.

Knowing

I forgive you
for not walking
inside my head
and knowing
what I want
before I do.
And I love
the mystery
of not knowing
how to be you.

a hunger

there's a hunger
that bores holes

without scarring
that eats portions

of the day yet
is left unfilled

I unwrap your name
and you spill

through my hands
and stain my feet

chant

silence reverberates
at this hour

when monks chant
and birds are deep

in dreams of eggs
and owls

and my mind hunts
for moorings

in the dusty footprints
of yesterday

wild daisies

we kissed
in the old cemetery

filled with the scent
of wild daisies

felt the blessings of flesh
and we wondered

without words
how it will be

or if we would still know
when we lay underground

the feel of the sun
or the love songs of robins

resurface

It's a cold morning
that smells of death

the news speaks
of eco collapse

in the middle
of the century

and images of
the plague years

resurface
in this species brain

we insist
on denying

as if we were
bodiless thoughts

scurrying from one satellite
to another

becalmed

we're invisible waves
in a becalmed sea

potential beings
filled with desires

that flame like ghosts
without voices

stretched

muscles line up
stretched and on fire

at the street corner of bones
waiting for a bus out of town

in this not young day
and older night

as if I know

I pour the day
into my bowl

along with the cereal
without thought

as if I know
its contents

and which spoon
to use

shadow

I want to touch you
so you walk

outside my head
and make a shadow

and I can look
where you've been

and step
in your footprints

and taste you
in the air

your face

your face is ink
married to a page

I wait for it to speak
to expand a smile

it remains lifeless
like a slot machine

without coins
or an unborn day

cranes

shadows

there are passages at sea
when we see land

at a distance
a dark ghost on the horizon

humped like the back of a whale
with trees growing along the spine

separations are like that
when our longings loom

like night shadows
on the skin of the sun

discontent

this ache
that never leaves

that we learn
to butter like toast

and give it
pet names

and pretend
it's tamed

and step around it
in our minds

waits for us
this divine discontent

that flares up
when light pours

from your eyes
and I drown

bird of paradise

the flower appears
the laughter of God

as a play of color
and form

a smile of petals
that sing

of birds tasting
the sun

and the glow
of wing feathers

a drum roll
of orange against blue

of the unfathomable
dropped into the day

lemons

there are lemons in the sun
big as grapefruits

that drag branches
to the ground

drunken flies crash into
besotted bees

and tumble down
golden skins

wasps plunder
fallen fruit

and I look up
lost in shape and color

with last year's taste
on my lusting tongue

virus

being ill is like sewage
in the brain

thoughts die in the
effluence of a virus

the walls of the day
fall down

one is left naked
on a sterile plain

hunkered down
in open air

curved around
the faltering moment

old photo

I find the old photo
in the pages of a book

and look at a me
I never knew

green tea

you are like green tea
I sip through the day

I want to bathe in you
and taste your sun

you arrive
measured in cups

interspersed
between desire

and the ticking moments
we tread

between sunrise
and sunset

car trouble

car trouble and the skin
of the day rips open

one thread breaks
and the fabric unravels

neighbors must be called
to take us to the grocery

options skid down drains
and we stuff our day

with walkable moments
and daydreams of donkeys

further

I shed my dream mind
in the middle of lines

step into the sheets
entangled in words

in a flutter of images
sticky as spider silk

that fade into air
before I can write them

sleep is not rest
but a journey into further

to this place
of malleable bodies

where I am an eagle
tasting the sun

a call

a call outside the window
from a bird in dreams

cuts through the night
and I wake early

to this solidity of things
that confuses

that eats at the music
in my head

till I am empty
in darkened rooms

inhaling the scent
of silence

shoes

shoes are like faces
some unlined

others painted
with laughter

shoes tell stories
without words

each crease
deepened with wear

a shape-softening
with age

till they tilt at rest
left against right

forgotten
in odd corners

like old people
left to themselves

lines

some mornings
words rush like bees

and cover the walls
inside my mind

till the buzz
shakes lines loose

and I catch them
on my tongue

Dawn

photo by n.m.rai

I wait for you each morning
as I fill my basket

with poems and pen strokes
that rain from my mind

and fall into the day
like rivers from the night.

You sleep though the dawn
as I bathe in the light

and dance with my soul
as if it were not myself.

Spice Jars

photo by n.m.rai


Words are littered
among the spice jars

the dried fish
and ginger

lemongrass leaves
and hibiscus flowers

the scents of life
saved as ghosts

of themselves
waiting for rebirth.

I resurrect time
in the shape of poems

and drink days again
as if sipping green tea.

questions

sometimes
we leap off the ship
to the water
and crash to sand

or we hear songs
in moonlight
that are only rumbles
of unseen insides

or we receive
a blank envelope
in the mail with
no return address

questions mound
like a cone of sugar
in our minds
and draw ants

unease curls the air
like green stems
pounding up
through concrete

there is only
the next breath
inhaling questions
without answers

Juggling

juggling takes practice
the hand just right

the practiced moves
the angle of the ball

the anticipation
of a trajectory

months spent
dropping everything

teachers spoke of
math and history

but never of how
to catch a day