Crazy Little Thing

For Joseph. The poet in me is no longer starving for inspiration.

Enter Lightning Boy, I

I was running for cover when you struck me.

Unexpected whip crack flashed my retinas, constricting pupils, and rang in the echoless open field. Heart stuttering, knees sloppy, my back kissed damp earth. You opened a door in the churning sky and walked to me on a path of illumination, offering a healing hand that blossomed open to show me forever. No conditions; just a bouquet of love and peace and rationality served on a blessed silver platter.

Enter Lightning Boy, II

I, the toiling
mathematician; you
the chalk dust 
burrowing in fingerprint
ridges – together
we harness genius,
the blackboard
of our calloused hands,
and drive toward
the indecipherable
equation of affection.

After numerous cold years
stinking of sweat 
mingled and hollowed, 
these hallowed 
walls of our minds churned
and finally
the variables click into place,
numbers flash together 
like old friends.

Orchard

Orchard

My heart is an orchard, with soft,

loamy soil to dig your fingers

into. Each tree has a name, and

each name has roots, some longer than

others, some younger still. A couple

trees have been selected for

execution, roots and all yanked

from the earth, my heart. These pits, these

empty spaces eventually

get filled again with dirt, and a

sapling is planted anew. A mark

is always left, however; some

rooted veins remain.

---

Friends. It's been a while. I apologize - life grows busier with each day. 

This poem was prompted by an event that occurred a little over a year ago that rocked my world. This was my analogy for the results. Some rare poetry for you today. 

Enjoy!
V

Dear Future Husband

(à la Robert Morgan, Dark Energy) 

Love me like Jesus loves the church.

Affirm your commitment with words;

songs or poems or handwritten

letters. Buy me office supplies:

pens and notebooks and notes that stick.

Curl my belly with your witty

morbidity, and don’t forget

to let the dog in at night. Live

with passionate ambition, tell

me every tiny detail while

I whip up two mugs of fresh brewed

tea. Be a reader, sponsor my

love of language. Activate your

soul’s depth with exercise; please join

my yoga sessions later in

the morning. Don’t make a habit

of spitting, and pay attention

to the sidewalk under your boots,

the drumming patterns of raindrops.

Remember to treasure me all

of our lives, for someday, darling,

when dim stars edge the ebbing blush,

I will return to ash and dust.

Journal Entry//Red Flag

April 7, 2015

9:25 pm

The Pit

Braid a rope of I-Love-You's,

fasten it to futility.

The streetlights don't reach down here - 

neither does your hope.

Surrender

Don’t struggle against the tugging of your

heartstrings even if there’s a millstone

tangled in them. Surrender; 

this portion of your prize is lost to us all

            despite the aching desire to pluck

            your splintered soul from the mangled jaws of

            forsaken love. Don’t gobble up the

blatant fallacies served with lying smiles

though they are glamoured and irresistible.

Don’t allow folly to seep into the creases

of your brain or under the warmth of your skin

where my insecurities and desires lie waiting.

                                    Instead of harboring that cracked millstone, heave it

up over your shoulder and plunge it into the ocean
            to see what kinds of friends you’ll find at the bottom.

Death

Devastating black oblivion, and
entire souls stripped from bodies, or
an endlessly open flower garden, and
turns for angelic transformation?
How will it happen?

In darkness, or
never-ending light?

Distressed screams of your brothers, and
enkindled, rotting flesh saturating your senses, or
a peaceful quiet empty place, and
thick rosy aromas filling your head?
How will it happen?

…

Where is your mind?
harboring thoughts; though
even still, void, with
nothing at all?

How will it happen?