Hello

I have written a variety of non-fiction prose – memoir, humor, opinion, satire – and poetry, but very little of that lately. Most of my best poems were inspired in workshops at or through Idyllwild Arts, with Cecilia Woloch and Norman Corwin as mentors. As I said, not lately. But it was an important time in my life, where I discovered my right-brain hidden name. It is not hidden anymore, as I am using it here as a nickname. I also abhor a deadline, so this challenge just seems tailor-made for me…Susannah

Desert Valley

Desert worn weaves platted through,
Silk soft with cactus pricks,
Covering tapestry and promises to fly
In places disintegrate at touch
In others bare fist galvanized rough
Such a foreigner to this landscape,
Not sure what ground will meet my step,
Months of cloud covered silence gave me a gift,
Deep inside I feel this call louder than ever,
Like a madman being the only one who can hear,
Ignoring the pleas of all those close
Knowing an oasis blooms beyond where they can see
Dowsing rods cross over that open wound
Cards blow fantasy across me
Even precious metals meant for gems is but a rock
Such a rock there is, but inside a greater splendor.

Am I the only one who reads all those word maps?
Reshaping verbal shards into a whole,
Projecting puzzles in aerial signs,
Am I but one of a team pondering every clue?
Seeking to find a way towards an inner grail beyond,
The more I tread the more I am alone.
Who else examines small markings
Knowing that this creature does everything deliberately,
Why leave marks no one else will ever grasp
Or care to grasp
And even if they grasped would be unmoved.
It waits for one who is meant to see
Each test just meant to show they truly are.

They all drank and thrust at the river in the sandy valley
Still nothing compared to where I went
But still they come and drink and do not see,
They drift and pass and still I remain,
Everyone around thinking me quite deranged,
They don’t see what I do, and I cannot even explain.
Such a wonder as only luck in a whole life can bring.
Waiting for failed goldpanners,
to retreat after a month of mere stones.
Knowing not what they truly seek,
they sift and sift then move to other pastures
I drank at every source I could,
I can only think of that one sweet taste
The only place I want to bath
Even if it be the hardest to reach.
Unlike every other,
the taste only grows stronger from yearning.
Nothing sadder than drinking another,
Chidded by bitterness and pretending it was the same.

I lay out right beside that creek
First the beetles came and stung at night
Then the snake intoxicate my blood,
Leads me to the precipice
Yet as the fool I did not fall
Held up by forces I dare not admit
Then the wild sides snarl and gnash
The more the forces thrown to push me away
The more they betray how precious they guard
Another day and more suitors roll through
Now I learned to not even see them,
They take what little they can actually see,
None touch the part this star struck location offers
Alone knowing that the whole valley quivers
In time with my breath my thoughts and my release.
Knowing now having stared so long
That it thinks of me as much as I of it
No matter where I am since I first stepped foot
I am present basking in its wonder.

One day I will open my veins
Laying back in that gentle stream
Let it seep out my life’s potency
Embracing its fluids with mine forever
Then there will be no distinction
We will flow and settle together
Only there can my worn body be washed out
Transformed and pulled under.
Then will it know every word was real.

Take me

Thrusting faceless hidden in hair
Why are you here with me
Forgetting who is laying moaning in front
Replaying moments I was inside you
Her grip cast myself inside you again.
Why months later is it still like this?
You cast every feeling you had inside of me.
Opened me to violation through disregard.
Are you condemned to fantasise about
Those men who heartlessly violated you?
Your every desire spoken to me
replays what they did.
Take me in my sleep
Take me in the shower,
washing my hair.
Take me doing homework.
Slip my clothes to one side
Tell me to be quiet
Hold your hand over my mouth.
Sell myself as she sold me.
Make me feel worthless
Use me totally – disregarded.
Exciting to raise adrenaline
Putting pressure on a wound.
I wanted to meet you here
To be gauze to your hurt
and bridge to your SELF.
I refused to leave and disregard
Angrily you cut me off
The pattern must continue.
Cocaine plaster building a wall.
I am left holding that savaged child.
Loving in the darkness
Contaminated for you.

Beloved

My beloved
I know you want to go away
I will love you from afar
So many wounds drain you
Dates haunt you
The whole world of harm
Has taken on my face
Yet I have my own selfish blame
You tell of so many plates spinning
One falling will bring them all down
Forgiveness is a task too far
In my sleep I cradle that little girl
Tomboy strawberry blonde
More like a twin than a sister
Cast our two seven-year-old souls
Bags in hand off to explore a river
Camp with knives away from the hurt
Safe in our imaginary games
Which continue behind these heavy suits
Only there will you reach for my hand again.

Away

Such a letting go occurs when you are away
Empty staring into my imagined possibilities
Does little potency of mine impact you there?
No longer a passenger on the train
Left at the station lost luggage around
Experiences and tastes not mine to know
Joined in love yet distinct utterly rendered division
Your life flows to its own orbit, conjunct for only mere moments
I know the gravity between us is stronger than most
Yet many parts of your whole deny me thrice
Other devilishly want to break all
Do those miniscule things beckoned not to
Seduce the innocent and smash down our diminished state.
Rage and rave and rip away – we did so many before we met
Now we are quite distant what difference can it make
I know niggling inside is the warmth we share
That heat continues and evaporates untouched.

“Id like you to write…

… about giving all control away. Being a passenger not having any say in where the car goes, how fast it goes, which route it takes to get there. Full surrender.”

Purified ebony in musk polished calm,
as sky and liquid carries off without distinction,
No motions of air transgress a hulled cast vessel,
Without light perforations adorned shadowed firmament,
Encased verging entombed yet womb-like-comfort,
Be it Styx or Tiber outstretched my limbs do go,
Sinews loosen as all regard rendered needless,
One last mere choice in renouncing,
No mere float yet no sought glide,
Yielding faining reliance entwined submission,
Drift along provocation of welling tranquility,
Softening compulsions to prevent whatever may be,
Facade of self dissolving through the division in hourglass halves.

Semi revolution of eyeballs upwards glance,
Fractured being looming up above,
Physical presence containing nuance,
Differing momentum inside conflicted dynamic,
Calm curiosity as to which can show,
Transitional responsibility of unbridled rule.
Laying down totally exposed allow the animal free reign
Yet this uninhibited freedom to strike brings forth a lick,
Wondrous gift like a marital bed no barrier to love or harm,
Trust being constructed on an offering of mutual risk,
Reflections crystalise possible when movement ripples cease,
What we see determined by we have known,
Past violation ripped autonomy like new babe from mother,
My current state drifting like a mobile to calm the same.

Unturning unhandled shovel digging for me
No finger raise towards the sky as the dirt falls down
What will be will feel like an end here down below.

Peck

Chisel striking downwards
Every motion quite light
Together eroding much
Individually each cut make sense
Yet together evaporating all.

Constant tide washing against
Unravelling all buried beneath
Exhumed and exposed
Still I stay washing away
Not sure where else to go.

Apologies croak throat too dry
I found there is indeed a limit
Which I seem to reach now each day
Every breath so chastised
Threaded into a constant dark.

Cloaked behind every peck
The cockerel crows three times
Continually expendable
Everything wrong done for me
Striving pitiful to remind the good.

Broken in, ridden for show
Prize pony trained to be sorry
Hope you feel safer now
An endless outlet here awaits
Throw all you have, and see me remain.

Today

Monochrome illustrations in hard-to-paint folds
Wealth brimming silence calm bustle outside
Compelling cringing urges to escape
Wild unbroken horse mental whirl
Shattered and whole, broken sheet vacuumed packed.
Frosted preserved and taunting at me
Never again, rings such dull hope
Considering possibilities not outwardly spoke.
Still cast down besides, so accursed
I know I truly want no one else.

Walls

Casting spells at your altar
Calling for me to become untimely real
The loving ‘thing’ you never had
and despite all here I came.
A shot came through of purest love,
That love not felt by us for years
Commanded to me by some inner calling
Encouraged and beckoned
On I float and come so close nearby.

Then come I come and whats all about,
but where I arrive no welcome’s near.
A fortress avoidant and walls most bleak.
Why call on me now for this?
While every intimacy an invasion seems,
Eros spread so thin so no where sticks.
In destructive rampage I reach out.
I meet every snare and trap you laid
Wounded and cut I stagger through
No drawbridge lowers and no moat abates
Yet on I wander through and through.

How dare I care, how dare I exist
Every step I make is a terrible wrong.
Boundaries drawn and redrawn to keep me out.
I falter and I stutter so confused of whats about.
If finally you kill me off
then know you must no more may come,
chances so precious we must all change,
as prayers are only answered from above.

When one stares so deep into mortar stone
then blinkered forgets the world beyond.
Taking comfort in the harshest materials,
as harsh breeds harsh and constructs this here.
I glimpse behind this place with momentary wonder,
As did you when kneel you did and made your incantations.
You sorcerer’s apprentice cast so well
and water comes and water comes
no wall you make can keep it out.

I trip and knock defences here and there,
show the hollow insides of idols near,
divesting of what we truly don’t need.
If such spells could cast us dearly so,
then maybe it was this same current called on
which now comes to push these barriers away.
Cling not to stone or wood or clay,
Wealth abounds wherein we pray.
What a curse to finally get what you invoke,
Accusing the universe for the horror it provoke.

I really never meant no harm,
but felt this call with perfect calm.
This confusing and confounding tear,
glace up our stars have crossed so near.
Yet come as asked and shunned with fear,
How could this magic have brought me here?

Why do you wish for the last thing you can handle,
I am not a golem made for you my dearest.
I cry myself to sleep and say,
here I am my promised love please stay.
My life goes on without unlimited scope,
my will was aligned to meet your plight,
I trained my whole life long time
conditioned by all I felt and knew
to manage to still survive,
to come now and know you.

When amputate me you did,
I have nothing but faith to hold me here,
yet I know you threw your purest wish for us.
I see inside that far tower there,
where waits a prisoner bound by herself,
walled in and chained up so tight,
needing the merest gift of light.
I wait outside these mighty walls,
with arrows thrown and rocks down too,
with calmness and sure footing of place.
Surviving for that one promised day,
when exhausted ramparts will fall down,
and our children openly spring forth,
and then I know my heart does say
that we may live forever more.

Blindfold

Blindfolded not knowing where she is again
Who she is with, how she feels
Does she enjoy this?
So tied I can’t go to her
I can’t reach towards those eyes which so often turn away
Does this have any meaning?
Why does it bother me so
If it was only work why couldn’t she not kiss me before
Trust up enveloped and resting on a ledge
I have to accept this if we will have a chance
She is hating my constant closeness
Guilty for how she knows I feel.
What is left here?
Do we enjoy each other
or just provoke need in each other?

After struggling through a wilderness of a conversation
Drowning in awkward tundra
Pretending to be calm and fine
Throat choked up
She needs to finish getting ready for her deed
I hear another abandonment
I am such a mess
A small wave crest peeps upwards
Saying she loves me before leaving.