Flowers (Prompt 5)
If you love them as they are
leave them alone
Don’t pull them from the earth
When you do, they die
Don’t place them in vases
let them exist in soil
let them breathe in life
let them live in light
not in water
Fill your gardens
not your countertops
I hear your store bought flowers screaming
give me back what’s mine
demanding life to be returned to their lungs
until their last breath
then you replace them with more…
Visions, Hour 5
The lights flash
Dull red flares of a dying sun
One last power surge before it all shuts down
Acid tears flow, eroding structures of the past,
Etching rivulets in cracked, graffiti-stained concrete
Cold desolation under blackened clouds
These are after-images when I blink my eyes
The insomniac hallucinations at 5 a.m.
These are visions…
Abandoned freeways littered with rusty metal skeletons
Broken storefront windows howl through jagged glass teeth
Fiber optic cables snake their way through cracked blacktop
Electric lines coiled on shattered sidewalk like cobras, waiting to strike
Waiting on a dead grid
A decaying city
A dying sun
A newspaper, yellowed with age, dances through the streets
A solo post-apocalyptic tango until the end of time
It catches a thermal and rises, climbs to disappear into smoggy black
These are after-images when I blink my eyes
These are the fozen stares of abandoned tech plants
These are documents in briefcases of war profiteers
These are the corroded stainless steel memories of a not-so-distant place and time
These the shadows of a world over-civilized
These are the bombs dropped on my subconscious
These are visions, arrested in early morning word form,
Before the sun starts to rise
Together, we
Big powerful horses
loudly stomp their hooves
deep into the earth
beside the creek.
Afraid, I take refuge
in a prairie
filled with saplings and boulders
and watch from afar their mourning ritual.
The horses are grieving – they lift their heads
and begin to neigh,
their voices echoing about me.
Softly I begin to sing
my own song of loss.
I look again at the horses —
their dappled hides,
their flicking ears,
their gentle eyes,
and my fear lifts
and I run toward them
and I sing to them
and I touch them
and we dance together
under an enchanted sky.
Dreams (Poem #5)
I know it sounds crazy
But dreams do come true
When you wish upon a star
Your heart’s desire begins
You set it free
Watch as it takes flight inside you
Every day with a goal of joy
You cannot bring me down
You do not have a say
The love and passion within me
It will seize the day
Work your hardest
Love like there is no tomorrow
Take risks
Be passionate
Do not hold back
Your dream may not come when you want it
But it will come when you least expect it
Spend every day thanking God
The past is to learn from
The future is not promised
But today is the present
A gift from above
So take that
Run with it
And never stop dreaming!
Seeing You Again
So many years had gone by
It didn’t feel like you’d missed any moments away
We talked
You encouraged me
And when it was time for goodbyes
Arms extended to embrace you in a hug
Grabbed nothing but missed air
An alarm sounded and you instantly vaporized,
Like a magician, you disappeared
And I awoke with tears in my eyes.
It felt so real
You looked and sounded so alive.
I was fooled once again-
It always happens when dusk turns to night
You’d think I’d learn by now
You won’t be here, come morning’s first light.
Hour 5
The pen is heavy in my hand,
its shadow is a monster on the wall.
I finish another letter
and set it next to the weeping willow tree.
It disappears when I reopen my eyes.
Rain polka dots my hair
and the sky and I cry together.
My hand is tugged and I glance down
at a red haired child,
eyes the color of the ocean.
I hold her face in my hands
as if I were holding my heart.
Words appear on her forehead.
Forgive –
The rain washes away the second word
before I can read it.
She is gone when I start to speak.
The pen is cold in my hand.
This letter is for her.
I leave the letter where she last stood,
holding out my arms.
Road Map
Undress me
Slowly
With those amber eyes
As the hours slip away
like my clothes on the bedroom floor
take your time on my curves
get lost on them
a road map with no destination
I Run…
Hour Five
I Run…
I run
because there is nothing else
I run
single-mindedly
I run
never out of breath
I run
without time to think
I run
without strategy
fear overwhelms me
fear defines me
fear thick as fog
fear dark and menacing
fear chokes me
fear propels me
fear surrounds me
I run
until I somehow find
…anger, resolve, bravery, strength, thought…something
I turn and face the huge dark monster that has chased me for many nights.
and…poof…it disappears before I even see it.
Mukti (prompt 6, Hour 5)
The tension recedes
as I lift away.
Nothing binds these snowy wings.
I sail high as the eye can see.
A speck of dust,
brilliant
in the sunlight.
A crystal
fracturing
into color.
Three times
I circle your face,
before I vanish.
At last
free.