A Man

 

A man of some note,

wearing the planets on a chain

said,

'I can't swing a cat without hitting

a faggot or a 

whore

or a

sinner of some variety."

The birds inside my throat stayed silent

but I could feel

their wings

flutter.

I turned my shoulders to July noon

as a favor

to such small, light riders. 

A man of great learning,

with entire

alphabets lined up on the 

tip of his tongue,

kept them all like pets

and taught

each one

to balance prettily on a circus ball

while he went at them hammer and tongs

to no purpose.

Three times that season,

my eyes

became eggs

and fell to my 

throat/

nest.

Finally, flocks flew filigree patterns

all around 

my head

and a man said, "Harlot! Sapphist!"

and a man said, "Anarchist! Libertine!"

but I was an 

aviary/

melody

beyond such puny mewlings.

Stunt Pilot

 

I had more to say than my skin could hold,

so lent my tongue to red weedy blooms

and with Winter Mother still and cold

Sawed and planed her coffin rooms.

I had more to go than my feet had bones

so lent my skin to a spring-stormed road,

a cowbird child from a nest of stones

by an April wind to the May field sowed.

I had more to dream than Night could carry

so lent my skull to Mare in trade

for a poppy dream of elderberries

and a jar of poisoned marmalade.

I had more to die than Death could sanction

so lent my trick to an urn of smoke

and hid there in sly satisfaction

tucked like a babe in Lugus' poke.

________

for Sunday Muse # 155. 

Mrs. Daedalus

 

At twenty, I loved how you always had to have the wind in your hair.

You and Diogenes, honest, blunt, tactless assholes

drinking wine on the balcony,

grabbing truth out of thin air with gesticulating hands. 

I adored you and that's nothing new.

At forty-five you haven't changed,

You're still the Greek MacGyver,

but it only makes me want to vomit.

Our son is dead

I don't forgive you

and that's the stone fucking truth.

___________

for Sunday Muse #153.

Bucket Of Tar

Here is a bucket of tar 

and a photograph of us dancing

on the head of a pin

shaped from a cloud already burning away.

I know how angry you are,

that you'd love to pour across my border

and make me care, but 

my bridges are mirrors where magpies scry. 

I know I said things, we both did,

with knives and roses in our teeth.

I am Eve with an apple in my jaw,

for whom God made highways and the will to survive.

Take the tar

and make your skin warm again.

Travel over yourself to the next natural barrier,

listen to the river and toss the photograph in.

______

for The Sunday Muse #117

photograph by the amazing Susie Clevenger

The Mercy Of Tigers

My loved ones with their fish-hook tongues 
kissed me, blamed me for the blood.
I took to pulpit, text became
curse you
and you
and you the same.

I took to keeping tigers fine
right here in Shady subdivision.
Code Enforcement lost their minds,
saying no.
god no,
it's violation.

Tigers, soft as angel's nest,
muscled, purring Detroit dreams,
lay anvil heads upon my breast
and striped my world flame-and-cream.

In back yard buried the barbed wire ring,
more notices drift against the door, 
saying
no, just no,
these prohibited things
forbidden, verboten, forevermore.

Tigers sweet as caramel nuns,
teeth smooth and strong as hymns at dawn,
across your tongues devotion runs
in me, with me, on and on.
________

for Sunday Muse 107 .

Mother and Daughter

She said, "Ugly little thing.
Stay put and be quiet. Don't embarrass me."

But the Heavens,
as vast as I was tiny, called to me,
"Little one of mine..."

I flew, and she said,
"You're going to fall,
hard."

Yes, one day I will fall
back into the Goddess's hand,

Wind-blown--
vast and tiny, both.
_______

For Flash 55 at Real Toads. Photograph by National Geographic, available for free download.

 

Song Of A Mad Girl

Where have you been, girl?
Down by the root-rot black-barked trees;
Walking in the bad water up to my knees.

Why, girl, why?
To carry these tarantula babies in my hair,
So they don't sink slow with their bellies to the air.

You know I love you, girl.
The road is flooded where the water snakes slide;
They feel like the arms of the devil going by.

Come back home, girl.
In my room is a hat pin long and sharp,
Like the scorpion tail hidden under my heart.
____
 

Rachel

Gilled creatures,
go back.
Back to the sludge-depths,
down where the dead-roots rise.

What were you thinking you could offer me?
I wear white lace gloves
even while shucking oysters.
They must be bought live, in their shells,
so that they may whisper to their conquerors
at the fateful moment.

All right.
I'm being ridiculous,
but you didn't know me back in mushroom days.
We took our German professor
down to the cold beach.
I have his accent still, in a jewelry box, in a drawer,
a little trophy for me to keep.

Back then,
I admit it, I was toasted most of the time.
I have a lot to answer for,
but I'm not sorry for the road I took.
I had a cute top I made from hurricane flags;
when black-haired Rachel ran her fingers up under it,
I blessed her for it, as the gooseflesh rose.

My universal veil and my bullshit affectations are gone.
I'm sober these days,
no shrooms, no Schlitz.
Listen, I could give a shit less
for the dead things
and the depths.

Let me just stand here,
sailor,
mermaid,
woman of my dreams...
when I sing to you, let me do it in daylight,
facing into the wind
like a sea bird.
______

I got some of my words HERE. Flipside, do you like that picture? I knew you would!

Liar Bird

It looks peaceful enough,
But you know the trouble I've had with swans.

The water looks sleepy, if malarial
And the clouds drape themselves, laundered white and blameless
Over her placid face
In reflection.

One mustn't flinch
At tea.
One mustn't let things slither from one's sockets
While perched stiffly at sofa's edge
Discussing the weather.

I was a mother once myself
For a few minutes.
It was long enough for my heart to slip, like ink from a pen,
Scratched by another hand onto a page I can never retrieve.

Do you see my child
Rolling up from nightmares to bob, gray and sloughing,
Choked in the crook of the swan's white nanny-wing?

I do,
And I cannot bear it.

But let's walk down by the pond just the same.
You can ask me if I'm cold,
While winding yourself nervously in a cardigan.
We can chatter,
And flit across the surface like jesus bugs.

It looks peaceful enough,
This going on with things;
But each solstice,
When I elude the upstanding rotten knot of those who love me,
I am found naked--
Bloody from breasts to thighs,
Snapping the bones of the liar bird
Who stepped up on the bank to preen.
_______

photograph by Margaret Bednar.  

for Real Toads photo challenge. 

Cowbirds

Be reasonable.
Don't die here, not yet.
Besides,
A good French manicure should never be wasted;
So keep fluttering your hands,
Asking for water (good!),
And variously demonstrating that the heart within you still beats.

You think me unkind.
Why?
I stomp on anybody's hands
When I find them hanging from the high wall by their fingertips like that.
If Goddess meant for us to be vines,
She would create us as slender,
Graceful,
Rising things;
Not great crashing beasts
Caught in nets,
Idiotically bellowing.

Hold still.
Be a lady for once.
Pretend that you forgive me,
And I will build a nest from assorted debris,
As birds do,
A little round emblem of natural perfection
That we can call home
Just long enough
To fall out of.
______ 
for Real Toads Open Link Monday