The discourse lies in the dust like fragments,

and I asked myself about beauty and freedom
and these golden wings I daily clip to keep myself grounded.

I dreamt that the Wind carried a whisper from someone's tears,
inviting me to lie in its ocean of hue and calm.
But dreams are a cripple that Jesus does not heal,
the epics of yesteryears when questions had no legs
and there was a peace we did not know,
the snow-soft bones of which trembled beneath the fragility of words.

Sometimes I wonder whether this human inside
is a phoenix, or whether the skeletons in my
closet, closed, clothe me in the cloths of colorful array
merely to invite these strangers to dance
in the moonlight obsession.

Are we the embrace before the sunset?
O lilac, riddle me this:
Did the blood turn violet yesterday on its own accord,
witch-like, this cackle on fire with hysterics,
when it seemed the shadows laughed
and I was the silence in someone's eyes?

a more human space.

"We were contented
with constant things, and stood there
in the interspace between world and toy."
~ Rainer Maria Rilke, "The Fourth Elegy"

***********

Let me say, old children,
let me say to the angel-crumbs,
as I flee to play
in the attics of dreams
and yesteryears,
that you, whom the angels embrace,
you who feel the hand of God
on your knee--

you are clay and kama
and I envy your buoyancy.

You age like a bottle of wine
in the belly of an unknown virgin,
you sing of the swelling ocean,
you are pirouette and hunger,

while I, cosmic astronaut,
orbit round Babylon and its whores,

I suck the marrow from the steeple
and spit the stained glass nativity in the offering plate,
I arrange the shards in patterns
that reflect the Virgin Mary and her gestation.

I weep over my thumb-sized spirit,
bruised from the slamming of Heaven's door.

it's not

---

(really) the way you hold your pen
as i imagine an ocean holding its waves
(it's difficult to keep such a
force placid when something
untamed, something yours,
beautiful, must be born),

or how the buildings and business-people
smolder into complex forms and shapes and
angels and demons
models
begin to dance feverishly, gloriously,
in your head beneath your unruly hair,

nor is it the
sex so suddenly saturating
veins and words,
how peaceful and turbulent it felt,
to be one,
or that your touch awakens my skin
(your lips a new drug
and i am your junkie)—

but maybe
(perhaps),

it's the way your eyes stripped off my eyelids
and reached inside for my heart,

how we lay breathless and
my right ear
it felt wind and air converge with
meaning from your mouth

.—and they were earnest gardeners—

that, when the dandelions of
youthful hurt and distrust were so delicately
plucked,

i felt a world collapse under my stomach,
i felt a new city begin,
i saw stars and choirs and,
yes, skyscrapers,
and merry go-rounds and
ice cream trucks played joplin's "entertainer"
and a freespirited child tapped its foot—

—but mostly,
mostly really,
i felt,
and i felt real,

and i couldn't help that,
when you pulled my heart through my eyes,
it got stuck in my throat and—
(and i can't get you out of my head
and i smell you on my clothes
and i will miss you in the morning when you are not asleep beside me)—

and out tumbled, "i love you, too."

whimsical unone

whimsical unone,

childlike, your lovesong,

moon be your sunbump,

and light be your day--

lonely poor allone,

fear not the dark wrrumm.

sun be your yum yum

and soft be its nay--

now now, small noone,

noone is someone.

smallones be stardone

and bright be their way--

chin up, oh smallone,

ones be twos be ton-tons,

tons shake their bum bums

and fear sings "lalei!"

"lalei glum grum chrum!

oocha boo chum chrum!"

so goes the ton-tons

so unones can play--

play, then, sweet unone,

un to your allone,

all kiss the noone--

big world is soft clay--

mold it, dear smallone,

laugh and be sunbumped,

now you are lovesung, and

may smiles always stay.

Fallen from Allegory, Pears

from window pane
allegory fell
pears of
blue danube played
in minor key, slowly;

wind, personal
-- soul excrement --
ejected by thoughts
needing room
( 6 x 6 x 6?
sometimes we do not appreciate the
architecture); 

then
I,
eye, and another,
casual passerby,
voyeur,
thought life -- when
boxless, not eaten for
breakfast with skim
milk -- fast,
or at any tempo or heat,
must cost you dearly:

Pears do not come cheaply,

at least at this time of year.

Soon fallen pears have twins --

for the thought of pane brings the Winter.

To the Daughters of Sceva.

Somewhere I went blind in the conversation --

between the epidermis and the angels --

somewhere my stomach lost its way

amidst the tangles of a prayer and an

agony, an anger, and all I hate; here is a scar; there, the wounds:

all they breathe -- can we not form a circle, brethren,

an imperfect oval to scream at our oppressors?

But the images burn deeper than the words:
I took all the precious porcelein perfections,
pictured the angels skating across their smooth, body-washed shells,
saw the angels' traces, the less-porcelein pained faces,
the ethereal ballet,
the euphoria of one salt water ocean masked by another,
the liquid rose smiling at the black heart processional
projected to all as a cherry blossom joy.

I know not how many angels can dance
atop a pin, nor less do I know
how many have danced upon you --
what red slippers they wore, or
if they performed Swan Lake and the shell was the swan,
or if you ask for encores,
or if the show sells out -- and how often.

Yet I know this night hurt.
I know the heavens broke loose with a shout,
and archangels, legions with blessed wings,
trumpets of the spirit (the spirit is the sword),
they descended tonight upon my red tremors,
they did a pirouette and I have lost breath and
appetite, and I feel silence, clammy as death itself,
I have a need for Tylenol, and let me effuse:

Can I not cast out angels
nor summon the demons at my command?
Can I not have arms of such love
so as to encircle the universe?

1 Ryan

I see the youth,

playing dress-up to put on a show,

to say, "Watch me conquer the world

in an eight minute speech and then,

Judges of the World,

maybe you'll love me.

Maybe I'll be human.

Maybe I'll have worth because my skirt flows to my knees and

I can communicate your Ideals.

Maybe my parents will care, then.

Maybe you'll see through my make-up

or my father's antique suit.

Maybe you'll see through to my soul and

love me for who I am."

But I never loved you for your mascara, Children,
nor did I love you for your words.
Usually you make me laugh,
all you children parading around as
grown-up monsters,
playing make-believe,
as if the omniscientknowitalllawyerwhoworshipscostbenefitanalyses
was a human who loves,
who feels,
who longs to ride the winds of heaven
and taste romance's heartache...
like you do,

you, who cries your soul into your hands at night,
when the game has ended and parents sleep,
who is anorexic or sexual or depressed
or raped or lonely or angry or
merely in need of love because
the world has sodomized you and sometimes,
when you feel as if some pills would help,
sometimes you wish that God was dead.
But He is not and the night will only grow stronger,
so:

Children,
I'd rather you be a slut
who falls to her knees for grace,
than the superficial lovechild
of the superficial leeches.

I'd rather you taste the death of love now,
to know who lied through their fearful teeth,
than later when you realize what's fantasy
when you're forever chained to reality.

I'd rather you spread your wings to fly, ...and fall,
than clip them to please the vultures.

I'd rather you'd mature
so these words would not stir your passions.

I'd rather that the clamours of the masses would please you less
than the whispers of God.

Love, Children--

Love is curious.
Some say it is a many-splended thing,
like oxygen,
or strawberry shortcake on a warm summer day.
But it has little to say on a cost-benefit scale,
nor does it move the economy

yet it moves your heart
for your heart thirsts for Anyone,
a someone who cares to know you're hurt.

Let me say, therefore,
that I care little for your dress-up and make-believe,
that speeches will end and
beauty follows the path of tears--
down your cheek as life slits your wrists.

Children, I love you.
Yet I love you beyond the games,
beyond rules, and
beyond communication.

I love you for your very selves,
in the inner depths of friendship,
where parents cannot reach it or harm it,
and love will never die.