Softening

Within the world’s troubled color I awaken,
pushing through the gates of sunrise,
the tense night pictures 
disappearing inside me.
I fight the knot forming inside,
the ropy chord after its own blood,
my muscles taut as clockwork,
And I soften.

 

I go outside and sit with my dog,
and drink my coffee beneath the clouds
littering the lawn.
She licks my hand for comfort,
time is of no concern to her.

 

I start to bloom.
My colors melt and run
and I hear the vocal struts of the birds,
as they pulse the stirring air.
I day dream of swimming through a river,
running water glittering through my hair,
as if the water was singing to me 
and I was bottomless too.
The ohm of the day
like roses damp 
with half forgotten rain.

 

Just bend a little 
I tell myself,
just breathe in the sun.
Look long enough beneath the surface,
and you will find connections everywhere.

Then you can move forward
with the day.

Sitting Behind

 

I sit behind my thoughts sometimes

And watch the fiction play out

all my selves beaming,

the starstuff and the alien

in my derelict garden.

 

Like shucking an oyster,

earth splits open

satisfied with seeing.

The camouflage of self

emptied of words,

releasing the grip of my echo,

The butterfly dance

that is life.

 

This is my quiet place,

this is my sanctuary.

It is where I let the rainbow mist

clear the fires that are raging.

The silent but steady cog that directs all motion:

a handful of glimmering air,

a bundle full of shadow

bash themselves against the air

as the light shines

from distant stars.

Dark days

 

I knew he was dead right away,

my gentile approach,

my footsteps holding

my lonesome breath,

tip toeing on the white carpet.

Stealth walking,

bit by bit,

halting and racing,

muddy brash footprints

in my place of precious, breakable things.

 

I saw murky details,

a purple face

like lighter fluid throwing flames

into the air,

burning the sides

of my neck.

The fetal position

of the body

looking timid as small child

on the lap of Santa Claus.

Only I wasn’t thinking,,

I wasn’t feeling

I was submerged in a spill of water

and drowned there.

Struck shock, still,

a porcelain doll.

 

Seconds later, I raced into action

Days, eons of go, go go—

in 10 minutes.

Time had no patience with me now.

I was dry and raspy,

like no fluid was left in my body,

just meat and sinew,

bone and action

choppy and blocked,

hoping this was a joke,

a wry fantasy,

holding my heart captive.

 

Count nine months forward,

the lights are still on.

I am slowly unzipping the grainy shadows

that lurk like Vaseline

in my mind.

Trying to wipe away memories

that still breathe.

 

I am porous,

breakable,

Smothered under everything

that needs to vacuumed out.

Still turning the wheel wearily

and grinding

the sharp glass

into sand.

Awakening

The spring leaves dream by the creek
Of knowing resurrection, 
Gathering trance like with frequent intermissions,
Bedding iridescent beetles and butterflies
In their pillowy bosom,
As the pink-orange dawn 
opens its eyes and wags its tail.
. 

I have stayed up all night for this,
The creek rippling its song
Over smooth stones drinking
To their heart’s content.
I see fish swirling, and bubbling up
To taste the air, then plashing back down,
Billowing an echo on the surface
Of the water.

 

And the birds with their colorful gowns
have wakened,
Bright and warbly,
Trilling tongue entangled lyrics
That beckon me like a young lover,
And send adrenaline to my heart.

 

This grand simmering hypnotizes me,
Clears the spiderwebs behind my eyelids,
Makes my mind creep softly down
Into the wisdom of the day..

FEAR

 

The ego is greedy,

it clings like a viper expelled from the garden

screaming aloud

like a split atom.

Prancing on my belly,

another color begging me

to perform, to memorize,

my drama,

bleeding inside

like mountains of

tongues slapping in the dark.

 

The nerve at the center of the bone,

blooming in my skin.

My threads of indecision,

as I hang by my fingernails.

A voice screaming for me to jump,

a stagger

in my eyes.

 

Something shaky and terrible,

the sour reality that rolls over and over

in my throat

dreaming myself afraid so

I can save myself.

Only the bone-deep children echo

the bloated words that drift and drift

in a razor sky.

The ghosts of old lovers

who smile from the jukebox,

with eyes

that can never close.

 

You have choked me,

But I gave you the leash.

 

And now I want it back.

The skeleton’s meat and blood

wringing from me,

graves of soft earth that rise from the rain.

I can see you now,

 

So you, hated twin,

you are a radio fading out,

the old bones of lava beds,

a thousand miles away,

a dead language,

a tomb.

 

I finally woke up

and turned on the light.

RM Nov 2018

Mona Lisa

 

I was first in line to gaze at you in a crowd,

and then I read your life story and gazed at you anew,

and finally saw you as a real woman,

yet not of this world.

It isn’t that strange really,

you married at 15 to an older cloth merchant,

and gave birth to six children (two you lost),

yet those are details.

Your face, your eyes

hold a clairvoyant ether,

like a moon expelling her dharma.

That mysterious smile,

a biologic drift seeking interpretation

from a haze that doesn’t obscure the view,

but makes it palpable.

 

You are an opera without music,

that holds a stain of smiles centuries old.

Would champagne spill from your fragrant mouth?

Articulation and pleasure to follow?

Or are you modeled on the cadavers of Davinci

A yawp of slender neck and jowl

as he systematically carved every curve of you perfectly?

Caught in an unchanging instant.

a silhouette sex,

a woman from the center of the universe

who just wants to left alone.

 

I see you holding wings in your smile

your surface a shy demurring;

thoughts dividing underneath

that try to hide themselves

but glow in private.

A mystery even to yourself.

 

I see plentitude and patience,

and a fierce conundrum of the soul

in the tempest that was Florence

of wars, and more wars

and lingering animosity

that doesn’t touch you.

You, an intricate ambiguity,

as life roils on

around your feet.

 

Finally I see you

reinvent yourself with flair,

hear your cadence as a prayer.

A slow fade,

a breathing wind

of gateless air.

The custody of knowing

you are never going anywhere,

not in this life,

or on the other side.

 

RM July 2019

Fear of the Ocean

 

The day is pushed inside out

as the sea waves claw at me,

I prance and hop through the flushing,

a dummy stiffness overtaking me.

as the foam breathes me in.

The green

undertinge of my face deepen,

while the upswells of pink

in my cheeks,

compel me to keep going.

 

But I can’t stop

the lapping in my brain

trying to suck me over the edge.

The deep bruise of pinpricked

jelly fish scraping against my thighs.

My fear is a ghost eating her shadow,

a tapeworm of the psyche,

a hallucinating fever.

the click of Russian roulette.

 

How can I redeem my gamble?

The whole cornucopia

of barnacles and seaweed

trying to float into me.

I will be remade,

I will transmute

the chilled wind and suck

that long drawl between land

and pulse, a becalming

of holy water,

as the waves dance and sing.

 

I will swim finally,

and join a thousand lives.

I will sluice through what was once

a terror,

leaving a fraying ribbon

through the sand dunes.

I will reach in and grab my beating soul,

and be healed.

 

RM Sept. 2019

As I walk into the dim room,

a movie is playing

and my mom is watching intently.

I am there but I am not there,

an ephemeral planet in the making.

A spectral vision.

A light and dark murky chiaroscuro.

An envelope.

 

Where is this place, this mansion, this spaceship?

Who are these people really in

this other reality?

Drowning in the refuse,

morphed back into pulp.

I can’t see for instance:

my mother’s searing invectives

my father’s unraveling tongue

This is not my home.

A breeze falls from a nearby tower and has no place to go,

I strain under the awkward weight of

a branch swarming with worms and bird droppings.

A bowl of foreign coins.

 

Then I walk into another room

and my sister,

a desert away,

is watching the moving images intently,

like a mirage.

Again I see my obscure picture on the screen,

holding forth in animation

Only someone else is talking.

Falling stacks of mismatched dinnerware

with nowhere to go.

 

Both rooms then divide and multiply

And all are foreign and cold.

Every director imbuing the action with a silver tongue.

Space is like an accordion,

but I can’t dance.

Palm trees where there should be pine.

An Undertow.

The sweet air that cant ride the curve

Or it will be killed.

Night that floats away.

Their own private paradise,

as my heart drains like sand from a shoe.

I can’t get out of there fast enough.

 

Until I walk another room,

And see my own movie playing,

and finally it all makes sense.

Awake to warmth and singing cells of slickness,

my skin tingles with meaning.

Everything that ever happened to me

hanging in the air.

At last time keeps its promise to itself

as my shadow slips under the threshold,

and all the little citizens of me burn.

Here I am free,

For awhile.

Until I get another hat,

Unill I find my way out of the current.

 

Until I realize

I can go for popcorn at any time.

And never come back.

 

RM Jun 2019

Sometimes weeks come unbidden straight from Hell or from a place I never want to visit. Ever. This week hit me in fours.  First a startup company I had invested in went belly up after just hearing a few short months ago it was healthy and ready to sell.  That was a hard lie to swallow and I was boondoggled. The next day, while innocently eating some sugar peas, my mouth caught on fire, or at least one tooth did.  The pain was overwhelming and unrelenting and after I isolated the problem tooth, I knew I was in trouble.  After a 7AM emergency trip to the dentist-yes-it was the worst news, after antibiotics a root canal and crown would have to happen-OUCH in every way!  But wait, that’s not all.  Then my car went.  My trusty 98 Subaru started running like it was racing at the Indy 500 and that was not on purpose.  So the car was in the shop for three days and I had to beg for rides.  I have never been big on being stranded in my home.  Nine years of constant deep snowstorms in MA made me feel being stranded forever. Finally I had a hip X-ray on a routine physical-I had a bad feeling walking out of the room when the attendent told me “I was lucky I was slim.”  In that context that couldn’t mean anything good.  In short, I need a new hip-my second one.  Now I hope I am done for a while.

But all was not in vain because I learned something very valuable  from a new friend recovering from a stroke.  Life is a series of “strokes of luck” and every situation gives you a chance to grow and learn something new. So be grateful for what you have… the beautiful things that happen every day even if you are not paying attention and overdramatizing every event instead of seeing it’s potential.  Those moments are the most precious and truly there for you if you take the time to look.

I took the time to look and will keep looking.  I am very grateful I had that lesson and will back up and attempt to live my life in gratitude.  That is my world view anyway.  Sometimes I just become dumb and forget all I have.