Love, where have you gone?
(With the dawn, on and on).
Bed bedecked with dew,
tears for you,
old and new.
The noonday burns bright
(blinding light, golden white),
Eyes closed can still ache,
wide awake
as lids shake.
Dark becomes the dusk
(twilight’s husk, moon a tusk).
Moth nears candleflame.
What’s your aim?
Who’s to blame?
Lonely as a star,
(falling far, where none are).
Gleaming on the sea,
You and me…
Let it be,
let it be.
Would that I could find
that pacifying panacea,
dumb beast that I am
trampling clumsily through the Heal-alls
and crushing underfoot the purification
I seek so blindly,
the fulsome fragrant flowers
so close within reach
were I but brave enough
and sure enough
for the spread-petaled trespass,
but as the donkey with idiotic hooves
I cannot clutch at this garden’s bounty,
though caressed by Titania’s fond fingers
and dying as a fool in the arbor of Love.
Upon an island, you and I,
near the center of the ocean,
a storm brewing fast in the sky
and the waves hasten their motion.
Angry waves from the ocean’s heart
batter inland with such wrathful force
as could sink this isle, or a part;
the tempest in its destined course.
We must have the words which can serve
as breakwaters against such tides,
to soften the Truths and preserve
the shore where softer sand resides.
Truth was the thing that built this land,
the waves piling up sand and earth,
but warring waves can also strand
two lovers in the tossing surf.
See how the waves break long before
surging over the coast we share?
Let us speak softly on this shore
and let waves crash everywhere.
Another eve passed alone
and I ponder my cold bed,
the night air chilling to the bone,
the hearth of day dark…now dead.
Single candle, you burn low
on the window sill nearby,
your flame is small, your wax aflow
as the teardrops from an eye.
Do I fret the solitude
and its all-too-silent hours?
Do I linger in this dark mood
of a wine that quickly sours?
I take turns about my room
and recall your lips to mine;
and in that mournful midnight gloom
I can see the full moon shine.
It shines afar—ghostly wan
with the daylight it borrows
from a fickle sun that has gone
to happier tomorrows.
Away! Away! Flee you far
from whence you oft wished not leave;
you were as constant as a star—
now dew athwart spider-weave.
My looking-glass shines no more,
nor can it with thin moonbeams,
nor my eyes, nor my smile, nor your
gilded glamor in my dreams.
When I shine, now, I am pale
with the distant light of you,
you are memory of a tale
I tell myself: I love you.
Your scent no longer remains
nor shadows from your light;
I cannot clean these linen stains
of wine, and blood, red on white.
Haiku
The blinds half-open,
neon light, her nude body
striped like a tiger.
Rhyme
Blinds half-open, the neon light
clawed through to the wet, steamy bed,
her bare breasts were striped black and white
with hot light and cool shade. I said,
“Do you always play with your food?”
She giggled, wiped froth off her lips
and said, “When I am in the mood.”
Legs spread, she gyrated her hips.
Lounging like a tigress she growled
as she pulled me atop her pelt.
“Feed me,” she said, her moans so loud,
and the moist jungle could be felt.
Raindrop down the window pane,
slow-sliding upon the glass,
as a teardrop spent in pain
after storms have come to pass.
Two birds hop along the lawn,
cardinals singing acclaim,
two red birds praising the dawn
and the youthful Springtime’s game.
Raindrops are infrequent now
and the wet cows chew the cud,
the thunderhead calms its brow,
though the fields are still aflood.
Somewhere downhill water flows,
cresting like a Sunday hymn,
singing of what loose silt knows
when taken from where it’s been.
Silent, the old farmhouse squats
within the vale, near the stream,
while the widow ties in knots
two ribbons within a dream.
The ribbons are scarlet red,
once entwined—now unraveled,
undone by the restless head
in which they twined and traveled.
She tries to knot them anew
with sleeping, that act which frayed
the bond between brothers who
never thought such love would fade.
Tossing, turning, she ties knots
with the sheets she shared with men
whom were foremost in her thoughts;
both together, now as then.
The cardinals sing no more,
but claw at one another
for a lady they adore—
tearing brother from brother.
Free download of the kindle version until the 26th. For people who enjoy reading supernatural stories and poetry.
Love is tearing wishbones apart
and then wishing that you had not
because the wishbone is your heart
and the wish but a merrythought.
Not unlike the world-wearied tongues
of lovers soon wilting away,
the petals fall from black bough rungs—
a pink clutter of yesterday.
Love Haikus
A garroter’s tool
strangling so sweetly, the noose
twined by heartstrings.
When we fall in love
the rushing air tricks our hearts
with belief in flight.
True love is grounded,
not airy-headed; we feel
no impact from falls.
Lust Haikus
Infatuation:
the sleight of hand that robs us
with counterfeit coins.
The Questing Beast roams,
its voice like a hundred hounds—
Lust always wanders.
Pestle and mortar
grinding redolent flowers
into a poison.
Tangleroot And Tressknot 