time erodes

ticking clocks, passing days, skin that begins to make the interior mirror cry

as the mind sifts through memories like sand, the grand and the bland highlights

the incomplete canvas we call a life, like the knife -time is ripping the seams of our dreams

what we want and what we have – a broken Eden – too much freedom in our rusty chains

to explain our pain away as just another bad day

age and death stalk us in the middle valley of our 40s – looking back at our tracks

the fragile cracks in our heart, our skin, scars that don’t mend on a human heart

remain a part of us – we cuss and hold in disdain

foot prints that fade, and shrink as we think of our children growing up

not in our belly but in a world outside us – leaving us the lonely ones – the only ones

staring down a meal in a box as the TV flickers, a party of one (minus the cats)

is this the life of a wife? a widow working to educate to liberate herself from a man

a husband who died in the smoke washing away his demons in a bath of beer, or Everclear

one day feels worst than the next – colder inside than out – wearing that smile on these days

to mask a world of pain – time erodes the worst of it into sand – gritty land

beaches for the young and the retired -

but souls are self contained – and no rain can stain an Angel’s eyes forever.

No memory or fear can keep you from living – under God’s blue skies it does rain

and we do hurt – but not forever.

I am the beggar

pills in my mouth, needles in my veins

all to sustain and subdue the pain – oh holy God please ease this

numbness

help the war in me to survive – to limp into Fall, to crawl into winter

my skin marked by a chair, by leather and steel that I barely feel

my heart pumps too fast to last – to succeed I need you – the glue that binds

in the quiet i hear whispers, my own fleeting prayer in the night

in and out of the sheets, the bed, like feeding the dead

i seek answers but the questions confuse me,

once strong for so long, now fading… like a muted sound on soggy ground

Father, Son and Holy Ghost… a dose of compassion please…

I beg you please… harbor my soul in Heaven’s trees, high in branches

in a hollow hole where hurt is unseen, where no one cries and pretends

where no bones and skin ache in the silence at your knees

Oh Lord free me from this bondage and despair, open thine hand to the cold air

and let me fly

for tonight i am the beggar, at your feet, at your crown

on sacred Holy ground, i bow & breathe and ask you to leave me

like you left me at birth, to nurse, cry & die in the warmth of human love.

Birthday Blues

The color of night is blue, a soft shinny bruise tonight

In the cold mist you are a warm soul I call to, see me blue sky calling you

See me lost in a crowd of dancers swinging on stars – hopping the bars – stretched out in cars – lost in limbo

Looking for that birthday wish, that lasts past the candles & tinsel hats, the bimbo’s act surprised,

The lady never survives past the third scene, I mean you’ve seen that movie, too. Haven’t you?

Little girl dance closer to me – rake away the debris of a lifetime and free your mind

I’m the kind who loves forever – but I take all love will allow

Like a pattern of jigsaw you want the puzzle but the pieces never fit

You want the rain when the sun is burning – I’m not turning ’round

I’m waiting for the skater on the thin ice – watching her spin in the same game

A downward spiral that gets you nowhere – but dizzy

Stop wasting time and love me, hold me, kiss me – before tomorrow never comes.

Another year, another blue comet in the carpet sky

Goodbye, sweet love… rocking you to sleep. That image I keep.

Of you in solitude. Like a picture in a wallet, frayed edge and yellow white… goodbye, goodnight.

Feb.4, 2009

outside the iron

A mile away from the sanctuary

Beyond my self contained cage of iron and gates

She ate as we talked, strangers walked round the path

Where the Chapel sits, it fits in its shade

A tiny handmade building to honor God

The late day breeze and conversation passed

As we reviewed a cast from our past – the last lovers in our mind

The difficult kind, the ones now gone from a distant time

Comparing notes to understand to comprehend more

why those doors shut and some do not

we laughed at ducks on the water – on the land

In the sand by swings where children dream and fall

A fence-less park where we sit and admit the cracks of a healed heart

Private thoughts and broken memories that pull us closer, never apart

binding us like books in a strap we overlap in places

I smile here outside my cage – exposed – but not endangered

lost in a fearless kiss – a fond embrace – a taste of more to come

Sitting by my angel outside the gate… chewing fries with almond eyes

My girl – My dearest girl – My soulmate.

neglect

Cranberry red in the tree tops, my warm socks are old

thin and folded to my ankles, I have goose-bump skin

But it is not that cold – not like the chill of old – the days gone by

The ground is dry cluttered with clippings

But the freeze dry of frost is lost on the calendar

Oh November morning, where is the misty gray

The hoods of children, the winter ache, the grass stained yellow

Why is the warm breeze licking the skins of dry leaves

Who believes in the ice melt? The Bible belt does… the end of time?

Oh November remove your coat, feel the warm sun’s rays

Just days before our Thanksgiving – the living we celebrate

The deaths we contemplate – the grace of our God blessing our meal

The poetic feel of the Greenhouse effect, to die of neglect

A murder of seasons, killing Mother Earth

Walk among the red leaves, crimson crispy reminders

That change is as old as the dirt we stand upon

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, the rusty remnants we rake

we all take for granted, are the seedlings God planted

That sway in the southern breeze of a nuclear winter

With no defender to hug them – no sap to rise or fall

When Revelation comes to call us all, like sheep in a pasture

The faster we live – the quicker we die – and why?

tattoo blue black

In the Memphis air rolling the ramp beneath my chair

The echo of clapping – hands slapping in time

July heat frying the concrete bleachers of the Liberty Bowl

My soul needed this – this trip into Tennessee

A chance to see and hear the sounds of life again

Wading out from pain- the stench of the breath of death

I’m no longer main stream if I ever was or ever will be

I’ve come to sit with the sun splitting my face

In half shadow on deck two – the roadies, the crew, the view

on stage in sound check mode, I smile and sigh

Over 80 thousand stand on the green the scene is a gas, a blast

A bare foot man in a black hat takes the stage

A thunder from the Peavey speakers, tweeters, bass

Roaring into the haze of afternoon – chicks in bikini tops, heroine spoons

On the shoulders of kids, all of us hemmed in to listen

As Skynyrd electrifies the noise – with blues rock poise

For hours on end they rise and fall in tandem playing, swaying

Until the sea of light turns the coming night into deafening chants

Then Allen cherps the sound of a free bird on a Fender’s strings

And crying eyes turn to cheer, the bittersweet of being there

Of watching the house fall in the tall shadows of amplifiers

Hearing the Southern anthem from near the roof of a purple sky

A lion’s roar – A bird in flight – A lost soul found – sacred ground

She now rides my arm – she keeps my soul grounded – tattoo blue black

on a white man’s skin – inked in – beside the bad scars she flies

And somehow defies the odds that keep me here – alive.

acts of God

On the stage of life one act ends another begins

Season’s transcend the weatherman’s babble

Like the rattle of a fool, this talk of cool fronts

In big fonts on green blue maps, perhaps he’s right

That out of sight, just beyond ear shot fall is coming

Wandering our way from the West, or is it a best guess

A mess of rain or more of the same drought

Without a doubt it is impossible to know until you feel

The drops of Autumn rain and crispy leaves

On sagging trees – this grass will not turn again

The sun has fried it yellow, a sallow stain color

And the wind is no longer from the coast – a roasting torch

But long shadows extend now from the porch

To the holly bush and Sabal Palm – it’s prongs fritter

Dry, cracking, splinter… as summer lays dieing

We watch it pass at last our hearts sighing

Another season, another reason

Oh Earth slow yourself down, this spinning round

This loss of control, this growing old.

signs of sheila

Gypsy woman, nurse to mankind, potter by design

Molding your world to find, a treasure by the sea

The company of a man near the Mississippi Sound

Biloxi beach where the waves mark the graves

Of many years lost but much has been found

Like shells and nails, Pieces of hotels among the swells

Blue water green, with a sheen of aqua sky that rides

The morning tide near Long Beach til sunrise

Melt the clay, throw the soft sand into your minds eye

Turning it with healing fingers that sculpt and ply

Your name is on Bosarge Road where you sleep

Where you raised your girls in the salty air of Gulfport’s shadow

Under leaf-less trees you wonder and survive

Making chimes & plates & dreams come alive

Red headed stranger in my cousin’s skin

You begin where most women end

Freckled, smiling, gypsy ways

Even Katrina’s waves left you to turn the mud into magic

I thank you from a distance for being so close

Closer than most, because everywhere I look all I still see

Is signs of Sheila by the sea.

 

 

invitation

July rumble of thunder and evening rain – came at four

Crackle in the sky – a downpour soaking the grill

The steam from concrete & hot black steel – our meal

simmering inside above charcoal sizzling fat steaks

Marking them in black stripes like prisoners in some

Old movie – they smell a smoky scent – not yet wet

medium rare – yes dear – I hear you

Then it stops – the rain drops – the abiding breeze

A stillness except for dripping trees with shiny leaves

 A yard soaked in wetness, green Bermuda -

Petal’s from Crepe Myrtles like watermelon confetti

Strewn on the walks – on the patio

Like some Romeo had come to call -

The meat hovers above the flame, no more rain, no more rumble

Only hungry people sipping sweet tea

Two days from Independence, home of the brave

Land of the free – The South we know and love

The rain we knew since childhood – the kind that needs no

invitation – because no party is complete without it .

 

gritty girl on orange beach

Go to sleep sweet child – breathe in Magnolia’s deep

Under purple skies and sun dried sand castles near the sea

Where waves lap the shore endlessly – repeatedly gnawing the banks

In salty air, where the sand sinks woman, child & man

The band plays old Jerry Jeff tunes under a hazy moons watch

Kiss me again like you did before, give me more love

More love than you ever gave any man, sweet child pucker up

You gritty girl in a sweat stain bikini – have you seen me smile

Like this when I’m not with you, sitting alone on Orange Beach

On sandy blankets my grandmother made, my mother saved

You move me like the waves – like the roaming moon – the dying sun

You put me on permanent vacation, my sleepy eyes close

lip to lip, nose to nose – you give me life – you give me peace

A sweet release – A feather on the wind that the angels send as proof

That love isn’t always wasted on youth – a truth we understand

A gift we hold in hand, in heart & soul.