Storm riders

"Out here we is stoned, immaculate."

Jim Morrison carves an altar out of a grey Sunday and I
am flooded
by colour making my fingers itch, words
piling into stalagmites
pushing for release

Lizard king, slither out now, I
can't focus in the deluge. My
eyes ache for wool's soft tug, I crave
Pattern and rhyme, need to hear
A mosaic of line and shade.

Spattered and bruised and ragged,
Not immaculate,
Not stoned. I need a funnel, a filter, a
Priority system.

When this gladiator war is complete, I will lapse into
re reading cookbooks and knitting books
Lamenting my spare time.

Monday haze

I know to escape the labyrinth I must turn always to the right, but
A bright flash of red turns me left,
The smell of coffee, the crunch of gravel, a tumbling shapeless mass of green fuzz,
Light jazz, loud punk, taste of sugar-caramel, taste of garlic, taste of bitter melon,
Soft shag carpet, sharp rocky path, cliff over a vast ocean...
Where
is my
right turn again?

Bus Time

Bus Time.
Thoughts tick,
  Pen clicks,
    Time sticks.
Bus Time.

Bus time:
Phone out.
  Cell-shouter,
    Smelly pouter.
Bus time.

Bus time.
Co-eds preening,
  Disturbed keening,
    Cars careening.
Bus time.

Bus Time -
bell rings,
child clings,
drops things.
Bus time.

(It's odd, I know
It should be so, but
Poems help the anger go.)

time

Most unappreciated gift, spend
pound-foolishly, profligate
on Not To Be Missed TV, witty
word-swords crossed with imagined opponents,
puttering, tidying, erranding for all we are worth,
making ready for when there's
more time.

perfect bus teeth

Cancer  ads with perfect smiles, banks
Luring with colourful infographics and charts,
Superb, sophisticated and simple typography
Elegantly leering over the frowsy
Grocery-carting lower classes.
The masses with earflap hats, strapped-on toddlers,
Earbuds and ball caps, stolid faces,
Bundled in brown and black and gray.
Stoic under the smug wordplay.

Feeders

Glutted on the ephemeral morsel of aesthetics.
I crave experience's savoury meat.

Fill my soul with the real
Gorge me with substance
Let me sup on the tangible for
I starve.

Today I am a hound

Today I am a hound.
Rich beany bitter coffee
Ozone-burnt air computer fan
Toast.

Exhaust, burning dust, warm car
I can't drive if I hang my head out the window.

Sweater rubs strangely on my hackles as
Man in next car leers.
Growl.

Today I am a hound.
Eucalyptus hand cream stops by to sniff out
Last night's drama.

Air conditioning meeting room,
Sweaty meaty hands strikes submissive with Brylcreem.
Howl.

Leashed to my cubicle. Feign work through
Open-eyed nap. Internet. Squirrel!

Released! Car bounds happily home.
Yoga mat wriggle. Smokey incense tickles.

Today I am a hound. Fed. Petted. Rest.

Opal Dance

It's an opal dance,
A milky flailing of limbs
A rocky place I skip across

Red leaves black the sun but
I burn and whirl.
Velvet slime caresses wrist
This moment is mine.

And you, in your hard garnet orbit,
Drift away through obsidian space

Savage, or Boredom of a Saturday Afternoon

As my teeth grind, I long to lunge
Rip the throat out of today
Feel its blood warm on my face,
Frenzy in my limbs.

I want to fly, not lazily aloft on breezes,
Beating wings into a downdraft off a
Volcanic cliff, pursuing the darting promise of prey
Diving into the hard air, feathers rippling,
Savage.

I want to man the cannon,
Plunge on smashing waves towards
The placid pleasure craft, smash it,
Splinter the hull and suck the treasure
From its marrow.

I snarl at the sun, enfeebled by lethargy that captures
Only my body.
My spirit broods, paces,
Savage.

blue

all the baking and busy and shopping and fierce intense face-down
in cookbooks will not
make this 1982
will not allow me to climb that plane, live on that
wavelength where all the past and present are future are in a line and you know they
are all one, all now, all to come, all in the past.

my poor limited logical brain knows
knows too much
knows too well
knows that I am not 12, that santa is not
poised over mexico
that a magical entry to a new world is not
wrapped in tinsel under my tree
that the six faces that go with this date
this night
are not here

won't be here

today is just a day

a post-solstice step along the way, crawling back toward sunshine.
That too, shall come
This too, shall pass.

Reunited

The lies they told us
  in high school
           the lies that divide

That clothes matter
Interests define
That you and I
Could never see
      eye to eye.

Labels strip identity,
Make you feel separate from me.

But we are music,
You and I

We fly,
Rhythm and beat,
A blended harmony

We are poetry,
You and I

We sigh,
Meter and sound and
   Raw emotion.

Our colours break prismatic
   from this black
     and white
         and grey color bar

Together, we are more than apart.
A whole, complete beating heart.

Rainy Summer

Writing happy poetry is HARD!

It seems the rain won’t stop

This summer

And I won’t see the buttercups

Reach for the sun

I won’t see

Diamonds on the harbour next to the oil rainbows

I won’t see you

Tanned

But the rain sparkles on your hair

And your eyes are all the warmth I need.