I Lost My Page

I feel pressed
flattened
like flowers between
the pages
of a heavy book
on your dusty shelf

you press me down
perserve me
your weight on top of me
smoothing me out
holding me here
as I try to float
out the door

you collapse on me
you feel me worming
squirming
pushing to that grey edge
pushing myself nearly over
twisted like leaves
caught in an updraft

you flatten my world
your eyes
pin me to these pages
to these sheets
my fluids on your fingers
I am drying up
my soul blows no more

I am pinned
our hair twisted
I buried my heart
beside my wounded knees
you watched on
and hated me

I won't stop loving you
even when you toss the book out
when you tear up the petals
when you spit my name out in a curse
I will love you
and flatten myself agianst the wall
to hide nameless evermore

Beauty (My Father's Hands)

you say
'i am too bruised for you
i can't survive myself
look at these angry scratches
this swelling place
where would you see beauty
in these fists?'

you know
my father came home every day
with darkly stained hands
from chain oil
and axle grease
smudges on his face
dirt in his eyelashes

he was a mountain of man
to me
his hands never clean
shaggy beard
wild hair
booming laugh
as he roared into the yard
in his one tonne chariot
with two flat tires

everyday he came home
with sawdust in his hair
and huge hands
lugging a chainsaw
at his side
tossing his dirty bucking pants
over the living room chair
much to my mother's displeasure

everyday
he came home
covered in the filth of working men
rode the big machines
once came home with a branch
from a surprised falling tree
embedded in his leg
bleeding all over the seat vinyl
as my mother sped
the hour to the nearest hospital

every day there was sawdust
and blackened hands that never came clean
and splinters
and little scrapes where the sparks jumped back
and burnt his skin
and bruises from flying sticks
when great trees met the ground
at his shivering command

and everyday my father was beautiful to me

if you can not see the beauty of yourself
reflected in mine eyes
then you don't know who I am
and will never see where I came from

I Hate the Word

Is love not a vile and formless thing?
Is it not all tripped forward in flesh
hastened to punished hearts
and be quickly thrown up
like two fingers down the throat?

I vomit these words up
like Clean Christians
applying hot pokers
to naked pagans

I twist 'i love you'
around snarled lips
with a tongue so bruised
in deep purples
that only spit and bile
come to the surface
and gurgle out around
my crooked teeth

all like a buzzing
of collected bees
under my wane and pale skin
and in silk covers
all wrapped in finery
face applied
and held still like granite
I find no comfort
and spew blood upon white gowns
and smiling sycophants

I spit up love
oh wretched thing that you are
I spit it up
onto the lapsing scenery
the collapsing dreamlessness of morrow's day
where garish sun sinks to Death's kingdom
and lovers become anchors
to my blackened vomitous soul
in the dark depths
of frozen oceans on the point of the known world

tread not where monsters touch
the faces of fair maidens
and in my fury
I am blind
o'er I catch your love all up
in all but these crooked sharpened teeth
and tear it to little bloody rags
on the edge of your fraying mercy

I cough up 'i love you'
in great black chunks
and gouge my green eyes out
for this is a vile and formless thing
this horrible love
that has found its way
to the bottom of my bottomless heart

Honey-Eyed

it was a crippled candy cane promise at best
the idea blooming in my mind
seeping out the edges
over the side of the bed
into a syrupy puddle on the floor

your arms wrapped hard around me
daylight an unwanted dream
I thought my thoughts
pouring honey in my ears
attracting ants marching up the wall

two by two they come
two by two

my world is dripping
sugaring my thighs into a sticky froth
spreading like peanut butter
your fingers find the way home
and you lick your lips twice

give it long enough
and sap becomes amber
deep within the chambers of my hive heart
queen of bees decorated teeth
my candied dreams pressed up against your back

deep breaths come
two by two
by two by two

and I stop
breathing that is
the river in my dreams thick as molasses
dark, rising up under my eyes
tearing down my face like frosted nightmares

my voice rather sticky
I find your flaxen skin under my fingertips

and march them
two by two by two
up the side of you body
slide my hand over your ribs
rest upon the flats of your belly
sticky fingers
sticky ideas

I close my eyes
thick in love
and you slip out the end of the sheets
sick of candy
pressing ants under your thumb
swatting bees from your eyes

and two by two
by a whole horde of fucking twos
I slip back down under a river of molasses
this wicked thing to do
opening my mouth
full of the blackest sugar
and scream

Lucifer In My Kitchen

dear Lucifer
tell them I love them
and when I close my eyes
I see them
and I smile a little
and I cry a little
and I dream up
a big black sky
telling my self
great big black lies
and little red truths

Lucifer, o' dear Lucifer
tell them I think of them
I took them home with me
I spoke them
to secret places
and I loved them
darkly and perfectly
for just a little while

Lucifer, my sweet Lucifer
save my kisses for them
tell them where
I am hidden
tell them to come
and find me
before I set this place
on fire
and fall asleep in the flames

Lucifer, my black king,
tell them
I was looking for them
and I will wait
until miracles light the skies
all red
and I finally
find my way home
to that dark kingdom
in the wilds

A Rust Coloured Season

when our skin met in the summer
you let your jitters get the best of you
laughing nervously in my ear

but your hands rested on my hips
as you followed my swaying rump
up the stairs
to a room that only existed outside
under a canopy of green needles
and sun dappled cheeks

I spent those summer nights
sitting nakedly on my deck
uncaring about my spying neighbors
drawing on my pipe
watching the smoke swirl into dim images
in the moonlight

I watched the deep green ivies creeping up the wall
listened to the little tippy tapping of the water
down smooth rocks
letting myself drift back to that white beach
watching the sun touch your skin with a deep brown
as I lay in the sand
and cursed the silence

the surf took my heart
and sent it to sea
on a boat built of drift wood
and floating seaweed
it is still drifting out there
bobbing up and down with the fishing birds
sitting on the tide
diving after
little fish swarming around the rocks
looking to nibble at your pink toes

our skin shining in the dripping wetness
as we stood on the beach and watched the sun set
listened to the waves lap at our souls
someone had to say something
but the words did not come
the silence grew up
and covered over my mouth
my tongue
wanting to gently touch your lips
stuck firmly inside my head
and sealed with the heat

the ocean called my name
as the moon rose
told me to go home
where I could dream of your arms
your trembling lips
your velvet skin under my fingers
in a haze of gentle drugs
and creativity set lose
on an unsuspecting world

sexual predators

dieing cities suffering the last of pale moonlight

decaying

in the tangle of limbs
the gentle lattice work of window frames

cast on upturn faces
flushed

with temptation to flicker fingers
over the gentle humming
of predator songs

where shadows embed
themselves in words

and unused emotions
stand in witness
to the last violence
committed on these endless shores