midweek dream

there are endless doors 

inside every one of us

& some of them open

to places we don't want to go

we are mazes we are mirrors

deformed funhouse mirrors

mystified & mysterious

most of all to ourselves

events & actions astound me

burbling creeks have found me

city lights are crackling loud

my heart is quiet as a mouse

perhaps i can forget everything

start over on a hill of snow

fly my self into the wind like a

bright & hopeful kite

invocation

something i will create here

a cycle a season a ripple of thought

like brief patterns on black sand

i have seen enough i have seen too much

i do not know how to be a professional 

or a person or a body or a temple

too many days feel like time loop movies

something eerie is wrong with the air

some truths make living feel like a bad trip

but i am alive & i am getting older

which means nothing except the days

are getting shorter & the secrets darker

world come read my half eaten dreams

like reality they are garish & incomplete

i have no finished drafts or selves

but something i am going to make

of my life my breath these dusty words

something i cannot sell you

lovers

the words are little coins
one of us still dropped

in the grimy well

we are lovers, we are hopeful

the world continues to simmer and burn

on occasion my wrists are kissed 

by somebody who has eyes like stars

what could i have done to receive such kindness?

people continue to die, and to suffer before that

now or later everybody i love hurts and heaves

there is so much that can fail in these brittle bodies

there is so much pain in these hardened hearts

i make my lover laugh but it is true

i feel too much, the great wave of feeling

knocks me over each day, i walk through

it like quicksand, weak ineffective knees,

time thickens around me and i am made

soup, i am loose, i am lost, i have flew.

the calendar flits onwards. loss stays

in the air like smog. love comes, holds me,

loves me, leaves. in the chalk-drawn world

i am still here, i am still learning, i will

learn until i am drawn white and time

eats me, leaves no bones. i will learn and learn.

kiss me, please, and let me mourn.

tip for monsoon

clove oil 

sprayed on every surface

saves objects from 

the relentless armies

of fungus and mold.

who knew the kinds

of things that grow?

little hairs of filaments

gentle dust of spores

if D sprays clove oil on 

their old watercolors,

the pigments may change.

*

two unseasonable 

april showers later,

the mulch is dry again.

but the air nearly hums

with all that held water.

this is where we will live,

in a see-through soup,

until different days arrive.

the rain is many-hoofed 

and persistent. the rain likes

to be heard, to be felt, through

the creases in your raincoat,

in the ankles of your shoes.

the rain knows you are asking

yet again: who will i be 

this monsoon? how will i love?

will it make sense, all the turns

taken in dry months? will it

make sense, the endless days

turning to dust in my fingers?

the rain is thrilled

to blur your vision again

to fill your mouth with water

if you ask too hard

and do not sit in the silence

of thunder and rain-hooves

your skin wet but finally

feeling again

the singing

O broken world

thank you for having

me here & also broken

thank you for breaking

me in this way

long muscle in the leg

aching, aching

vibrant green of my heartspace

muddied by all the grief

there is so much to cry about

yet it is hard to cry

all the grief lives like rocks

in the riverbed of our souls

it is what moves the water 

through, what causes burbles

O broken world

today I cried at how nothing

can ever be perfect or even

just okay: this wild & tender

living breaks me, aches me

yet imperfections are what 

make us, the glitches in genes

shape us: species upon species

& each one buzzing in aliveness

feather colors popping, & textures

& faces, little hairs waving, & all the

delicate physics required to work

an ear. All comes via error. & here

we are, and we can hear.

& how the songs all make us cry.

O broken self, so the songs can slice

through us & beyond. O broken world

you are my heritage & I will learn

to love you, to live you, to sing

word for word

After the thunder rush, in the wide open space
of that moment between us -
I feel the words wandering up my throat.
They come from the sticky honey of joy.
They are only three.
They would tie us together.

We don't know if we want to be tied.
But I must share this sweetness.

I love doing this with you, I tell you,
And my heart widens at the wide truth of that -
intimacy, mother of all pleasure, has been
blooming between us, & I love doing intimacy
with you - and car rides and breakfasts -
you cooking for me & me coming up
behind you to hold you, the full length
of our two creature bodies, pressed up
& warm while outside it pours. Come on,
let's get back into bed. The world has paused.
Nothing makes any sense. Isn't it lovely.

I love doing this with you, life. How many
times yet to fall. How many monsoons,
how many limbs that twine with mine.
Backs yet to discover new scars on.
I am not alone here. There are others.
All heart & guts & ears to the world.
Sometimes their words
line up with mine.
So nothing needs to be said.

it has begun

in the rain

a bowl of oranges. a disco ball.

a cat in a bag. a dusty ashtray.

tree trunk full of little mushrooms.

a purple flower by my purple lighter.

the smiles of strangers, & my faith

now that i know i owe them nothing.

i owe myself - i owe this earth - i owe

ancestors & spirits. i want to live 

my owing life brightly

& with love. i want to pay back

& pay back & pay back 

generously & gladly

by living, by loving

first of all this spirit-vessel.

in the rain this body is moody,

can snuggle for hours. wants

to be kissed in the neck & held

like they are loved. now they know

they are loved. i love them. i hold.

still there is pleasure in the

unfamiliar touch

of another, in iridescent fingernails,

the metal of a lip piercing caught

in a kiss, the serious mouth of one

i might love. i did love, i do love,

i am back to a youth of tossing

love from my basket of love.

have it i have more to give.

but i will not let you take from me.

not now, not irreversibly. 

in the rain i tend

to my kitchen, my corridors,

my balcony garden for hours.

i dig into my compost. i am making

soil, dark & crumbly & rich. 

mud-stained, i nap in the rain,

in a warm hollow in my bed.

here is where it is beginning:

the rest of this, of everything. 

a blink & we are already in it,

in the gluey jelly of this moment,

in the giant steaming pot of time

that never moves & never stills.

there is more to learn & it is

crunchy & delicious to be alive.

& awful & aching. & warm & wet

in this rain. yesterday & tomorrow.

on failing

there are so many zips inside my bag,

& they are all open, like open mouths.

i fumble, try to pull the zipper with two fingers

& i fail, & hurt my little hands, & what is new. 

i fail at loving, at living well, at discipline

& regularity, at tending to this body-boat perfectly.

over & over i fail at perfection, at forgetting, 

at a straight spine, at letting go. i even fail at failing.

the months pile on like yellow leaves at a window,

or dust. nameless and indistinguishable as dust.

occasionally i fail with passion & gusto,

a made-up song on my windstruck lips. 

what else is there to do on this blessed earth,

this blessed & cracked & sticky earth? come

sit with me by a lake or a corner, feed me a berry

& learn how to love me. fail with me & we wouldn't

have lost a thing, we'd be filled with air & float

down the streets, nameless & glad as the dust.

touchdown

every morning i wake up lost
as a lone creature in an odd world

that cycles on regardless

of how i feel or whether

i can make meaning of it all

whether i can make meaning at all

a lover leaves. the leaves arrive.

this story is endless. lovers and leaves.

the sea fills with wind. the sun dips

to horizon, still fat, and vanishes 

at the line even though it seemed

for a second that it really won't,

that the vastness of the moment

would stay breathless and still.

but it keeps moving. it cycles on.

touching the ocean with a single toe

and seven minutes later, no sign left

of the unbelievable orb, just a bright

mist where it was swallowed by sea.

that's going to be me. just some

decades to go, breathless moments,

lovers and leaves, learning and lostness.

the sharp smell of mint in the early morning.

before the rains

In anticipation, everything is dried and reheated
in April sun. Dogs and flowers and sheets laid out

listless in the soup-like air. All the roads are dug up,

in progress, tar steaming at noon, the spinning of dust.

On the scooter ahead of me, the woman's sari

is so perfect, red pleats embroidered with gold,

that I don't speed past them. I follow, let the light

bounce off her fit. It's the best thing to happen all day.

If there is a right way to be, it has not been told to me.

I love too hard     too quick     it does not work. I slip.

The coconut trees shed their leaves like large, tangible

promises. Drying in the heat. Ready to reach the ground.

And me? Some days I am a healthy plant. Some days

a gap in the room through which you can see the moon.

There is something I wait for. But it does not come

until it comes. Until it comes, I will wait for rain.