sunday muse #166

 

when i walk on two legs

i feel nothing

intruder blindfolded

fool of the world  

if i crawl like an ancestor

chest to the ground

feel the earthbeat, make it my own

mother’s love flows in these valleys

swimming in shadows

white sapling and raspberry cover

i am thirsty and to find her

wander the blackjack

follow rockweed paths, follow the clover  

tree moss and columbine

into the cold river

i drink

and sunset explodes the sky

white water catches fire

i see it

feel it

but i trade my language for the soul of a wakan

so i can’t speak it

but for the hair of my neck

and growing glow of my eyes

everything

alive

like mist after rain

stars on frozen snow

bluespruce and sage

the way the redtail lands on a tree limb

and folds his wings

song of the summer reeds  

and the taste of the river

posted for the the sunday muse

illegal trombone serenade

 

artwork "when the moon is fake and your mermaids cry"

copyright ziggy zagmyer

jalopy dreams · Illegal Trombone Serenade

个

(heads up! listen to the poem here)

illegal trombone serenade

artificial heartbeats

television flickering endless shades of blue on walls crawling with artless intent and too

many signals crisscross a confection that reeks of evening news and cheap booze and old

shoes that squeak on streets too real spinning forever-cycles of red-yellow-green-red-yellow-

green-red-yellow-green-red-yellow-green

 

but we won’t know what any of that means

until dogs remember their feet

and

 (here we go again)

                                                the moon

the dream compass

the calendar stone

always the poet’s prisoner

always the lover’s lost butterfly

the lunatic’s faithful equation

(because she is a lightning rod of chaos

and my heart is static cling!)

so up we go

up illegal ropes

                up balloon strings of hope           

                                                up-up-up

over the murky dark misery

over the neighborhood pawnshops

over the angry traffic cones, lonely lamp posts

over the big helzberg diamond billboard

                ring finger pointing to the moon

climb up to the roof of the city and leap

                                reach out and grab that glory-glow

by the toe

but the moon is always fake

a riddle, a clay pigeon, a sleepy dreamer-fever

her big fake face reflected in every apartment window

i try to kiss each one

                on the way down

(all the way down thinking maybe next time try a butterfly net

or a magnet)

 

but dogs remember their feet

and when i sneak away, shameless midnight gut-punched retreat

my shoes squeak

maybe just like

playing trombone 

posted for the open mic at: D'verse

30 years of poerty

jalopy dreams · pretty waitress perfect of fools

个

(heads up! listen to the poem here) 

pretty waitress perfect of fools

she’s a lovely cold sculpture, marble nude with her head cut off

a sexartwar reality keeps the rattle snake that bit her

in a peanut butter jar, like voodoo

 

she’s a painting of a painting, a revlon reproduction

venus on the half-shell, phosphorus and effervescent, arms wide like

happy hour and everybody’s glow in the dark expectations

                                                                coming true

 

she wears a uniform of fingerprints, her angels in aprons overshadowed

by dogs playing poker, howling her attention

she cleans up and collects whatever beerbelly heroes will spare

nickels quarter dimes, her rent money jingles

 

she’s a time-traveling daydream, her mind leaping thru wormholes

body serving smiles here, head swimming in future grace

 

on long bus rides she rearranges mental furniture (symbolic sofas

in relation to symbolic windows, grand pianos on top of glass coffee tables

                on top of brass buddha candle holders)

                                acrobats and ballet daredevils   

 

she stuffs her soul into shoes too small, stretches her body into double shifts

overtime in underground nightclubs, basements full of hey-dudes

                                and hey-bros in hey-ho-lets-roll rattlesnake bliss

                licking each syllable- hey girl

                                                                you-wanna-git-wit-thissssssssssssssssssssss?

 

                she’s twenty-seven now, still standing in a doorway, evolving

revolving in and out of fear and doubt and circles of dead inception (sex-

art-war-sex-art-war-sex-art-war-sex-art-war-sex-

art

war)

 

see her scrubbing tables? see her bleaching her reflection?

scratching thru the surface the varnish comes unglued, see her

wash away? the moment splits in two, a small voice becomes urgent like

some twisted edvard munch screaming

                                                                                screwthissceneiwantout!

 

put the wardrobe back on the mannequin

pose it in the kitchen, the display window

                back up on the pastry tray

slip out of her mona lisa cage

where the black earth washes her feet

                 removing miles of bad road

turning stone back to flesh

winter-thawed and summer-bound

                                aprilish

singing reunited gaia-heart

                                (i am universe

                i am

                                universe

                                                i am

                uni

                                                verse)

see her holding the moon in her hands?

perfect

of poets and fools 

posted for the open mic at: D'verse

wild blue yonder

ok, so for the "risk" challenge over at D'verse, i am attempting to write a train wreck, which is not a style of poetry, it's just a train wreck, except with airplanes =)

 

flight seven seventy seven destination

                                                       side-of-mountain 

 

as the flight attendances take their break in the baggage hold playing dice games

the pilot performs stand-up in first class and the last green olive on earth swims

in his

very dry

mar

tin

i

meanwhile

 

                                (the strike-ready snake will not hesitate

 

the headlights of the tracker-trailer will not blink

 

                                political pundits scream theater in a crowded fire

 

                and all the hamsters trade their hamster wheels for happy meals)

 

the inflight meal was a can of worms

the inflight movie was a documentary on the opiate effects of inflight movies

meanwhile

all the corporate risk managers travelling to the annual security convention

block the airplane emergency doors wearing parachutes half-eaten from last year’s

                                                                                           plague of miller

                                                                                           moths  

 

and the traffic courts paved the road to hell with endless debate over the insignificance

of seven hundred and seventy seven good intentions but can’t remember where they

                                                                              put their 

                                                                    prayer beads                                                                     

meanwhile

all the doctor’s doctor their doctrines of the dying patient’s last rite to self-righteousness

 

                (righteousness (noun) a highly volatile substance manufactured in the mind

                dirty burning no alternative fuel always blowing up in someone’s face)

 

meanwhile

a mountain looms

big

purple

majestic

with big purple arms open wide beckoning come to daddy

come to gravity, drop your f bombs over denver and set your engines

on fire

hurry back to earth, a big dumb rock, but also a mother

suddenly scolding us: if you can’t solve your problems yourself, then i will

                                                                               solve them

for you

which is great news for the cockroach dreaming of opposable thumbs

  

the sunday muse #163

 

life so far is recital

posture

finger positions

her mind so far, precomposed

                cello lessons

                formal arrangements 

                smile and curtsey

she is young and can’t quite feel strings ring under tender fingertips

pedantic to the process

                silent to the soul

suddenly hits a wrong note

a sour thing (but… it… feels… so… sweet)

another blunder

a deep note, from a deep place

                                                and now she knows for sure

she’s not making mistakes

                                she’s making choices 

she is young and this is her first rebellion

 

presto change-o this is her song now

                                breaking notes chained together crawling like caterpillars

lightning racing up and down the spine arching high exploding butterflies 

joy fills her face spills out her eyes thrills the fingers teasing tangled strings

            presto into the strange-o she tests her range and finds no

                                walls nothing to stop her

nothing to stain her rearrange her she can shape herself into herself

                confess each flaw spirit-rich flesh-raw dialog with god

she tames the beast she brings the boogie everything spinning spinning dizzy

 

she is young, and dizzy is the gift she gives the world, gives herself, that and

                permission 

                to be

 

for "meeting the bar" Symploce – the combined use of anaphora and epiphora

 

night is always blessed with regret

and blake street is quiet 

no traffic crashing into puddled potholes

steam vents breathing only smoky ghosts

alleys are quiet

storefronts are silent, sleep washing the windows

 

discarded newspapers are quiet

no wind pushing them into corners, no one mugging them for answers

horoscopes, weather reports, peace on earth

 

dumpsters are quiet, but thoughtful

a filthy history fermenting

lampshades, old sweaters, soup cans and beer bottles (bad novels)

((broken pencils))

plastic bags full of plastic scraps, soon dump trucks will come

take it all to rust farms

 

soon milk trucks will come

 

buses and trains will come

people will fill them with heavy shoes, warm coats, a shiny business 

caffeine static, morning panic and small talk

 

sunrise will come

and any object that casts a shadow will feel it

all daydreams will seek it and eat it 

apple raw

all visions, all missions

all real and doomed to live

 

sunday muse #162

posted for the sunday muse #162, i missed the deadline i think, sorry, i write slow

flatfooted

one stuck in a puddle, one tripping over curbs

                i stubble

                                she slips across a window and around the corner

streets are wet and busy

                everything splashes

my imagination

                her misbehavior

it is daylight and she should be sleeping  

I travel by the power of bone and muscle and want

                she moves like water thru shadow

                                                                thru myth thru my head and

                                                                                                one step ahead

she sneaks in-between the ripples of the puddles of my marching feet

                                                                                         ties my shoelaces together

i am clumsy, she is clever

she is magnetic north for all the glowing creatures

                                                                i am day labor

she hides in the corner of a crow’s eye

                i search the thrift store lost and found

she hides between the credit card logo and no smoking decal on the café window

                i play the shell game                      

flatfooted we dance

its noon and her head is in the clouds, pale smile of the plotting

                and two steps ahead

my eyes turn everything over, make a mess

                i want meaning, measurement, understanding

                                i want photographs and facts and maps

she can only be revealed with a blacklight and slice of lemon

                (and reads the same forwards as backwards)

she sleeps naked in cloudless lakes

                                draped only in loose gravity and thin veils of chaos theory

and i don’t dare wake her

                                i don’t dare try to take her because

                                                                                                i don’t want to make her

                                                                                                                change

                                                                                                                the way she

                                                                                                                                plays

                                            this game