Mourning
Has washed over but it's swelling tide
Does not ebb
Each day dawns in brightness
Many things for which I thank
Surrounded by love, by comfort
Yet even the weight of your arms fall short
This sadness has become a sickness
For which there is no cure
The rose tinted frames I wore before
Are now shadowed
The sun still shines
Birds singing
But it's always raining in my head
Leaking out to form rivers
From where I spring in cathartic feeling
Healing is no process
It is a journey
One that I will follow through this life into the next

We grew up strong in sunlight
Our Mother, earthen goddess, shown like dawn in springtime
Wild flowers basking in her warmth
I have never felt such love
Through the hardest of times
The finest of lines
She loved us without judgement
As age progressed and we distressed
Only fine wine could compare her
We are blessed to know such beauty
I am the woman I am today because of you

That spark and fire
Flooding veins with desire
I am thoroughly singed
By this heat between our skin
Bodies pulling closer
Mouth aching for just one taste
Converge
Two bright spiral sparkle super nova souls
Filling every corner, penetrating every hole
Always leaves me thirsty for more
For one night away from the warmth of your sun
Feels like days in darkness
Shine hidden until you turn your smile this way once again

Always standing on ceremony. Reach out and touch that which is forbidden.
Fruit hangs heavy and full of juice from my trees.
Shadows from a thousand nights shroud a garden veined in blood with heavy secrets.
whisper your name along my walls.
Seek entrance.
But know you will find no rest here.
Only the sands of time running, sifting through root and bone.
Searching tirelessly for the end.
Close your eyes. Breathe deep. Know what it is to fade.
Away.

I crawled myself home
Soaking wet through the trees
After standing for hours outside of your window
Hoping for a peak
Into your warm light insides

I thought about that summer night

When you told me to open up my eyes
Turn skyward my hands of light
Paint the stars across it's silky midnight blue
You said it changes when I touch it
Soft at first then sweeping strokes
I never forgot the hitch in your voice
As you watched me work
We talked til bright rays touched us at morning

I grew cold as I waited
The night settling into my bones

You never came home

I wonder if she is special
Special like you said I was
Hauling my bruises and heartache onto the porch
Tears mingle with rain as I cry myself to sleep
Against my door frame
Hearing your voice whisper through the trees
*Open your eyes. Paint with light.

Further still
Heat laced with wet silk
Lassoing isn't so easy
With hair forever unkempt and breezy
Reckless, careless, tossed to the wind
I close my eyes only to rise and fight again
Broken through the quakes, the rubble
I've got moonshine veins
Laughter like bubbles
I wrap you soft and sweet spun sugar boy
Only to fall away, this run hiding toy
You put far too much into my hints and clues
I'll be your heartbreak if you'll be my muse
A deal is a deal, sing it soft, dance slow
I want to hear it all go down
I want to be front row

Released from my physical form
I allow the tendrils of sleep
To conduct it's shadowed symphony
Crescendoing
Into a frenzy of cacophonous arousal, exhiliration and fear
My body soars in dream land
Shallow breaths become hurried
Bottomless pit free falling
Alice in Wonderland acid swirl
This crazy train is right on schedule
Each night whisking me off
To the exotic, horrific and depraved
My only respite...
The sticky sweet haze of Mary Jane
As she melts
Into the visceral underbelly
Of my subconscious
Only then do I wake well rested
Not aching from the memory of sleep

There are worse things I could do
Then fall for a battered heart or two
My mind gets lost in their confused translation
Are you in for the long haul or a short gestation
I do not mind soothing the ache for a while
Just as long as when you leave, you leave with a smile

Downtown's been calling
I just let it ring
Like virginity that conversation,
Once ended
Will not be taken back without painful
Drastic measures
You are not poison
You are forever
The perfect drug, made just for my wounds
You would destroy me
Jam my busiest crossroads
Old haunts blending into new aches
I'm not ready for your vacant houses
Windows cracked or hollow
That feeling, those shells
Lie within us all
You need a warrior
I am one,yes
Call to arms
I'll be on the front lines, ready

                           Pain.

In any form is welcome.
For pain is feeling but not too deeply
Not like the scars of sadness
I am shell shocked, disconnected
No longer whole
Shrapnel still embedded
Organs and tissue assimilate to it's form
Healing, yet still
Unable to lift a sword to defend
Are you ready for that?

(silence)
I know what you are thinking

"How will we know if we don't try?"

                           Big Picture Moment

When I'm ready...
                 I'll let you know.

Held to such high expectations
The fall alone would render but a stain
I doubt enough bleach exists to remove my offending shadow
You grate along my very bones
Pick them clean
Wanting. Needing. Take without asking.
My will a buffet of constant gorge
Even when I grasp the chance to speak up
Crumbs are left
I feast on silence

Between earth and sky
I live a lie
Upon minutes and years
I flood these tears
Down hallways and alleys
I traverse these valleys
Out of windows and screens
It remains to be seen

(By Brook Ilges and
Sverre G. Holter)


There's fire in it. Chestburn. Lungs
And lava, heart in heat; blood
Boiling. When I move,
Steam escapes from between
My ribs.
They cage a dragon's mouth.

Our edges cauterize
Unable to stabilize this searing
Electric firestorm
We coalesce into colors
Streaming through our nerve
Endings
Pulsing the rhythm of ages
Into the space between our gazes
Your scalding hide sets us apart
A rough reminder of the scars that
Stitch beneath

Sometimes.
Sometimes I find myself.
Sometimes I find myself
Biting down on
Whatever is left of myself
After the vulcano sighs and
Withdraws its black; its
Ashes; its pieces of planet's
Core, just to hold onto
Something with
Something.
Sometimes I wonder if
The memories of surgical
Sutures are all that keep me
From falling apart.
Take my mouth; I'm saving
My hands for
My heart.

Darkness falls, low light lingers
I trace the confines of your cage
The lock rusted and still
A key exists, the heart resists
Too damaged to offer naught but numb
Cutting through pumice walls
Fiery thorns thick, penetrate with ease
Such paltry designs of recovery
I'm fading fast
While you still burn.

And while one of us fades burning,
The other burns fading, and all is as
It all should be, as two stars
Decide not to form a solar system, but
Instead to brush themselves into a painting
Of a dream that a child that has yet to
Become just dreamed; awoke from
And whispered: "I want them to
Be my mother and
Father..."

We stand before them gray and numb
wake up
All eyes vacant, fingers lax
wake up
Waiting patiently, thoughts sterile, for meal time
wake up
On the menu today is fascism
wake up
But we've been fed that so many times before it is
considered comfort food
wake up
All of our threadbare clothes are dull, without variety
wake up
The food sits soggy and weighted in our ravenous gut
wake up
Clawing at the cage of our hearts to do something
wake up
To be something
WAKE UP
Yet still we toil in our once free soil
WAKE UP
The feel of dirt under our nails the only connection to the earth we have left
**WAKE UP

I was made to weather the storm
First steel frame constructed with intent
Then mold carved in alabaster with curves to make even a blind man sigh
I have never turned away from a challenge
The closest thing to sand and stone
In me are love and fear
One, if allowed, can wear you down
The other stop you cold
Neither have hindered my great regard for growing
For learning
Both have left their mark in my eyes
Still smiling even after the light has dimmed
My frailties are not on display
You will never see me begging at your door for scraps
I know how to forage, I know how to hunt
Table set by my own hands

Warmed skinned
Heart of gold
In between the young
And the old
Passion burns like fire light
Within this cage I learned to fight
Life broke me down with loss
With choices
I built back up with steel
With voices
I've carried on through tears, decisions
Tender is my new found vision
I'll help you too if put to task
All you have to do is ask

Luscious swirl colors
Sunlight reflecting off of
Rainbow jeweled depths
White cotton absorbs the laughter
In banded, restricted patterns
Blue lazy afternoon
Pink sugar candy
Green that's not so easy
Indigo spot light shining
Mimosa bubbles fizz with comedic intent
Juicy honey bells spiking my taste buds
I soak you up, great God of life
In turn creating sacred geometric love
On simple fibers

Sifting through each little grain
As though sand
Leaving a trail back to reality

Admired. Required to perform.
Feathers of turquoise and purple bruise my stage name.
Belladonna.
Blooming eggplant bright and dewy.
Eyes dance and twinkle only for you.
Indulge me my pet. Sharpen your knife.
I feel like blood tonight.
Tight smiles wreathed in crimson.
Waiting. Waiting for release.
Tear me open.
Burn me down.
******* away.

Nature has deemed fit to bless the female form with monthly...troubles
Once taboo to speak of
Many grew up ignorant of their own blood
Only that it's purpose signified
Their readiness to be sacrificed
Lower than cattle, owned, bartered
A son meant continuation of line, of name
A woman was an acquisition
Nothing more
Many a young maid, trembling on her wedding night
Forced to open her heart, her ****** body
To a man, hopefully gentle
That she had only just met
Let alone speak to
A groom preferred his bride
Meek and mild
Untouched by even her own hands
To know pleasure was to be a wanton
Nothing pure could be so passionate
When our very nature dictates us to be so!
Society views our struggle as
"Having come a long way."
How reprehensible to say such a thing
When we are still victimized
Underpaid
Objectified
Abused
The media flaunts only those
That are deemed "beautiful" by a panel of judges
When in fact all of us radiate
For we are governed by the moon
*Our very *** harnessed by her silvery pull

Houston woke up early. Yawning. A cigarette away from just packing his meager possessions and leaving everything this dusty room did not have to offer. A spark of zippo flame had his lungs drowning in chemical filth. Sometimes it felt good to get *****. Often enough now that he had forgotten what it felt like to be clean. The yellowed pages of his favorite books stared back at him in a mismanaged pile on his writing desk. What few thoughts he had managed to scripple out kept them company on crumpled napkins and ink stained pages.The sheets a sweaty twist around his pale form. He knew something had to give or he really was going to go over to Silvia's to just "talk" but do what he had been thinking about more often of late and  drown her in the kitchen  sink sloshing over with ***** dish water she never drained. Gods but that woman drove him crazy. The clanging of glass every time he took a step a testament to those emotions. All he could do to cope with the damage she had wrought was lose himself in a bottle. Any bottle would suffice but his favorite was spiced ***. It used to burn going down but they had gotten so used to each other it was like old people having *** with the added bonus of actually reaching fulfillment.  The company he had kept last night lay sadly on it's side next to his worn mattress. It's cap somewhere in the wreckage of Houston's hundred dollar a month room. He looked down at it and sighed, picking up the neck and now stale sips left in the bottom. He knew that this one swallow would only stoke the flames of his desire for more yet he could not help himself. Autopilot had taken control weeks ago. The glass on his lips was comforting but the not enough taste left on his tongue was sour. Today. Cracking of his spine echoed as he stretched. Today he was going to get revenge.

At least it was springtime
I whisper to myself as he eases into the unknown
Such a strong man, a quiet man
My grandfather no longer suffering
Another gentle soul these hands have helped
Continue on this journey of "being"
No longer human
Scattered amongst the in between
You are loved
You will be missed
Rest in Peace

Loving you is like trying to light a damp cigarette
The skin eventually burns but the heart stays dark

When cool winds shift from South to North
I feel you in my bones
A heart escaped this hypochondriac
Even if it is true that something just isn't quite whole
Sea salt rusted pump, sizzle
A cradle for the bawl of humankind
I hold it tight to shattered rib
Breathing in what I hope is starlit dust divine
Know this though, be wary  
She spins like a drunk bumble bee
Will sting you if touched
These eyes see much more than she
For in them they hold a clearer view
Ill abused, you lunged too soon
Another heartbreak for you
I cannot say nor have I way of healing that fresh wound
Seems to me like salt and sea are all a man could need
Racing around mountain ledges (knees raw and skin red)
Sunshine lover I would call you down
Gladly share your bed
You say I am too soft, too wrinkled
Worn down from loss's toll
I know better now than to lose my temper
When all I have ever really wanted was a hand to hold

I wash my hair
The dirt is stripped away

Wet.

Rinsed down the drain into the sewer
Stinking sludge water waste
A homeless man leans down
Filling up his intellectual cup
Gutter filth rot glory
No wonder bums are crazy
Talking to mattresses, having imaginary riches
Someday

Makes me wonder what it's like deep inside
I could be imaginary
More than just one
Do I get the crazy out on paper?
Or down the drain when I wash my hair?

I burrowed down
Kept my head below the fault line
Hoping that I would go unnoticed
As a novice I had no shame in hiding
A caged beast that eventually broke free
Soon the seams of my cocoon started cracking
The edges pulling with such pain
My throat burned from the effort
I was still the only one to hear the echo
From darkened corners burst forth into blinding light
A rainbow of late spring brilliance
Reflected back in dusted delicate unfurl
I was no longer an inching segment
I was a butterfly girl

Poison infiltrates my stalwart veins
Unable to process with the soiled remains of a battered
Tattered heart
Still on the wintery edge of wishing
I was made of stone
Eyes wide shut, looking up through dark waters
I can still taste you on my lips
Feel you on my fingertips
Ice crystallizes where magma used to flow
Larva to razer sharp butterfly
Silver moonshine quick
Wishing I was made of stone
With absent minded memories

He is suffering
The tell tale signs of decay setting in
It's all I can do to not break down

Five hours later

Gentle hum and gurgle of breathing treatment
Wakes me from dreams of good-bye
Sweet and gentle but suffocating
Do you even know I am here anymore?

Two days later

I can hear them whispering outside
He's too fragile, not much else we can do
My voice catches in my throat yearning to rail at them
HOW DARE YOU GIVE UP!
His breath still draws and my hands are fighting

The failings of a weak condition paired with bacterial war are too much to bare. Go home babe. Sleep with the angels for I cannot be selfish and keep you here so tortured.

*I never let go.

Shadows caress like a silk prom dress
Memories of my youth scatter
Dancing along the lines of my past
I heard your voice yesterday on video  for the first time in months
Four years ago we took to the sky
Diving
No idea if this was goodbye
Your last words uttered
Before we again touched ground
"I love you, Brook"
"Everyone else, I'll see you when I come down"
So crisp and clear
As if you were still here
I cried and cried until it hurt
Laughter pushing to insert
For though our end was laced with loss and pain
It is outweighed by the love we gained
This constant push and pull
Triggered by the smallest things
I will miss you every. single. day.
I could never let you fade
This gnawing ache I must let heal
Or I'll never move on
Never truly feel

Sunshine giggles ricochet
Off of not-even-Easter yellow walls
(More like Easter *****, or so you say)
Your laughter carrying
All the way across vast ocean
Causing mine to well up
Head thrown back
Face hurts
Kind of chuckle
Those are my favorite
No, *you are

Can be exceptionally rough...*and beautiful

There is breath here
Still
Full of silent
Mornings silent nights
Looking
Glass half-full half-empty
Handed
A Love beyond wild edges
Made
Too sharp to catch my fall

Yet I stand these tests of strength
Weathered the devastation
Share stories of our struggle
Never really losing the acidic taste of failure
The burn of letting go
How do I not feel guilty?
Even knowing I gave my all
It wasn't enough
Played out in such a way that nothing could have been

*I still had more to give

Rip those seams girl
You've got a leather heart
I want to taste your deepest secret
I've a mind to tear you apart

"I urge you to turn from me"
"I beg you to leave me be"

My grief is precious, pure and chosen
Heart and lung have stalled, frozen

I've got medicine for those tears of yours
You give me the time of day
I can give you laughter and more

With loving hands, soft sighs and light
He pulled the rain clouds from my sight
Vision sure, hands true
I wasn't broken, just had to choose
My smiles may come and go
But the sunshine he brings will always show

Every muscle aches
Tense
Stretching into yet another morning
Awaiting the inevitable
Slinking through dark hallways
The front door pulled free, sliding open on silent hinges
I breathe deeply of dew
My hands shake in my coat pockets
I don't want to go to the doctor
I know that I am getting a shot
They (my illusion of control) always tell me to behave
Well I'm not like them or anyone else I know
Drawing in quiet, shadowed corners
I barely hear the soft cry of doves
**** them
My whole Thursday is ruined
Shouldn't I have some say?
Property. Separate beating heart.
Separate thinking brain
Property.
Why even run, someone else will just find me
Try and stick me with "anti-bodies"
Under the guise of "knowing-what's-best-for-me"
**** them.
Feet moving faster.
Only I know what's best for me

Two years gone
Willow-o-the-whisp whispers
Fleeting in those final moments
Yet standing stark as limestone monuments
Now that time has passed
Many things I let slip soft as silk against your feverish skin
Hoping that they wound their way through the fog of narcotics
Finding the struggling will of your spirit
Easing your decision to soften your hold
How could I explain that your vessel was failing
You knew in the slowing of your heart
The stressed racing of mine
I could believe you smiled though your features lay lax
Last breath eased out in exhaustion
Finding peace after a well fought war
Two years gone
*I still feel you here

You didn't surprise me, you upset me
My defenses laid bare at your assault
I have never ached so deep for someone's touch
The jagged edge of my merciless memory festers
Wallowing.
My fingertips sore from constant busy work
I'd rather be quiet and useful
Than obvious and numb
A fine line between the two
Raw. Undone.
I scream until my throat gives out
Better to focus on that pain
For your loss has left me gasping for air
Searching violently for the unraveling end
I just thought we were stronger than that
On my knees before you
Confessing all my sins
Unhinged.

I'm wearing armor
These wounds still bleed
I painted on my "Don't ask" face
Just so you wouldn't see
The pain that lies beneath
My emotions are my dedication
I take your's into consideration
Not expecting reciprocation
Rarely surprised but if you do
Try to see it from my view
I do not take sympathy with comfortable ease
I ask you kindly, pretty please
Know that I'm grateful if my words fall short
I may do a little talking but I'm more the writing sort

The heavy melting  of drug hazed bones
Confuses my curiosity with the sober

                              You cut me.
                                      To the quick.

Anger deep mortar holes smoldering through layers
I had carelessly constructed
Breathing through the cracks but just barely
Suffocation at it's most frightening
It is not the burn you must worry about
Just the ache

That is where I have kept these last months
A tangible, gut wrenching desire to be numb
I. Felt. Everything.
Strange dreams weaved colorfully throughout
Waking in a cold sweat
Looking for flowers but all I find is **dirt

Cigarette drag
Exhale
What am I doing here?
Smoke clouds waft gently around me
Twitch
Haven't felt right in months
Sleep. Wake. Stare. Sleep. Wake. Stare.
What day is it?
Gods, my head keeps pounding
Coffee sits half drank on the counter
Focusing on witty magnet sayings
Last night I had company
Raw. Visceral. Open.
Things went a little far
With you they usually do
Mostly due to boredom
You come to break the monotony
Bleed a little
Still asleep
Never said the safe word
Pineapple
Though you should have
Obsessed with making you beg for it in a tortured moan
Against my flushed skin
My kind of love can slip too deep
Don't fall for me
Poison
Addicted to the echos of your name on window panes
Evening light is still too harsh
Splash some water, deluge
Keep breathing.
Blood stains eventually fade.

I don't know this place
This face
Anymore

A sudden drop in lighting
Temperature raised a few degrees
Lines of sorrow on a face
Once lined with laughter

What's become?
What's become of me?

Wanderer. Gypsy. Warrior.
A coalition of stardust children
On a hunt for home
I've laid out my welcome mat before
Lit the candles
Not for long
Whispering, the wind picks up
Moving across the tundra
To howl through my iced cavities
My edges are sandy shores
Muspelheim soaked with sea salt love letters
Loki resides on the interior
Playing tricks
Searching for a völva who will guide his way
Perhaps I am she
Who shall never rest
Until I reach Valhalla

Morning yawns over the valley
Quiet right before the light
Then a chorus of birdsong echo's
Through softly swaying tree tops
Rain falls in a steady rhythm
White tailed mother's guard thickets
Snorting gently to reassure their young
It cannot rain all of the time little one
Low clouds linger
Breathing in our atmosphere
To coat withered midnight lungs
In peace
Lush green perks up, unfurls new leaves
Ready to soak up another day

I am not see thru
Smoke clinging softly to my fingers
Translucent at best

There is something to be said about riots
Smoke bomb haze blinds the masses
Watery eyes. Stinging throats.
Loud meaty slaps of police brutality
Synchronized violence erupts on well played corners
It's not safe here any more
The wall beyond is swarming with those willing to
die
For liberty
Freedom, Freedom, Freedom
Chants become sharp screams and panicked shouts
**** the Government!
Who knows the way to heaven or hell?
Better yet, Who doesn't?
Stricken eyes, bloodied skin, but more human than either
you or even you
There will be no mercy
There will be no quarter
We will never submit

You sit across from me with your knees in knots. The best place for you to be. At arms length. Where you are safe from the soft trembling of my hands, the nervous pounding of an unsure heart against the bruised cage that holds it captive. Between the pages of you and me the ink has always blurred but  I have opened my mouth and let loose words, imagines that I wish I had kept to myself. Promises that only stoked this erratic flame. Cannot say for certain in the dark if you were laughing or crying but in the harsh light of day you were neither. You were gone.

I never can hold on.

Rubbing sharp sleep from tender eyelids
Unable to see clearly yet
Already the heady, green desire afflicts me
Pleasurable thoughts swirling around an exhausted brain
Yesterday was difficult
Tomorrow no better
My tin full up of sticky sweet African mango
Going no where
Sliding softly into all my sore spots
Just what I needed
To start my morning

Vaulted memories of hot asfault and a million stars surface
Gathering in little many moons ago puddles
Reflecting back into my haunted eyes what might have been
Where are we off to now?
Seems as though we are always on the run
I fOllow but never can catch up
Always just out of reach
In letters and prose you still exist
Laugh lines etched into a photographic brain cell
Easier to hide than you think
Then again mine never quite reached my eyes
Yours could never stay at bay
We are if anything constant and eternal
Gravitating, orbiting in the same system yet following separate paths
Dust swirling in the after math of a super nova
Wild and untamed futures written in the stars

The day it is a waning
Long streams of soft blue, deep violet
Ozone veins carrying the wakeful into sleep
I peak now
Eyes bright with moonlight
Stars dancing brilliantly against ink black anti-matter pools
I would go out drifting tenderly amongst those memories
Even if their edges tear apart from gravity
The knowing would suffice
Come dream with me 3am wanderers
Let the cushion of the unseen comfort
Sore spots that we no longer urge to heal