I felt your skin
strip away from me-
you said you’d be right back-
as you slipped into foreign bodies,
lips soft with easy dinners,
who forgot the lightbulb burning out,
the lid left rattling on the counter,
a suit of pots dented, stacked,
steam lifting from a rust-ringed drain.

That studio in the Texas Riviera
was never meant to last-
brown carpet, AC rattling,
bass beating through drywall,
neon from the Whataburger sign
bleeding through blinds.
We were two beautiful accidents
in a month-to-month, always paid late,
your sweat a spell pressed into my skin,
ankles grinding on parking lot gravel,
the road outside a forgotten promise.

And when you smiled I held you
like a chipped glass,
rim still sharp enough to cut.
The ember died against porcelain,
the glitter was swept with the crumbs.
Your armor slumped in the pantry corner,
rusted tins, lids unfastened.
You walked away, naked and ordinary,
the light left buzzing in the kitchen-
outside, asphalt slicked with oil-sheen,
my body, also, dissolved
into the shimmer of the road.

~
A blood promise
On the threshing floor
--a strand named Skull of Sidon.

The sunset passage
No longer a place for them,
The acceptance of absolute negation
Remedios the beauty.

Saint Fishermen churn in the waves
Crushing grapes from the estate,
Even the girl with the silver eyes,
Only then will their house be blessed.

Women uncharted,
But prisoned on watery shore,
Hum a silent prayer.

This is atonement day,
May grace be with them
In all the days ahead.
~

I was putting on jeans.
My dog was smiling.
Sun was coming in the window behind us.
We were there
reflected in the screen
of the old tv I had fixed myself.
A second sun
was reflected there with us.

I was young.
My dog was alive.
We would watch "The Adding Machine"
on the old tv that afternoon.
I was getting sober.
The room was small.
It was years ago
and I didn't know
that I would remember that morning
forever.

Letters not sent
Words untouched by hands,
There is no softer gaze,
Opening radiant ways
With rapid pulse of breaths,
In spoken sentences.
The invisible margin of lost attention.

I saw unsettling light,
The sun glinting on the window,
An ordinary building across the street
And an elusive, surreal reflection
Of a blurred sphere, not giving warmth.

I stare at this distorted image,
Wanting to endure it directly,
Longer than I could bear,
In a motionless pause
The side effects of this manifestation.

My eyes were slightly closed
To hug the contours of an unclear shape.
The luminosity from a distance
Safely stays at a fragile layer,
So as not to freeze and not to burn
Before the piercing, conclusive truth.

Being for so long and perfectly alone.
So many hours punished by the silence,
The long days in tamed anger,
Waiting for relief,
All those good wishes in letters were never sent.

The gleams turned in the blunt, painful light.
Just two living spheres and a clear, cold glass
In the ocean of rigid duties,
A star’s slow implosion,
Reshaped colorful memories, grasping at remains.

The vivid balloon with the air gone—
No longer flying above our heads.
Nothing else, just indifference that forgot
How it used to cry.

October, bring me home to all the scents I so adore
clothe me in cinnamon dreams and help me collect
all the  colors that I so lovingly wrapped  
with burlap's gentle touch !

October, blush me with orange and tangerines
tint my lips with red and crimson sheen
and as the fall foliage falls away from me,  
bring me a mug of  pumpkin spice, Oh please

October, while  your busy bagging gold
I am gathering dry leaves at my feet
Raking in hopes for a mild mild winter,    
and marshmallows roasting by a lovely fireside.

After the first hard frost comes the gentle snow,  
then later on if we are lucky, a beautiful warm spring in toe...

Rain waits
for clouds
to fall.

Flowers wait
for spring
to bloom.

Heart waits
for someone
to love.

Before I could stop,
love entered my heart,
making it a permanent home.

Once, in happiness,
it sang and danced—
now it sits silently
in the corners of my heart.

In pain, it screams
without a voice,
but only in silence.

When the sun goes flame
When dried blood's no shame
One truth stands out in the shivering cold
That there is no truth in silver or gold . . .

and you can't handcuff those of the spiritual fold !

The Conjunction Holds
(with a verb in the wings)

Not the leap,
but the plank between banks—
its grain remembering
both shores.

Not the shout,
but the breath that lets
two voices
share one lung.

I am and,
I am but,
I am although—
the quiet ligature
that keeps the torn cloth
from drifting apart.

The verb would run,
would strike,
would bloom—
but I stay,
a hinge in the weather,
turning both ways at once.

Here,
in the seam’s small country,
I keep the quarrel and the kiss
in the same sentence,
and call it
poem.





.

the night whispers the black water fall of ashes
that bloom into the sparrows of sorrow...


the sorrow sparrows are back again
sitting in the tangled woods of twisted trees.

Van Gogh heard their voices
bouncing off love's walls.

the sorrow sparrows are leaning into me.
my sad eyes, dream of you brother.

I lean into the soft lit room
searching for love's quiet hours,
with sunlight flickering through willow trees.

"don't cry, darlin," my wife whispers.

I grew up along the Brazos River
Not far from an old cotton plantation.

By the time I was a child, it was in complete decay
And it left the same in the lives of those
Who had been slaves for generations afterwards.

I remember the first time those descendants
Rode our bus to their raggedy old school,
My generous, childish heart ached for them.
Much later, they'd go to the nice modern one.

I made many new friends on those rides.
I let Cookie brush my hair, as the other girls stared.
She was "high-yellow" or bright, as they would say.
My heart thrills to see them now grown, come into
The beauty of life as it was meant to be lived by all.

Yet, now evil forces seek to undo that.

Three minutes of song
flooded my brain
with images of that night.

It felt like I was there again—
you,
me,
and a deflated mattress.

The window rattling in the rain
as we whispered
our darkest truths.

It’s night now, baby.

Do I still make you stare—
stare into the sky
the way we once did?

Or do I melt
like a snowman in the sun,
leaving a puddle
for you to run through—
laughing,
barefoot,
untouched.

Just three minutes.
I’ll be sure to skip it next time.

But for now,
you can consume me.