White maze for the middle classes,
collect your museum passes at the door,
please
continue through into exhibitions,
photo pictures of art you won’t remember the name of
but because you’re educated you’ll hope to retain its
name, medium, date and frame size of,
and equate them with those pieces you Googled before you came.

Through the double doors
her cries walked down the corridors
whilst cradled in his hands, cradled carefully,
he stood upright in boots on the
newly polished granite, shipped-in, floor.

The art gallery Father and Daughter
are the hidden display
only found in writing in the pamphlet
for today. Some will see them
through cuts in the door,
others may hear them but assume
it’s ambient art-gallery-played-through-speakers
sound coming from the back room.

Legs crossed, propped up on a chair,
Being careful to cross them since I'm wearing a skirt,
Sipping a white chocolate raspberry steamer,
I run my fingers through my hair,
At once relaxed and sleepily alert,
I hear a man ask the barista for more creamer.

Two new books, two whole worlds, sit beside me,
My pretty new bag sits there too.
My cellphone awaits some call I probably won't take,
For I am at peace in the moment, you see,
And nothing will interrupt my view,
For everything, everything, is at stake.

I feel the slight pressure
Around my finger,
I sense the sparkle before it hits my eyes.
I look up from my new jewelry
To the man who put them on me,
And suddenly I'm surprised.

I had wondered where He would lead me,
I didn't think he would bring me anywhere,
And now, in the local shop for coffee and tea,
I find I'll follow him everywhere.

you only loved me
when the moon was high
         (and you were, too)
and the stars in your eyes
shone so bright
but not because of me

find beauty in the ugly
when times get hard
and skies darken
billowing thunder
night time harshness
you'll need it
don't let the mind
become too dark to see
that from the rubble of malice
you can build a new greatness
rising and falling and rising and falling
like the ocean front
wave after wave after wave
every sentence has an ending.
but don't let them break you
to stop you from writing the next
find beauty in ugly
for the times
when all you see in the mirror
is hideous tricks of light
assaulting the senses
do it for the times
when you are so high
you kiss the sun
for the times when you fall
for the times when you get up
and for the times when you take off

A summer’s hand on bewildered torso chest,
her love: the best kept secret since their escape
to Brest that time in Spring,
Northwest France with its untamed waves lapping at the
hull of The Sea King in the harbour, half mast.

But with every try, harder than the last,
he did not respond to her see-through glass
appeals for an apology-
over two-hundred-and-seventy-minutes
wasted on the TGV back to Paris,
a holiday cut short by her wandering knees,
wide apart in another man’s apartment.

For money was passed in sweating palms
for a day’s encounter with her good looks and charms,
though the men never knew
about her man back at home,
designing the new tourist information
for a cheap weekend-stay in the heart of Rome.

What he bought to the marriage:
stability, safety, security and their baby.

What she bought to the marriage
mainly tears and daily anxiety.

But they both knew the complications
and the clauses of her contract,
agencies would delve deep into the contact’s history
to make sure they were legit,
but it never hid the fact that she had
intimate encounters in hotel honeymoon, champagne, new linen suites.

I have a  garden
No one ever sees
From all others set apart
In it grows black flowers
The color of your treacherous heart

They have the smell of rotting ground
Outgrowing every flower around
Ugly to the eyes
Always need weeding
Much to my distaste
Always seeding

Black flowers for my love betrayed
Black flowers for words spoken
Black flowers for a love lost
Black flowers for a heart broken

Though I rip them out
By ones and twos
Leaving an empty space
In the morning
Much to my disbelief
Others have taken their place

Legends say black flowers
Should be given
To heart untrue
There is no one I know
Who deserves them more
So black flowers I give to you

This poem is copyrighted and stored in author base. All material subject to Copyright Infringement laws
Section 512(c)(3) of the U.S. Copyright
Act, 17 U.S.C. S512(c)(3), Tammy M. Darby

When God made you he must have been writing a sonnet
because you are a poem
You are a masterpiece
and sweetheart don't cry
you'll make the paint bleed
your colors will run
and your face is too beautiful to be distorted by sadness
and dear you are a poem I have yet to write
because you are a feeling I've yet to feel
and I'd like to feel your body against mine
And I'd like to feel the way you speak
and I've read four dictionaries and have yet to find a word that describes
the beauty that surrounds you
It's not perfect
I've tried perfect
but your beauty is something that will never be porcelain
it is the beauty that comes from being dragged face first through the mud
it is a beauty that comes with scars
but don't hide them
because I'll count them like the stars
and tell you God made each one
like an eraser mark
trying to take out the parts of you He thought the Devil created
and you are a song
I'd like to sing
because when you swear
it is honey off your lips
but when I swear it is like spitting sand
and I know bad poetry will get me *******
but for the ones that matter you have to bleed onto the pages
so take this ink as my blood
and revere it like communion wine
but never get drunk on my love
because I never want to see you suffer the hangover
and take my words like bread
but eat more than just my thoughts
because I want you to live,
I love you