Mail Order

Mail Order
a space sonnet

The men stood restless on the loading dock.
All eyes scanned for the signs of transport ships.
Each one, past nonchalance, had checked the clock,
Attuned in thought, the same prayer on their lips.

At last the cloudless sky rained down the pods
Like dandelion fluff; and out they rowed
Into the bay with nets in eager squads -
The clutch of longed for eggs carefully towed.

One rower paused and gazed upon a face
Still in the sweet repose of cryosleep;
A snow white beauty in her clear glass case,
The sight of which made him both laugh and weep.

“The brides have come!” he cried, and all joined in
A shout of joy from pioneers: “Women!”

RCGA

New Waltz

The band is tuning up again;

I hear the subtle thread

of a song I’ve heard many times before,

music that has taken me

over many miles

waltzing in the arms of strangers

friends

and lovers.



Which are you?



I see you standing at the edge

tapping your foot in time

a hand extended

and I am already anticipating

the breathless whirl you’re offering.



Ah, my heart is shameless.



It is dancing ahead



outpacing the rhythm



precessing me across the empty space



eager



foolish



giddy



before we’ve even taken the floor.



RCGA 2010

Lover’s Farewell

I can still remember,
and will always,
the sheen of your skin in the moonlight
the first time you were bare for me,
and the gleam in your eyes
I recognized as echo of my own.

Ah, alas.

For all the nights of pleasure
for all the mornings of warm comfort
settled in your arms.
Alas for the fret moments
wondering how you fared
when we were apart
and the anticipation of knowing
we’d be together soon.

Time was suspended for a while
and we reveled in it
darlings of some goddess of passion
worshipping at the altar of each other.

Now…
now we part
and I know I have no will to say goodbye
so I give you this
the distillation of my memories
perfumed with the last scent of our bodies rising
scribed with the nail-scores of lost control.

You will abide with me
like a treasure hoarded in my chest
locked within my heart
yet never seen again but in my mind.

I saw how the moon loved you
when I held you that first time
and I knew you were only mine for a spell;
I can no more possess you
than I can that gleam that sparkled in your eyes
when you lay down for me.

RCGA. 2010

Light

There’s a bit of sunlight trapped in your hair

just there

I think I can capture it with my lips
if I am careful

and maybe I can transfer it to your mouth
with mine

give you a taste of the bright beauty
you’ve brought to me

RCGA,2010

Tantra

I am holding out my hand to you.
I am the Earth…
I am your Goddess Lover
I am deep, and warm, and as fertile
as the longest of your full night dreams --
naked as the Moon,
blinding as the Sun,
more intoxicating than swallowing Stars.
If you touch me,
you will know what it means to be alive --
you will understand how the rhythm of your breath
is the axis upon which Eternity spins.
The fire of inspiration
waits, banked, to light our joining.

RCGA, 2010

Inebriated

I am intoxicated
by the cadence of your voice
by your playfulness
by your eagerness
by the shape of your being.

I would like to let you protect me
even though I don’t really need it

just because I imagine
how delightful sleeping in your arms would be

tipsy from
your scent
your sound
your way.

RCGA, 2010

Listening

Once I woke in the night
thinking I heard your voice
calling my name

and ever since
I cannot sleep for waiting

to hear it again.

RCGA, 2010

Respiration

The long day stumbles,
falling into sultry night

and I am so tired

I breathe,

remembering what's been forgotten,
surrendered
to the hypnotism of life...

Spirit rises.

Sweet
silent shadowed space
surrounds,

soft shelter of soul,

transcendence.

I breathe,

abandoned to the swell,
the slow rushing wonder
of air and ether joining,

swaying lungs
like a ship's sails filling,

rippling taut,

releasing.

Somewhere near
the sweating cicadas rouse
and talk to the moon,

counterpointing the cycle

with rattling timbals.

RCGA, 2010

Twined

I dreamed about you last night
tantric twined
above and around you

and all the while I knew
it was a dream

and all the while I wondered
if you were dreaming too

If you dreamed me
above and around you
rising and falling

if you knew it was a dream
and that I was dreaming too

RCGA, 2010

Rattling the Cage

Not one word.
Don’t open your lips
even to say you love me

because

it would be too much.

I am already at a crisis,
a flashpoint,
walls buckling with the tension
of holding all this in.

I do not know how to let go
after all this time.

What if I opened my hands,
unlocked the cage,
opened the door?

Ah, you would run,
don’t think that you wouldn’t.

No one standing could face this,
and lying down, much worse…

You might instead
scramble into the cage,
shutting yourself in,
and then where would I be?

Tending you,
a wild thing mastered by freedom.

Please do not speak.
It would be too much.

RCGA, 2010

eNothing: POEM OF THE DAY "Love" by Pablo Neruda

eNothing: POEM OF THE DAY "Love" by Pablo Neruda

Ah. Ah. Ah.

Shore

I believe in the infinitesimal diamonds
living in the sand,
thousands on thousands
clinging to your feet
as you pace by the sea.

I know you like I know myself,
which is not too much,
but enough for now…
scented of salt water
warmed in summer sun,
oceans within you shifting,
pouring out and extending
towards some far horizon.

Look, there is a shell
empty of its passenger
weathered and half-buried
reminding me that today is not the first day
that the world did not begin
when you looked at me.

RCGA, 2010

Daddy's Girl

A long time ago, it seems
I was born
in a Hollywood hospital
to a Southern Belle
and her intemperate Hispanic husband…
and I was loved.

From the time I came into the world
I always knew I was Daddy’s Girl.

Daddy
who walked me to sleep
who lifted me to the pulpit to sing
who paid me to shine his Sunday shoes
who gave me free range of his library
who settled my rebellion with a look
who told me nobody was good enough for me
but that I would make a lousy wife anyway.

Daddy
who in the pain of parting from Mom
gave me to her because, he said, she needed me more
but really, he knew he’d be living hand to mouth
to support our separate households alone.

Daddy
who every year on my birthday
tells me the story
of the nurse coming out of the delivery room
and saying, “Mr. Gutierrez, you have a daughter.”

Daddy.

I’m glad you finally said you are proud of me.
I’ll always be your girl.

RCGA, 2010

Elixir

I have wanted you
like cool water
and you have been
that draught for me

You are a shiny thing
hidden in the bottom of the glass
that hypnotizes me
and makes me forget
where I am going

For a moment
I can imagine having you
I can indulge myself in the fantasy
before what is interrupts what might be

I have told myself again and again
to open up my fingers
even if the glass breaks
and yet, I keep drinking
because you are the elixir and the jewel
so satisfying, so beautiful

RCGA 2010

Secret

Am I your dirty secret, then?
It's not the first time
I have been

an unacknowledged paramour
slipped in and out
the servant door.

In all your grief of things you've lost,
I am not mentioned...
to my cost.

Yes, I am angry, and alone
no private grief for me --
I own

each single moment that we shared
when I imagined that you cared.

Deluded me. I was a spell
repeated often
written well

but always used in private space
unable to claim pride of place

A concubine, a chere amie...
you were much more than that to me.

Sincere apologies I send
that secret still
here at the end

I cannot speak your name aloud;
what we had lived
beneath a cloud.

Penuel

I have been wrestling all night
like Jacob with the angel
looking for my advantage...

and finding none,
I am forfeit,
but have refused to let go.

Look... I have had a dream;
not an ordinary dream...
and the message was clear:
I am not The One.

I have been ordered
to release you,
because I am holding you back,
and my work
isn't about what I want,
and never was.

I have to wait,
as I always have to wait,
and you have already moved on,
but my energy has you tagged
by the ankle,
an irritable bitch who won't be left behind.

No. It is time
and I have no cause to hurt you,
else I could just trail you
like a jealous plague,
knowing always I was standing in your way.

And I know it is sad,
because I am sad saying it,
writing it,
even thinking it...
but there it is,
It
It
It
and it won't go away.

Trust me, I have wrestled its representative
and found no weakness.
I am not for you
and I need to stop fighting
before I break something
important.

Heavy Heart

When you lie down with a heavy heart
Your dreams will take you nowhere
Just around and around the same old circle
A carousel of pain

When you lie down with a heavy heart
Your thoughts will crowd your hopes away
Herding them into dark corners
Where their glimmer is disguised

When you lie down with a heavy heart
You must cling to those sparking hopes
Until you’re off the carousel
And morning comes

RCGA, 2010

words

you ask me how I feel
and I cannot answer you
because I have forgotten
in this fog
what the words are
and somehow
they would seem inadequate
if I could force them
to my lips
when I would rather kiss you

why is it so important
the vowels and consonants
formed into images
that might appear distorted
from proximity

allow me instead
to reach into dark places
with my tongue
to speak with parts of me
that seldom have a voice
let me
let me
show you what I cannot say

with your permission
it will be enough

RCGA, 2010

Perfection Part 2

I hear your earnest words
telling me I am perfect,
and though I know you are being generic…
you are speaking of souls,
something universal,
even impersonal…
I feel something more in your protest,
that perhaps you consider me
more valid than I do myself:
this woman of experience and years,
this cracked and flawed vessel I wear.
You see my spirit like I see yours.
I could come to crave that mirror,
one that sees inside me
and tells me hidden truths
I have tended to deny
on the evidence of the ones
that only reflect the surface.
Why is it we can look upon another
in the clearest, most genuine way
and love them for who they are
when we seldom give ourselves the same honor?
The thing we are seeking
has always lay waiting inside us
but maybe it is useful now and then
to have someone show us
that beauty is not skin deep
it comes from something deeper than bones.
What else is love, then
but showing each other how we are
how timeless and whole
how amazing and rare
how perfect.

RCGA, 2010

Reiki

Rudderless

I lay down

The Box inside me

Tightly bound

And the storm came

Brilliant with lightning

Ponderous thunder

Rain so cleansing

In sheets and streams

While I lay unwinding

And the box started moving

Beneath its binding

I have been cold

For so very long

Numb to the touch

Deaf to the song

Yet it is frightening

To open once more

To let my dreams breathe

To see what’s in store

So many spirits

Stand murmuring round

Twinkling light bodies

Their voices round vowelled

Bright came a strike

With a rumbling crack

I stared at the window

Prepared for attack

Nothing came

I was safe for the moment inside

Coddled by warm hands

I lay there and cried

Then the box gave a leap

One strong chain fell away

Promising me

It will open one day

Oh, am I brave enough

Am I to dare

To live and to love

And gods help me, to care?

RCGA, 2010

Neither Ready, Nor Prepared

Both day and night I find myself
so hungry my knees tremble
and it isn't for food, for liquor, for romance...

I'm starving for the lost parts, the times of being pampered and spoiled,
the rubbing-my-back-until-I-fall-asleep and the reminders to eat and rest.
I am suffused with nostalgia
for the pleasures of routine,
the absolute wallowing boredom of secure sameness.

They seem the most intensely beautiful things, now
those dull days, running into one another.

The good times always seem so superior in retrospect,
so shiny faced, pictures of old holidays
where everyone is smiling, frozen in a single moment of joy.

It was never the good old days.
There were certainly excellent moments
but any meal replicated can't match the memory of itself
because it's not just the food, not just the liquor...
its the romance we perceived in it
the magic of that minute
the alchemy of you, and them, and then, and there.

Did I say it was boring? Maybe it was.
Maybe I think boring is romantic
at this stage of my life.

Someone else can rub my back.
Will it be the same?
Not hardly.
But pray heaven, it will still be an excellent moment
I'll remember as good times.

 

RCGA

MeMe's Purple Dawn

Perfection

Nobody's perfect
but sometimes there is perfection
even for the broken and flawed
when some other
just as fractured
lifts you to the light
to show your rainbows
and proclaims you
beautiful

RCGA 2010

I AM YOUR GODDESS

In ancient forests I was there for you,   

A constant presence, nascent and aware.

Meandering in brooks of crystal blue

You knew me like your breath, the very air.

Our sweet communion soothed your wild heart

Until you learned to build a wall of stone,

Restraining all my power with your art.

Gone from our glade you walked away, alone.

Occasionally you came back to me

Depleted in your spirits and your mind,

Depending on deep memories set free.

Eased in your soul, you still left me behind.

Someday you’ll come and claim me for your own

Someday you’ll recognize I’ve always known.

RCGA

Kisatchie Pinecones

Days and Nights

The days run into one another
jostling children in a queue
mindless of what came before
and what comes after
eager just to get there


Nights spread out
deep desert sands
chill and dry and contemplative
elderly women staring up
at Orion
longing for something
just out of memory


I am between them
the children and the women
watching the sun set
feeling the moon rise
sweating and shivering
counting clouds
and stars


RCGA

Witte Wieven

It's late for frost, but just last night

a strong one fell on everything

that bit the soft presumptuous leaves

and iced my garden's flowerlings.


Before the dawn I went outdoors;

it's just a short walk to Fern Park,

and though the path is not well lit

I'd know my way there in the dark.


My grandpa lies there, granite bound

and has been there for many years;

next to him lies my grandmother:

"She shared her smiles and hid her tears".


I felt the cold bench through my clothes

and pondered the grey slab of stone

with aching body, wondering

if death is better than alone.


For sixty-seven years they lay

beside each other since they wed,

and nine long years after he passed

she still made room for him in bed.


I always wanted love like that

the kind that goes past "death us part"

but now that I have loved, and lost,

I don't know what to tell my heart.


A witte wieven was drifting up

as sunrise came and warmed my head

I left some flowers and a prayer

for both the living and the dead.


RCGA

Saudade

Quietly, now
Come closer with your sorrow
Place it near mine
Let them nestle together

They look so alike
The echoes of our singular pain
How can it be?
Does grief have a lineage?

I would reject my own
As a bastard born broken, hideous
Except that it is so dear
I cannot release it yet

Not to the world, at least
Not for the examination of strangers
But for you, sad counterpart
I will pull back the blanket

Ours is understanding
Clad in darkness, weeds and armbands
Carrying these burdens
Recognizing their sameness

Quietly, now
While their howls are quiescent
Let us find comfort
Place your hand in mine

RCGA

For The Birds

Peacock spreads his tail,
a display of eyes.
He struts the lawn
and prances for emphasis:
‘I see you wherever you go…
I know your every movement…
I reign supreme…
Look upon my majesty.’
Peahen in her drab
huddles, clutching a branch.
She wails from her perch,
her voice
sounding like madness.


RCGA

Aside

If I give in to this urge
there will certainly be a moment…
oh, more than a moment…
probably an hour, at least,
of sheer, indulgent bliss.
Oh, sinuous temptation,
tickling me with your forked tongue
in unmentionable places.
I am reminded
by your dangerous whispers
of my mortality
of time’s brevity
of opportunity’s limitations.
But how short is life, really?
Not short enough, apparently
to avoid waking with a headache
and regrets.
Trickster, stop poking me in the id;
I have enough heartburn
without eating fire.

RCGA