Clouds

In the days when I was your sun
In the time of shared imaginings
We watched white manatees
swim across a sea blue sky

In the days of endless summer
In the time of possibilities
We lay belly down
on the sun bleached pier
and watched bull frogs part the duckweed
singing their anthems of revolution

Your heart
was a crystal
transforming smiles into rainbows
and rainbows into reality

Your laughter
was both wind and windchime
My cause and
my effect
I breathed it like air
Aware of it only by its absence

When you are gone
Time ticks away
minutes, hours, days
Rainbows fade to gray
And the clouds
are just clouds.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Artistic Interpretations w/Margaret, Simply Beautiful

Pink Washing

Welcome!

Or should I say, "Well-Komen"?!!

We at the Komen Foundation are so happy

to introduce Lake Komen,

the very first lake dedicated to breast cancer research!

Yes, it's even pink!

The Komen Foundation was able to purchase this lake

with generous contributions from folks like you!

And we vow to dedicate

a significant* percentage of tourism profits

back into breast cancer research and treatment

Come bath in the pinkness

and allow the wellness to seep into your body**

Drink our rosy elixir

and feel your health improve**

We even offer Lake Komen water in bottles

for you to take home for yourself

or to give as gifts

At Lake Komen we offer

you a choice-

group swims or individual bathing

(pink towel and swim cap included!)

Do something good for yourself,

good for the fight against breast cancer,

and good for the economy*** as well!

Visit Lake Komen today

At first blush, it's just a pink lake

but really, it's so much more!

*amount to be determined at a later date but not to exceed 0.04 of net profits
**statements have not been evaluated by the FDA
***our CEOs

submitted (albeit VERY late) for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads , Transforming Friday, Nature's Wonders




Watch this 2 minute video and be enlightened!

Untitled

We linger at a crossroads
where snow buries the crocus
and the muddy rose struggles
to think of blooming
Thorny nights
of suicidal fervor
The owls bury their heads
under soft feathers
and hope for sleep
You are but a thread
in my fabric of worry
The birds keep quiet
when the sun finally shines.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Flash

Phantom Pain

The Phantom was having a rough day

No one was taking him seriously-

An elderly woman with a small dog

was sitting his seat

and that bloated diva Carlotta

still couldn't sing worth a damn!

He thought he had made himself clear-

Threatened "a disaster beyond your imagination"

should his demands be ignored

Then he received the note

He, the Phantom,  was being charged:

"making serious threats of bodily harm,

and creating a hostile work environment"

This was unbelievably insulting

He was the one bullied

all those "monster" and "gargoyle" taunts

Now they were accusing him?

It must have been that twit, Christine

He should have known not to trust her

A beauty for sure 

but one crystal short of a full chandelier

He was only trying to encourage her

flatter her

and now, he's looking at a sexual harassment charge!

Homeland Security had been notified too

Seems that "You will curse the day you did not do 

all that the Phantom asked of you"

was perceived as a terrorist threat

Good God! 

No hope of coming above ground now

O.G. was a criminal suspect!

Oh well

the daylight hurt his eye anyway

He would wait until this blew over

He had his music

and his stash of Hustler magazines.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, FB Friday, Mashup

Carmilla

When the inky black of night

Washes over the day's canvas

That is your time

Your blood red lips

Your alabaster skin

mesmerize

Your scent

intoxicates

Your raven hair

binds me

even as I stroke it

I bloom under your touch

With each soft unfolding

I become more of you

and less of myself

With the sun

you are gone

I sleepwalk

through the shell of the day

waiting for yellow/pink sky

to become indigo

Come the gloaming

We drink each other in

Nourishing

Depleting

Again and again.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Bits of Inspiration, Queen of the Night

Immigrant Stories

He was a big man with
big hands
That was all Sarah could remember
about Papa
........................................................................................
When they arrived at Ellis Island
he called her and Mama
"little greenhorns"
Sarah thought it was a term of endearment
.......................................................................................
She wore her bruises
like her daughter would one day wear
Girl Scout badges
She had a story for each:
The time she spilled her milk and broke the glass
The time she spoke Yiddish instead of English to Papa
The time she let the ice block melt
on her way home from the iceman
There were many more
.........................................................................................
Papa called Mama a fat cow
When Mama wouldn't stop crying
he hit her-hard
Sarah hid in the closet
hands over her ears
...........................................................................................
Mama lost the baby
Sarah didn't understand
but vowed to find it
Maybe then, Papa would smile
and Mama would stop crying
But Papa slapped her across the face
and Mama cried even harder
..........................................................................................
Every Friday night
Sarah says the berakah over the candles
The golden candlesticks,
the only possession they were able to bring to America,
remind her of Mama
Tarnished by the years yet
still strong,
still valuable.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Open Link Monday

Monarch

Monarch in autumn
Orange black wings against brown
Life persists in death.

submitted for Mind, Love, Misery's Menagerie, Heeding Haiku w/HA, Drop Your Haiku Somewhere

origami butterfly w/haiku left on table at county bldg.

American Dream

I ride bareback on a bald eagle

right through your door, or

if it's locked, your bedroom window

You're gonna love me!

I'm patriot porn--

Apple pie sweet

and fuck me heels

Cherry red mouth pledging allegiance

while I jiggle my blue starred tits

I'm white as fine grade cocaine

You know you're addicted

Glory, hallelujah!

You know you want me

I'm the American dream, cupcake

Just don't open your eyes.

a bit of cynicism submitted for Magpie Tales, Mag 245
and Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Bye Bye Miss American Pie

The Seasons

source

The flowers bloom then go to seed
The leaves turn brown and fall from trees
So all of Nature's children heed
the calling of the Seasons.

The frogs and turtles go to sleep
The squirrels hide acorns buried deep
so all of Nature's children keep
the rhythm of the Seasons.

But humans are a stranger breed
We oddly seem to have a need
Refusing to give in, concede
the cycle of the Seasons.

So stubbornly we do believe
That loss of youth is cause to grieve
And though we try, we can't deceive
the passage of the Seasons.


submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Sunday Mini Challenge, Salvatore Quasimodo

October Is Gone

November Wind by Lisa Alisa

Like a train you just missed

October is gone

Only the roar in your ears remains

As November enters

you feel your own seasons change

Gold to brown

Red to rust

Leaves to dust

under your feet

You wrap your sweater tighter

try to fight the cold

but it's under your skin

now

Winter begins.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Flash 55

Very Superstitious

source

Say a prayer beside your bed

Hope that you don't wake up dead

Throw the salt and knock on wood

so that all your luck is good

Spit three times and close the books

Make sure that you count the rooks

Leave the house the way you came

If you don't, then you're to blame

Charms ward off the evil eye

Keep one close and don't ask why

Mend your clothes and chew a thread

Cut a cross into your bread

Bird in house and hat on bed

Both bad signs, will lead to dread

Close the casket when you die

Fear to look death in the eye

Hang a horseshoe on your door

Don't let luck spill on the floor

If you think that it's a game

Burn in Hell's eternal flame

You must watch each step you take

I tell you this for your own sake.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, FB Friday for which we are to write something spooky!

Sonnet For a Nightingale

source

I thought I heard the nightingale again

But it was only wind under the eave

I doubt that this cruel night will ever end

Should morning come, will it bring a reprieve?

You didn't leave a message, didn't phone

Your absence rings so loudly I can't hear

The night's the hardest time to be alone

But if I must, be kind and make that clear

If blinded to reality, deceit

may force a nightingale to sing all day

But hear the bitterness within the sweet

Its sorrow the false notes do not allay

You keep me in the dark with silent lies

I sing for you through tears and blinded eyes.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Bits of Inspiration, Nightingale

Mother

You always called me

your little tsouris

I thought it was a term of endearment
Like a lost word,

[it comes] back unbidden *

with your memory

You said you knew

the dark spirits would follow me

because my name was uttered

in your eighth month
 You tried

to love me but

when you looked at me,

you saw the dybbuk

and recoiled

You accused me 

of trying to turn you into a ghost

when I named my doll after you

I didn't know

I was only ten

On your grave today

I placed a stone

I'm still trying, Mother.

* For Ella's prompt, we were instructed to include a line from a ghost poem. I chose "Unbidden" by Rae Armantrout

Poet's Notes: I've made mention of several Jewish words superstitions in this poem:

• tsouris = heartbreak, worry
• uttering baby's name during pregnancy will alert evil spirits
• dybbuk = an evil spirit that possesses the living
• naming a baby after someone still alive is akin to wishing them dead
• instead of flowers, Jews place a stone when visiting a grave

submitted for Magpie Tales, Mag 242
and Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Play It Again, Toads #10, Hallows Edge

Ouija

source

When I was a child

The line between doubt and belief

was permeable

a meandering current in a stream

between reality and imagination

How I loved to cross that portal,

to lift the veil of certainty

that disguises the world of possibility

We had a ritual:

Winter was best

as dark came early,

before we had to go home for dinner

Sit in a circle

with the board in the middle,

each of our hands resting ever so lightly

on the indicator

Wait

At first we thought it a trick

But we pinky swore it was not

The spirit was speaking

We were the conduit

Soon, the game became unnecessary;

We just held a pencil

and it spoke to us

in smoky, graphite

Over time

amorphous scribbles became

differentiated

Scenes of destruction, fire, slaughter

emerged from our own hands

without our intent

Our feast of fun

became fear, force-fed

I made the decision

to sacrifice the board

and, along with it, the drawings

Sealed in a trash bag to be carried away

with the week's junk mail

and coffee grinds

Belief and doubt battle to this day

Childhood fantasy or

something wicked narrowly avoided

Belief usually wins out.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Get Listed for October
and It's Ma Thing

A Grain of Truth

photo by glitterdarkstar

You pour lies into my waiting cup

I drink them greedily

like an addict

They go down

smooth and warm

They feed

a lack

I know they devour

as they fill

Leave a bigger hole

in my soul

This is how I exist:

empty fullness

full emptiness

Craving more

You always oblige

I hate you

I want more.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Sunday Challenge, In Other Words

After

source

She wraps herself in sheets

stained with tears and sweat

She has been stripped

of something vital

that she can't quite name

It makes no sense-

She had wished it all away

but still,

there was an undeniable connectedness

She makes the sign of the cross

though she stopped believing long ago

She closes her eyes

feels between her legs

She bleeds

a broken poem.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Open Link Monday
and The Sunday Whirl, Wordle 181

October

photo by songs of light

October is a cruel month

She doles out sunlight

like a petulant child forced to share her candy

Too hot to bundle up

Too cool to strip down

October relishes discomfort

She paints flowers and leaves

the color of dirt

just to remind you

that nothing lives forever.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Words Count With MZ, Personification

For Allison In Portland

The misty morning rain and dove grey sky

Reminds me how the wet days make you smile

I swear I hear your laughter and I sigh

Imagining a bridge across the miles.

We'd put our boots on and go take a walk

We'd splash in all the puddles on our way

We'd joke and tease or maybe we'd just talk

A day I spend with you is the best day.

And even though I miss you constantly

I daydream in your room to feel you near

I know that Portland's where you need to be

So I would never try to keep you here.

So when you feel the rainy morning mist

Know that I am sending you a kiss.

submitted for Magpie Tales, Mag 238

There Is No Art To War

artwork by blue clementine art

There is no art to war

Art creates;

war destroys

Art understands;

war attacks

Art is honesty;

war is treachery

Art is tender;

war, indifferent

War is tactics

Strategy, scheming,

cold, efficient planning

Art is ardor

Energy, fire,

hot, chaotic humanity

There is no art to war

Allying the two

is a disgrace, a blasphemy

Art would sooner die

than be captured 

in service of war

It often does.

submitted (late) for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Get Listed (September)

Persephone's Invitation

Garnet by Dragon Of Lust on Deviant Art

When you are ready for me,

wear garnet

Red

is not enough

Rubies are cloying,

cherry Koolaid red,

jellybean red

That kind of red

is for the timid

Call me with garnets,

with blood,

deep, warm things

not so sweet

Drape a string of seeds

around your neck

I will take you to dark places

where the moon fears to shine

I will bring you September;

you will wear its leaves upon your fingers

When you want me,

cloak yourself in autumn's satin

Whisper my name to the reddened, black sky

You will taste wine upon the breeze, and

Your heart will glow like a gemstone.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Artistic Interpretations With Margaret, Mineral Rainbow 
and Sunday Challenge, September Skies

Put On Those Rose Colored Glasses

source

Hey, baby, don't be like that

When I told you there was no one else,

I wasn't really lying

You see,

I meant that there was no one else

worth mentioning,

No one else

worth getting you all upset about

See?

And it's over anyway, so

let's just forget all about it, ok?
Aw, honey

don't be like that

You know you're my girl

and "I gotta work late"

sounds so much prettier than

"I'd rather pull out all my teeth with your tweezers

than watch "Dancing With the Stars" again!"

I mean, do you really want me to say,

"I'd rather be shot through the face with bullets than have you kiss me"? or

"Your meandering hands feel like spiders crawling all over my skin"?

Yeah, I say, "Plant one here, baby!" and I smile

even though it hurts

C'mon, sweetie

don't go changing the locks again

I bought you some roses 

Naw, I didn't buy her any

She doesn't even like roses, 

and yours cost me way more!

Let's just go to bed, huh?

I'll pretend your dismal thrusting gets me off

just like I always do

I'm done with her

It's all about you now, baby

Wild horses couldn't drag me away, just like the song

I love you, baby

You believe me, right?

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, You Could Have Done Better, Out of Standard

and The Sunday Whirl, Wordle 177

Another Icarus

He always knew that he would die this way

From the moment he first felt the fire,

the warmth spreading over his body

that made all the pain go away,

he knew that he would never stop

He wasn't afraid of being burned

He flew higher

and higher

He wanted the sun for himself

if only once

And when he gave that final push,

he almost made it

Almost

But in the end

his wings turned to ash,

his body to dust

And the flame still burned.

submitted for Magpie Tales, Mag236 and
Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Open Link Monday

Warrior Princess

image source

  She births stars from her fingertips

Dances with fire

Wraps herself in comet tails

Spinning the flames

As graceful and dangerous

as a tigress

Fierce

Fearless

Feminine

Wild as summer jasmine

She dances with fire

to moonlit music.

image source

Note: This poem was inspired by watching a performance of Weapons of Mass Distraction, the fire spinning group (all students!) at Reed College in Portland, OR where my daughter is now a freshman. After one of the women's performances, a woman sitting next to me shouted, "Look at that, you bimbo cheerleaders! These women are WARRIOR PRINCESSES!"

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Open Link Monday

Carnations

source

Carnations

pressed between book  pages

On the flowers, fragile and faded,

I can still smell the scent of long-ago perfume

The petals fall, papery snowflakes

melting like promises

forgotten.

Written for the previous week's Sunday Mini Challenge, Triquain at Imaginary Garden With Real Toads

Heaven's Ghetto

Keith Haring

Love can be dangerous

Cross the wrong street-

love can be deadly

Doesn't matter how we die

Disease, murder, brainwashing, hopelessness

We all end up in the same pile of bodies

Buried by gloved hands and masked faces

Heads shaking 

Thinking "not me"

until it is

Hatred is a virus

as much as HIV

It spreads by fear

Grows stronger through ignorance

And the cure still seems miles

Away

Meanwhile

We die for love

Destined for Heaven's ghetto.

submitted for Magpie Tales, Mag 232

and Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Open Link Monday

Closets

source

There are closets in my skeleton

Gaping spaces between bones

Inaccessible places

Lacunae

Waiting for me to press "play"

or not

My ribs are not your tie rack

They sit too close

to my heart.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads,  Artistic Interpretations w/Margaret,Skeleton Poetry

Children of Decay

Overnight they emerge

Ghostly grey presence

belying the morning shine

Flat headed phantoms

balanced on thin, stringy stems

Children of decay

birthed of death

No fairy picnics under these

skeletal umbrellas

Prodders of rot

Auguries of degeneration

spreading earthy perfume

among the sweet flowers

They stand

ashen tombstones

marking time

Reminders of mortality

always reminding.

submitted (late again) for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Flash Fiction 55

Dog, you, me, dog

dog

you

me

dog

Lined up 

on the bed

Pressed together

A living panini

on a sheeted plate

Our essences mingle

wrapped in heat

wrapped in sheets

Warm, gooey, cozy treat

Sandwich perfection

dog

you 

me

dog.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Open Link Monday

There Is Beauty In Small Things

There is beauty in small things

if we would stop to see

Pause upon a snowflake

with its fragile symmetry

Cherishing the commonplace

bestows it with sublime

There is beauty in small things

if we would take the time.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Words Count with MZ

On the Brink Of

We were ten or eleven

Still just kids but

almost not

Young enough to play on the playground

Old enough to notice

(not quite hidden in the woods)

girls stealing smokes

and making out with boys

We were at that awkward stage

One minute playing with Barbies

the next, examining our silhouettes,

waiting for them to look like Barbie's

It was a time of imagined possibilities

and dreams smashed in linoleum school hallways

On the brink of we didn't know what

Our lips kissed only by Bonne Belle strawberry

we practiced by kissing ourselves in the mirror

I suggested (jokingly)

(Why was my heart beating so madly?)

that maybe we should practice on each other

"Gross!" you said, and I

didn't miss a beat, "Yeah, I know, right?"

and that was that.

The next year you had a boyfriend

and we lost touch

But I still remember those on the brink days

and your freckled nose.

 submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Open Link Monday

This Poem Is Red Lipstick, Schrodinger's Cat, and Dandelion Fluff

source

This poem is red lipstick.
This poem is Schrodinger's cat.
This poem is dandelion fluff.

Crimson lipped attention-grabber
Painted patterer
Beautiful emptiness
Nothing to say but
oh so lovely
This poem is red lipstick.

Perhaps it's here
Perhaps it's not
Maybe it lives
Maybe it dies
Study it; it changes
This poem is a metaphor
This poem is Schrodinger's cat.

Breathe and it's gone
Its seeds planted everywhere
or nowhere
Catch it on the wind
or blow it away
This poem is dandelion fluff.

This poem is red lipstick.
This poem is Schrodinger's cat.
This poem is dandelion fluff.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Hannah's Sunday Mini-Challenge, Boomerang Metaphor Poems

Stairs

Behold the stairs which felt our tread

Carpet frayed and thinning

Threadbare stairs which we walked down each day

and up each night, the very way

Stairs on which our footfalls fell

Our secrets they would never tell

These stairs have seen us through our pasts

The only evidence that lasts

When voices still, when bodies' lust

of flesh and bone has turned to dust

Though wood is worn  and cloth unspun

These stairs are here and we are gone.

submitted for Magpie Tales, Number 228
and Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Open Link Monday

Never Forget

source

It never really goes away, does it?

Some mornings I wake up and forget

for a little while

But sooner or later

the skipped heartbeat comes

and with it, the realization

that nothing has changed.

Constant companion

never invited but

arrived with suitcases nonetheless

establishing squatter's rights in the bloodstream.

We lie down at night;

it is the space between us.

We hold hands in the sunlight;

it is the shadow overhead.

We float in the ocean;

it is the undertow that pulls us out to sea.

We are never alone now

It is with us always,

lurking like a lie,

waiting to come crashing down

Crushing

us.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Sunday Mini Challenge, Claribel Alegria

A Woman Must Always Look Twice

A woman must always look twice
She must look first at what she sees
Then she must look deeper
She must read between the lines
on each face
She must look for subtext,
for subtleties
She must be alert
to the riptide
below the water's surface
or risk being carried out to sea,
drowned.

Yes, a woman must always look twice
She must look first at the smile
Then study the teeth
She must suss out
the impulse to rip her apart
She must know when she meets a wolf.

A woman must always look twice
She must first look ahead,
know where she is going
not get diverted by mazes or tricks
And she must look behind
She must be aware
of those trying to overtake her,
to run her over
or leave her naked and bleeding in the street.

A woman must always look twice
Even at another woman
She must protect what is hers
from her sisters,
her friends
who are themselves looking twice.

A woman must always look twice
when she looks in the mirror
Does she look pretty?
Does she look too pretty?
She must look at herself
Then she must look as another would look at her
She must assess the message in her clothes
in her hair, her make-up
Do her hips sway?
Do they sway like a woman's should
or like a whore's?
A woman must always look twice
at her body.

A woman must always look twice
A woman must always look twice.


submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Open Link Monday

The Lighthouse

photo by Margaret Bednar

The lighthouse keeper

climbs the stairs for the last time

Each step creaks-

bone and stair-

to the top and down again

The light

blinks its shine in the night sky

over a black and silent sea

"I am here"

"I am here"

it calls out to the emptiness

like the last firefly of summer.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Artistic Interpretations, Life On an Island and
Flash Fiction 55

In Praise of the Older Body

photo from The Body Is Not An Apology

Let us raise our voices

in praise of the older body

The body who has survived

insult, illness, and the indignities of the years

Praise

to the fragile thin skin

with its lines like poetry

written on its surface

Hallelujah

to the drooping boobs

hanging like water balloons waiting

for some mischief

Amen

to the no longer taut torsos,

hard and thin as wooden planks in their youth

Now soft, delicate dumplings,

yielding, giving pillows

Sing adorations

to the stretch marks

and the scars,

warriors' wounds,

earned and cherished

Hosanna

to silvery hair,

a glittering crown

atop the head of a queen,

full of knowledge and memories and wisdom

Glory be

to age spots,

the kisses of time,

to crows' feet and laugh lines,

birthed by so many smiles

Praise

to the body 

who is a work of art,

a work of life lived,

of love given and received

Let us raise our voices

as we raise our arms,

be they fat as Vienna sausages

or skinny as chicken wings,

in triumph 

and in praise 

of the older body.

Whale Hips

Whales have hipbones

though they no longer walk on land

The remnant of a past life

lingers

well beyond its usefulness

Perhaps this is analogous

to the love I still feel for you

and the hurt 

that

I haven't seen you

or talked to you

in decades

The past

imprints itself on the present

Vestigial feelings

Meaningless and wasted

Saved like an old sweater that no longer fits

but was once was so soft and warm

that you just can't give it up.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Obscuring the Truth With Facts, Out of Standard

Avant-Girl

Street Art by Saki and Bitches, London East End  (photo by lolamouse)

I saw you walkin' down the street

Can't get you off my mind

Your brown skin glistened in the heat

Ripe peach from the behind

You flirt, you flaunt with your tight dress

Your hair is waves of blue

You leave me shakin' and a mess

Don't know what I'mma do

Girl, you know you're fresh and brash

And you make my mind whirl

Some folks be sayin' you're just trash

But you're my avant-girl.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Avant-Edge: A Sunday Challenge

Anything

Anything for you, baby

You know that, don't ya?

If you want my attention, I'll drop whatever I'm doing

and give you anything you want

You know I'm a sit on the couch and watch SVU kinda girl

but if you want to go out,

I'm up and out the door - just let me put on my shoes, honey

You can take the covers, take the pillows - both of them

I just wanna sleep next to you

You can snore in my ear

and it's better than any Beethoven symphony

If you're feeling affectionate

I'll cuddle with you despite my hot flashes

and your tendency to smell like rancid Fritos

I'll accept your sloppy kisses

like they're gold coins pouring out of a slot machine

You know that I see you kiss other girls

and other boys

It's alright, baby

I know I'm your number one

You'll always be mine too

Anything for you.

Baby Mouse and Soni the Poodle

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Kerry Says - Let's Have a Conversation

One of my favorite Doggy poems by one of my favorite poets, Andrea Gibson

Feline

You sneak up behind me
A cat after prey
Soft and silent
as night swallows day
You sedate with your purr
Rub your body on mine
Make me believe
You're a creature benign
Crystal green eyes
Reflect my desire
Give nothing away
of what will transpire
I reach out to touch
Pull back bloody and scratched
You walk away
Smug and detached.

Submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, FB Friday, The Art of Guido Vedovato

Here is the link to the painting that inspired the poem

Snapshots

Meshes of the Afternoon by Maya Deren

The bread is stale

The flowers are dead

I look in the mirror and see

my mother

The roses are red

So is the blood

The mirror is cracked

The pill is swallowed

The flowers are lovely

The bread is round

The people are celebrating

The door is open

There is no bread

The flowers are pressed

The knife is at the wrist

The baby cries

The baby cries

The baby cries

 

The dirt is on the grave

The mirrors are covered

Where is the key?

Swallowed  by grandmother

The stairs are endless

The phone is silent

The music has stopped

I stare at the key

The bread is stale

The flowers are dead

I look in the mirror and see

my mother.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Bits of Inspiration: Maya Deren