Picacho

.....Like many mornings, I got up and drove to a small town in Arizona to work up an estimate for asbestos and lead removal from some buildings prior to demolition. The town has long been mostly empty with many dilapidated buildings and many of the rest being bought by the government to expand the freeway.  Walking through these houses always smells the same, always looks the same and always evokes some strong feelings in me.  While this was a quick effort, I think it begins to cover some of the feelings.

The dusty hue of the morning sky always settled lightly in Picacho

Cracker box square, the houses long left untended….contents strewn

The smell of rotting wood and moldering plaster, every one the same

Wading through clothes that never made the move, knee deep in panties

Mommy, where are we going?

Look at her eyes, the same color as the dusty morning

Mommy, what about Duke?

A hope and a prayer that the car starts this one last time

The lilt of the Mourning Dove is never soothing, not in Picacho

When you arrive or when you leave the coo is the same

Neither welcoming or desperate, just the sound of suffering

A knowing that when the souls have moved on, the silence takes no prisoners

Daddy, where will we stay?

The shape of his eyes match the dove’s cries precisely

Daddy, what about Teddy?

A shame that never flowers into the sharpness of resentment….for her sake

A better life may wait in the next town, a town that’s not Picacho

But only with help from someone who knows without doubt

What it is like to be human and temporarily misplaced

Picacho was their one true love, left for now to fend for herself

The Wedding Dance of Cora Blue

......an ode to the strength of women.

God showered his shards of colored glass

At the wedding dance of Cora Blue

All danced light on tips  and rainbow hues

Riding magic waves of love and sight

Til satyrs whispered, turn out the light

As time wore on, the world loved in mass

To the life and love of Cora Blue

And worked fallow fields the ancients knew

Growing kindness, folding wee ones right

Til times grip became a touch too tight

The destiny of that perfect lass

Loving angel known as Cora Blue

In history books the pages flew

No one human had the reach and flight

That she bestowed on her wedding night

© 2011 Crowley

Selfless

I celebrate myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

I ate at your brasserie for a month and a day

Wisdom and milk chocolate pancakes with boysenberry

You insisted I knew better and ran your fingers through my hair

Sharing thoughts daily on how to save the world

Over wine and the thinnest slices of carpaccio

I sucked in your available soul and crooned new day songs

When night would fall you would dance in that nightgown

And I would stare with a teenage boy’s delight at the undulations

And sneak a kiss if only in my dreams and taste the faintest of cherry

Grant me one wish and I promise not to waste it on myself

I will carry your vision to the borders of the known world

And tell the winds of my other self, browning in the Arizona sun

The first stanza is Uncle Walt's Song of Myself....one of my favorite stanzas of all time.

Words For Your Coffee

Wrap your body in a blanket of your daily successes

And listen to the cricket with a musicians ear

For it is love that he is singing, life that he is crooning

Every line a melody, custom tailored to sooth your brief madness

Take a breath and the toothpicks from your eyes

Let them land softly on gosling down, resting preciously

They will be the windows to your dreams, translucent

Puffing sweet scents and glorious vapors used for flying

If the night terrors knocking at the doors of your mind

Cause you even a modicum of distress, take note

I have left a light on in the bottom left hand corner of your dream

Pass this way and you will be safe, there will be dancing

After catching a glimpse of what the faeries have to offer

Be it cruel or painfully beautiful upon waking to thoughts austere

Just know that you can carry these thoughts forward and blazing

And stir them into your morning coffee….with a touch of vanilla

© 2011 Crowley

Inspector General

I love me some Isadora Gruye...she rocks.


“I like your hair…..”

“Grease fire….It’s growing back”

You turn and order green tea, no sugar, from the cute organic boy

For the seventeenth time this week

“I like your shoes….”

“I know…who wouldn’t”

You stare at the shoes at least five seconds longer than I did

You turn and look hard into my eyes

“Well as long as we are on the subject of liking things….”

You shift and raise one arm to the ceiling

“I like thick prose written in a junkyard setting….heavy on vermouth”

I stare back, thoughtfully

“Why, whatever do you mean?”

The Wordsmiths Song

He laid her to rest in a bath of his brightest verse

Still growing hair propped under a poetic pillow of Christ and despair

Her fingers circled in the finest agony, neatly inscribed in fourteen karat metaphor

Her bosom draped in sonnets that would make Hera blush

You sleep now love

God save me

And eat in filigreed finery

God save me

I'll weep for your ghost

God save me

And companionship lost

God Save me

Take with you these words that I sing

Amen

They are all that I have to give

Christ....amen

He kissed her forehead with senryu lip gloss, cherry

And brushed her hair back with yesterdays melancholy sunset blazing

Her skin was as cold as a Russian winter, inked with an icicle

But her memory was as fresh as a teens infatuated lovers glance

Goodbye dear love

God save me

And fly with lightning bug splendor

God save me

I'll toast your soft touch

God save me

And companionship lost

God save me

Take with you these words that I sing

Amen

They are all that I have to give

Christ....amen

A Toast

Taking your soul in plain sight

A boundless favor to free you from your happiness

That woman would destroy your mind as was mine

And in your hour of need, you would have only your hands

And as time would show, dear friend, they were too weak

Though her eyes are curved and cut like marbles

She is no more yours than the wind or the rain

Though her voice chases the wild dogs from your mind

She is a woman with only a short time to cast

That which her hips can bear and carry through the veil

Your head isn’t my prize, but more a surety

Your empty stare, shoring for my own angry heart

I can share with you my thoughts, uninterrupted

But how I wish you would comb your hair

And wash the blood from your lips

Do you think that woman misses you?

The same way I am certain mine longs for this touch

Get a hold of yourself, there are ten-fold waiting

To touch those breasts and she will receive

Sooner than you could imagine possible

A man does not do for a woman, but alas, for other men

Taking in glory like the smoothest silk and spinning destinies

Destinies that are lost in an instant to times infinite march

If a man gets lost in the trivets of or his own wanderlust

The pay for such a man is impotent indeed and won't buy bread

One man’s life is a small price to pay my friend

I breathe my last sane thought into your mouth and wipe my blade

Holding the last of my drink to your rigor mortis lips

A toast to your attentive ear and the end to your sorrow

Tomorrow I see her again, and all will not be well

If Jesus Wrote a Poem

For the lack of a better comparison

It would be like the executioners chair

Rabid for truth, beauty and justice

But sad in it's ugly simplicity

You are looking at Nirvana's face

But you can't seem to pull the trigger

Roll on three........

Swellendam Express

I found my love lost in thought

On the tracks of emptiness and volition

Asking spirits if this was the path of happiness

Chug, chug......hissssssss

Come here child and feel this beat in time

With the syncopation of your own existence

Black as it seems, it's just a tunnel

Clang, clang......hisssssssss

Wrap your beautiful arms around me

No one will tie you to the track again

Those bastards are done, I'm iron clad death

All aboard.......hissssssssss

When this tongue parts those lips, softly

These eyes will close briefly in another dimension

And the sparks will provide a refreshing shower

This train is leaving the station.........

Nostalgia for Sale

               Photographer: Mary Ann Potter

You gave me that look, rolled your eyes…chuckling

Your connection to my heart severed wholly with a rusty hatchet

I wanted to buy that house, my house and mend it neat

The one where a young girls dreams warped and waned by day

Nostalgia for sale……ragdoll memories

 “Run to the market punkin’ and get me a beer”
Cigarette perilously close to my hair
“Your mom’s after me to paint the house”
One apple, two apples, three apples, four….

That top step was perfect for dolls, a book, a kiss, a cry

Daddy’s front stoop wisdom, forming misconceptions, but endearing nonetheless

Rodney hiding under that porch when company came…hoping for skirts

Missionaries chased down the block, caught only in the dog’s dreams

Nostalgia for sale……fading memories

“Run to Green’s for me sweetheart, I need some smokes”

Whiskey breath perilously close to my nose

“Your mom’s after me to fix the fence”

Five apples, six apples, seven apples, more….

Locks on teenagers doors kept Uncle Jacob at bay, drunken covert fumbling

Mom seemed to turn the other cheek til’ midnight knife to balls….reformed, Hallelujah

Carport posts destroyed by driving lessons and dad’s not so subtle teachers hand

Tree house porn scattered by the wind, glossy thighs on mom’s windshield, beatings

Nostalgia for sale….so sweet memories

“Run to Grant’s Teddy bear, my oxygen is out”

My first love perilously close to death

“Your mom is after me stay on the couch”

Don’t be in a rush to get out that door……

Trinny Can You Hear Me

Trinny, come and lie down by my side and breathe

Your perfect skin glows as brightly as that star

And you start to speak poetry about the days

When we were clean and the stars were just stars

You'd scorch, you'd melt

The life you were dealt (alas dear child)

Is fraught with white spectres

And full on black tigers

Who'd fancy your pelt

Trinny, don't you fucking cry on me

Your perfect heart like an egg, colored for easter

Fragile, painted upon rooster lips with a touch of fuzz

Speaking tirelessly of making love under the trestle

You'd teach, you'd track

It's mounting your back (heavy dear child)

You wail at the spectres

And stab all the tigers

Who'll pick up the slack

Trinny if you die I'll kill you, I swear

I love the way you feel naked, all consuming

I rub my freshly shaved face on your back, your buttocks

You coo and shiver as you ask me to hand you grandmas afghan

You'd squint, you'd smile

I walked the hard mile (loving dear child)

I'd marry the spectres

And tame all the tigers

Whose life is on trial

Trinny..... Can you hear me?

Always a Teacher

She stood tipped toes on turquoise glass

Asked angels for a backstage pass

The homely one he snatched her eye

And blinked away with no goodbye

She screamed and bled a wailing cry

Her life had been so neat

In two strong hands she came across

The voices there bemoaned her loss

Ethereal air turned cold stone

Placed in front on a gilded throne

A teacher faced a final loan

Confused she took her seat

Two by two wee ones funneled in

One eyed children who never sinned

They would have sat for seven days

Seeking truth from her tortured gaze

“Help them to navigate the maze”

“Your words will be their meat”

The booming voices new her fear

“To teach them you must be a peer”

“In heaven there’s no need for eyes”

“You teach them only lullabies”

“And calm there adolescent cries”

Her heart it skipped a beat

Always a teacher

Vessa's Meal

The tower eats the the children's dreams

And writes them down in magazines

Bee stung

Man hung

Over Vessa's broken nail

The witches brew from Satan's tongue

Stored in a cask without a bong

Drink deep

Thoughts creep 

Dodging Vessa's dirty smile

Your breasts they never leave my eye

Your sex an ancient lullaby

Hand firm

You squirm

I think Vessa's going home

A tug and tear of rabbits cloth

I fake a flying abott's moth

Cork bark 

Birth mark

Upon Vessa's rounded cheek

The life that formed in mother's womb

Pinned oddly up in sister's room

Evil bitch 

Solo hitch

Leaving Vessa's clammy grip

El Sol

An Aquarius sun not baking, but brining moments

The tide rolls unshaken in quantities unmeasurable 

But the time here trickles over the face of smooth granite

Moving mountains one atom at a time, carving soul canyons

The breeze whispers nautical tales written in artists sand

One million grains to capture the crease in the Captain's forehead

An entire tropical beach to explain his love of drink

Not enough sand in Mexico to calculate the depth of his sorrow

For those unable to still a mind, the battle wages

In between cold beer and a salty sun, it settles in

A death grip released by witnessing necessity in simple fashion

What do I need to get by today, por mi familia

The pelican intuitively knows high tide, boiling waters, heavy meals

Efficiently killing, but murder is not on it's mind

Eat now for tomorrow it storms, empty hearts, hollow bellies

Mañana brings torturous results for some, bliss for others

Rising, bleeding, bathing

Que pasa El Sol......que pasa