Tuesday, August 5, 2008

halcyon, on

halcyon,
on those days when you fell from grace
with your cheek
pressed up against the windowpane:
that was your moment.
and it was your moment,
when i was your moment.
that was your moment.

now recall a movement,
some subtle, untouched, unbridled movement
you're a warrior on your back.
with your eyes locked
on the ceiling
on the ceiling fan.
(with your eyes locked on her eyes locked on the ceiling fan,
does it make you sick?
well, does it make you sick to know that this will all go
full circle.)
"just like your mother, just like her daughter."

i was walking out,
and you were walking on the ceiling.

I’ll wrest my wings
when the storm comes crashing in.

halcyon,
you're not fooling anyone;
you're the same old girl you were
when you were young.
when you're sleeping in,
the waves come lashing against the shore,
look down the list of things you wanted her to have.

"you're just like your mother."
"you're just like her daughter."
and when the storm mercifully comes crashing in,
rustle your wings, spread so gracefully,
and throw your frail body
to the sea.
just like your mother, just like her daughter.

i'm drowning
while you’re wading.
are you waiting
for those seven days of peace,
for seven years of tranquility?
we're set on a new name:
reclaimed.
Hallelujah.

(This song is about the sea.)

Tuesday, July 22, 2008

threads of light

the summer's been cold,
and all the plans that it's crushed
were left fleeing and fleeting
or passed down to us
we try, but it's never enough to gather our sense
as we spend our late nights and mornings planning our
intoxication and facing the consequence
what's left of the day is devoted to rest
it's this iterant pattern, this pattern i intervent
it's this pattern, this iterant pattern that i divest
and build anew, built into an establishment
poems that keep me awake and the measures i take
to avoid the ranks of those who self-medicate
i'll never be that

are you seeing clearly with that smoke in your eyes?
are you breathing clearly with that smoke in your lungs?

pose, poise and impose
it's poison that flows through every impulse
you said,
"though i make my own luck,
the half that i lack is the whole we make up"
wait love,
we're caught in the fray
and just being alive is half a reason to stay.

what we've had falls victim to memory,
ennui.
on we who keep marching
onward
on and on and on.