A Sequence Of Dreams

The Narrator dreams of Candles, Myths and God

It was dark except for the candles
and I leaned far forward,
my hair falling in shrouds round my face.
I blew out the candle
and it lit more, and each time I leaned to blow
more candles would light
until I began to think of the Hydra myth .
How each head lopped off became two new heads,
maws open and hungry for flesh ,
hungry for the feel of hot blood
running down long necks
and the aftertaste of iron
across questing tongues.

The flames were dancing,
seeming to mock my futile effort
to extinquish them with how they seemed to dance
just beyond my reach,
and how, completely frustrated
with my failure to quench them
I prayed for rain ,and God,
who never agrees with me about anything
and who likes to tell me He does exist;
just not quite like people expect Him to be,
made the clouds gather
and the rising wind made the candle flames
dance even more vigorously.

So I started laughing and laughed
until I started to weep
and each tear put out a candle, sending up little
puffed signals of surrender and defeat,
and the smoke tendrils curled up
and impregnated my hair
and I smelled the beginning and the end.

Two : In Which The Narrator Collects Flower Petals.

I was never the flower girl in any weddings.
I didn’t even pretend to play bride and groom
but the second dream was hidden under a huge wisteria
which dwarfed me to child size
and the petals drifted down
collecting a hint of salt from the near tidal flats
and I started trying to catch them
and even used a butterfly net
but they all would spin away at the very last moment
dashing my hopes
but the air was still full of this thick
scent of wisteria and salt and decayed things
and I knew that I was dead too,
even if I woke up alive, it made no difference
I was dead for a reason, and the wisteria could’ve told
the story and I would’ve been unable to disagree.

Three: The Narrator Is Woken By A Child And Goes Back To Dreaming

A small voice worms into the smell of plants
and says I don’t feel well and

I wake, heart thumping, remembering the certainty of being dead
and terrified that the child will find me gone,
and scream in the beginning of a lifelong trauma :
gasping for water like a fish flopping on the tidal flats at low tide,
the small body clings to me and I hear the thunder of two hearts
in the dark and if I am dead
I am at least able to levitate my corpse into the bathroom
getting water to soothe an aching throat
and forcing my corpse to exhibit tender concern and warm lips
and throwing it all back on the bed

to remember vaguely that moment in drama class
when he asked me after a mime session
if I always threw myself on the bed
that way, feet to to pillow and head
snapping across the foot of the bed
and the answer as I drifted back to sleep was

breathed outward ‘yes…. ye es .

Four : Columbine and Pierrot Appear To Mourn The Death Of The Narrator

They opened all the doors and windows
and the wind God called swept back in
invisible fingers riffling through curtains,
flipping idly through pages of books
moving carefully coiffed hair
and as soon as a door opened, other doors would close
in a perfect parody of choice
when everyone knows the only choice
left to the poor corpse is
Heaven or Hell.

Still dreaming, the narrator realizes
that there will never be sex, either,
which tips the balance mostly towards the Afterlife as Hell.
Pierrot finds the wisteria petals wafted in and covering everything
but the body and whistles to Columbine to gather them
and mound them over the coffin ;
and they dance a parody of sex, pretending to make love
as if psychic, and reading the deads last thoughts.

Five : When Woken, The Narrator Is Bruised And The EMTs Are Called

No one know where the bruises came from,
when we went to bed there wasnt a single mark
and we woke up- bam, it looks like a train wreck
and I the only victim, nothing happened
other than the usual, dreams and children
up in the middle of the night
and I didnt trip or fall or do anything unusual
but my chest feels pinched and my heart is racing.
My left arm is kind of numb
and I can’t get my fingers to move right.

Even as they watch, the bruises fade
and I am left with these two EMTs
who, laughing, grope after the disappearing bruises
and search me from head to foot
to find only more disappearing evidence
and want to use words like stigmata and miracle,
but I still can’t move well enough to fend them off
and there are two of them and one of me anyway
so I can’t really say there was much of a fight
and I remembered the dream in which I knew I was dead
even if I woke up so I relaxed and remembered too
that if I was dead there wouldnt be sex
but it looked and felt and smelt like sex
and I concluded that I was alive after all.

Six: The Therapist, at Coffee

is vaguely stunned, suggesting mildly
and half humorously
a switch to decaf, before asking
why the rape was after the dream of
death, and we discuss escalation
and fear and how it all seems so very remote
when the sun shines and the air
still smells so sweetly of wisteria
and how strong he actually thinks
I must be, to have passed through
and over and beyond
even half of what really happened.

I shrug, yawning.

Choices

This isn’t the one that you wanted, but
I pulled him out of the way of the others
and he latched on, milk teeth meeting
in the webbing between thumb and forefinger
and I thought, “why not?”
But you’re right, I want to save them all
even the runt, one paw shorter than the others.
You really do have to admire the tenacity
of this small half blind creature
with a handicap, fighting my hand of fate like that,
fighting the inexplicable choice of the unknown.

Binding

You will not find what you need
on this pharmacy shelf.

Follow me. I can help you.

First we collect water from the creek
in the darkest part of the moon
You have to reach deep to snatch
the blackness within.

Go ahead, its water.
Seal it closed with this bit of pitch,
I forgot to bring you a cork.

You can use your flashlight if you want,
its old fashioned of me but I prefer the torch,
I sprinkle herbs and breathe the smoke,
it helps me think where we go next.

I need you to kill this bug - no, this one-
and place it in your left pants pocket.
I pray the murderers prayer on you now,
those who kill will know you now,
recognize you as their own.

Theres a place close by where the holy fire
was lit, we take your water there to boil.
We place my torch in the center, see, exactly here
where it dances to the Mother’s pulse,
where it catches the blood and becomes a live thing.

Here, I carry water for drinking- have some.
let me see your bug for a moment,
no I dont need to touch it .
I am merely the tongue that gives your need a voice,

We sing blessings three times three, backwards
we sing blessings to the winds four quarters-backwards
to the above and the below, backwards
Now go.

Put him back, but in the right pocket now.
When she’s dead, remember to let me cleanse you.
Those murderers will cling to you alive or dead
I only ask for one night.
I want your child, that is my price.

Nocturne

I will leave before the sun rises,
when the last of the moon is paling
and the stars are winking out.
I don’t like to be about when sleep
wears thin, and people fumble.

I lose the words.
I want the night back
the dark and encompassing cloud
the song of the wind
the screech of the owl
the rustling in the grass.

I hear a call I can’t refuse to answer.
It will pull me from my bed,
pull me from your arms
carry me away

come the dawn…

Marrow

It is a fact, children have more bones than adults.

Age solidifies and calcifies us,
children; though younger, will splinter
into a puzzle of scattered bones
that add up to more than their parents.

The blood just seeps into the thirsting earth,
no matter the source, organs desicate
under the sun by the side of the road,
muted evidence of something beyond normal.

The bones are gnawed by predators,
of which Time is the most persistent,
followed only by the wind, which rolls the bones
like dice across the landscape in some game
where no one knows the rules.

The DNA will tell you it was a little girl,
but only the wind knew her name.

Lyres83008

In 3, 2, 1

It nags at you like a broken nail
even after you file the rough edges away.

go ahead and laugh
but it speaks to you, certainly it does

these experiences we have-the sharing of laughter
the sympathy, the tears, the tugging of desire

you know you want to, you just never say so

It’s the missing punchline to the joke
you stopped telling midsentence

this is, again, like the missing man formation

This is you missing me missing you.

This is the realization
this is where unknowing crosses knowledge

this is where the story ends

When Angels Weep

It rains.

Don’t laugh,
my mother told me so.

Grandmother was more scientific,
she explained the cycle
of water and how
the dew evaporates up up into
the sky to condense into clouds
and when they get too heavy

it rains.

what is too heavy, I asked.

She said to ask an angel.

Water Baby

Some fish are just fish.

I keep the chair, yes.
The Chair, the Fork, the Plate.
These are my constellations,
this is how I order the night,
this is how I eat on Fridays.

I never saw a rainbow
trout that I didn’t enjoy the hell out of
once he was de-boned and broiled
lightly, with butter and pepper.

I envied the ability to piss off the stern.

I ate Bambi too.
Thumper, occasionally.

But my favorite was the old Fass Bro’s Fish House
the hushpuppies
and sitting at the elbow of the fisherman
with the Chair, the Fork and the Plate.

Lyres072008

The Melon Scented Candles

were paid for with my credit card.
I signed the receipt, it must have been me.

I placed them on the armoire to gather dust,
to show signs of neglect
to count the days.

When the dust gets an inch deep
I shall strike the match, light the candle
and gently blow oooooOooooo

creating a flame surrounded by a field
of swirling dust motes

all of which I send to you;
all of the longing and all of the loneliness
all the missing and the wishing
and resentment- all of it sent
searching for the rind
separated from the pulp.

oooooOooooo.

oooooOooooo.

Two Kittens Unravel DNA

It was a sweater before it was a
ball of string before it was a sweater.

They bat it lightly this way, that way
they makes cats cradles, bend string
balls into ladders,

creation with kitten paws, clumsy.
No God, No God, No God.

They explore possiblities, discover universes
in grains of dust floating in the evening
of the world,see endless wonder

in a sweater that was once a ball of string.