Pink blooms black setting
Chives protest roots pull free
Somewhere a phone rings
Dirt-encrusted hand swipes sweat
Leaving taste of grit behind

Aransas

at port aransas you remarked what a good team we made.
our combined karmas enabled us to conjure birds, beasts
and open eateries. no phone, a broken map but we were
filled with our ineffable silence which rang brash even
before there was such a thing as beginning.

a coyote sat tall in orange grass eking its way from
the black canyon humus. you noted my kestrel kept
up with our FOUR RUNNER, arriving on electric lines
moments before us every several. that afternoon we
saw roseate spoonbills in FLIGHT as well as a small
family of them, washing in the rivulets and DINING.

whoopers at great distances danced in order to
strengthen their relationship. the vultures on the
viewing deck allowed us utter privacy with which
to view the cranes people travel great distances,
and still not glimpse. wheres the fuckin crane?!
you did your impression of an angry camper.
you made us laugh until it positively hurt; we
went exactly nowhere without seeing them.

at dagger island a serpentine monster uttered
his red longing petrified neighbors took to
be dream. you handed me a bone crucifix
to hold while you tended to your CAMERA,
i palmed it in cooled prayer of thanks for what
was US IN sage walkways, us again in
silent grove of silver trees bent motte of us
driving home whatever sticks is what stays.

thank goodness you walked ahead of me.
a wild boar screamed calamity, charging
from the wood smelled so eucalypti,
i begged, no, commanded you to put
your face in it. he bolted to the wood opposite.
i did not move. i didnt turn to watch his mad
exodus. my smile held me in a steel tank you
excavated like a bell from the muscle blade
of our conjoined shoulders

that night i could not move and you did not
stop speaking excited magic
spells out what could only be taken
as good, and right.

Bree aka zlee zlee

i woke up with strangers on my mind.
little flashes of the features
of the people my life collided with
when i worked third shift at a truck stop
in the middle of the midwest.
strangers i adopted as familiar faces
to get me through some lonely midnights
far from the hills and hollers
of home.

like the boys from the car wash next door
who made their money scrambling over semis
with soapy rags, at top speeds,
even in the dad of winter when icicles
caked up their beards and sideburns
and their fingertips turned purple and blue.
they spent their money on lottery tickets
and Marlboro Reds and Nugget
and Mountain Dew.

Or the middle-aged waitress with sad eyes
who came in like clock-work for a thirty pack of Busch
and a half pint of Tvarsky, hundred proof.
exhausted after an evening
of attending to letcherous truckers
and stingy tourists just passing through.
she counted out dingy dollar bills from her apron
and even her teased up hair had fallen, wilted,
given up.

and the broad-shouldered, big-bellied pig farmer
who ushered in the dawn
with a load of squealing hogs, doomed
and stacked three deep in a shiny, silver trailer.
he stopped to fill up the tank
on the way to the slaughter.
his leather face was smattered with grime
and laugh lines and grimaces,
spread out in equal parts
adn he grumbled if my timing was off
and his coffee wasn’t fresh enough.

but i’ll never forget the night
a girl i went to high school with
walked through the grimey, double doors.
she was great big pregnant
and on the arm of a truck drivin’ husband
and we both stopped to take stock
of a sign from the homestead,
incredulous that East Kentucky could appear
out of the corn fields
off the highway.

Nothing for the rats
Echoes scream, none shall listen
It’s now cast in stone

Intellectually
We’ve kept on the training wheels
Exchanged for progress

Our highest plateau
Workers achieved 100 years ago
Flourished, did the arts

Proletariat
Now under the spell of “tech”
The ladder up now burning

Riding the white elephant
Advancement now traded for
Convenience, despair

There is a vacuum inside glass blocks.
Build a hotel, you may need to destroy some.
They explode, sending shards equally
in all directions. Don’t know why
we can’t salvage them. Some foolery.  

Marriage is built with imploding force.
When it shatters, all witnesses suffer.
What seems everyday becomes lethal.
There is no telling where shrapnel
lands, soft tissues, stunned trust.  

My tiredness camouflages itself in beer.
All I ever wanted was a peaceful life.
Give me two days out fishing with Jay.
Give me a chance to wake up clean.

I love driving around Lexington, listening to NPR, crying tears when someone touches my heart with her words, watching people.

main street morning

the tattered and worn

wake up to traffic

I stare at them from  my

car as I drive to the dog park

or they trudge

downtown from shelters

free breakfast

outside the library

hot coffee just like home

It never matters
how long joy lives.
Anything that deserves
seventeen seconds
meant something to someone,
one day or some day.  It is okay
if our past is a dream for the future,
or if we hope to never turn back. 
Either way, to know one day better
than another, is
proof enough of good.

                   For Bharathi Veerath

A woman perched on a pendelum,
she lived.  Breathing bravery across
a world where women are newly
human, no one stops
to think about how
the revolutionized are hurt
by change. All warrior women share
your thoughts, we should have said,  
but she has given in,
given up on hanging on.  

If Not But for the Stars

i somehow ceased to amaze you,
and now i dig round in the aftermath,
looking for my little hairbrush–the one
with the bristles like your face on my face.
remember? you were all vibrant, thriving
and pushing and striving. you hungered,
and you hungered for me. i blushed, all
piqued, and responded rather kindly.