Image Obscura

When image is obscured by splintered dreams
and the opaque reality of being someone's other
and destiny is only a dime store belief
a portrait on a magazine cover

In those trafficless moments midst the pants for breath
the second thoughts and guilt's illogic
I stand my love as tall as my heart can reach
and pray you do not look over my shoulder

Red-Tailed Hawks

Desire dances between the intuitive and instinctual
where the danger from need is its exploitation of reason,
and blindness to the insuperable obstacles in its path.

Our path was a thick carpet of pasture beneath a soft blue sky.
A pair of red-tailed hawks soared overhead on a thermal joyride.
Everything within our reach was a new treasure to hold.

What we saw, felt, and possessed, are now the skeletons of memory.
Hauntings that remind us of the vacuity of the material world.
Ever widening their circles the hawks flew on. So did you.

Distracted

I should have done a better job of guarding my heart
but I was too busy listening to it sing
feeling it pulsate to passion's rhythm
anxious to believe everything it told me
I let it go beyond the point of knowing better
and was not there to catch its fall

Clutter

Wouldn't you like to throw a blanket over my head
and shut me up long enough to catch your breath

Good or Bad

The recognition of an other's need
is the bellwether of conscience
and conscience is the glue of community

To fault someone for their inabilities
shows the inability to realize your own
a debilitating egocentricity

We are not all made the same
certainly there is no one else like you
is that a good or a bad thing

Who Really Knows

I've run out of truths to tell
and though my silence is not a lie
it is a misrepresentation of the love in my heart

Can there be a strategy for an impossible situation
a way to bypass the teeth that grind the patina from life
a means to possess the means to access hopefulness

How can the worse thing that ever happened to one
be the best thing that ever happened to the other
why is the right thing a waterfall of despair

Just a moment with you is soul awakening
until the mind is blistered by the shackles of commitment
until the psyche is whipped back into its hiding place

What part of life is not an impossible situation
what steps do we ever take sure of where we will land
who really knows who loves them

She Remembered Poe

She was stirred by what I wrote 

and remembered "Annabel Lee"   

as she was once moved by Poe 

she was once again moved by me 

And is that not the power of a poem 

to draw forth what hides in the mind 

to give thoughts a voice and form 

and let perspective and coincidence rhyme

Tension

Don't ever take your eyes off of me
my mind is wound to the maximum tension
but I've centered my gaze beyond your fear
you want to be observed
but not watched

Sidelong glances
and nods to pretenders
and suddenly I'm face to face
with the reality of a bounty
yet to be reaped

How did you come to be
the arbiter of my desires
are you in tune with my longings
if I asked you to hide with me
would you care if we were found

The Gloaming

We were at our best in the gloaming
that time passage when we neared invisibility
embracing the coming darkness
and plotting our escape
only to curse our cowardliness
from beneath defiled sheets

Morning was a floodlight
that pinned us to our failings
yet we arose to the persuasion
of coincident dreams
a step ahead of the demons
that haunted us

There was never a question
of going through the motions
movement was the theme
on which we survived
that and promises we made
over our shoulders

Promises to oneself can be kept
or forgiven without consequence
promises to others
stumble under the weight of conscience
they have a way of stepping into the abyss
and luxuriating in the fall

Our only promises that ever mattered
were made to each other in the gloaming
when we had caught enough breath to think
just a silent understanding
that back to back we faced both ways
just beyond the past and just ahead of the future

That Look

I know that look of yours
that encompassing appraisal
that can withstand the dragon's breath
to determine the real danger

And I know that look of yours
that plaintive resignation
that ask not for mercy
but come what may

And I know that look of yours
those smiling eyes
that dare my advances
and laugh at their inadequacies

But most of all I know that look of yours
a beauty incarnate
sprung from a bounteous soul
that understands the intricacies of love

Dare

I told you a truth
and you turned yours eyes to me

A gift that froze me only a moment

Like all men I'm drawn to beauty
like only a few I know where to direct my gaze

Your eyes dared mine to really see them

Rhythms

I sweep my brow
and cleanse my mind
and pretend I have your attention
but my voice is an octave below what counts
and I shake in indecipherable rhythms

There is a froth in your wake
that settles on the shore
like forgotten chapters
in a book of fables
lessons that I'll never learn

You watch me while half submerged
turtle eyes ready to duck
and find comfort in the murk
where the truth need not be clear
but reason fights for air

And of course I love you
a singular preference
amid a multiplicity of desires
even when I have nothing to give you
but understanding and resolve