becoming sita

sometimes
you find pearls
not in the depths
of untouched oceans,
but out in the wild
where trees mate
and die,
where a fire sits
readying herself
for the flames she grows
with her fidelity -
not to a man
the world loves,
but to a breath
that fans her waters
and tongues of fire
into which she leaps,
with the close of every day
living at the cusp
of two worlds,
the lakshman rekha,
becoming
sita.

what you love

somewhere,
where right and wrong meet
and wage war,
is a battlefield
without words,
without weapons,
without laws,
without a cause;
where everything drops dead
to the ground,
where you stand
on all sides
as one,
taking the shape
of the arrow
of love,
simply
what you love. 

from the other side

I want to plant trees.
All along the road we live in.
Not to save the earth.
Not to preserve the wild
within busy grey walls.
Not to fill the gaping hole
in the ozone layer.
Not to sit under the shade
of a story the world loves
to rave about.
Not for Facebook likes,
or petitions garnering tribes.

I want to plant trees.
So the two dogs
who come hanging their tongues,
looking for cars to sleep
under this scorching heat,
or the men who work
on sites and roads,
holding fire in their hands,
can rest a while;
so the cats and birds
and butterflies and worms,
have friends and enemies,
and homes to climb and fly;
so I can find a home
away from home,
for these tiny saplings
peeking out from the fold
of their mother's bosom;

yes, I want to plant trees
I can talk to and feel love,
here, from the other side.

warpaint and fire

there is a space
I can walk,
where I don't need
warpaint and fire,
or cries blasting open
the silence
where fault lines shift,
sink and explode,
and still I walk
held by opposite worlds,
and not swinging between them,
holding the one tiny spark
of love inside
for everything
tugging at this skin
called I.

lies

lies lay scattered
in the dirt,
like impotent seeds,
biding their time,
until the seasons change,
when they lie exposed
to what they could not be,
truths they could not see or feel,
for they were just that -
lies.

here, now

squeezed
between
moving walls,
to one last breath
of everything that was,
pushed,
shoved,
heaved across
the grooves
of a growing darkness,
where breath stops,
where dreams don't matter,,
where thoughts
freeze over hell,
where hope
stings every cell,
the cord is cut,
finally;
the womb is no longer home,
but a prison
without bars and walls;
seeding the faith
in Neverland,
here, now.

striptease

hey, I don't need to strip myself in public,
not anymore;
no, I don't need to wear clothes to stuff my boobs,
my biceps or my backside,
not anymore;
no, I don't need to let them hang loose
behind large windows and doors
that keep the wind up,
not anymore;
no, I don't need highlights and curls
and made up moles
in the right places,
no not anymore;
hey, I'm not a stripper -
not anymore;
I don't need your eyes
to meet mine,
to ogle at me,
or look me up and down
like a can full of worms;
I have mine; my own;
and,
in the comfort of my own room,
in the attic or in the hallway,
or down in the dark basement,
where I shed skins without a mirror,
I strip down to my bones,
until the marrow oozes
from every pore,
where these eyes
burn into every nook and cranny,
reveling in the mystery
of what it takes to be me,
turned on by the sheer audacity
of being
this man, this woman,
for my eyes
alone.

at the altar of waiting

clouds of grey 

and indigo

gather

across the sun,

eyes dart

over cornered angles

of a protracted sky,

trees thirst 

with their necks arched,

dancing already, 

to a song

they want to hear,

the dark dirt 

arranges her pleats,

readying herself

for sweet communion,

tired hands 

wriggle and clench

their fingers in hope,

while I sit on the edge 

of worlds, and watch -

an invisible dewdrop,

serenading the clouds,

with her rain,

at the altar of waiting.

the glass blower

sit in the fire.
still.
naked.
fragile.
innocent.
like glass
waiting
to be blown;
when walls
grow soft,
yet defiant,
decanting the world
in their skins,
holding the pain and joy
you could not pour,
nor keep;
when goblets
become bubbles
growing in thin air,
rising and falling
into the flames
of what held them,
what grew them,
without,
within.