Where can I find you

Where can I find you
When the land runs away?
In a new year the
Months stand as promises
Though darkened by
Uncertainty,
Despite my fiery resolution
Time cannot be swayed
Nor fate circumscribed.
The old wisdom says
Que sera sera
As if to comfort, or that
Love removes
toute la crainte 
d’une extrémité.
But I cannot agree
Because I have known endings
In love before
And think the opposite is true:
It ends too soon

O morning

O morning with a thought of you
Through dark and dreams I come
To promises made before
The twilight of our breaking day
No more to haunt the darkened landscapes
In the ghosted space between us
Your name tattooed upon my lips
I breathe you in
With sunlight

Epitaph

today i shiver at the
coming nothing and
shudder at the why of it.
are these philosophies
meant to comfort?
how can we face the day?
what is your guarantee for
these labours?
the countless throng
all gone in faded time
do you remember them?
etched on stone in
shoebox gardens

As you are now
I once was
As I am now
You shall be
Prepare for death
And follow me

i cannot countenance this
imposing rock
who can stand the
weight of it?
gibbering, chattering
fumbling about
we rush headlong into it

Stop, reader! I have left a world
In which there was a world to do;
Fretting and stewing to be rich
Just such a fool as you.

it crushes my chest and

stifles my screams

it ends there upon the green

Coffee date

"We're at counter-purposes," she said
"And in any case blind
To the reality of our situation
You're not interested in
Knowing the truth of the matter."
"What is the truth?" I asked.
"You cannot begin to fathom it,"
And she wrinkled her nose.
Then she asked me to pass the cream.
I watched her pour it, and the
Coffee swirl around before being stirred
All together into one familiar light brown colour.
"I know more than you think I do," I said.

Áve

"O my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fires of hell

Hail Mary, full of grace,
the Lord is with thee.
Blessed art thou amongst women,
and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.
Holy Mary, Mother of God,
pray for us sinners,
now and at the hour of our death. Amen."

With the Holy Spirit and Power
Your voice echoes in the Church
Now shaking
Now shivering
Flanked by aged pillars of flesh
Now rising
Now shrieking
The Host unmoving
All approving
Now tearing
Now rending
Your robes descending
"O my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fires of hell"
Now burning
Now writhing
Our seats aflame
"O my Jesus"
"O my Jesus"
Save us from the fires of this ecstasy
"Forgive us our sins"
We cannot undo them
Save us from the fires of this ecstasy
ora pro nobis peccatoribus
now and at the hour of our death

In the years

In the years we've lost our
Special kind of intimacy
To the pain of those
Suffering days,
All the ways we've been
Picked on,
Now gone before a
Newer age.
I can't help but reminisce
About our days of bliss
Where all was daring
Us to fail.
How frail we have become
Before the challenge of
A newer day.

charity

the way she spoke, through teeth,
led me to believe her heart wasn't in it
she played the lie with cramped tongue
tucked behind immovable ivory gates
i did not choose this path for you or
call you by a masked name
you stand in high cut dress
the stone cold beneath your slippered feet
"the pay is good" she reminds herself
with Christmas 'round the corner and
nephew's love for their aunt
making mindful of the season
(the lie's made just a little easier)
i see it all at once in those dark eyes
the terrible truth of her humanity
it cuts too close for me to
play the dark charade
and turn my back to go away
my strict morality will leave her penniless

Her eyes

Her eyes a mirrored wonder
Moonlit silver doubled
Shimmer like the heated land
A supplicating hand to
Open air between us
Drawing ancient runes
Upon a crystal thread
In drops of dew and blood
"You've waited long
Upon the virgin ground"
(Her voice like golden
Light on morning fields)
"Has time at last
Reached fullest hour?"
The sign: her star shines  
Upon the mountain brow
As constellations churn the
Ether sea
Eclipsed beneath a mirrored
Wonder crashing into me

Through Elysian Fields

"In no fix'd place the happy souls reside.

In groves we live, and lie on mossy beds,
By crystal streams, that murmur thro' the meads:
But pass yon easy hill, and thence descend;
The path conducts you to your journey's end."
This said, he led them up the mountain's brow,
And shews them all the shining fields below.
They wind the hill, and thro' the blissful meadows go.

-Virgil

she opened

she opened
starry eyes
on glowing world
forty years ago
gasping autumn air
as red leaves
hovered in the
misty trees
as beautiful as these
in parent's aching hearts
watching as she starts
to know their face
"will her years be
full of grace?"
they wonder
how her journey
will unfold

"forty year's old"
they write
inside the gilded card
(how far this child
has been and seen
beneath the climbing sun)
"happy birthday" in the
book with papered lines
she reads with
shining eyes
oh goodbye to
memoried yesterday
today she's
born again

did you fall down

did you fall down
upon the sloping ledge of
life?
just when you were
picking up speed
the floor came rising up
to meet your wide-eyed face,
out of the race
and they all pass you by
but not us,
we saw your good intentions
the colour in your cheeks
the innocent resolve
now dissolving as it
drains from those
perfect eyes
as the self begins to lie,
we beg you not to
listen to whispered
"i am nothing"s
our hearts are full of you
and we hold out
aching arms
we will share these harms
if you let us
we surround you and
affirm you with our

Yes

i dreamed of you again

i dreamed of you again
but the dream was mine
and i tried to stay asleep
to touch you more
but the door of my eyes
opened and gone was time
i'm not fine
this cloudy morning
and the coffee steaming
forms the face of my dreaming
i can feel you in the air
around me
will we lose each other this way?
fading with each day
to be surprised by
dreaming's touch
it's too much for me this morning

Crystal Ship

what can i give you?

what can i give you that will
enlarge you?
is it eyes to see the
rising day?
the starry night
sapphire-jewelled in an
arched celestial dome?
or is it home,
the growing box of
youthful hearts?
where there is beauty
we are transcendent
where compassion,
extensions of ourselves.
all parties, tribes, placards
force the trembling eye
but compassion,
a seed that grows from
deepest "I"