children's codes for grownup games

i've been thinking about these

x's and o's

rearranging them in my mind

pulling them off that page

with their fuzzy lines

from your pen that always

leaks too much ink

your pockets are spotted with it

but its your favorite 

so i don't mention anymore

if i drop these letters in a grid

make them stand up straight

place them in orderly lines

maybe i'll have a better chance at overcoming them

these three x's 

the three impossible challenges

the woodcutter's son emptying the castle of bread

the miller's girl turning straw to golden thread 

the nobody's child sneaking her way inside your head

The first kiss

I wanted you.

The second kiss.

I was yours.

The third kiss. (oh triumph!)

You were mine.

three black strikes with a line struck through

it was tic tac toe and i love you.

Careful of the Antiques

she sat down to dust them last

as always, using their fragility

as an excuse to catch her breath

it seemed they gathered more figurines

vases and silver bells and useless things

every year and the dusting stretched

longer and longer every monday

but then tomorrow was tuesday

and scrubbing the marble floors was easiest

by far with her new brush that twirled for her

all she had to do was guide it

of course there was still the three floors of it

and the carpets to beat 

but it was the simplest by far

not much longer till then she sighed

and then the bells began

one after another with their rushing rings

pushing her up and along the hall

to see what it was they wanted again

last time they rung this loud it was a crown

with a prince thrown in

but that was half a lifetime ago

Cinderella set the slippers down again

they were far too fragile to dance in

The ritual before dreaming.

she would need a new brush soon

forty-eight, forty-nine

it was remarkable how soon they wore through

fifty-one, fifty-two

they made them better, in the old days

fifty-four, fifty-five

with the silver handles and thick bristles

fifty-seven, fifty-eight

none of this plastic nonsense

sixty, sixty-one

so light she sometimes forgot it was in her hand

sixty-four, sixty-five

and the flimsy pegs that fell out at the slightest tangle

sixty-seven, sixty-eight

how strange that my arms grow tired now

seventy, seventy-one

with this same old labour

seventy-four, seventy-five

and yet they are stiff and slow

seventy-eight, seventy-nine

and these poor fingers curl so awkwardly

eighty-one, eighty-two

around the smooth handles

eighty-four, eighty-five

how ugly they are and they used to be so smooth

eighty-seven, eighty-eight

oh well, such is the way of the world

eighty-nine, ninety

or as much of it as i know

ninety-one

the witches hands, hers too grew feeble,

ninety-two, ninety three

gnarled and arthritic they could not grasp

ninety-four, ninety-five

and her swollen wobbling arms lost strength

ninety-six, ninety-seven

till she could climb no more

ninety-eight

and so i have been alone these many years

ninety-nine

waiting with nothing to do but this

one hundred

and done.

Rapunzel laid her brush aside

and began to braid her silver hair.

Patience

i love the way you wait

with your fingertips just against the air

thats just against mine

and if i didn't know i never would

but i do

and it makes me smile

and the smile stretches all the way to my toes

making me larger

a growing thing 

full of strength and wellness 

and suddenly its your fingers

against my fingers

and we are waiting for no one

Tropical Hideaway

they complain about the records number

tell me its not the heat..

its the humidity

and i nod, i agree

and they wondered why anyone,

looking at me

would want to move to this tropical misery

and i shrug and don't say a word

about i have not yet had to

put on a coat

my thick wool coat

that traps scent like treasure

and saves it away for snowy days

it still smells of you

of your hand at my waist

of your arm across my shoulder

of safety and silence and the strength under your skin

and i cannot bear to put it on 

without your fingers adjusting the collar

pulling my loose curl and putting it back

worse than that i cannot take it off

face the world without your warmth around me

lose the scent of you in the cutting cold air

and shut the door to my empty house behind me

letting all the cold air in.

They say only a fugitive would choose texas in the summer

choosing between it and hell

and they ask me what I'm running from.

a coat and an empty closet

next to mine.

and they were embarrassed to see me cry.

isaac missed the point.

This time it is the loveseat

its wooden claws curled in upon themselves

and i laugh to see the way it seems to fight

against the indignity of the dirt

the dust that curls up around it

like a lover's touch sinking gently

into each curve, each carved curl

it may be stubborn in its shine

such a proper Victoria

with her straight back and sloping arms

and how the upholstery tucks in tight

leaving no seam visible, as is right of course

This is why I chose it today

to push it, quietly protesting,

out the silent sitting room and down the stairs

with a bump that would have shocked her

but what did I care

so here it sits

drawn up in itself

in the middle of this flat expanse

they politely call a yard

and I call a desert, a weak piddling excuse for it

but a desert nonetheless

and here I leave it to retreat to the porch

the storm breaks like judgement

splattering across the tight fabric

like machine gun fire

and I wait laughing

when the lightning hits I am not surprised

the gods have taken my offering in the spirit it was given

piece by piece I accept this destruction

moment by moment they steal my genes from me

and when the last knot comes undone

the lightning will come

They say the old dear is crazy...

i've hidden it in the umbrella stand

with its silver hook of a handle

carefully dented and dinged

and a careless raintarp half dropped over it

no one will notice

organization is not my gift

and this fault conceals many others

how easy it is to conceal a deadly sin

behind a minor character flaw

that you may gently mock at dinner parties

and having had your audience applaud

with quiet smiles and the faintest hint of laughter

muffled in the pressed cloth napkins

and the hairspray designed to be invisible, but strong

one day i'll learn its trick 

and hold my shape against the wind and rain and questing fingers

looking for all the world as though this

the graceful curl of my being

was how i was born to be

and no one will question my perfection

because after all, we all know, she's a little untidy

and we'll all be safe again because the balance was restored

all this perfect grace against the books left on the counter

and we allow her these little flaws,

or do i allow them

to find some safety in my vulnerability

what a weakness, to leave possessions scattered

as though they have no tie upon me

the wise ones see a sort of strength in it

a slightly twisted secret.

like the one i keep in my umbrella stand

with its shine a little spotted here and there

I smile and comment,

but the stains! they are so difficult to remove.

And really, who wants to bother

scrubbing away all that blood.

Ender.

they say the world is divided

into two parties if you please

the leaders 

and the led

the action

and the reaction

and then me

i have chosen to stand

not for something

nor against something

not in protest

nor acclamation

just to stand and be still

to watch

and not be seen

this was my choice

my voluntary exile from the divided world

my single pride in not leading astray

my single fear in having none to follow

but in standing I too am single

a single shadow amidst the flux of waves

a single voice

whose silence is a gift 

only to herself

and when speaking

steals no thought from any

this is my prison and my freedom

to need nothing and have nothing need me

what triumph!

in this divided world.

to be whole. and alone.

Imagine my horror

when behind me i find

a thousand others

standing

to see what i see

a pointless leader.

a lost follower

another piece of the crowd

that shoves like a menagerie

to practice silence

and loneliness.

i have ruined the world.

a dream, a vision, a future.

today you fell asleep against me

I didn't see it happen

but felt my heartbeat slow

my breathing change its rhythm to yours

and with a sudden swell of feeling i turned

 carefully, so as not to dislodge your head

against my shoulder

and watched your face soften

with your small breaths so steady and quiet

and in the midst of your sleep

you smiled

at that point i realized

i could do this

i could trade my aching independence 

my fear of manipulation

my single cereal bowl and disorderly books

all of what i understand myself to be

for this

to watch you sleep

with your hand swallowing mine.

Freedom and Fetters

if you, questing eye that you are,

were to take your gentle hands

and carefully scoop out

 like a fruit with a quick twist of the wrist

my insides

do it swiftly 

in one motion if you please

and then let them slide

into that large crystal bowl

your mother uses on special occasions

careful not to spill

but here, look here

these strings of shadow 

they hold everything together

but right here

inbetween the heart and the throat

there is a giant knot

a tangle of epic proportions

that even Alexander would pause for a moment at

you could emulate his method

and with a word or merely a swinging door

could slice the tangle in two

and i wait

but then with your gentle hands you begin

with small tugs and quiet words

to untie my burden

at the end with a gulping gasp 

i could finally say

I love you

and with those words

i tie myself to you

and will not touch the knot

Lost in a Lotus.

You have found children in the supermarket

lost of course

it is a common thing

to see them watching the end of the aisle

for a familiar waist

what a way to see the world

from belt buckle down

and how still they stand

tensing at each shadow that bends

around the shelved corner

because they know most likely

they are to blame for this tightening fear

but they'd take the punishment

the stern look the quick reproach

if only to find the one who knows their name

to use it in an exasperated sigh

you've seen the lost children 

in the supermarket

everyone has

I walk the streets quietly

waiting for you to turn a corner

and with your stiff voice tell me

"There you are.

Don't you ever do that again."

i will promise. never again.

A stranger saviour.

An old man stopped me on the street

to ask about my hat

but that is not what he wanted to speak of

he wanted to tell me a story

a grand tale of who he was

and what that meant

to find in the explanation to a stranger

a new vindication of identity

He was eager to speak

and slow to stop, sure that this

was my desire as well

to hear of him and his life

with its great arc and flair

I nodded and smiled

agreeing

that a life like that

was worth telling, worth celebrating

and that I ,strange girl on the sidewalk,

understood

we parted to cross the streets

at 90 degree angles

with mutual gifts

He had given me a story

and i gave him a smile

How strangers may save each other.

science explains the soul

"Do you know,"

she asked me once

with that crisp tone which means

she plans to impart some practical piece of science

in order to pin my flighty mind to earth,

"how we see things?

What we percieve in the way of colour

is actually a result of reflection,

rejection you might say.

It means that the object has absorbed

all the other colours but

for some reason, refuses entrance to this

and so it invites its way

into our eyes and we see the door

for example, as red.

"Even colours hate to be homeless." I comment.

This is not what she wanted 

and so she tries again

to inform and instruct

and with such information indicate my own distance

from the world of real, as she calls it.

"We see shapes in this way too.

Processing through lack as much as presence.

Occasionally a line exists not because it is there

but because there is nothing thrust between two somethings

I nodded.

She wanted to see if I understood.

"So, if you looked at him

you would see me."

I thought. 

"And love is a line because it appears 

to exist when there is really nothing between two someones."

She threw her hands in the air

and abandoned me 

to chocolates and black and white movies.

She did not hear me say-

"I thought love was a circle but it seems

the shortest distance between two disappointments-

the first is being alone

and the second is like it. only lonelier.

So i suppose a line is fitting."

nuns and nudity.

I wonder about these saints

with their large dark eyes

and ever accompanying light.

It shocks me how they sit

so still, so composed

with their flagrant exposure

a curve a line a dot

and a swatch of cloth hanging forgotten

off their serene shoulders

lit in the light of their holiness

In the street I would turn away

attempt to minimize their shame

by covering them with my eyelids

drawing darkness over them like modesty

and yet they do not mind

they sit smiling the faint smile of the vindicated, the irreproachable

and i wonder if this is what it means to be a saint

to lose so much of humanity

that they may sit revealed

not as women, but mere flesh

wrapped around their secret being

something so foreign that to come close to it

these painters in their desperate courage

must strip them of all else but their glowing skin.

Reflection

I have seen you everywhere today

in the tense quiet face of the Western man

in leather clinging to the swinging reins

as his fall and his enemies place him

beyond all surgery

in the bronze boy stretched to his toes

with every small muscle taut and 

his quick ribcage tight against his skin 

as his stretching wings create for him a new shadow

and place it far from him

in the weary Greek boy just pushed into manhood

against the whitewashed expanse  of wall

clutching his stomach through his rough robe

as though his heart had broken

and he could not place the pain

in the crouching Hercules

with lion paws dangling from his cloak 

that cushions only slightly

the weight of the wide rimmed world

that creaks above him like an anchor

in the rounded suggestion of a man

reaching in his dusty red coat

for the hand of a woman who will not  reach back

he has no eyes to see

in the hard strong man who stands firm

determined against the pushing shadow

and against the weight of the crushing crowd

behind him, his family,

he supports his soft too-round wife

with the mere touch

of his elbow against her fingertips

I have seen you everywhere today

and in everyman

You have been old and young,

full of strength and sapped by fear.

The center and the shadow.

I have seen you in the staring child

who over his mothers shoulder

reproaches the world 

for the thought of separation, of loss

and i have seen you in the neat folded hands

and covered feet that the shadow stretches across

even as the shadow has already stolen away

the light from his lighted eyes. 

I have seen you triumphant, failed, 

a familiar face and a stranger.

I have seen you everywhere today

I have not seen you for three months, twelve days, and eight hours.

What a thief love is.

Plaza.

i found a photo of you 

hanging in its white frame

on the white wall

i know it is you because of how you sit

against your black chair

strong as if against a horse

that will obey if led

but strains against the ground, like a personal offense

I do not know the woman pushing you

her white uniform erases her

rendering her nothing but a shadow of sorts

the hidden engine of which we do not think

while driving our quiet stretches

I only see you, strong as always

on that debris littered field

and the shadow that stretches its hand

out towards you , like a greeting

from too far to yell and so we wave

and wave again

showing how strong

our young arms are

against the encroaching autumn

and you say nothing but sit

silent and strong across the unlevel ground

under the shadow of the marble Caesar

who raises his arm in salute.

We are one, we two, he says

strong and silent with the world, 

waiting to be led, beneath us

and white time pushing us

invisible and steady

towards our known end.

We go in strength.

Memori

the day of my death

i did three things

three things for you to remember

to remind you why we used our special pronoun

us

i organized the icecream in the freezer

in neat stacks

with their pint sized labels 

slid to the side so you couldn't read them

without squinting

and then i labeled them

the way you eat them.

"two in the morning-you can finish that paper"

on the double dutch chocolate

"life is still simple-look how you made it today!"

on the cookies and cream

"go buy more icecream. you hate this"

on the vanilla that neither of us eat.

 

i bought you a printer's worth

of photo paper

and three cartridges of ink

and eight scrapbooks

because you hate looking at computers

for too long

and kodak employees make you nervous

the way they flip through

your private moments to kill time

also a good black pen

to write notations without bleeding through

or splotching the page

which irritates you to no end

i underlined all the quotes

in my favorite book

that remind me of you

even though i know you insist

that you are nothing like him

that wild eyed rochester

with his heavy hand and stabbing wit

but still i insist with your careful love

your quick anger when i hobble myself

and your roaring declaration

that the world may stand against 

but i will be yours. and only. forever

rings through these pages too

i tuck it under your pillow 

i do these three things

on the day of my death

to comfort you, to remind you,

because this is the unspeakable crime

to divide us into i

and you, left behind

but remember this.

i will be yours. and only yours. forever.

on the day of my death

i do three things for you

and then one more

for me, and me only,

i watch the sunset quiet in my chair

and i do not call you

to say goodbye

i know you know i love you.

and i cannot say goodbye.

close the door behind you.

i opened the door to your room today

i just opened it.

there was no preparation

not a deep breath before

or a stiffened wrist to reach 

i stepped inside

your empty room

stepped past where your bed was

instinctively avoided the pile that always grew

to the right of your window

and adjust the curtains

i haven't changed them yet

i suppose i will

it would make a good library

this room that was yours

i walked into your room yesterday

and i realized it was my house again

all of it

Why I fear Asher Lev

I have written that he writes of revolution. and that is true

but he also writes of redemption, of the giving of the secret to repay the past.

This understanding strikes second, always second, after the clarion trumpets of the revolution have echoed into dusk, into dust. 

It comes after the ties have been broken, the chains shattered, and the very language of the oppressive truth forgotten.

It comes slowly, tasting of guilt first and then a bitter nostalgia.

How this redemption grows- in dreams, in sorrow, in the places where the wounds and wounded have died and forbear to walk again. 

Yet this is what he writes, He writes a resurrection.

The revolution is done.

It was strong and it may have been right but it is no more.

The redemption must come, coiling amidst the thoughts of the rebels, reminding them.

The reminder that spring is not the wealth of the world but summer-summer when the death has come and age has brought beauty again.

 How could they, revolutionaries that they are, ever escape the wealth that they were searching for, the burning strength that drove them away and draws them back so inexorably?

He writes of redemption but there is no mercy. 

This is a restitution, a repaying of wrongs, a righting of what was fallen and in it there is no grace. There is inevitability. 

So the story swells and so it always will for the root is in the ground and must always be so. No matter how the spindling seed may fly, swept away in the wind, that grasping gasping freedom, it must return to earth. It must make peace with the ground and so too these rebels, these revolutionaries, they must return, unwilling perhaps and grudging, but they return to the secret strength of their parents, the solid light that they fought against envelopes them and too their children.

This is the sacrifice,the peace offering, they must make-found in the faces of their children.

Their children who know only of freedom what we have taught them and only of fear what we have feared. 

How then to return to the place we have feared and say- 'freedom'. 

How to turn back on the far place to which we ran and point- 'fear'.

Yet this is what we must do upon our faces and hearts to rewrite the revolution-to be redeemed.

This is retribution, it is restitution that we surrender to truth and in our turn watch our children tear away from it hungry and angry.

For the wrongs we have given such sorrow we receive.

But this is right and fair and as we fall in the glaring truth so greedy for our solitary surrender we learn what it was to be left when we, the hungry and angry, led away the hopes of the old in captivity.

We learn then the truth of a revolution- a point on a circle must always return.

He teaches us this. and leaves us to grow.

Why I read Asher Lev jealously.

he writes a revolution every time

a revolution from something that may not be wrong, a revolution against something that may be right.

but regardless must be revolted against

because it is sure, so sure, of its own rightness

and how, how, can humanity bear that insufferable rightness

that intrinsic selfcontained orientation that declares all other compasses worse than obselete, it declares them nonsensical, irrelevant, nonexistent

they cannot and so build hate against it, sneak small weaknesses out under the curtain of our eyelids and then when free from the blaring glaring rightness of it all build the weaknesses into tragic flaws

into bitter breaking antiques of old answers held together by that most dirty of all religious words

fanaticism

the dirt of that word shocks the modern word, the blaise, unshockable world looks away in shame from this, unspeakable

the crime of the fanatic, the prosolyte, the believer without an advocate

because he simply believes that his rightness will prevail

and so we dirty it. we throw cynicism and charm at it, we pollute it with clever denigrations and attempt with wit to throw it enough in the filth that we may look at it

and in the midst of it there is a blazing confusion from the believer, that irreproachable inapproachable fanatic,

a confusion all the more irritating because it is mixed with a sort of distant pity pointed at us with our dirty hands

and there he stands with his glory of correct belief above us watching us with our sneering terrified faces trying to pull him down

and he wonders what we think, why we think that the fraility of man means anything against this immovable force that will noe be corrected, that will not be reproved, that will not even deign to be proved. but only is. and will be.

and so he stands and he falls and is covered in the mud, the soles of our filthy shoes, the gritty ink of our trashy newspapers commenting obliquely on the quaint traditions of these fools, these antique fools, amusing only as long as they are weak

and we become tired and wander away, unfulfilled

because though the man is broken and tattered and torn

that blazing truth sits like cement unable to be shifted

that is chaim potok

the swelling circle.

today i found

under the fragile skin

stretched across my wrist

blue veins

popping

creating swelling hills against

the smooth plane that was there before

like rivers rushing with the winter melt

they spring from some unknown site

deep beneath the silent skin

that curves to keep it secret

they terrify me

these vulnerable veins

so close to the dangerous air

the years have pushed them there

have thrust me farther and farther into the strange

the snapping unknown

and soon there will be no where farther for them to go

they will burst with their blue grace

and i will be old and bleeding

all of the risks i never took

out in a blue flood until the world blurs

soflty into a place of safety

for a moment

and then i am gone

into another unknown.

the small loves are broken.

knock knock tap

i beat a secret rhythm against the green wall

waiting for you to answer back

my world swells in this spring rain

stretching corner to corner

transforming these stiff walls 

into sloping curves flexing 

under the weight of this bounty

and i rest my cheek against the green

feeling the thrumming beat

enter my skin and tingle

like the last note of a lullaby

the sudden thud shocks me

pulling me from my reverie

as i realize you are leaning

on the other side of the wall

listening to the world breathe

the same as me

then comes the tearing

the shrieking shredding as i fall to the floor

watching the wealth of the world bleed away

 in great clear drops into infinity

you are left behind.

look my love, i plucked this flower for you.

careful of the sap. 

I fall for infomercials.

You’re selling glass for diamonds

And I’m the type who’s buying

Because in this rush for wealth

I’m just a fool’s gold miner

I love to take your rubble

And I’ll thank you for your trouble

How you’ve made it sparkle and shine

I make it worth your time

In this world of cheap dives

I’m buying pretty lies

You get what you pay for

I believe you’re worth more

each time I'm left with a hand

full of shattered glass

I bleed it off and stand

swearing you will be my last

love for nothing

love for cheap

love leaves me bleeding

on my weary feet.

i stare into the mirrors every morning

trying to catch the reflections in my eyes

cementing them in there 

to give me an appearance of depth

when you peer into them

look for the real me

and i present myself

with these faces layered upon each other

to give the illusion of growth

these outfits fanned out in display

illustrating my richness of character

Alas Apollo's Gift Postscripted.

I warn you

do not dare to continue

to ignore me.

I will teach you

ignorance

is far from bliss.

It is the ignorant who ignore warnings.

Poets and prophets know something of wisdom.

They know to ignore, is to imperil the soul.

In Which I Acknowledge My Literary Debts.

I'm here to tell you nothing

that you haven't heard before

a thousand times or two

I've read you the prologue

you've memorized the epilogue

from the introduction

to the grand reveal

I've shown you the script

You've untied the knots 

of this denouement 

and could quote the ending

in your sleep

There is only one thing left

to tell you, or for you to learn.

Let us turn to the Acknowledgements.

Here under inspiration for this tragic drama

we find,what a delicious twist, your name

thank you, dear muse,

for teaching me the art of bitterness.

and the power of ignorance.

Today I will be presenting: Disillusion

hello...

helllllo-(is this on?)

OH Hello.

Yes excuse me

...so sorry to interrupt

but if i may?

I just wanted to say-

quiet down please-

that,well, if you don't mind

that-ihatethewayyouignoremealmostasmuchasihatethefactthatineedyou.

I beg your pardon 

for the interruption.

Thank you for your time.

I'll just be...going now...

The talent judges all agreed

it was the strangest act they'd ever seen.

They thanked her for her time

but one of them muttered

does she know that poem didn't even rhyme?

what sort of illusionist does she think

she is, with that...

but they couldnt remember what she looked like

no one could.