(Out) Laws of Physics

If I could slice open
the fabric of time
and slip out into the nothing
I would meet you there
and
(finally)
(like a sigh)
hold your face in my hands.
I would breathe you in
and pull you close.
I would press my face into your neck
and let my lips brush against your skin.
I can imagine
this place,
this void
filled with the glowing warmth
of our bodies.
I feel the length of you
pressed solidly down the length of me -
your hands in my hair
my mouth
finding yours.
I don't know if there would be sound
in this pocket of limbo
we would stumble into,
but I imagine small moans of pleasure
being drawn from me
as I explore the outside of you
the same way I've carefully mapped the inside.
Maybe we wouldn't need to breathe
out there in the nothing;
maybe we would exist in our most natural state -
maybe
I would see in your eyes the key to satisfying
the growling lust shining darkly from mine.
Maybe I would pull you into me
with a sigh
and maybe you would let go of everything you've ever held back
everything you've carefully denied yourself.
And maybe I would pull from within you
every strand of desire
you've ever left unmet.
Maybe
in this pocket of nowhere,
our bodies would blend together,
absorbing each other
like spectrums of light
or osmosis.
Maybe I would fade into you
as you plunged into me,
and I
would dissolve into a mist of atoms,
reforming again in the real world.
I would blink
and steady my breathing...
still aching from the receding waves of pleasure,
wondering why my arms felt so empty.

(I've started to envision my poemy things with illustrations - this one calls for a black piece of paper/canvas with pastels sketching the outline of two bodies, intertwined)

(non) Conformity

Wedging my entire kaleidescopic Self into
the narrow slot of acceptable-in-the-corporate-world,
requires that I reign in my impulses
my imagination
my desires.
I cannot make all the dirty jokes that flicker through my mind,
nor can I use all the flowery language at my disposal
when detailing the procedure for filing a particular form.
I am full to bursting, much of the time,
with ideas and poems and raunchy puns.
It is a good exercise in self-control, I suppose,
but it wears on me.
I want to dance naked in the rain
and lie in a hammock with a book in my hands
(one I will devour at some later time,
but may never open
as I watch the leaves dance overhead,
or watch my eyelids disappear in the distance
as I wander deep inside the paths of my own mind...)
I daydream too much
and write too little.
Time to find some balance.

Does Elvis Live?

I saw Elvis last night,
could have been him,
if I squinted,
and if he was still in hiding,
and if he had gotten into really good shape
for a man in his...80s?
Yeah, no.
Not even close.
This man and the band put on a good show
for all the sweet old ladies
and some of their daughters, too
(like my friend);
but I was there as a spectator of the spectators.
I was not there because of a deep love of the first American heartthrob musician.
I was there because a friend offered me free tickets.
I was there to feel the music thrumming from the stage -
(that bass player was cute)
and to drift along in my own thoughts,
imagining what it must have been like
to have been a teenager when Elvis hit the scene,
and wondering how it must have felt
to carry a torch for him for 50, 60, 70 years.
I have not really been much for celebrity crushes;
I prefer dreaming of a real person -
the real-er the better.
I prefer imagining...lips on earlobs, hands sliding under shirts...
the real world is so much closer to the buffet of sensory possibilities -
touching, tasting.
Ahem, I digress...
Watching this man on stage,
wooing the sweet ladies who'd loved Elvis in the goddamned NINETEEN FIFTIES,
I wondered how they could possibly feel anything
in this moment
besides sadness and regret.
Such a pale immitation this man was,
and I was about a yard away from him,
but even from the back of the house,
you could see that he was smiling like the Las Vegas strip.
He was giving them the show they craved,
but I couldn't buy what he was selling.
I think I would have liked it better if he'd just looked like himself,
and skipped the, "Thankya vera  much" schtick.
It felt so hollow, so unsatisfying.
In 30 years, will I go see a Nirvana tribute band
and swoon over the man in the blonde wig and plaid flannel shirt?
I don't think so.
But maybe my generation's answer to that will be to have a hologram of Kurt on stage,
or better yet,
a Virtual Reality game in which I can make out with him.
I may not have been much for celebrity crushes,
but I could watch footage of that man all day
and it wouldn't fill the cavern of grief I feel for all his lost poetry.

But, I had a lovely time,
and it reminded me that I should get back to writing that book,
and the other one.
First, I should finish reading those Elvis biographies.
And maybe go find a hammock to lie in.

Polarity

First draft of a children's book starring a polar bear.

Original artwork and outline provided by a friend.

Here's my take - 

Felix looked around.

The world was white.

The snow

the sky

his fur.

Felix couldn’t see where he ended and the snow began.

The caribou were white

the foxes were white

the hares were white

even the weasels were white.

Felix sighed.

In the springtime, they would move south again,

and there would be green.

Maybe…

Maybe if he started now,

he could reach the green sooner!

And maybe,

if green was possible,

maybe other colors were possible, too!

What else could Felix find?

He began to walk faster,

and walking turned to loping,

and soon he was speeding across the tundra.

After a while,

he came to a forest.

The trees were covered in snow,

but he could see the needles and bark

beneath the layers of white.

He filled his belly and rested for a long time.

When morning came, he heard birds chirping

and felt the sun’s warmth on his back.

He stretched and smiled 

and continued on.

He marveled at the forest as he went.

The snow was melting,

and more and more colors were showing through.

Tender green ferns were sprouting all around,
and the fallen tree he'd slept against last night
was covered in lichen and ridges of pale mushrooms.

Felix walked on,

and soon there was no more snow.

The trees stretched high above him,

their leaves rustling against each other in the breeze:
everywhere there were shades of brown and green,

and sometimes a glimpse of bright flowers of pink or yellow.

Felix thought he might have found what he was searching for,

but he wasn’t sure,

so he kept walking.

Each day, he noticed that there were fewer and fewer trees,

and instead,

there were vast fields spreading out around him.

The sky was wide and blue,

and the grasses shooshed in the wind,

rustling and sighing,

like the leaves of those trees,

but all in one great chorus.

It was warm here,

and he lay in a patch of shade

at the edge of a corn field

and napped the afternoon away.

Felix liked the rolling hills and the red barns;

he liked the fat brown geese that seemed to be following him south.

But he was pretty sure this wasn’t the place he’d been dreaming of,

so after a good meal, and one more nap,

he faced south again and looked some more.

After many days,

Felix had walked over mountains and down into valleys.

As he walked, the air got drier,

and the days got longer.

The nights were blissfully cool,

and he could see almost as many stars

as he could on a summer’s night back home.

Instead of trees,

there were great, green lumps with spikes poking out all over.

There was no snow and no grass.

The soft ground was orangey-red,

and instead of being cold and wet,

it was hot and dry –

the pads of his feet burned

with every step he took

under the glaring eye of the sun.

All was still,

like on the tundra.

But this did not feel like a place he belonged.

He crouched in the scant shade of a giant green beast,

and dreamt of howling winds

and icebergs.

This was not what he was searching for,

so he kept going.

After many more mountains

and many more deserts,

Felix came to the thickest,

greenest forest yet.

Vines wrapped around tree trunks,

and everywhere there were

wide, green leaves

and narrow, sharp leaves –

leaves underfoot, leaves overhead.

The sky was green, too,

or at least it seemed that way.

It rained all the time,

and even his fur started to turn green around the edges;

he smelled like moss,

and the air tasted like a rain cloud.

The snakes were almost as big as he was,

and he didn’t like the way they looked at him.

Felix hopped on a raft,

and floated as far down the giant river as he could go.

He dreamed at night that he was on a chunk of ice,

floating with the seals and the walruses.

He woke up feeling itchy and hot;

everywhere he looked was green,

and the brightly colored birds flying over him

sounded like they were laughing at him.

He missed the way the icy water felt on a morning swim

and he missed the way the snow felt on his tired, moldy paws.

Felix sat on his raft, floating through green, warm water,

and ached for his home.

When the river reached the ocean,

Felix dove into the waves

and swam as far as he could go.

He found a strong current and floated along for a while,

rushing south in the cool water.

He started to feel chilly,

in the very best way,

and he saw familiar faces

(image of orcas and seals),

and wondered if he’d walked so far

that he’d come all the way back home.

After many days of swimming,

he saw colossal white masses on the horizon,

and was sure that his eyes were tricking him.

He swam hard, and tried not to get his hopes up,

but soon he smelled snow,

and felt the wind whipping along the surface of the water.

He heaved himself up onto a shelf of ice,

and sprawled out,

panting with fatigue,

and filled with relief.

Everything around him was covered in snow.

Everything was cold.

The sky was gray,

and the wind dug into his fur like shards of ice.

Polar bears don’t often howl,

but Felix let out a bellow that filled the air with the sound of his joy.

He had found the place for him.

He had found a new home.

Thinking Thoughts While Seated

I used to love meditation.
Back then,
I called it "prayer."
I would float so deep in my mind,
expressing gratitude and hopes.
I need to make time for it again;
it would solve so many
of my frazzled, frenzied moments,
certainly.
I should sit
on my sit bones
(a yoga instructor once told us to sit on our sit bones -
I didn't even know I wasn't, until I did, and wow)
and close my eyes,
and I should breathe slowly, deeply.
I should remind myself that all is well.

Love

I am
a delicate arch
My sons
are the wind
and the rain
Relentlessly
wearing me away
I stand firm,
but am changed
They are stronger than I

Vibrance

I realize
that I probably shouldn't
dissolve into the wind
and wrap myself around
someone else's soul...
but it's hard to stay anchored
to my own
when the light pours out of another.

Fireflies

Sitting across from you
in this noisy restaurant
at the end of a busy, productive day
we are too hungry and
it is too loud
to push our voices
through the multitude of crashing soundwaves
and say the soft things
that rumble quietly around on our tongues.
Instead,
I study your sweet face.
I see in your eyes the fragile human light that shines in all of us,
so easy to take for granted
so easy to assume it is unextinguishable, permanent,
like your love for me,
or mine for you.
In that quiet bubble of time
(the duration of a single breath)
in the crush of voices
echoing off the hard surfaces of the low room  -
in that moment,
I felt the quavering ground beneath me,
of time that will pass,
time that is passing,
passing,
and soon will evaporate around us like steam.
One more breath, just a blink away from the abyss,
and then I was savoring you--
recalling all the love that you've shown me, today alone.
I know that you can sense my restlessness lately,
my pacing, growling impatience with the world around me -
my need for space,
my need for adrenaline rushes and
new experiences and sleeping late and smoking and drinking and boys.
One would think I'd had enough of boys,
because I've raised so many of them and married two,
but I have found that no matter how many I have,
I only ever want more.

Happy Non-iversary

It was twenty years ago, today...
---and if I were making an old-fashioned mix tape,
I would cut that line from Sgt. Pepper's
and place it first,
then maybe follow up with the opening spoken lines
of Let's Go Crazy,
but I'm not.
I'm not making a mix tape,
and I'm not celebrating.
Would we have made it?
Would we have been joyfully toasting
two decades of togetherness?
Or would we hate each other more -
or differently?
Maybe we would have fallen (back?) in love.
Maybe we would have dragged each other along
through this journey of life,
(reluctantly crouched at the starting line)
or, more accurately (but less mix tape-ily),
reluctantly approaching the finish line (of child-rearing, at least).
I don't know the answers to any of those questions.
I do know that I am still unable to forgive myself
and still unable to write to you.
It's too much, somehow.
It's too...intimate, too real.
If I write to you, then that means that I know (or expect) you to read these words.
And I am maybe not yet ready to write words that are actually for you.
They are still for me...
maybe all of the words
were always
for me.
Maybe that's the problem...
one giant piece of the selfishness puzzle.
But in any case...here I sit,
on what would have been our 20th wedding anniversary,
tired
fat
worried
(about work, the kids, the state of American politics),
and I wonder if you noticed the date.
I wonder if you even remember,
but of course you do.
Your memory is as sharp as your tongue used to seem to be.
I don't know if I got tougher,
or if our disentanglement is so complete that you can't hurt me anymore...
or, more realistically, that you just don't try to anymore.
An image of you as a wounded animal,
lashing out at the one causing you pain...
of course you wanted to hurt me.
Even when I was only loving you,
I was the atmosphere around you,
full of light and joy, but just
hovering
ready and able to end you.
Because you dared to love me,
and that gave me all the power...
too bad I never knew that.
Too bad I interpreted it all wrong,
and thought that you only loved controlling me.
Could it ever have gone differently?
Would I ever have seen the truths of either of us,
without fleeing to the edge of the continent
and hiding myself completely from you?
I don't know that I could.
I look back on that life and wonder why it wasn't enough for me.
All I can really see that makes any sense
is that I needed tenderness and compassion
and that it wasn't coming to me.
But why couldn't there have been a way for me to make us both happy?
The sad little truth of it
is that I may never be happy -
content.
Humans are not meant to have contentment, not really.
It feels good, but too much of it inhibits progress...

I just wish I had the courage to really write this,
to write it to you.

Our sons are you.
And I love them so much that it's impossible not to love you, too.
I wish you were here, but not like that...
just together and laughing and showing the kids that everything will be ok.
And maybe a part of me wants to go back to the breakup
and relive the gruesome pain of it all
because there is no way
that I've suffered enough
to deserve the goodness in my life now.
And I need you to know that you have -
you have suffered way more than enough
to deserve only goodness in your life now.
You always did deserve that.
As painful as it was to not get what I needed from you,
it was unquantifiably painful to not be able to give you what you needed from me.
I wanted you to feel safe and loved and fed...
I wanted to create the happy childhood for you that you never had.
And I wanted you to golf every single minute, because it made you feel good,
and you are so damn good at it.
(And I guess this must be deep because that's the first time I even swore...)
I miss your brothers,
and I miss the lightning storms crashing and flashing across the whole valley;
I miss the mountains and the giant sky;
I don't miss the fucking mormons,
or the arid air parching me from morning til night;
I don't miss feeling wrongly paired with you,
but I kind of miss fighting with you.

I am grateful for it all, though.
For what we taught each other,
and what we survived of each other.
I am grateful for the time we spent figuring out the world together,
and for the good times...
there were good times, right?
I am grateful for the two beautiful products of our DNA splicing together
and splitting and splitting and splitting
(and somehow not becoming conjoined in the womb
 - dyyyyying laughing at that memory);
and I know that there were good times.

I see it all a little more clearly now.
I see the sweet, innocent girl I was for 21 years.
I see the tiny amount of time that passed between living that life,
and discarding it all with bravado -
pretending to be a badass,
pretending to be tough, and cool...
and then I met you,
and you thought I had strenghth
because I showed you my teeth -
I was a tiny little mewling kitten,
puffing up its fur to the Rottweiler
(a strong, intelligent beast
whose eyesight maybe isn't so good,
because he believed that I was a tiger).
And there we were,
mismatched because I put on a show of toughness,
and all the while assuming that everyone else was as tender inside as I was.

Well, anyway.
I'm proud of you for all that you are,
and all that you've given to me and to the kids
back then,
and always.
I'm grateful that you are still out there,
sharing this part of the journey with me.

Saints and Sinners

I wonder...
what if you were my priest?
I think I would like it way too much.
I would consider becoming a nun just to be closer to you,
but instead,
I would put on my prettiest Sunday dress,
maybe something with flowers
or a long flowing skirt.
I would walk into the cavernous,
hushed space,
and make my way past the rows and rows
and rows
of empty pews
and slip into the confessional.
I would say the words you expected to hear,
then I would pause -
slow, deep breath.
Father,
I would say
(in a voice just above a whisper)
I have sinned.
You would say the words I expected to hear,
urging me to speak the sins aloud.
I would tell you, then.
I'm having impure thoughts, Father.
Night and day,
leaving no room for anything else.
I am consumed by images of skin - 
the back of a neck, the knuckles of a hand - 
I see the pieces of this man whenever I close my eyes.
You would tell me to recite poetry from the Bible
and expect that to clarify my cloudy soul.
I would come back the next week,
my cheeks flushed,
my hair wild.
Father.
I have sinned.
You are patient with me,
but you fail to see,
through the ornate screen between us,
that my eyes are filled with desire still,
and my shirt is unbuttoned lower than is decent.
I lean my head back against the wall
and close my eyes.
This man...
My voice trails off in a slight moan.
I need him.
Prayer isn't working,
nothing is working, Father.
You would speak softly, steadily
of virtue and modesty;
you pause, but when you start to speak again,
I rush on, telling my story -
I was out, having a glass of wine with a girl friend the other night,
and I saw a man who reminded me of him -
He had the same eyes, oh...those eyes...
Without a word,
I took this stranger's hand and led him away.
He smiled in surprise as
I pulled him into the shadows and opened his pants.
When he entered me I whispered your name...
Silence would fill the space between us, then.
The screen not nearly enough to hide what I had just laid bare.
I would hold my breath then,
wanting to run away and never come back,
but not daring to move.
I would start praying then,
for the first time with any sense of urgency,
and my lips would move with the silent words, my eyes tightly shut.
I would be so focused that I wouldn't hear you,
but then I would open my eyes
and see you standing before me.
The look in your eyes would be enough
to send my soul straight to a hell I don't believe in,
but I would stand
and press my lips to yours,
holding your face in my hands...
you would taste like heaven.
But then, I guess this is why I don't go to a church to worship.
Because...if you were my priest,
I would bring you to my religion.
I would disrupt,
make it all crash to the ground,
like Christ with the moneylenders
or Samson with his long hair...
And we have no priests in my religion,
but I would worship you if you came.

Exes and Ohs

Selfish,

you called me.

The most selfish person you'd ever met.

I recoiled,

angry - 

unwilling to wear this mantel you cast over me.

I remember the way my eyes darkened,

narrowed;

the way my jaw set in defiance.

How could he think that of 

me? I huffed.

Everything I do is for you

for our children - 

teaching them to count, 

to read, to ride bikes;

taking care of you all -

cooking your favorite foods,

cleaning all your clothes 

and all the rooms of our house -

all 4 goddamned bathrooms, 

and even your 

empty soda cans and 

empty cigarette packs

from the floor of your

empty

Mercedes.

All this, I do for You, 

the master of my destiny, 

but not the Captain of my soul.

I writhe under your steely grip,

agonizing over my loss of freedom.

I discard any notion
that you could be correct
about my degree of selfishness,
and press onward,
away from our life together.

But now...

a decade has passed,

in which we have been separated by cavernous distance 

and mostly silence.

And I finally realize

that you were right.

About so much.

But especially the selfishness.

I would expand that indictment to include

self-centered

self-obsessed

self-indulgent,

for starters.
I am all that you called me and more.

I would reach across the distance

and fill the silence with apologies.

Marr(i)ed Perfection

You are unrelenting 

in your criticism of me, 

and I of you 

I'll admit. 

But 

will you? 

Admit 

anything 

ever? 

Will you cede one inch, 

one millimeter? 

Will you allow me to be 

to breathe 

to express, 

and 

even more importantly 

will you ever hear me 

when I clearly state my needs?

Will you give me 

more than the sliver 

of our king sized bed 

that is left over 

after you've sprawled across it? 

Probably... 

I just have to ask.

I tried, and I tried, and I tried --

It’s like how I felt about my Volvo –

everything about it scratched one itch or another,

from the cradling leather seats,

to the turbo-charged purr of the engine;

from the memory button for the seat settings,

to the extra traction you could 

            turn on 

to supplement the all-wheel drive.

This Swedish marvel had windshield wipers 

that would sense the level of need 

    that you had for them, 

and maintain a clear windshield, 

whether a light drizzle or a downpour.

This vehicle of mine was the most satisfying
shade of sage green,

(like a pair of eyes you can't look away from).

It tickled every nerve ending in my body,

And filled me with a swell of delight –

I wanted to wrap my arms around it and kiss its hood,

Like a child with a favorite teddy bear.
I miss that car,
but not the life it was a product of.
I miss the cleaning ladies,
and the vacations,
but I don't miss the roar of dis
     satis
        faction
that echoed through me
from morning til night -
(it was loudest at night).
I don't miss pacing around in my gilded cage,
or shaking the bars
as I watched my dreams pass by
just out of reach.

Yeah...
you're kind of like that car, sometimes...

You, too?

Desire
    drips
through me.
When you are gone,
it is a raging torrent,
but when I am sated on you
when I am surrounded by your words
your smile
your gentle presence,
then
then is when
it drips, drizzles, hums
so low, so soft
that I feel buoyed by it
and carried along without need.
Then
you are far away and at first
(sigh)
at first
my desire stays dull and smooth,
I remain satisfied like a cat
with its mouth full of mouse,
but then I swallow
and begin licking my chops
chewing my lip
casting about for
you
as I stretch the limits of satisfaction -
empty
is my mouth
and soon
empty will be my heart
only to be filled with the aching rush of desire
for (absent) you.

Days of dreaming

I'm a big fan, he said. Will you sign my copy?
I love that they call you 'Hova,' she said. Can I make it out to 'Hova'?
He smiled, nodded.
I'm an atheist, but you're my kinda god, she said.
There is power in your words, your music.
They stepped through a set of open french doors then,
and the whole room was filled with white velvet -
the sofas and ottomans, the carpet, even parts of the walls;
there were peacocks wandering through the room,
and she blinked -
did you do this for me...?
He smiled, offering her his arm.
She took it, still looking up at him.
His eyes were warm, inviting.
She wanted to dive into them and be warm and safe, forever.
He started walking again, disrupting the mesmerization that held her.
She let him lead her along through this wide space,
this dreamy room she was sure she had seen before.
As they walked along,
she thought they were alone,
but then a high-backed chair swiveled around
and perched upon it was a man.
Seeing him made her smile;
he smiled back,
and with this gesture,
she could feel guitars start strumming,
softly from every direction,
like purple rain on a sunny day.
She paused and let it fill her.
I thought that was you, she whispered, or maybe just thought.
Her eyes closed,
and when they opened again,
the room was bathed in purple light.
She spun in every direction, looking for its source.
He was gone.
She turned back to her guide
to ask where the other had gone,
but he only smiled and moved onward.
They were climbing wide, spiralling stairs
for what seemed like both hours and the blink of an eye,
until they reached a plateau that was filled with so much green
she almost thought they'd found the Emerald City.
It was grass and trees, rolling hills and crushes of foliage;
she breathed deeply and ran her hand along the moss covering a boulder beside her.
Oh...
He squeezed her hand in agreement.
Yeah, we're almost to the best part, lil mama...
She half-smiled, a dreamy smirk -
Did you just call me 'mama'? 
That's what you are, aren't ya?
Yeah, I guess so, Z.
They walked through the forest for another millenia,
and then when she was just starting to wonder why she wasn't thirsty yet,
they saw a silvery light in a clearing out ahead.

            How long have we been here? she asked.

Always, he said.
That's what I thought.

All doped up

Caffeine
and I
are almost as incompatible as
self-restraint and I...
but not quite.
Caffeine is divine,
or makes me feel divine -
immortal, unstoppable -
unsleepable, at least.
Iced tea with lunch,
and at 10pm I feel like slumber is only for the weak.
Sleep is useless, unnecessary and a far away dream.

Timelessness

I gaze into the past,
and Tom Petty is alive, present -
it's a one-sided, almost-time-travel.
I watch Prince give a conspiratorial grin to George Harrison's son,
in a perfect reflection of his spirit - shy, mischievous.
He doesn't know it,
but he's still here,
still giving us greatness.
I want to climb through my computer's screen
and hold onto them until my heart stops racing.
They were gods.
They are immortal in a way the Greek, Roman, or Christian gods
never could be.

Should Monster

I should be working on
The Novel,
not composing little poems and ponderings for no one's benefit.
I should at least be scrubbing a toilet or dusting a light fixture.
I should be doing lots of things...
but it really depends on who you ask.
My mom?
Would tell you I should be more industrious,
and less indulgent;
she would say I should be going to church,
but that is not a place that exists for me anymore.
It is the unhappy ending to a fairytale
told by a monster or a witch -
and not the good kinds,
like you'd love because they were
    misunderstood.
No, this fairytale was written by monsters
who pretend they're the good guys,
and that if you never do anything you want to,
that after you die you'll be rewarded.
Utter nonsense.
Be kind, be good, be honest.
But be kind to yourself, too.
I don't believe in "shoulds," or "mustn'ts,"
and maybe you should
                                    n't either.

Rainy Haze of Spring

Wet and foggy trees lined the winding roads that led
to that happy place where the god-like woman
used her hands to melt my muscles and remold them.
In a purple haze, I drove,
then "Purple Rain" came on and I was stuck in my car,
even though it made me late.
I floated on Prince's notes
and settled on the table.
I kept thinking the phrases,
"So what's new? How've you been?"
but they never successfully crossed the bridge
between my cerebrum and my soft palate/teeth/tongue.
I was wrapped in my fuzzy purple mind,
remembering, reinventing, imagining.
I floated home
(or drove, probably),
and dipped back into the real world for the afternoon,
to dine and go to a movie,
then dissolved into my second favorite chair
and dialed my favorite number
for what turned into four hours of intense therapy
that felt like a dream, with so many giggles.
I am in balance.

Artful Nudes, in Watercolor

Sometimes,
the mood just strikes. Ya know?
Desire is a feathered vine winding through you,
whispering of orgasms to come,
so you take a moment,
and conjure one up.
Sometimes you have to improvise.
Slip into a darkened office,
your own backseat,
a bathroom stall.
Silence is key -
no moans must be emitted,
no panting.

And then the world recedes around me -
I am an iris folding in on myself
expanding and contracting
like the birth of a new universe.
I pause, and think of giant, vibrantly painted flowers.
I step out of my own mind and click "search."
Wait - now I am lost in a blackhole of Georgia O'Keeffe images
(do yourself a favor and click here to see what I saw
and bask in the light of her flowers and her stoically beautiful face).
I am smitten with her beauty
and the beauty she captured with her brushes,
but I'm caught slightly off guard by the nude photographs
of the artist as a younger woman than I usually picture her -
hard to tell, maybe in her 30s or 40s,
but the raw beauty of her in those forever frozen moments...
aaah...it's almost like magic
(or a chemical reaction on film exposed to light).
I see the inner spark in her-
defiance, ferocity, passion,
a dark storm somehow transforming
into a splash of bright flora -
and crave the ability to slip inside her mind,
her body
for just a moment.
I acknowledge that I feel pivoted
to new perspectives of her work
because of this new connection to her physical beauty -
I suddenly see her as a mortal
who had pain and joy and talent and struggle
and was maybe
just a little bit
in love with the pussy.
I mean, jesus.

Not that we can blame her;

it is a wonder to behold.

And for that matter so is the cock.

But I digress....

     where was I?

Ah, yes -

the portraits of the artist -
they stir in me deeper thoughts,
maybe self-loathing.

Maybe I resent the giant leaden anchor I feel

holding me fast against all the ocean's currents,

snaking its way to my hull and keeping me in place -

the anchor that ties me
not to a point of coordinates on a map,

but to a point of relating to the world:
that you don't matter unless you're beautiful.
It's painful to face this indictment.
I've been so sure of this,
but here, in this instance,
I am sure that 

I have it all wrong -
one imbues the other -
Tom Petty's sexiness is derived directly from his music, right?
There is a balance in him, maybe in us all.

And maybe that's why,
in just the right light

at just the right angle

on a good day

I can see echoes of beauty in myself

(but then a slight shift of the protons and neutrons 

and the illusion dissipates).
But I've chosen to pretend I'm beautiful anyway,

which propels me to imagine great things -

or maybe not lofty things,
but dirty, glorious things,

and sweet, strange things -

and to believe that what I have to say matters.