The Eggcorn

Dogs pat around the ordinary kitchen chair. Sounds of morning
push into the growing day where black coffee, steaming and bitter, transports me to uncountable sweet cappuccini and soft summer warmth; my hand in yours, glowing in the bloom of light– firm bodies, firm skin, firm resolve. From that cheap Roman hotel with blue linens, I scribbled a billet-doux on fine florentine stationary, the color of the sea, the sky, the color of your eyes, while he hovered like a warden over my shoulder– I was asking you to wait–Handing my sky-colored affection to the clerk, I said your name like an incantation, the warden’s mouth tightened with envy and mine with resentment, eyes hardened with enmity.
The bite of black coffee, unsoftened with foam.
In an ordinary drawer, on an ordinary morning, in my ordinary house, there’s a half-used box of fine florentine stationary, the color of the sea and sky, the color of your eyes, the color of my– dissent, waiting.

#NaPoWriMo, Day 28.

Acrid cold pushes the limits of patience,
pink nostrils flair, linings stinging
with each labored breath,
ice forms–

aching joints,
aching teeth,
aching heart.

Half-lidded eyes,
squint against the wind
heavy soles with a quickened pace
recoil, echoing against icy pavement–

aching toes.

A small thread of resolve remains
to remember.
To remember a different place where golden motes ride
invisible currents in oblique light–

Where heat settles
on all sides, a husk,
offering no escape through
shifting weight.

Where fingers are limber,
painless,
where skin pushes back with rills of sweat
sweeping warmth away in drop after trickle.

Freeze here,
just for a moment,
cursing aching fingers,
savoring.

Push forward —
into a fog
of green water and salt,
of cheap cloying sunscreen, of wet cement
whose shadows cling to frigid nerves.

Toes spread with muscle memory
in fine heated dust–
red grit settles in a film
defining tender curves on each ankle.

The air slows, with
tension
of the weight of air on skin
the second before he reaches.

Wind slices–
emphatic percussion
pulling her back
into the biting cold

of now.

aching joints,
aching teeth,
aching toes,

Dismantling with it,
cognizance–
aching fingers,
the moment before the flavor of flint and salt–

aching heart.

The heartbeat before
the flavor of dust
that had settled on the sheen of his flushed skin–
filled her mouth.

NaPoWriMo Prompt, Day Twenty-six:  “Taking our cue from today’s craft resource, we’d like to challenge you to write a poem that includes images that engage all five senses. Try to be as concrete and exact as possible with the “feel” of what the poem invites the reader to see, smell, touch, taste and hear”.

I can’t remember the exact moment
when I saw you last,
perhaps, it was in the chrome light of a spring,
or maybe it was summer,
or perhaps your silhouette was driving away
in an orange MG,
whose top wouldn’t fasten in the rain–

Or perhaps it was in dappled light
of an open breezeway, sunburned and salt kissed–
a quick hug goodbye
with plans for tomorrow.
That’s the thing with fate.
We don’t get
to mark the exact moment.

Burned permanently,
like a snapshot
is moment we first kissed in the
chrome light of the California afternoon–
with horses and clouds for a backdrop.
But, you left that summer
with bigger future plans that eclipsed kissing.

You returned
with a military regulation haircut
framing blue eyes.
Grown into your limbs–
but your beauty wasn’t clear to me
through the fog of awkward bluster,
I marked that moment with exasperation.

I marked the moment,
at the gas station,
when I handed you the only helmet.
Two-wheels, a short drive, sun-burnt,
and sixteen–
I was,
I am vain.

I also marked the sickening sound
of helmet hitting steel.
After thirty-two years,
I can hear the reverberation through my chest–
I feel the heat-driven adrenaline and unforgiving pavement.
I marked the fear on your face
as we picked each other up off the road.

Hopeful for your encouragement,
I marked the moment,
bleary-eyed that I anticipated
your eyes, your knock,
with running shoes in hand.
Breezeway plans were waiting–
They still wait.

I marked the moment of that call,
later in the day,
dialed from a baby-blue push-button phone.
That moment ending in the sound of grief,
reverberating through my chest,
a sound my sixteen-years had never made–
a sound whose repetition I still dread.

I wonder when you made that leap,
If you marked the moment?
Did you know I’d be waiting running-shoes in hand?
Did you think of our first kiss,
or the moments cleared of fog
that could have been–
with horses and clouds as a backdrop?

Now, I mark each moment, small and big–
with allegiance to a name I cannot speak,
still ever wishing for your encouragement.
You taught me to look through the fog for beauty,
to be generous to a fault, and that sometimes duty eclipses kissing.
You taught me to be better, and
that we don’t always get a second chance.

See, that’s the thing with fate–

NaPoWriMo, Day 24 (Hopeful Elegy)

Thracian King

Diomedes,  savage hawk, with the legacy of war boiling

from agnatic veins,

Barbarian

could be gentled to dormancy with

the measured step of a

mare.

 

Four strong, in his stable,

he doted.

A loving father in his worst

of days,

manger chains of bronze and

brilliant hours swimming

in the Black Sea.

 

Prowess, personified, in

The Swift,

racing circles in fresh pastures,

throwing her sleek body

into the wind,

dappled flowing

river currents.

 

Intelligence reflected in

The Shining,

affection exposed

in dark soft eyes,

light bouncing from

her glowing pelt

spun from godly bronze.

 

A kings wealth was

The Yellow,

who softly called at dusk,

to her kindred, the setting sun,

while standing watch until

her other sister, Dawn,

returned.

 

His favorite, was

The Terrible,

answering to Id,

storm wild, teeth gnashing lead mare

confidence unrivaled and

devoid of deference,

even to him.

 

Daily, comb in hand,

eternal devotion on kingly lips

a song of everlasting care.

Fighting gods

and mortals both

to keep them

near his breast.

 

In the end, the gods,

held him to his words.

You see,

in brutal rule,

he’d fed them,

not grain or grass

but human brawn.

 

So in his death,

in kismet,

he became not stallion,

but a mare

as they consumed his regal flesh

and begat a wild line of Id,

devoid of deference.

 

 

Song

NaPoWriMo, Day 15

To dream of a

teacup

is a bitter draught.

Life immobile

on the tip of a wagging tongue,

where tannin depletes

ability to

form meaningful

words.

 

To dream of a

teacup

is a cloying swallow.

Love overwhelming

in a heart stuck stagnant

where treacle reduces

capacity to

structure

logical thought.

 

To dream of a

teacup

is a diluted solution.

Action arrested in tepid intent

where ambivalence dominates

desire to persist

in full warm vitality

of life and

of love.

 

#NaPoWriMo

Deplete

Stuck between the

worst of neither worlds

is not a truthful curse

But rather

a glimmer or

laugh, over a glass of cold milk

from a sinful cow

purchased instead of borrowed.

 

 

#NaPoWriMo

Glimmer

Over a shoulder,

reflected in the

flaking silver

of an aged

mirror,

the reflection of

antagonism,

spittle mouthed,

corrupt with the froth

of acrimony,

begins to

receded.

 

Stored affronts

feeding the brute

diminish.

Once fiery words

diluted with the

fat of time

become

A spoon of

pablum, which

can sustain

no one

indefinitely.

 

Atrophied muscles

ache

with effort to turn

forward.

Eyes dilated,

flood fresh

in cobalt air

and blinding sky,

squinting anew,

battling to

leave sustained

darkness.

 

#NaPoWriMo

via Daily Prompt: Froth

Froth