The Husbandman's Hands

cradle soft my soul

whisper to me, low and bold

tethering your remedies

‘round my wounded heart with

nimble words, you sew,

with tight roped attentiveness

through the dangerously delicate

muscle of my heart

while quietly praying for a miracle 

Connection Born of Fire

He lies sleeping,

My pen across the page,

His white noise lullaby.

And you… you settle

Deep into the places lovers keep

The blinding light of a dream I can touch.

This secret life sustaining me,

Through the fragrant disappointment

The chosen consequences of living brings.

I am, in stillness,

A woman who loves you beyond reason,

Soul sought what wishing could not.

Within the ill-equipped truth,

Of my disingenuous circumstances,

I see clearly the face of another an know your silent suffering as my own.

There is transcendence here

Beyond the place a logical train of

Thought my mind rarely follows

The remembrance of your touch seared

Into the welcoming of you into my moist flesh, into my heart,

Aching for yet another assault your passion wages.

For I am a warrior born of blood,

Breed by an angry mother in the absence

Of intellectual pursuits, who knew only carnality.

Draw from my weeping body

The weapon of my own destruction

And wipe clean the evidence of my grieving and render it inert.

Lay me down upon the surgical table of the heart,

I surrender myself into the capable hands of the one who can mend

The ribbons of me cut from the severed dream.

There is simplicity in this

There is truth in this

There is purity in this

There is life in this

A union beyond reason and

The permission we give ourselves

To surrender to it, and breathe in a new language of intimacy.

This we grasp with both hands

A risen bliss, and from it flows

The peaceful act of healing what the world could not mend.

Fueled by an unknown source

Crafted in the furnace of simple magic

Forged by the steel blue blows of selfish tongues, unknowingly.

Beneath the surface of our deeds

An honest epiphany is delivered in my breast like a secret

Guarded by the crumbling walls of my own idolatry.

And I know, beyond my own ability

To prevent the now writ’ truth…

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)*











*quote from e.e. cummings 

An Elegy For Jay Gatsby

All wanted things grew silent the night,

the absence of understanding became your entombment.

The languid beauty of your sleeping figure

set secretly from my reach, sparkled with a dark beauty.

Death brought you the release of your inexhaustible torment

living the life, five years her absence brought you.

In the darkened state of my dreams, with the bright

knowledge of a murderous truth, I alone now know, I am your friend.

I sent out across the expanse for any who would come

to honor you as a man, as the giver of gifts, as the sacrificial lover.

No one came.

Your body lie as in sleep, waiting for her to come

As you always had, with the sharp ambition to win her.

The embroidery upon the satin should bear an epitaph,

The great lover who built an empire from longing.

Campaign dreams, the texture of your desires, sprinkled the color of your coffin

casting long shadows over the foundation of the great house you hoped to lead her home to.

Green light blinking on in the expanse, far greater, with no boat to sail across such a sea with.

She gave you the emptiness of regret instead, lay silence upon your quiet breast in lieu of flowers.

Sleep now, Gatsby, your father’s hand is near. 

I’ll keep watch now, settle deep into the bosom of peace.

“So we beat on, boats against the current, 

borne back ceaselessly into the past.”

 ~F. Scott Fitzgerald, the final line from the Great Gatsby.

My poetic tribute to one of the greatest literary characters in American fiction and his author. The Great Gatsby is one of my favorite novels of all time and I've often wanted to write an elegy for a fictional character, this is my first attempt. An Elegy for Jay Gatsby. 

Posting tonight with the fabulous poets over at dVerse for Open Link Night #95.  

Dawn in Bed

In the cool of early morning

the steel blue coming dawn

heralds the approach of the sun.

I lie in a half-lucid state

underneath the memory of your

eyes the color of the azure sky.

My world existing beneath their

all encompassing gaze. I know no

other dwelling place where

your expanse is not above me.

My thoughts make no rebuttal to this truth.

Disarmed and naked in my vulnerability

the light reveals my state, the fragility of a woman

whom has known the touch of a man

and been irreparably altered by it.

We exist in the moments that are now slipping

through my consciousness, growing more

alert, like sand through groping hands.

Fragments of moments and flashes of memories

the color of tin, and just as sharp,

I collect with words on pages

and how I long to craft them into possessions I can keep,

and carve out a place for them upon the shelf of my days

where I can finger them once more in silence.

You have placed the glow of the sun in my heart

and given me peace in unsettled places.

You have laced together particles of my soul

that had no hope of cohesion

until you laid eyes upon them.

With your instrument of sounds discernible to no one but me

you loved me into the madness of surrender.

I hear you in the bathroom stirring the

sounds of your physical presence.

The beckoning of your obligations take

you from my arms and though I still

feel you with me, you are not here.

Grief for moments passed and a hope

for many others provoke me awake

so that I might occupy the same simple day

as you, and walk in the hope that the expanse between

the days you craft for us with your simple words

will inevitably bring you home to me.

At the side of our bed you kissed me good morning

and I swallowed you into my embrace once more.

I am yours again beneath your endless sky.

Until you struggle away, and I am left in the still warm bed

of our night beneath the stars that will never

alter with our own movements in spite of them.

I know that you must go now.

A mournful, blissful radiance will be the garments

I shall wear today in remembrance of you.

I see you now from a distance

In the doorway

In the street

In the vehicle of your absence

And I know now, without a doubt, that I have loved you without boundaries, and I will never be the same.

I have recorded an audio version of this poem on SoundCloud, Click here for a listen: 
Dawn In Bed Audio

New poetry for a new Open Link Night. Join us over at dVersepoets.com to enjoy the fruit of poets and the communion of poetic companions. Cheers! ~Apryl 

Paperman

Existing in two dimensional intangibility

Your arms weighty with the details of life

An ardent taskmaster awaits, the dictator of survival

Our paths crossed along your trade-route toward home

You smiled at me

And your eyes danced

You smiled at me

And my heart grew wings

In the stonewalled silence you surround yourself with

My delicate words seek an opening

Hopeful I send them through the needle-eyed sliver

I see you briefly in the ignorance of my existence

Spending myself with a thousand thoughts

Delicate words etched from the details of my own life

Folded gently together with prayer

I send them all unfettered with wings like expectation

A thousand tiny syllables uttered behind my teeth

Behind lips swollen with sobbing

Sharp against my fingers as I fold

Bloodied digits with paper-cut ambition

Red lipped remembrances

Smoothed across the page

And how I prayed

That would be the one that would sail you home

My skin bares the mark of your silence

My platform bed, worn thin like tears on pages

Heart fragile as paper

Rising with expectation to herald your homecoming 

I wait in the solemnity of prayer

In the dark before the dawn

In the stillness before the storm

From lighthouse paper airplanes sent in silence

Sweep me into the embrace of a thousand tiny hopes realized

In the light of a new day sprung from weeping

Heavy in your arms where the details once were

Thick with the dimensionality of grace in all it’s splendor

I am not shaken

I am not removed

I am not absent

From the fullness of loving you

Resurrect from the ashes with me my love

Dust the mourning soot from your weary eyes

Bury the disembodied despair you once surrendered to

Take my hand, together we will transcend

In a three dimensional kiss whisper the triumphant words of those

Who have risen from an amputation of the soul

And settled into truth of what it means to live again

alone... again... at last…

We are. 

C/S

Linking up again with the fabulous poets at dVersepoets.com it's another Open Link Night where we make poetic contributions and offer our encouragement, our praise, and our critique of one another with hopeful voices filled with the growth that comes in community. Join us if you wish, encourage us if you will, and share a pint with me, but only if you dare. As always, your comments are welcome and appreciated. ~Apryl 

Lucidity

sensation of skin on skin

fingertip on nose and mouth, drawing a single, solitary line

he slips down my body with tactile elegance

alight with the provocation of enhanced awareness

I am alive again, for the first time

heart pulsing love notes into my extremities

filling my ear with hot words

softening my defenses,

transforming my ravenous need into blissful fulfillment

rose scented pathways

marks the passage of lips curled with words

on the end of every simple sound

the standard of beauty we have become

a redefinition of each other’s desire

quantifying simple needs with breath and resonance

blood provoked with the tip of a tongue

liquid thoughts like sugar

dissolve between the friction of our kisses

classic style, with momentary graces

steals through my consciousness

like sand through groping hands

knit together with fragments of spirit and soul

in the warmth of glimpses, we see a desired state

crafted in the image of Eden, in it we are made new

sandalwood and the godly taste of ambrosia hidden in

folds of flesh. drink deep from the hard

liquored shots we take of one another

intoxicants slipping down the throat

of my openness aching for satiety

consummation of joy manifested in those moments

this woman belonging to one man alone

in his darkest secrets, her whispered name remains

and in hers, branded by the fires of his promise, she bears his mark

we are at the beginning of our love story, he says

my princess, my love, my sweet baby,

this is it for me… this…

is far too great a burden for one man to bare

and bending to remove, is now misshapen,

broken beneath the weight of unspoken expectations

transformed into a great a swell of sorrow overwhelming,

in the fragrant morning of his absence I realize

it was always, only just a dream…

Now open those pretty eyes and see, with sobered lucidity.

Linking up with dVersepoets.com, join us, won't you? 

The Transient

St. Terese Florida 

I exist as an orphaned creature

borne of want and fury

this once fertile existence

now suffers but a glimpse of plenty by moonlight

monstrosities only make sense in

the shadow of present nightmares

cast off like a blanket, will I this night

but gather instead provisions fit for an escape

fear is but imagination

set free in madness

I shall no longer endure the darkness,

but grope after days of illumination

switch on the light, when found,

and stand awake in truth

linger not here, will I

in this place between worlds

dream no longer, will I of

Eden recreated in mortal fantasies

it is the light I now pursue,

and the light-giver with arms wide as weeping

at his feet I’ll lay myself

and bathe in the bright shelter of his warmth

for what greater purpose does light have

if not to vanquish darkness with it’s presence

Look for me no longer among the shadows.

Linking up again with dVersepoets.com #OpenLinkNight and writing along with A Poem A Day challenge for National Poetry Month. (Though I'm not always posting the poems) Today's prompt was light and darkness. I made an attempt to capture a journey through both. Thank you for reading and thank you for your kind/constructive comments, they are deeply appreciated. ~Apryl 

Death Hewn Love: An Easter Reflection

Death

Man child

Offering self

Exchanging life for love

Ransom of blood, blood moon shadows

His death

Burial

Finished

Mourn beloved

Shaken by grief-filled cries

In hollow of created earth

He lies

Resurrection

Third day

Newness dawning

Blossoming with love hewn

From death; forever lost it’s sting

He lives

In honor of the upcoming Easter weekend my poetic offering is just that, an offering. 

Linking up with dVerse tonight, join us for a verse and the communion of conversation. 

I look forward to exchanging a few with you, thank you for your readership and 

for the comments that I hope you leave, they are of great worth. Blessings ~Apryl 

She Carried it in Silence

When three years of age she was,

the girl saw a vision that haunted her.

Abandoned by her mother with a baby 
in the backseat of a red car too big for her, 
yet it moved across a sea of automobiles.

The baby, she believed, was her sister.

She never understood why they came.

She never understood from whence they came.

She only knew that they always came.

Dark shadows bringing blackness greater than night.

Her great-grandmother had them too,

spoke openly of voices and visions.

In her presence alone the girl felt belonging,

a like minded knowing that people exchange in quiet smiles.

It was said that the Grandmother had aged into madness.

Dismissing the ramblings of the old woman

by adults, gave cause for her silence.

Native superstitions, they said, from Grandma's childhood.

They came to the girl at night,

mounting blackbirds in the pitch.

Tightening the openings around windows

she tried to keep them out with

barriers crafted from clothespins and fabric.

She placed tiny crosses on windowsills made of toothpicks.

An old native American woman once told the girl

that she was special, a child of gifting

one that wasn't filtered from her by

white blood and religion.

That night the girl saw 

a great white whale worthy of Melville.

And in it’s mouth a great vessel,

and aboard the vessel was her mother.

Still, she hoped the gift was of God.

Clutched tight her rosary, and prayed.

Confusion and secrecy knit together her

thoughts and in silence she remained.

Few knew about the gift, others whispered

about the knowledge of the things that

drew from her the child-like images

more accurate than divination.

The girl became a woman, and put away childish things.

She buried her gift in her heart by faith.

She carried it in silence, with it’s visions.

She swallowed whole the key of release, in prayer.

And with it, envisioned her Great-Grandmother freed. 

Linking up again with dversepoets.com for Open Link Night. With a grateful heart I welcome you and thank you for reading my poetry. Your visit is appreciated. Comments are welcome, thank you for them, your words help to carry me to my next poem. Have a blessed evening, I hope to see you at the pub!

Surrender to the Burning

My quiet eyes weep

for the one who will banish

from them the view of all other men.

In silence they do dote upon

the verbal imagery of his face

it clouds the mind and torments the soul.

The first flourishes of a spring drawn

from a frozen earth, birthed into being

by the presence of the sun.

Passion favors the sentimental heart

imprisoned by the walls we build

for simplicity’s sake, for our own safety.

Walls are built for such things as these;

For the breaking of the waves

that threatens houses built upon the

inconstant sands of a fallen world.

For sheltering dear ones from

the terrible conditions that lurk

beyond door posts and property lines.

For the keeping of creatures

brought under-wing with careful tending

and, at times, for restraining away their stubbornness.

For the housing of fortunes that pour forth

from the fingers of diligent men

like the belligerencies that pour forth from a drunken one.

And I, one lost among them, slipping through the hands

of caretakers and housekeepers, unknowingly,

a thing without the walls of care

a creature born of the wilderness

not dear enough to keep

the rogue wave of men’s nightmares.

I am, after all, a woman with fire in her veins

and purity tucked away in her

heart like a secret.

The sun has drawn lines, dark upon

my unclothed skin, hungry for it’s continual

kiss to shelter me from the harshest of exposures

to this dead and dying world.

I find no greater comfort than this,

that we are each creatures of light

drawn together by a likeness of being.

Light alone burns the remembrance of darkness

from the corneas of my eyes,

and absorbs the sting of infectious living.

Nocturnal shall I be no longer,

for I am a creature of the day,

I have laid myself upon the alter of light.

And I must, surrender to the burning

for it makes ashen things out of

the temporal, and the wretchedness of life.

Yet one thing remains…

By the sun life is born and sustained

none can live apart from it,

neither you, nor I can escape that truth.

There are no better stories than

those written by your presence

hot upon my days.

Those ever fixed marks revealing

a profound truth I can no longer deny,

that I loved him once, and

sometimes…

he loved me too. 

I'm offering up another poem for dVersepoets.com Open Link Night, come join us for a night of poetic revelries. Offer up one of your own and join the fun or kick back and enjoy reading. I look forward to seeing you around. ~Apryl  

I Wait

For simple words to signal your status

Like the blip of a heart rate monitor

Above your silence

Beneath the weight of your absence

Like the mother of a lost child

In the desolation of your abandonment

In prayer for your restoration

Like Samuel’s Mother at the altar

My arms as empty as her womb once was

For finality, a telegram, a text message

Like the soldier receiving a Dear John letter

There is peace in closure, release in goodbye

For the sound of your voice to rouse me

Like you did that last slumbering night in your arms

You had to leave me once already

For the lines to be drawn

Like guarded boundaries

That will take me from you

Release me from my prison of waiting

Open the door of this caged soul

Mourning dove calling for her mate

Break the bonds of my torment

Whisper words of release

And leave me to my grief

Rolling green melancholy

Forlorn is my forgotten state

Anemic understanding

Return me to my desired state

Bathed in the fragrance of your presence

In the absence of fear

In the reaping season

We all labor in silence

For the banquet

Laid out like your nakedness

Communion of two souls made one

Linking up with Open Link Night over at dVersepoets.com Come share with me a poetic exchange. 

Desire

Dusted leaves and painted showers hidden within
Angry winds blow through my soul stirring forbidden emotions
Whispered fantasies and aching loins,
Push me upon the threshold of insanity

Your words overtake me,
like waves upon the shores of disillusionment
Breaking me down with every syllable
Contentment seems an impossible dream.

Newness entices me and forces me from reality
The strength to love you, the power to deny you,
All within the boundaries of myself.

Going on and on seems endless,
Resistance seems futile
Yet painfully I resist you.

Unspoken words lie heavily within my breast
Your actions haunt my mind
Fleeting emotions seem a thunderstorm.

I long to be within your arms and inside your heart
Your passion burns visions of you into the dark corners of my mind.

You are my disability, your unconditional love paralyzes me
Within your eyes lurks the destruction of all I ever dared to dream.

I release resistance, allowing you to completely devour me,
With the devastation of consummation and I am forever changed.

And you, in the morning light of reality,
are merely an illusion. 



Come hang out with us at the pub tonight dVersepoets.com, submit your own work or drink deeply the thick words that are offered up. Hope to see you there, cheers! 

Like the Tide

Long and plain

in our

extraordinary

simplicity.

Slipping gently

into my thought,

beneath the sinews

that bind

day to night

and me to you.

Your words live

in my veins now.

Skin dissolved

as membrane.

Union of souls,

body, mind,

emotive, passionate.

Draw back with me

like the tide.

Fold yourself

into the petals

of my embrace.

Settle into the

cradle of my rib cage;

the bend of my knee,

the connective things

that enclose

man into woman

dark and deep

into the secrets

lovers keep.

We speak a language born

of fire

and of earth

of nights

we lost words

in our surrendering

to the unknown god

of my idolatry. You

have become

the definition of man.

And me, I became

a refuge of woman

bedded and curled

at the whisper

of your name.

Linking up tonight with dVerse for Open Link Night. Won't you join us? 

Drown Beneath the Tree

This big world keeps right on spinning

No time have I for grinning

The bottles keep on dropping

No sign have I of stopping

From the self-same grave that made me

Returned there I did, with favors

They have hands and so do I

And death, I met him between my thighs

I am the daughter of a forgotten father

Whose son hangs on a tree no longer

And I, well I'm the whore that hung him

Drown then did I beneath that very limb

And laid we there with poplars bare

For I never learned to swim

Linking up again with dVerse Poet's Pub Open Link Night. Publish your own poem on your blog and join us. I'll be dropping by later tonight. Hope to see you there! 

An Autumn Night in Boulder

Photo: Boulder Boulder by Katerha

patchouli scented pathways

stone sentinels stood steadfast

Chaco covered Pearl Street set ablaze

planetary alignment, hidden in the stars

you brushed against my hand

enough to feel the warmth of skin

as we were wondering through that foreign land

street venders peddling wares within

I bought an artisan’s amethyst ring

a solitary remembrance slipped on tight

as the buskers began to sing

we whispered promises with hearts alight

our childlike laughter of organic origin

created atmospheric disturbances

in those simple moments we became like puritans

beyond the rigidity of archaic formulas

sipping fare trade coffee in the moonlight

stepping into the new familiarity of one another’s presence

hoping endlessly for an extension of this night

returning to us our once forgotten adolescence


Tonight I'm linking up with dVerse where we are celebrating OpenLinkNight... if ye be of the poetic persuasion and spin a few rhymes link up with us. Cheers, hoping to see you at the bar! 

The Muse

inky veined

and muggy too

elementary words flowing through

I am the absence

you are the arrow

targeting this windblown sparrow

unambiguous are the moments

we become a secret creature

forming substance from seeming nothingness

plucking remembrances

from things branded in the brain

the violent acts of living, bleed inspiration

breathe words

from the one born of fire

buried by an earthen father in skin

again and again

union of spirit and flesh

resurrect this vessel’s ability to congregate thought

I am here

but a little while

I beg the stilled silence for oneness

whispers down the bone

creep into subconscious want

become again with me, a creature of beauty

raw symbiosis

we, with stuttered fingers

find each other’s pace, and the words come

slowly and surreal

we dance with black and white

pages of prose and poetic utterances

written by strangeness

creations borne of this madness

I am a writer

Linking up with OpenLinkNight @dVerse  Where Tashtoo has the bar. If poetic community is what you crave, join us you should, I'll buy you a verse ;-) 

This Quiet Absence

there is rhythm in the reckoning

of soul and body to it’s maker

designer of fortune and fate

I am the daughter of

a wayward father

lost in the translation of relation

we are one with the furthest point

of self same poetic expression spoken

into existence by prophetic utterances

and I am, we are

at the beginning again

circled ‘round and ‘round the question

is there truth in the utterances of men

or politics all

in all and through all, save one

and in Him only truth

truth sustained by mortal men

is fragile, and fallible

perfection in grace alone

provokes the soul to live

and flesh to breathe

bold and beautiful blindness

thrust  into me like a dagger

sing vibrancy into my voice

solidify my understanding

rewire my hardwired thinking

help me to begin again

loving is the act of learning

and learning the act of submission

to thoughts greater than those of one’s self

begin again with me

in this quiet absence

birthing substance from silence

fashion me new wings of understanding

from the debris of dissension

and we too shall be free

Linking up with dVerse Poet's Pub for Open Link Night. 

Last Flight

blue sky abundance,

billowed expectation

that wanting creates

lavish thoughts in

sky the shape of forgetting

clouds the color of silence

it is there that I loved

in your fragrance, absence

of earthen understanding

alabaster transparencies

heaven in the hindrance of

light,  quiet, cold and

absolute…

refraction of vision

of day sky sewn together

with condensation

malformed tundra and

a terrestrial drop off sans

oceanic sounds that

fling things into

abysmal need

the want of which defy

Maslow and his hierarchy

snake river gorge and

a buoyant regret not even

switchbacks can confuse

blue, like the wide eyed

wonderings of a childlike

exploration of humanness

gripping with the

fattened fingers of leisure

apathy divines the truth

of prophetic expectations

repetition is the pattern

only choice can break

slip between conscious

choice and the automation

of routine and there

lies observance

descend again into

a reclusive innocent awakening

opaque weariness

give yourself permission

for shedding shards of

substantial solitary existence

just breathe

Linking up tonight with dVerse Poet's Pub Take the time to join us if you will. Poetry and community abound. Thanks for visiting and hope to see you out there! ~A

Once Hidden, Forever Remembered

she walked quietly, arms folded
soles upon her land of birth, reflective
her Mother’s adornments remain upon it
las cosas sagradas, like the altars she erected

2000 anios El Senor Sufrio Por Nosotros
it reads, the old wooden cross my Grampo built
Daddy took my picture in front of it
for the purpose of remembering

la casita, now overrun by mice,
descendants of those my Grandma chased
broomstick held high, Aunt Jemima
stood inside on a shelf like a guardian and reminder

we are not without our own
cartoonish popularized prejudices

Spanglish is spoken now, in my generation
English rules my Father’s
Spanish my Grandparent’s
Indios, Latinos, Chicanos. Familia, all.

soy Americana,
con sangre de enspanola
y sangre de la tierra

I walked beside my Grandmother that day
upon the land, the farm de Los Romeros
we walked together and remembered,

toy trees and warm tortillas,
hand rolled cigarettes and poker for pennies,
the multicolored stones in the half walled porch
seeming to hide inside them the stories of us all

in the corner of the yard a Statuado of Jesus
el Sagrado Corazon alive still, with thorns and flames
delivering forth the lifeblood of the stories de la familia

speak them, hermanos
whisper them to your children, primos
tias y tios, never let us forget
we were of this place once
this place where earth meets sky
in the stories lie our
cultura, rich and deep.
once hidden, forever remembered

we lose part of ourselves lest we remember,
speak these stories, dear ones,
stories of blood and water
they are the origin of our belonging

Linking up with http://dversepoets.com/ for Open Link Night.