Paradox of a Drowned River-Flower

~ a dark love poem ~

You said

in voice infirm,

sight ravished by too

many suns and

glimpsed chimeras,

nothing is forever.

I walked a chained walk

on a scorched immaculacy,

shattered splashes of

yesterday’s innocence.

And I was left with

a sharded sun

black flowers and

severed arms…

The Woman Who Would Be Mother

~ though we did not share a womb ~

It’s dusk.

“Come child, sit”

she’d say.

Wood fire

clay courtyard

small and damp

smell of which

sits in my soul

like aromatic earth

even today.

My Ayah’s lap

a cradle

like no other

a cradle of cloud,

amplitude

and simply

…

Ghosts of a Lost World

~ and we must live ~

The outside world.

Do red and purple neon signs pierce hazy skies, still, and roadside cafes animate the night? Can laughter be heard as girls, buoyed by sunshine, excitement and expectancy walk to school? Is there really a world left out there? I will…

Her eyes were closed, his open, and between the woman and the man, ghost screams rose, and like thin long birds that break their beaks against cracked mirrors, flapped around, then settled to roost in the disquiet of an abandoned citadel of silence. Both lay at the edge of an…

Exile in Egypt

~ Cairo, day one of two years ~

Like shards of crystal slanted with gold, dragonflies hover and hasten in green clouds of an ancient Ficus more a terraced geographical feature than an arboreal entity, they dart and skim then dance down to sip cool waters from a pool undisturbed…

Give Me a Vulture Any Day

~ On some things I am clear ~

and I will not go quietly

I judge the murderer

I judge the rapist

I cannot

judge a woman

or a victim

who kills a tormentor.

The anguished know —

within shadows

agonies

cry

gems die

everyone hears

no one hears.

They…

Broken In My Own Wholeness

~ an unlove poem ~

Cleanse yourself

cleanse yourself

what,

cleanse my own perfection?

All I am not,

you want

when

in your own

crumbled edifice

lie tired counted hours.

To purify perfection?

It’s mine to keep.

I was broken.

Yes, broken,

broken

but in my own wholeness.

Dendrites

in…

My Life, An Illusionist Graph

~ and every day, new axes ~

Love’s little deaths

shed burnt flowers,

melted stars

rind and pulp

at my door

and I come alive

again and again.

Geometry

of up and down lines,

— a daily graph

I must live by —

cannot hide…