Discounted Poetry

You can smell The pebbles Hot beneath the lonely sun. The cathedral Proud and pointing up, Converted gold untold To mortar, stones, Artistic glory, Awing and reminding vulgar villagers Of divinity intruding on finite reality, Eternity. I want to round the corner On the gravel boulevard And find you standing Like a sacred church Beneath the open sky. - 6/8/26

I am bent. I'm watching sweatstreams Drop to darken dirt below in blotches. I am spent, And yet a never-ending waterfall. You are the puzzle I'm afraid I haven't gotten Time enough to solve. I see you take it black These days, Abandoning your snowy sugar sands. Your daring lipstick Is a lethal thrust Or bloodied shield for sheltering. Exhausted, I am dreaming of starfish, Blueberries ordinarily available, Soft patches of silver, aquamarine, And mother of pearl, Your slightly wicked smile Holding all the sprawling city, Maybe every inch of the world, Your uncovered shoulders on my pillow, Underwater eyes. My every thirst would quench And all my questions put to rest If not for your ambivalent attention. - 6/5/26

You landed Lifted, A lunar rocket in reverse. Venice is a world away. - 6/4/26

You carry wind across the border. Soldiers shoulder rifles, Eyeing you with threatened faces Threatening. You never meant to end up here Against the wall Awaiting passage and permission. You took such pride in proving self-reliant. You chopped your hair defiant. You left your home to find it Dragging in the dirt behind you Everywhere you go. I see you through the strip of chain-link Staring open as a hungry hand, As the finales of forbidden affairs, As a complicated question of theology, But your betrayal laid me down On the dusty ground for years. Although I still can feel your breath Against my cracked and blistered lips, I've nothing left for you. - 6/3/26

Perhaps the humid sky's Too heavy. You are never there, The ending of the yarn You've strung throughout the trees Is simply tied onto a barren branch. I'm seldom tired. I am yawning Not from weariness, Well, mostly not, But boredom. The pressing air, Quicksilver lover, Older man In search of the end Of searching, Traveling on, - 6/2/26

That stare Rejuvenates the dead and gone. Your smile Slays us all. The angel visited me early. She only speaks in warnings, Never blessings. Our highway's buckled and uncertain. You've got to toss down more Than penny antes When there's blood  In the middle Of the table, When lines relax to fuzzy smears Throughout the room, When all the colors fail to grey, When all you are Is taken, broke. I think I know a way around, A path directly to the middle Where the fire blazes  Yet does not consume. I can take you over, But you've got to make it halfway To my vehicle yourself. - 6/1/26