Poem: Emi

She says her name is Emi.

Short for Emily?

No, just Emily, she says.

I don’t know much about her

Except for the fact she loves to spell.

She sits over her picture book and spells every word.

One day I saw her write her name.

She wrote Me.

M E

Em ee

Emi.

Poem: Untitled

The fearless fire makes tigers cry.

I find nothing but sizzling stripes

And shattered CDs flying through the air.

I’d like to write away the rain but can’t.

The rain droplets on my tree outside show me the lives of my neighbors,

And shards of broken mirrors envision pieces of my future that shall never be.

What is buildings were but walls with no people living inside?

And all windows were made out of stained glass

So when you look outside the world appears rosy?

Poem: The Essence of Dreams

Gauzy apparitions sweep their fabulous feathers

In the winter-spiked air.

They run under the moon through the snow-dappled trees.

These are the agitated nightmares that

Materialize in my sleep.

My dreams: glacier blue lakes,

Creatures that fly,

Liberated,

Beneath the sky and sway from the weight of air.

They are dizzy with thought,

Their wings as slender as the rays of dawn.

When they soar they can finally believe that

Fear thrives in shadows,

And hope is an empty promise.

When you add and subtract what’s left of you,

You can’t see yesterday.

I am afraid to take a risk.

You expect to find yourself in someone else,

But this transformation ends and begins with you.

My dreams still dance:

A figure that chases rainbows in a box of prismatic light.

The azure depth of night.

A hot candle magnified beneath the glare of wind.

Iced April with a frosty exhale.

The sun chasing shadows.

The rattle of glass.

Dust swept up by gravity to fly

Untouched

By the world.

Here dreams connect fantasy to reality.

My hair is curled by the sweat of human fear.

Foggy entrances chinked by memories.

Poem: Green Life

Come, run with me under these trees.

See the green?

Feel the life?

Now, I’m not telling you to leave your kind so you can just be with me.

I know you civilized ones hate to do things like that.

But…

Sure, in the wild it’s rough.

And my kind aren’t very welcoming to outsiders.

And yes, I know you’ve got comforts livin’ civilized and all.

But you feel real proud every day when you survive to see tomorrow.

You get to feel the wind.

Hear the song of the leaves.

Hunt for your own food.

You feel more alive, somehow,

Knowing it’s not guaranteed it won’t be taken away.

And this place it quite beautiful,

Isn’t it?

Poem: Hurt

It is human to feel pain.

It is not humane for someone to hurt you.

Here, does not the tear sound so loud when falling on your pillow,

Loud as a rain drop thousands of feet up?

And your throat aches, as unpleasant

As the smell of ozone.

I try to be perfect but she only criticizes.

I came to your doorstep expecting comfort,

Finding only black cobblestones you tried to bleach

And a dead cat impaled by a telephone pole,

Stiff and silent.

I try to remember that night.

There were stars above the city.

Birdsong within a thunder storm.

You want to experience my pain,

Wanting excitement.

You do not know it will only make your hollow heart emptier.

You only see the poppies blowing.

Poem: Yellow

Babies like the color yellow

And why wouldn’t they?

Yellow is

                A daisy

                Sunlight

                Butter

                The color of their rain booties

                Their stuffed animal

                The blouse of their nanny

                The color of their mother’s gold earring

                The eye of a stray cat pausing on the street

                The center of a rainbow

    Joy

Babies are Joy.

Poem: The Fantasy of Argen

To the south there’s a place names Argen.

In its center there’s magic

That can make you young;

But the world’s tragic.

There’s haunted dangers everywhere.

Ghost princes whom themselves hang

At noon and midnight.

The flowers have fangs.

Past the mist of the Mountain Forests

There is a bridge without end,

On the dank lagoon

Of dreams that don’t mend.

You will come to a yellow clearing

Cut into birches and oaks.

You’ll see a castle

But that’s a hoax.

Don’t listen to the Shadow Music.

It can break a diamond’s heart.

It shall make you a slave

To the Pixies of the Dark.

A warning against the black roses:

They have a beautiful smell.

They grow in the house

Of the youth named Belle.

She’s a daughter of an enchantress.

She carries a silver flute.

Belle has an owl

That has fatal hoots.

Poison Ivies are truly potions

In her lush dappled garden.

Crows are her servants,

The moon’s her warden.

Poem: Why You Cry

When your heart’s a sad sea

And you’re as lonely as a tree,

You want to lessen the tide

And that’s why you cry.

Poem: Ponderings of Me

The splinters beneath me on the wooden bench.

Why don’t they ever replace it?

Gasoline fumes.

The smell of the dead future?

The cool of the trees’ shade,

The hot sun beating down in the nearby playground.

Why do the insects crawl on my book?

Long strands of hair glinting on my black pants.

Why are they russet in the sunlight?

I pretend I have no needs.

I don’t have to eat or drink or get tired.

But I still experience pain:

The ache in my shoulders because of sitting

In the shade

Of the tree

On the old wooden bench

For hours.

And I’ve already finished my poetry book

But I feel hungry and can’t resist.

I eat one small granola bar.

Do the flies smell the sugar on my breath?

Maybe if I convince myself I don’t have a desire to eat or drink

That means I’m not human.

Not being human means being perfect.

Why is it impossible to be perfect?

The old men sitting next to me on the old wooden bench

Have loud, harsh voices and talk about

Thinks that don’t matter, conversations that have no interest.

Why are their lives so boring?

Poem: Transcending Music

The music’s rhythm is curved and tender

And the transcendent light is undulating in thought

And definitive in nature,

Accentuated by the November blues.

The slippery mildew has an authentic essence.

Magenta blood spills out of my cuts.

Why is it we fear the ordinary

But feel extraordinary?

The fathomless voice of the wind screams in my ear.

The tree shades shiver.

Did you know the rain wants to travel in boats?

And past time is frozen in ice?

And cigarettes burn the universe?

Poem: Dreams Live

Dreams are the things that never die,

Even when you want to die.

Dreams are the things that never change,

Be it sun or rain.

Poem: White Swan

Magnus is a White Swan

Flying to wed an Ivory Prince.

They say they will have a Dew Horse to pull their carriage home.

The ceremony will start in a Prairie Twilight

And the joining will be lit by the Harvest Moon.

The Royal Silver, their attendant,

Will pronounce Magnus the Heritage Princess.

The crowd will then cheer, including White Swan’s parents,

Raspberry Phlox and May Night.

And the fireworks will explode,

For the prince ordered Foliage Confetti.

Rumors have spread that the Scarlet Emperor

Will come at the end to wish them blessings.

Quote: Origin

Monkey said to Man, “We are brothers. We are descendants of one common ancestor.”

Man replied, “How can I be related to such a preposterous creature as you? We were formed separately by a divine Creator.”

The Earth rumbled beneath them and declared, “It does not matter which one of you is correct. Why are you quarreling about where you came from, when if it were not for either of these you wouldn’t even exist. Give gratitude and not spite.”

Who of these is right?

Poem: Luna

Her eyes are stars

And her hair is as butterscotch and sparse as her mother’s.

She is young.

These children surprise me everyday.

She clutches a teddy bear

And has the voice of a baby bird.

She’s learning to fly.

Her view of the cold world is playful and warm.

Her mother calls her Luna.

Quote: Birthdays

I had my first birthday in Paris.

I had my second birthday in Tokyo.

I had my third birthday in London.

I had my fourth birthday in Rome.

I had my fifth birthday in Athens.

I had my sixth birthday in Moscow.

I had my seventh birthday in Mexico City.

I had my eighth birthday in Buenos Aires.

I had my ninth birthday in Madrid.

I had my tenth birthday in Cairo.

Poem: Blue Feathers and Cold Rain

Blue feathers and cold rain.

May the eagle be our sky

And the flowers our earth

And a bright spirit our world.

Blue feathers and cold rain.

Poem: The Parking Lot

I lug my schoolbag across the parking lot,

Where giant oak trees tower over the quiet cars and give off dappling shadows

And the grass has grown waist-high and wild

And barbed plants poke through the soil

And there’s that nice green smell of things growing

And little seedlings have pushed themselves through the old gray bricks

And pigeons fly overhead like dark shadows

And a blackbird bathes himself in a rain-water filled rut in the street

And little brown songbirds give off bright happy chirps

And I noticed a silver, long-tailed species in some bushes that are rare in these parts, but sing beautifully

And pines and trees swirl in the air.

Then I realize I will miss walking home from school,

Ever since I decided to go to a different high school in the urban city.

Poem: "Bark, Bark!"

“Bark, bark!” goes the little dog.

The big dog fears the bear.

The wind blows continuously,

But it comes from where?

Quote: Follow Your Heart

Don’t follow what your mind’s saying and not your heart, because then your heart will make sure you’ll be never happy.

Poem: The Gift

I’d snatch the moon from the sky,

And give it to you, its identical eye.

Sure, there’d be no more moon poetry,

No more rushing tides,

Nothing to light the night.

Nothing for Wolf to howl to,

With enemy Lynx sauntering behind in the snow.

Nothing to make Raccoon’s fur silver.

Would you wear the object of a million human wonders

Upon your neck

As a gift from me?