There is something splendid about
a Peruvian man leaving the rice to burn
because he is unable to keep himself
from dancing
when a good Salsa song comes on
there is something exquisite and wild about a woman
eyes closed
paying uncontrollable obeisance to the rhythm
thrilling to the beat
waxing and waning to the sound waves
there is something gorgeous about the
I-can't-help-it
the movements, like an untamed clockwork
the way the line between sound and
limb's poetry blurs
fantasia's demise comes with a soft
violence, unanticipated
followed by a drought of wakefulness
surprised to see walls and ceiling
surprised to be alive
You asked me once,
what was my favorite color.I told you it was the ocean on an early summer afternoon with white clouds around the sky.
(it's definitely sunlight shining on crashing water with dolphins in the surf.)You asked me once,
what was my favorite smell.I told you it was twilight October when the sun turns trees to fire and witches come out to play.
(or maybe it's a spring morning in the grass and trees when the sun shines after rain.)You asked me once,
what was my favorite song.I told you it was the flash of white on black when a mockingbird takes wing.
(or maybe it's just the first days of spring when the morning's just begun.
Daddy when I was ten months old you were my favourite word
because I couldn't pronounce other nouns as properly,
I couldn't say mirrors until I was seven,
I ate synonym buns for breakfast
and I spoke like Elmer Fudd for a good chunk of my childhood.
You were the only exception to my speech impediment
every time I would visit my vocal therapist
she asked me to talk about whatever I pleased,
so I listed facts about my dad,
I explained that your beard made your kisses taste like carpet
I told her about how I used to sleep on the living room floor
so that I pretend to feel your beard sweeping away my tears like a boom,
I exaggerated about how yo
when i grow up i'm going to get bags and
bags of seeds and scatter them in the
rain all around my neighbourhood,
chuck them into empty lots.
i'm going to get a mirror
and write you are
beautiful on the top of
it and put it on a wall
of a building on a busy street and
when i grow up i'm going
to write love letters to
strangers and big descriptions of
what i did today
and post them to street addresses i'll
make up and put toys and random
objects in people's letter boxes, like
a corkscrew and a live frog
and i'm going to get a white board
with a pen and put it in an alley way
and put a sticker saying my
thought of the day on
Youre a half-penny thought in the back of my mind,
just a whimsy, a waste of a fragment of time.
Youre a telephone number I forgot to write down;
youre the least of my worries, the last in a line
of a long list of wishes Ive wished for.
Yes, your voice is a song that I hum now and then,
not for long, just for fun, never starting again
round and round in my head, nowhere near my top ten,
this refrain wont remain, when its over - Amen
just a tune that I once mightve danced to.
Youre a memory, fading, a faraway sound
hardly there, barely heard, just a wisp on the wind
like a melody play
peter pan and i
have
some sort of understanding.
well,
he was hovering around
my bedroom window
when he saw me crying
and i said, i'm turning twelve tomorrow.
that's when he offered
his hand and a little pixie dust
his hair was wispy, his cheeks i guess
still held a little baby fat.
and i couldn't help but notice the small
tinge of regret, the sense of neglect
that no child should ever feel.
maybe his eyes held all the wisdom in the world
all the secrets of the fairies,
the pirates,
how to reel in the little boys
and girls,
how to build a family
and the terrors of being alone.
and now i'