Out of darkness grows

It feels like rain
in the bones.
It is as though
I have known
the subtle differences
of hours
from reading water lines
and by translating the stain
visibly left behind
similar to thunderheads.

Another dawn lightens over me
and after so many
thin and pointed
Winter moons have waned,
it becomes easier to reminisce
in this Time
alone and perishable.

Soon enough,
daybreaks the serene brow
into blended spectrums
dampened down seeds are sown
deeply enfolded into the crust
and the anticipation of flowers
made nothing but sense
of Beauty.



Painting by Jean-Francois Portaels(1818-1895), 'Spring' c. 1879 in Public Domain. 

Artist leaving residence

The artist leaves the building.
This time he is
wrapping up
his canvases, colors, and
hairy implements.

He loads and stacks,
lines and lays his tiles, some gently
until tightly packed
for transport.

Some of them,
he jams in just seeming
to fill in
any open spaces he sees.

His neighbor, the lady
living below him,
paints furiously-impressionism,
she is no artist.

She tries to finish
her own piece
before he is gone-
before all falls muted,

from above.
Heaven forbid,
the muse is moving on
to another scene, landscape

perch, set of white walls,
half empty canvases,
or another artistic
aesthetic altogether.

Painting by Thomas Prichard Rossiter, 'A Studio Reception, Paris' c. 1841,[CC0], via Wikimedia Commons.

Warning signs

Red dawn
sits quietly
behind Eastern hills.
Space
is blue and cold
in moonglow flood-
light.

A candle flickers
inside
the window.
The birds stir
leaves,
while wind
picks up any loose
thoughts.

...the purpose of a flower,
color can make us
feel.
Beauty is perishable,
like the light
of this day.

A reflection glows
warmer,
warnings signs were every-
where
day breaks
hearts as light as air.




Painting by Herbert James Draper (1863-190), 'The Gates of Dawn', in Public Domain. 

Continuities

Please consider this
an invitation for you
to take a small step
with me
here

into a warm pool
of self-reflection
with its coincidences
and resemblances
to the things we
can touch
that may also touch us back

for the same reason
or terrify
by
sheer proximity of skin.

It feels blurry when fully
immersed
here
because this liquid is so much
thicker than blood,

immortal and color-less
in order
to not conceal its particulates
as deposited into your banks
of experience.

It all comes together
like light,
gravity, family and an image,
for a moment.

This shape
water takes
the pathways
as they mimic the way of wind
taking the open path
along, long, way around
an obstacle that doubled
itself as a ladder.

Without braces and right angles,
there are no straight lines or perfect circles
to be found or measured
here.

We may picture
perfection but cannot describe
or swallow it without losing
our senses
of things.

In between
breaks of concentration
the glass spiders
but it is held together
in its frame

since there was no place
to remain
the same
as the way we found.

Let us both observe
how much further,
the way you have held yourself back,
the way you left yourself
so easily open to suggestions
such as novelties as in
the word and first-mover
who made us-

stand up
while the mirror-image stayed
observant and seated
in place.

See,
that was not you
there
sinking in,
drinking in, thinking in
collected bodies capable
of lucid dreaming
without ever remembering
if we should have
broken the surface.




Photo credited by Jon Sullivan, 'Ashes on the Reflecting Pool' dated February 2013. 

Should've asked first...

We were connected
to each others gaze
and more
deeply, once
we wished would last for-
ever.

Remember
with me
conversations, deeply
endless opportunity
being
together only-
beginnings.

I know
that was then,
but I do not know
when this
is-
more endings.

True, I only speak
most
honestly in poetry.
Saying more
than I could other-
wise.

I only ask
now, how we changed
focus-frequently
away...

Don't answer,
I won't repeat.

The blue-lit face,
red cheeks, empty windows
and presence-
elsewhere, I try to focus
on something
as intangible and
deeply infinite,
as sky only to resist
the falling atmosphere.

It is my fault.
I should've asked
you if you think
we get what we deserve
always?



Painting by Philip Hermogenes Calderon (1833-1898), 'Her eyes are with her heart' c. 1881, in Pubic Domain. 

drawing with charcoal

Seething and sizzles
with intermittent sparks,

This dawn cracks
its sharp end

Making wake
a current state of fray

Today
may bring light

By ignition
cauterized by the heart.



Painting by Alphonse Asselbergs (1839-1916), 'Around a Fire in the Forest', in Public Domain. 

Heft

Balance may never be explained
in a constant way.
Sentences have periods,
stories are many series of scenes
that never end.

When we insist on showing someone else,
the way it is, the way we see it
changes inevitably
somewhere between pointing and looking.

There is always more to see.
Obviously,
there is no way to stay
in equilibrium for an eternity.

At least we both must hold on
to something
that seems worth
mentioning.


Artwork by Édouard Vuillard (1868-1940) in the [Public domain].