LET ME TAKE YOU TO A PLACE 

Let me take you to a place
A place where
Shovels hang on fences
Ice picks on sheds

The village idiot puts razors
On the feet of bug-eyed crazy chickens
And grows dogs starved to fight 

The drunken neighbor
Looks the other way
While she sits…and sits…and sits
Crocheting lies in warm blankets 

The sign of the times
Is the electric bill
Lighting street lights that glow
On paths to nowhere 

There are dead animals
In live traps
Black cats eat their kittens
And hiss sickly warnings 

Blind dogs summon underground
Animals that bump into rocks
Causing silent screams 

Your heart beats in a blues rhythm
Slowly thumping and building
To an explosive end 

The earth is alive
With worms
Crawling through roots and telling lies
Causing birds to frantically fly into windows
Fighting their reflections
Trying to nest their souls against winter winds
And summer whispers

GEORGIA ON MY MIND

The soft slam of the screen door
Announcing the end of the day
Rosy cheeks and warm smiles
Await on the other side
In well rehearsed and worn rocking chairs
Lightening bugs left to die in a mason jar
Stirred to life by the Buzzzzzzz-ring
Of the doorbell
Basement projects with old tools and paint
Homemade go carts with wobbly wheels
And a rope to steer
Fueled by laughter and gravity
Stopped by the flat spot at the bottom of the hill
Cracked sidewalks and scraped knees
Red clay stains and fire ants
Afternoon thunderstorms lead to
Countless hands of 500 Rum
Grandma’s recipe of sweet pickles once dill
Sugar cookies and sweet tea
Tall pines and winding hills
Mass on Sunday once Latin now not
Followed by fried chicken and stick onions
Stone Mountain and General Lee
The Varsity
Krystal Burgers
New summer sneakers and hair cuts
Emory University with Foreign Films and Art to see
Fox Theatre; Peachtree Street
Margaret Mitchell and Willie B
All now Gone with the wind, but will always be
Georgia on My Mind

BLACK DOG

The black dog is loose
The black dog is on the run
I want to run free
Free in your mind
A silent partner
To your thoughts

There is no time
I’m stuck in this moment
My soul might die here

Dog is god
God is a dog
A black dog
The black dog is on the run

Philosophy is found
On the bark of the black dog
Not that tree

I’m chased by the black dog
Keeper of dark days
Even darker nights

Drink it all
Still can’t sleep
I see you
In my dreams
You are uninvited
I am the black dog

WHEN I AM OLD

When I am old
Will I sit alone?
In a café
Stirring my coffee
Black
With paint stained hands

Will I stare?
At youth
With longing or relief
Will I hold their gaze?
Or re-direct my glance

Was I a good friend?
A great lover
A respected rival

Will I remember the books?
Books I read
Songs I sang
The philosophies and lessons
That rang

Will blue still look blue?
And compliment yellow
Will the black dog
Sit and stay
Or run away

The work is done
The coffee is cold
What will I do?
When I am old

LISTENING IN COLOUR

Close your mind’s eye
Let colour fill your silence

The sound of yellow calling blue
…ring around the roses…
Violent violet scraped on knees
…pocket full of posies…
Green screams and orange hides
…we all fall down…
Fall down and touch red
Hold it close and listen to its cries

Listen to the colours

Red ants march in yellow corn meal
Blue raisins shrivel in pudding treats
Grey ashes float in cold coffee
Paint on brush
Across canvas
Through hair

Churchill’s black dog barks
Philosophy under grey skies
Black birds nest in yellow ochre
Umber branches scrape paint chipped
Window panes
White whips and snaps in wind

Listen to the colours

Erase black
Replace with blue
Scratch white and it’s yellow
Listen to the colours
The colours are talking to you

BRITTANY SPANIEL
The hot mid-day sun caused momentary
Blindness as she entered the dark auction barn
The stench of un-wanted animals
Over-whelmed her senses

Sight, once adjusted, lands on
Spitting llamas, with wide, black eyes
Of shock and confusion

Old, tired goats with miss-shaped horns
Flattened by age and curled at awkward angles
Stared back in panic. 

Stocks of wire cages full of chickens
Line hastily built plank walls
The chickens defecated on the rabbit cages below. 

Used incubators with yellowed fixtures and frayed wires
Cardboard boxes tied with string with holes poked through
For air to help whatever struggles inside to breathe. 

There – there she was – in the middle of all the stink Heat and chaos
In a cage two sizes too small for her frightened frame.
“Husband couldn’t stop beating her” the man said, “so the wife Said to take her to the auction and get rid of her.” 

“What kind of dog is she?” She asked.
“Brittany Spaniel” he said, walking away into the shadows And sawdust of the auction arena, passing a sign that read:
No Dogs Allowed.

THE GARDEN 

My minds shadows are cast
Over your emptiness
Leaving us both in darkness 

In the garden
Ideas are suspended snakes
Threading their way through memory cells
Fighting to stay alive with you 

Monkeys attach themselves
To every limb
Demanding explanations 

Bugs crawl in and on your skin
Causing silent screams
To reach up to infinity 

In this garden
Nakedness is anger
Surrounded by weeds 

In this garden
Nakedness is a cloak of anger
Tickled by weeds
Irritated by reality 

In this garden
Thick cloud formations
Frame the death of photosynthesis
A cool wind
Blows your scent from my window 

Sleep only prolongs the
Reality of death
My love is real sick
My dog is blind
And the landscaping doesn’t hide
The truth 

In this garden
The birds will pick you clean
Leaving your frame of truth
Revealed
Never to be picked

FALLING

If I could breathe
   I would cry
If I could cry
   I could breathe

I’m not afraid to die
I am afraid to fall
It’s Einstein’s theory
Falling needs no explanation
Gravity will absorb the speed
Of your fall

A person falling
Freely feels
No force of gravity

These are the thoughts
That bends fenders and tightens ropes
Nobody knows the sadness
Hiding behind blue eyes
That is cracked mirrors

Cloudy windows
Grey cotton
Snagging on black trees
Acting like thoughts
Even though
I put them there

ANTS IN MY CORN MEAL

There are ants in my corn meal
Ashes in my coffee
Here I am
Broken in two
Invisible today
Lonely
Dark and hollow

Smoke it anyway
We’re all going to die
Smoke your dreams
Live your nightmares

Eating Melba toast
With green butter chips
In a blue café
Crying green
Through red eyes

Dead birds
Hanging themselves
Near the clothesline
My empty thoughts
Are rockers
On a sunny porch

I’m NOT naïve
You can cut your hair
And grow your past
There are such things as
Slow cigars and fast women

Dead grass still grows
It grows and grows
It won’t stop growing
Growing grass
Hiding jagged rocks
Broken ankles

Drinking and driving only
Gets you there on time
Pour me a drink
Liquefy my tension

IN THE DARK

Burdens of the dark
Too heavy
It can’t hold up for long
Dark is so heavy
I’m in the dark

I’m in the dark
Left of your heart
The voices screaming
Stop fighting the darkness
Live in it

Dead animals
Represent our souls
My soul might die here
I look up from the hole
Still dark

Brutal dark hangs thick
Faceless fear becomes the norm
End it all
Still dark
Haiku

TEARS IN HEAVEN

As the wind blows
East and west
So does the bird fly
On wings of regret

Broken hearts
Reaching up not out
Grabbing and grabbing
Enclosing minds in fists of hate

Dry hurt drains
Into blind eyes
No
Not hate
Painful love

A sister can’t help
She can only hold
Only hold the bucket
That will hold the tears
In heaven