Sub Rosa

Sub Rosa Dec 2013

WANTED

--------------
Fuel for my fire
in exchange for warmth
and a good laugh
---------------

Sub Rosa Dec 2013

Before the lightning followed thunder
I let my drums beat full.
The showers came
a hellish rain
a hallowed earthen lull.

My song, it was received
by wind and trembling trees
My love, it was recalled
and you blew it back to me.

But your hurricanes and forest fires
have not swallowed this torn land,
sunk in the mud and
beating my drums,
in the heart of the mire I stand

Sub Rosa Dec 2013

Judge

Two smiles and a trigger pull,
momma fell down to her knees.
I got twelve dollars and the gas tanks full.
momma, be at ease.

I took the wind at my back for far too long
with you hanging from my hair,
and now all I know is all but gone,
and the bass in my veins is dragging me back
to that ****** song.

Was there life in those eyes,
could you see through the flies,
in the light of the fire ,
the breath of the liar,
can you tell the naughty
from nice?

Two smiles and a trigger squeeze,
momma is on her knees.
She has a killer son, but a loving one,
her baby is all she sees.
he's headed for hell
with a bullet to sell,
momma, be at ease.

Sub Rosa Dec 2013

Population 7,451

I could stumble from one end of town
to the other,
a mile of tripping over my own feet
somewhere between the water and the hills
between the fishes and the coyotes.

Twelve years as a tide,
scraping the same sand with raw fingers
waiting for the current to tug me out to sea.
tossing and turning,
the city set on spin-cycle.

We built a house atop a mound of dirt,
overlooking the valley of sticks and tanned grass
inhabited by the breakers.
The leather skinned reptiles who found dust
beyond their childhoods.

Where the tide has crashed for a hundred years
and the floaters and drinkers,
the crumbling ambitions have washed ashore
along the Payette River.

I see the same horizon from every street corner.
The only variable
is the number of cars that pass through everyday
and have the unfair luck
of escaping the city limits.

Sub Rosa Dec 2013

The users. The wrecked.

Getting on
through a trying work hour in the night-time rush,
groped by strangers with dark eyes
the color of neglect and whiskey.
Men with knives under their sleeves,
calling you back and back again,
refills for their poison and pretzels for the table,
don't be a *****, darling.
I only want to feel those hands trembling
under mine.
All you ever knew were the bruises and the burns.
Gliding closer and closer to
your face, your hands,
inching towards the skin that gleams, exposed
and invokes the shame you feel from
fetid breath on your neck, these
animals with moldering livers.
but another round for the men in the grease and grime.
Green bottles and a smile that said
'I like the taste of your weakness,
You like the abuse.'

Sub Rosa Dec 2013

balance

wrap your summer fingers
around her wintered soul

balance

Sub Rosa Dec 2013

And so it snows.

Maybe the Earth grows cold
out of longing.
For he has drifted so far from the sun,
and misses her warmth
on his aching skin.