God got bored
with blue,
and started stabbing
with white,
but forgot to stop,

the desert blue canvas
starved of brush
swallows paint.

Faded tan dunes
freckle orange
before flooding

Rust and blue
mix brown drowning
below grey sky smeared solid

green flecks
with lightning’s
silent flash.

I turn to the artist, and ask
will you paint thunder?

Surround me with luck,
because the cranes just flew in
and I want them to stay.

Save me some jawbreakers,
because I want to remember
being a kid in a candy store.

Collect my Popsicle sticks,
rock candy rods and bottle caps,
because I want to remember

every wine dipped evening,
flower grown morning
and poetry painted night

because, I only have five
seconds for the future,
but goldfish can remember

forever,
if you just decorate their bowl.

Oh  eager member,
                                       how you make a mess of things,
                                        turning long hugs into lawsuits,
                                        adding inches of distance
                                       between closer moments.
                                     You make getting up to leave
                                    a dance between the couch and door.
                                   Stealing what I’m sure is precious blood
                                 flow from my brain, you grow without
                               regards to your destination.  I’ll call you
                             rube, scrub, and newbie, ****** *****,
                           because you can make a mess
                        of even holding hands,
                     but most often,
                  just my pants.
              Sincerely,
          What should be blushing cheeks.

You,
girl who's starved of passion:
I disappear into you like
a drop of sweat in a sea of desert sand
finding the well beneath.

Buried river,
one drop from the surface boils you
turning artesian spring bringing
flowers to the desert missed longer
than forever could fathom.

New oasis,
let me bathe in your pools,
lounge in your shady breeze,
and muse over your every petal.
Bring me home in the growing seeds
I’ve sweat for you.

Dawning goddess,
don’t vanish or melt away,
and I’ll never let you dry,
forever sweating the water
I drink from your springs,
to find you again and again.

I'm going to run tonight.  
After the sun is down, the moon
has dipped into the starry sky's darkness
and the weekend fire pits are dancing with my shadow.
I'm going to breathe tonight,
deeply of the budding greens and mulching blacks
until my nostrils are painted with earth.  I'll let the sprinklers
drench every inch of my body until
I can flick the water from my hair
and all the world soaks through my chest
so my heart can beat against it.
I'm going to howl tonight,
from the very bottom of my breast with a smile on my face
legs never stopping to catch the air my lungs are surely missing
because tonight, the little boy, the lover, the beast—
tonight— they are the poet.

Sunrise between leaves
ignites neon green glowing—
exploding the sky

the graffiti sleeps
yellow waiting for their disk
of light like mixed paint

coffee ambrosia
wakes us with eggs and sausage
to reality

Clear Creek washes us
clean of sin or innocence
blank slates for a day

Beer, tears and smiles
meant for you, me, meant for us
fleck public places

laced hands and sweet talk
interrupt clever timers
launching adventure

Margaritas drown
studying sailors at sea,
setting new courses.

lamp light turns moon glow,
wet metal bench, a warm bed,
flip-flop footsteps, dance

I pray to goddess
the divine will sleep in peace
forgetting our sins

It tastes like the Sun’s warm syrup
dripping off dew glazed Marigolds
an hour after morning’s dawn.  

Rolling green plains toasted to perfection
smell sweet on the evanescent breeze
blowing over bakery fresh bread.

The new leaves in the trees quake
with noon’s convection, where
we’re sheltered by the shade

while we eat on our blanket
all day and never get full.