My Shameless Lion Pareto

He woke me last night
from outside the perimeter-
the repeated decrescendo
of roaring
of reifying
of his repeatedly realizing
the predator’s
Pareto principle.

He struck me
with his proclivity
for parsing Pangea,
and reinforcing
the sustained
survival
of his species
in the sum of his
slashing
severing
shameless
privation.

This anti-Aslan
his eyes and heart of darkness
roaming the voodoo veldt
of global capital
and trade
will not
lie down
with lambs
yet he sees
with eyes
of angels
into the deepest
anarchic
abyss
tail stretching back to Africa
whiskers
sensing
the alchemy
of order
and myth.
.

Black-eyed Susan

She stares away
and smiles
crooked
when the wind blows
laughing at the sun
and running
she's running
running after dandelion snow.

Through the meadow
where the sweet spring spills
down to the sluice
and the old grist mill
beneath the curtains
of the gnarled and wispy willow...

Hand-me-down slipping
over sun-skin-beams
daintily dipping
in the rising stream
Eve is dripping
yet she doesn't let the chill show.

I stay away
and day-dream
drowsy
until the wind blows
dancing with the leaves
and waiting
I'm waiting
waiting for the drifts to grow.

Barefoot breathless
where the willows lean
falling fences
and the river between
swiftly carried
to the edge of the leaping waterflow.

Cashmere clouds
hanging in the air
swirling strands
of angel hair...
Black-eyed Susan
never let your petals go.

A Hunter's Song

Now in the moon of Mabon
as the harvest and the hunt
draw the man from the hearth
and the warmth of his woman’s
good thighs…

we will see.

The home fires will be lit
and Branta canadensis
searching for maize, wheat, barley or oats
will fall to the siren call
of love or lessened hunger
in fields once thought to be
sanctuary.

The home fires will be lit
and the stag will err
with his velvet horn tattered
in his musty rut
and soon hang
as a pendant
of hubris.

The home fires will be lit
and the drakes will denounce
their mother’s wisdom
in favor of fantasy
sweet nothings
and death
from double reeds
double guns
and breath moistened cocobolo.

The home fires will be lit
and the bruin
in avarice and desperation
will blunder into the brambles
where he’ll know the singing
bowstring too late
with the taste of berries mixing with blood.

We will see
again
the dance of hunted and prey
of ourselves in the fray
and wonder aloud about our fate
as the home fires burn bright
in our absence.

Birdwatching

fall cardinal sins
legitimized voyeurs all
ornithologists

Sugarplum on the 4th

Sparklers drip and pinwheels spin
mind aboard the carousel again
where choke cherry lips
and cotton candy grins
all yawn until the spinning
top
stops
stalls
and lights go out
mommies hushing
and school girls shout
"I can't see you, but I know you're here."
as borders blur
and smiles smear
like fudgy finger-painting
in electric dyes
or neon ink across the velvet
skies
skewed
the symbolic blots
kaliedoscopic crayons connect the dots
that bend the line
and slow the ride
that raced the heart
and pried the eyes
wide
open
ecstasy.

(re-inspired and re-discovered thanks to "Almost Literary.")

Enshrining Autumn

Like seeking firmest fruit
amongst the pithy
the bruised and unripe
I gather them-
her October words
burnished fallen blushes
strewn amongst the thyme-
and fit them safe
nodding
between waxy glassine windows.

Unction

Remembered impulse-
instinctual
child-like obedience
to tilt the head
and swallow
when thunder calls.

First published in "The Oak," April 1997

Mother's Palfrey

This night bleeds burgundy
soaks the needle
dripping silent
slipping violent
under threadless seams
that envelope the past
too fast
to freely
too far sewn in
to the fabric of fearing
the frenzy of hearing
her pistil heart pounding
frantic
drowning
thick throbbing
seething frowning
waves chaotic
hypnotic turmoil
as she's beating through endless
measures of symphony
fleeting dissonance
and the mind of maternity
rhythm racing to catch the trio
hidden in the distance
dissidents
defiant
running for shelter
in the bunk bed for two
for fools
or for jumping innocents.