Knocking on My Muse's Door

Adrienne Rich has been one of the most influential authors of the mid to late twentieth century

Adrienne Rich has been one of the most influential Lesbian Feminist authors of our time

Adrienne Rich has been one of the most influential and activists of the nineteen sixties and beyond

Adrienne Rich has been a mother, a wife, a socio political poet, an activist, a lesbian, and a feminist

Rich's poetry and prose are not only radical, they are representations of our society

Rich's poetry also reflects upon her own life and how it has changed

Rich's poetry gives a voice to the poet, the mother, the outcast, the down-trodden, etcetera

So fricken excited about writing about Adrienne Rich (YA!)

Ideas Rambling Regarding Judy Grahn

How does her being a lesbian narrow down her audience? Does it?

Can I not enjoy her poetry or apply it to my own life because I'm straight?

Do homosexual writers and journalists review her work different than those who are not?

What do they focus on that straight folks don't?
lifestyle?
privacy?

Do they focus more on things of a private matter than those who are straight? For example, straight people may skip the fact that she is a lesbian at all and simply focus on what she is writing and what she may be speaking of. Those who are homosexual tend to focus on the fact that she is a lesbian so that they can use her as an idol almost.

Does this make the reviews less personal?

Does anyone consider the line, "I wanted to write something about women so that I could read about women." or "This is for all common women."

Not all common women are lesbian.

Yes, she was a huge lesbian activist, but I doubt, highly that she just wanted lesbian readers.

Does that make me sound anti-homo sexual?

How can you recognize someone's lifestyle over their work?
I understand the connection but how can you let that fall lower on the importance list??

For example, how can Jamie Lynn Spears play a disney character for small children when she is pregnant, unmarried and like 15? So from now on can she only play characters who are in thier teens and pregnant? Can Ellen Degenerous only play lesbian characters? Was Heath Ledger really gay?

Taboo= less acceptance, harder work.

How the hell do I write this paper without offending anyone? When I'm trying to say there should be a seperation.....? help.

Whitman Homage

Petition of Protection -- some theorists argue time doesn't even exist.

Use Your Wit, Man...

To Walt,
As I sat and read your words that are, somehow, at the same time my words and the words of the world, I found myself filled with an uplifting feeling of lovingkindness that I have not, up to this point in my life, felt before. Your words have stuck with me, and I mean to keep them, as if you were at my side, endlessly whispering them into my ear so that I may never forget. Do you find it strange that I wish to wear you like a headphone, not the one that goes into my ear, but around it, which is much more intimate?
I stumbled across you in a book of verse, and saw other wonderful writers adorn the pages.
Then I saw Pound's work and was pissed off.
Flipping back to you, I let your words flow over me, and soon the weight was taken from me. But bearing it for so long had wearied me, so I set you down. You told me you wanted to stay by me, so I let you, your voice ebbing into my ear.
With you on my ear and in my head, I lay myself down to sleep. But I found no rest that night. Whilst dreaming, your words soon found your body, and your body found me. We breathed each other in a swirl of words. Yours, mine, and those that I could not distinguish as either.
Just as the breathing reached a pointed climax, you announced that daybreak would soon be arriving. But I reminded you that college students today never wake with the sun, and are more apt to rise with the mysterious moon. You let out a bellowing laugh that shook our beings and embraced me. I recall reaching for your beard before everything became a blur and went dark.
Walt, I'm not sure what you did to me, but I'm suspecting foul play. I may have let my inhibitions scatter with the winds, but your words were intoxicating and I was once told that you may still be a virgin, and on top of that, you may have been gay. I told myself I wouldn't hold that against you, but using drugs and alcohol to take advantage of someone isn't socially acceptable in this era. I hope we can move past this and resume being friends someday soon.
Clenchingly,
Kyle Simkins

Pound -- In My Head, This Is On Time

Shadey Lady

For I am me, not entirely what you see

Painted, polished, put on for the world.

And I love myself for it and for it I despise.

I am honest in my vane, through which my blood flows,

Pulses, pushes, permits this bodily existence.

And what is there without the body?

How am I to know?

For the body is all I can see and therefore accept,

And therefore discover, and therefore desire.

And I love myself for it and for it I despise.

Warm skin with cold shiver, a gust presses

Hard against my back.

He presses hard against my back, fingertips

Like cotton pressing soft against my back.

We tumble with the tumbleweeds, rolling

Round the desolate expanse of the sheets.

And I love myself for it and for it I despise.

For the expanse stretches far beyond

The four corners where I lie.

The same sun that bathes my breast

Feeds the tender tulip, guides the wandering goose.

The greatest orb imaginable,

Giver of life, direction, and pleasure.

I believe in you sun and in you I question.

Such radiance offered freely,

To every man, woman, and child.

Departing long enough, inviting obsession,

For beneath the golden splendor I feel your affection.

My need for you sun grows as you diminish,

And many days without you darkens my spirit.

I believe in you sun and in you I question.

How could you leave me when I love you so?

How could you allow my lust to overgrow?

With you such pleasure, without you such despair,

I am under your heat spell.

Warm sun reigns my existence but it will not rule me,

Blinded by the light without you I can not see.

I believe in you sun and in you no question.

Milton -- Late? yes. Great? YES!

Dante's Inferno -- Better a C than Never

poem

Dark soil and tall sky
Majestic fish perch in the tree tops

Light sand and deep sea
Schools of birds wave as banners

Here I lie on forest floor
Crawling through mud with my mind
It still sounds foreign for
Me?

Oh wind, thou cruelest bitch
I can hardly perceive,
And still you will not leave.
Even the meadowlark who sits on that tree
Will protest my presence with its calls.

O, Spring has come, suddenly. Like
mongols sweeping the hills.
And every parcel the hoofed beasts
trod
Comes to life, thickets and grassèd sod.

Half a million years of toil.
Hoover Dam, you survivor. You sole survivor
ten thousand hence.
Hence the end.
Is that all there is to say?
It is of no concern anyway.
It has no impact as far as the eye can see.

Poetry is such a buzzkill.
But not always. There are poems
for all sorts of things.
Peace, laughter, disturbance.
But right at this moment, no thanks.
No thank you poetry,
I don't know if we can ever be more than just friends.

Dear Whitman, I enjoy your writing.

She gazes through brown, no green eyes
I saw Venus in one eye and Neptune in the other eye.
The waves crash in her ears and shells trickle out and glistening viles of sand.
The wheat bends 300 miles away and 4,000 miles away and just up the road.
The ripple from a Michigan stone turns into laying bodies and ripens our fruit.

Balancing a chin on a palm, the fruit swells and the breeze runs by and excites the surface I share.
If the public was private, and the private was private, we would share our privates without gasps.
The primitive woman waited all night to see our dance but there were too many eyes, too many eyes not using their ears, or their tongues.
The man throws a stick to his best friend and waits for a loyal return.
The beautiful, long, silky dog tramples the edges of the legged and the ever-bathing world.
The runner takes strides so long and so lost in his high, he runs by without noticing a dog on the edge of creation.
As one walks, as we all walk, and I wait, as we all wait, for our man to move into the next frame.

I am a woman, and he is a man, and we share a pulling force.
Woman and Man. Is there a difference? Are you the difference?

I am happy, I am not ashamed, I am your body as you are mine, and he is ours, and she is ours.
I am young, and you are young, and each day our bodies decay, and each day every body decays, and each day every body dies, and each day every body lives and breathes.
And I am happy that every part of me lives and breathes.
And because I am of two and you are of two and we are all of two, we all have multiple souls, and our multiple souls nap and sway and rejoice until we all arrive.

And I turn back and look at you, and you look at me, and we entwine.
I see a crescent moon settle on her face and she adds aroma to the wind and laughs.

I twist that way, you are there, you twist this way, I am there, and our skin dances and jumps, and it is good.
You are one beating heart, one of a number not yet imagined. And I am a beating heart, and she and he, and that is good.
You are not a top hat, not yet décor of parental love. You are perfect, formed perfect with all your perfect qualities. And I am perfect, and he is perfect, and she is prefect, and that is good.

Lay and watch the clouds! O the first screen to ask for an audience and we watch.
And I close my eyes and see the world all upturned.
The core scorches our delicate earthly blanket, but leaves no grafts.
The volcanoes and trees erupt towards the sea where we sit by and watch.
The sea expands out of a leaky hole in the center of the universe. The universe I have not yet disturbed. Have you? Will you?
The world is upside down, but we keep a collective beat, and we carry on.

I descend towards my lover’s warmth and she colors me and moves me and moves into me.
I come and I come and I go, with a tight and loving grip on every strand of the world.

I could and would not stop if I wanted, If I should, I would not want even if I should, who would want to stop?
Who would stop the spinning?

We lay over manmade robes and I use my most loving touch, as others use a prod.
I slide into her space and time and she takes me in, takes my neck and takes my waist and hips.
Can I feel more beauty than this? Can I feel my body separate from hers? Can he feel his body separate from his? Can we all detach from a soul we have boarded?

No, I will stay for now, and you stay, and we all will stay together.
And the world will turn, and the hearts will beat, and all will rest, and the rest we wait to see.

Homage

My son and I
rolled down the humps
of the field
flattening dandelion walls and
painting ourselves streaks of green
I plucked a hair from it's back
it yelped
Sandwiched between thumbs
I kissed it and made music
My son beamed, show me
we laughed and played our greatest hit
What is the grass
I smiled and handed him the book
Oh, well what are the clouds
They are the balloon animals of God
Or perhaps
They are the hats for imagination
Or maybe
They are tear filled sponges
Or angelic pillow forts
Well that one's a bunny
Where are you guys
You are going to miss
Life
The game had already started
What is the score
It doesn't matter
everyone is a winner
says the loser
no one can win if nobody loses
says the winner
nobody wins
chimed death
Embrace those you love and
those you have never met
Live life to the fullest
that's how you win

I have been fit

I have been fit for the universe, and fit and tried for my voice, and fit for my lovers, all.

I have been molded by the decadent wet breezes, by your decedent father (but not your decadent father), by the decayed and still decaying breath of the leaves in the topsoil.

I have been carved, carefully, intimately, by waters and aphids and knotted wooden fingers, in and out, so that I wax like pale dunes but feel as does solidifying tempered sap... how glorious does my skin feel! How marvelous it looks under flickering street lamps!

I am nature's best; for all of us, every one, has taken the push of the wind, the height of the tree, the beauty of the lower flowers, the low of thunder, and cocooned, all, into one beating, breathing being; we have in us the best of nature's ebbs, and leave her flows be to blossom and reach.

Do you doubt me? For I tell you, intently, that I know best; for every earthen whisper has been laid in us, and I have ravished them, temporally, every one.

I have been welcomed, been eyed, been Aye’d, and welcomed again, and encouraged to taste a platonic fruit with a more evocative juice… I have tasted it most, not all, but most, and confidently say the world tastes like we... you are the world, then, and I know it, and love you both as one.

And to you, friend, I whisper, close your eyes! Listen! And can you? The Mexican chicos on the corner have made music out of silver boxes, and add their pennies and tar-shoes to the sound, and do not whisper, but say louder, "Baila!" and while you feign deafness, your sit bones allude you and have discovered how to seduce your spine. In it, I say and see beauty, and dance with your consenting parts, and make it of the world.

And of spines? Who among us does not wish to be a savior? I ask you, for I saw you slice the spines from your books last summer, all of them. Each one you pulled, pulled as though it were an Olympian column made entirely of orange peel, and deigned to set the pages free, as your auds, like minted honey under your warm tongue, sssaid to me that the words of your world needed a flamenco, too. How you cried when they did not move! When they did not dance with you! While you slept, I then pulled out the sheets and spread them about your floor, so that your sleep might calm knowing the pages could breathe, as you intended. Your minted honey tongue was reward enough for me, and for the floor pages.

World! Reveal more, so that I may revel more! I have been temporaried by things not of you, my world! If I say I have not seen, nor heard, nor felt all your splendor, then, to you, I say that that it is only because you have yet to churn the soil round and pull up from your underbelly what more is to be seen, or heard, or felt.

I am the oldest atheist. Who could wish for more than what this world has set out on their back porch? Who could want deeper truth than what the steaming tree branches spell out against the anesthetized night sky? Who could ask what we are of who has seen a mother give birth, or a single blade of grass surface, gasping, among its sisters?

Which of us is not afraid to die? And which of us, who spent each day only watching the months run after one another with shoes untied and flies unzipped (only to return more boastful than ever, hand in hand with one another in their turn), would dare fear what we see? No, rather, we would laugh, and heartily, too! For what, if anything, is not beautiful that this world has given us? If death comes to all, then surely, the world has ordained it, and if my voluptuous mother creator has said so, then I will take off my shoes, unzip my pants, and chase death with the younger months struggling to keep up, and will surely return from it in the third cycle, breathless, ready for one more race.

The world is not my bed… though, in truth, I see everywhere places and cause to lie… and lie, I do... with you, for you are my mind's changeling... and though I have not seen you before, the flint in my teeth will not spark with surprise upon your arrival, for I have known this face, known this roughness, known the softness of your bottom lip and the resolute firmness of the top, and have willed you into being and will will you into my world bed.... and say, luminously, that these notches read more fittingly on a full sycamore post than a whittled balsam stick...
The ebb and flow of your lungs have taught your hips as much. To bear hips, with bare hips, and then over points of contention, contentedly, and up, and up, to lips of leaves, reaching over and up to mark one more notch, I say, world, Brava! You've done us well.

Have I oversweetened existence? Oh. Well, then, so I've done. Nothing left to do but throw more existence into the pot, to balance it all out, I s'pose. I leave that to you. I still have to shower and meet up with the kids down the block.

An Homage to sisterhood

My heart thwarts out to you, my hope.
Eight long and joyous years--four of them spent apart-- in which we have used the word "friend" to describe our relationship; but the word "friend" doesn't work for us anymore. "Family" does.

I have six sisters, two by blood, four by rapport whom I love and adore
Six sisters who I would take a bullet for suck out the poison on any wretched bite
Six sisters who I would travel to the ends of the earth to hug to care to kick the ass of the bastard who broke their heart or plot revenge on anyone who would hurt them

Four sisters I have who would do for me as I would for them
Four sisters who define loyalty heart soul beauty greatness everything we dream of
Four sisters who greet me with a kiss/without swords or arms

Four sisters with their own individual talents:

Adriana with her artful hand that can outdo photoshop who walks in beauty with her hair up
Adri with her wild wit her bold humour her kind caring ways who used to be silent and seemed in a daze
Dri dri with her silent wit and numerous talents, whom I envy b/c she is good at EVERYTHING
My Aya Aya, my moldy Ass, with her heart that wraps around you after weeks of separation
And pinches my cheeks as if I were five
Will make millions via Manga via her right hand

Elizabeth, Lizzie pie, Lizard Boo, or Tori as we often say
is the most loved of all with her sweet and charming ways
She greets friends and new acquaintances with childish excitement, a hug, and a kiss
and welcomes welcomes all into her house, her heart, her soul.
She is the only human with a heart of solid gold and a soul that is deeper than the darkest abyss
She will feed the hungry and clothe the naked and home those without a home
And when you leave her, she always bids you well: safety, more hugs, and sometimes food
And that doesn't even scratch the surface to how AMAZING she really is

My Angie, my Jan-gee who always talks about porn-- but never looks-- loves in Latina
Like my Liz always hugs always listens always lovesunconditionally
Stays honest about herself her life others and more
Makes the best Tamales and Tacos el Pastor one could ever eat-- Jalisco style-- droooool
Listens when your heart breaks in two because of a boy or because of life's own heartbreaks
who will then take you into her car to sing QUEEN to sing JOURNEY and best of all BIG BALLS
Will get you tanked on the weekend and then continue to excel
Will one day be one of the greatest scientists ever known to humankind
And best of all, I get to say that she is my kinship, she is mine ASTOUNDING

My Courtenay, my Kori, my faraway heart my paradox
full of piss, vinegar, praise, and the same filthy mind as me-- SHE IS A CARBON COPY
Challenges life as she sees fit-- and don't challenge her five feet-- she'll kick you ass and make you regret it later
While something to be loved, she is something to be feared but also someone to love greatly
The most caring the lost loyal with the naughtiest sense of humour you could ever see
An obsession with all things witchcraft all things love all things tantra all things Japanese; NIGHTWISH AND SAKE AND TAROT GALORE
Beauty packed down into five feet and one inch; Intelligence packed into beauty; devotion packed into her own image, her own mischeiviousity.

But to know how we love, one must understand how the five of us love; one must become us.

Two sisters I have by blood, two sisters who feel more distant than friends
Two sisters who, despite emotional distance, will defend their blood with all their vigor (as will I)

Four sisters I have thanks to that fucking school
Four sisters I have for life, four sisters who will always stay true
Four maids of honor I have-- it'll be a bitch to decide when one day I become a bride
Six sisters I have foreverandever; Six degrees of hope for this world:

- One an artist
- One a poet/author
- One a scientist
- One an accountant
- One a psychologist
- One a nurse

Six degrees of hope bound by caring blood and love.

Sonic's Rendezvous

When I hear a live recording from a great band from 1978 that was never very popular but always brought the juice…an artifact of distribution…fossilized access…my ears only a stop along an infinite highway of auditory receptions…the shivers of primitive neurology in a tsunami…counting points along a topography stretching in either direction…the knowing doled out in discrete apportionments like a secret handshake…carried on the waves like particles…converging…the aside about the guitar that drops out during the bridge…it’s like you’re talking to me with feathered hair, man…or with a spacesuit on…waiting on the promontory of an arena with a Chesterfield…fuzz-fearful, and holding…but tomorrow, for you, the Betamax; digital-ized now, dig-it-al-ized…for the future…and they come too…stranger to me than your butterfly collar…lookin all eighteenth century, sportin gigantic craniums and missing their pinky fingers…but not that drum-fill…not that wah-solo on eleven…no, not even the singer’s cranked-out moan…even though they don’t know what crank was…and we party like it’s 2089, 1723, 545 B.C…and we talk about starting a band…and we write songs that kick ass and stick to your eardrums like cotton candy in July…July: do we still have that then?…and we’ll leave it for you…dig-it-al-ized…we share a joint and the guy without a pinky has a seizure…then feathered hair has one…then I get all shaky…the shivers of primitive neurology in a tsunami…and we remain…by the box…ear to ear…until the encore.

Poem of Amy Holbrook, an American

“Do you guess I have some intricate purpose?
Well I have...for the April rain has, and the mica on the side of a rock has."

This morning I watch the day break,
Gray but not bleak to me, for I have seen other sunrises…at daybreak we stand alone and silent,
Watching the world, tremendous, and knowing our place is in it.
I am alone, and by extension, I am not alone.

Last night I awoke to sounds all around me, in the middle of the night,
an acoustic guitar, a girl’s voice, sirens in the distance, the laughing of people outside my window,
They did not trouble me…I knocked on no doors.

These are the sounds of Life, and I am happy for them,
just as I am happy for my 6:21 silence…I stand at my window.
Out in that night, you were awake.

For I am your guardian this morning…as you sleep I contemplate.
I think not of you, but for you, as you have done for me.
I am off and running, but I will wait for you.

Wind! Rain! Still I am uncertain,
I am certain as I am uncertain…an answer will come to me in time.
I hold a book up to shield my face.
I walk past buildings. The campus is as a ghost town.
The sun has arisen, but light has not emerged.
I walk, thinking.

A war is raging on my shoulders, angel and devil,
Shouting above the whistle of the swift wind. Another shout.
My own voice...I throw them both aside.
For I am not the poet of good, nor the poet of evil. I am neither.
I speak for myself, as for you. The mostly okay.

In buildings, the heartbroken sleep fitfully. They will awaken soon, hungry,
though breakfast does not open until ten. Fret not, my compatriots,
for I have been among you and will be among you. I take my place.
We pass our nights the same. I watch days break for you.

Whitman Homage

I am a girl, delighted with the simple joys of the flirtatious text
I am a woman, calculating the cost of the message- in my emotional bank, as well as amongst this months mass of monies owed
I am a collector of dollars of the consumer, the customer.
I am the customer.

I am a student, impressed at times by my own insights. Depressed as they lack luster in comparison to my classmates.
I am a classmate, my class mate, a red hot aura of frustration and elation, exhaustion and awareness.
Perceptions of the other rarely leave from for extenuating circumstances.
But circumstances always extenuate.
Maybe she has a reason for selecting such a horrendous hair color.
Could be that she likes it.
But the point is, the point is is that its her hair to color, her images to create, her persona to make for the rest of the world’s viewing pleasure. Or displeasure.
Whatever.
The freedom of choice and the freedom of will inspire and instill in our hearts a desire to BE.
Be you be me be yourself be ourselves be a bitch be a tease be a goddess on her knees. Be Meredith Brooks.

Gone are the days when my voice didn’t count because I am female, I am not white, I am underclass, I am uneducated.
Gone are the nights where it was not safe to walk alone, walk solo home.
Or so we tell ourselves.
Our fairy tales are no longer of Cinderella’s and Belle’s, of mermaids and faeries.
Our fairytales now are tales (lies) about crime, lies about equality, lies about safety, lies about lies.
When faced with the truth our American eyes grow wide and our American brows arch in alarm.
We react with denial, with a sharp rebuttal, because we couldn’t possibly live with ourselves if we lived in a country that did that.
But we do.
Acceptance creeps across us without our notice, like maple syrup across pancakes, until we’re engulfed, engrossed, and covered. Suffocated and stuck by the truth.
The truth that we should cut back on the latter half of apple pie and increase our intake of the former a little.
The truth that the obesity problem is a problem, our problem, and laying blame about why I’m fat doesn’t make me not fat.
The truth that 4000 pairs of boots is a lot to carry around. And they’ll be at ISU. Remember who they used to belong to. And you know what else is a lot to carry around? The baggage left behind by the former boot owners, before they died in a war they did not ask for.
The truth that truth is entirely subjective.
There is no objective truth. (Your welcome, Nietzsche)
There is no absolute truth (Sorry religion)

There is only a you and a me and an us and a they.
And we can’t be defeated by them. We must band together against the ever changing attacker- them!
We have chosen to be who we are, what we are. And so we have chosen to scare ourselves shitless.
And that is a good thing. Because one of them just ran off with the last roll of Charmin.

Homage to Whitman

I sit my weary ass on this sit-in-spin of a chair, whirling around like the drunkard's mouth on the bottle. I LOVE YOU DRUNKARD! You are who you are; as naked as the day you were born; inhibitions thrown to the wind, but trampled by the scorners.

I think we should all be drunk; drunk on life, and the love that we are all capable of giving.

I have love for the little hussy in the corner, making available her whole being for a one night adornment. I have love for the middle-aged man, trying to regain his youth with the help of the sips from his little Red Bull beverage. I love these beautiful beings because there is something in them that lives in me, and thus lives in one another.

As for those scorners, of which i've been, come off your high horses and sit on your ass as I do. The air is scarce down here, and the mind can better judge. Too much of anything can cloud judgement. If we all sit on our asses, we can better see the way we share so much of this world. We share breath, hormones, thoughts , and life.

Why should we scorn the little whorey girls, the tight-lipped virgins, the casanovas, and the FREAKS? We are all FREAKS, who tread on a thin line around one another, thinking no one can understand that inner freak, that closet rowdy, that silent sheep, but the truth of the matter is that we bloom when allowing another in our wierd little lives. It can cut us down to that tiny little thread we tread on, but can shoot us into that exasperating air.

In the end we land on our asses, not our feet, for we are not cats, we are humans. so give that person you scorn the love you would want for yourself. See how light your thoughts are, and how heavy your heart becomes, balancing the negative and the positive that within us exist. I LOVE MYSELF, BECAUSE I LOVE YOU!

Grassy Leaves of Grass

Enamored am I of the profundity of these lines, the ease with which they flow

Freely, gladly, unobtrusively from the loins of a seasoned, weathered heart.

O that I could idly loafe and leap through the licentious hoops of life

while languidly licking the tip of the phallic lollipop that lingers and leers

in the depths of my oversexed libido, my thrust-thirsty flower of the white oleander type—

Pure pale perverse little pussy with a milky-white exterior concealing the poison contained within.

I behold the soupy swamp—the pussy willows wafting and waltzing around its murky edges

Playfully beckoning the beastly bachelor’s buttons to rise and fall with the wind’s expectations.

Lying in the Earthly meadow endlessly, lazily counting the leaves of grass descended from

the weeping willow that has its roots in the labyrinthian maze of my otherworldly brain,

I ponder the cycle of life—birth, death, rebirth—and its perpetual movement, its endlessness.

Awe overcomes me in my solitude as a space for the afterlife between death and rebirth appears

before my very eyes—expressive eyes that reveal the complexity of matters of the heart and soul.

The interrelatedness of earth, air, fire, water, animal, human, and spirit—

everything possessing an element of the divine within the intimate conglomerate of nature.

A subtle influence likened to the eternal ebb and flow of the moon-pulled tide

criss-crosses, curls, and ties everything together—a pristine package tautly fastened with an invisible bow,

which over time, has come to be known as the all-encompassing Oversoul.

The soul of all souls—mine, his, hers, and yours. We all come together in this planetary orb

working, soul-searching to find a deeper meaning for our purpose in this unpredictable world—

I have yet to procure an answer after ceaseless reflection and my mind grows flummoxed.

Seeking relief, I allow my thoughts to stray to my lover, latently fantasizing about his tongue betwixt my lips

Stifling a sexy smile, I speak with the bees who willingly trace his handsome face for me out of pollen

Those lovely locks of dew-smelling hair falling gingerly over those honest shimmering eyes.

I dream of his fingers dancing the expanse of my naked body, tracing my beauty marks like stars in the sky

His tender voice whispering, “Worry not my love, for invincible we are, this moment shall forever be ours.”

It is his very existence that gives me hope.

Hope that I can find it within me to love unconditionally both myself and all else in nature,

that I too may soar above material nonsense and realize the magnificence of my own Earthly being—

that we may find the strength to exterminate the constraints placed upon us by the throes of oppressive society!

Let us transcend the bonds that hold us captive within our rubbish-ridden minds and instead

act as sponges soaking, internalizing the innate unity, the wholeness of humanity and nature.

We must take the hands of one another in search of truth, willingly traversing paths unknown,

traveling into new realms of thought where life is ever-changing with the capriciousness of Mother Nature.

Treading the waters of the opaque ocean, I have hopes of the liquid pervading my pores,

quenching an insatiable bodily thirst that keeps me parched even in a month of monsoons.

But I tread to no avail, tiring and wishing for a ship to set sail and transport me to a blesséd place

A sacred temple of Mother Earth hidden deep within the forest amongst a gathering of Dryads

Whispering whimsically of the Old ways, their fragile voices lost in the bellowing whipping wind.

O that I could recount the gorgeous trees I see forming an alcove, an umbrella of leaves:

Catalpa, Honeylocust, Elder, Willow, Maple, Ash, Beech, Sweetgum, Sycamore, Sumac—

A plethora indeed. I marvel at the selflessness, the radiance of these intricate, life-sustaining trees.

Westward ho! The birds migrate in a conglomerate V fixating on a retreat most divine and sweet

But my mouth, it makes a perfect O when preparing for the entry of a much-anticipated fleshy pole

and when undulating in waves of intense sensual pleasure, my back often resembles a lowercase letter...n.

Mortality with a capital M does not frighten me nor phase me in the least, for I am well aware that this

is to be my Earthly destiny. Death has betaken me many a time before, but unalarmed I stand

for ’tis simply a part of the life cycle, which has a tendency to repeat itself time and again—

a fact of life to be embraced, for it defies logic to fear and deny what is only a matter of time and besides,

rest assured that at least you will finally learn whether the grass is indeed greener on the other side of the dirt.

It's finally here again! Soon to be departed

I celebrate the weekend
And all the graciousness of its being
For everyone’s weekend which parallels mine down to the very atom

I slave and sacrifice myself over five days
I live and breathe papers, books, education and Spanish for the time being
I sleep when I can and catch my breath even less
This I still love for it is what I do
I wouldn’t have my weeks be any different for where they will lead will be great
And yet I trudge on as the leaders beat us to a pulp and watch us squirm and cry
Only to be saved by the sweet release of Friday and keeping us fully aware that hell begins three days later.

A class I was forced into and took much more than I cared too, soon it will be over
A poem much longer than I cared to read, passion soon erupts
Oral Tradition learned from paper and ink, thankfully ended
Literature of a foreign people becoming viable
Learning the art of learning and teaching, keeping the kids in mind
Making peace with grammar rules, to continue the power of teaching
A sigh of relief in the blissful afternoon air of Friday
A joyful conversation with friends that could last for days
Hanging out with good people opposed to spending money
Spending money and still hanging out with good people
The bartender recovering from our last visit still knowing our names
The bus driver ever jolly always up for a conversation
The bed, ever welcoming

The Sunday spent working in the back of the house
The air filled with the sweet perfume of Whoppers and Chicken and fries and salt
Even Sunday I celebrate for the people I work with
The fulltime employee looking forward to the next Friday
The three girls who make a slow morning go even quicker
The two hour long break in which nothing gets done
The night crew making sure everyone is busy at all time
I pleasantly make the meal that has been asked for, the meat for those who want and willingly pay the price
The shop will turn no one away nor leave anyone dissatisfied
This is the drop of the frozen patty
The wary hands covered in plastic and thoroughly washed
This is the drop of the burger onto wonderful bread and the addition of garments

I celebrate the weekend in every being of its fiber
But the days don’t stop changing and Monday will eventually come again
So next Friday at the bar I will again meet you.