This is how it will feel to meet God.

I wasn't sure that I believed in you.
But here you are.
Smiling at me from your chair.
Kissing me in the morning.
Singing to my demons, putting my doubts to rest.
Gifting me with faith.
Renewing my soul.

This is how it will feel to meet God.

I must be wild.

When the pretty flowers seduced man into assisting them with the propagation of their species, did they know that the cost would be their freedom? They flaunted bright colors and intoxicated us with fragrance, and for such witchcraft we have relegated them to exist in the confines of garden walls and raised beds for their whole lives.

Some say that women are closest to the plant kingdom. I can understand how it might be true - it's easy to see how we have learned from them, how we have shared their fate. I wonder if the plants mind it. (Do we?) Are they satisfied? (Are we?)

I, for one, have no problem giving of my fruits and beauty - it is the one thing I live for. I want nothing more than to bloom, ripen, and drop the ends of myself (the beginnings of a new thing) down into the dirt for the benefit of all who came before me, all who came with me, and all who have yet to come. But I must be wild. I must be free to grow, to sway, to reach for sunlight, to weather drought and storms. I must dance with nature, and gamble my very life on the Great Mother, who births and destroys. I must have the option to find new ways of being. I must be free to evolve.

Perhaps that is why I have become attracted to wanderers, vagabonds, and other artsy passers-by. Or perhaps it is because I have rooted myself in the dirt of the road less traveled, that these bold eccentrics tend to find me. They are my friends. They are my loves. They are my tribe. They don't always stay for long. Or perhaps I am the one to leave - my petals die off and I retreat into the Earth in preparation for a new season. Either way, the connections are always real; both parties are always nourished. The memories will last and the exchanges will flow forward into our new selves. We are both touched, and instantly changed by this natural, wild soul connection.

Still. I don't always want to be passed-by. Even I would appreciate some company, some lasting attention... some long term symbiotic exchange. A deep love agreement. Even some security... not from the elements, or from nature. That is my home. If someone is to love me, they must know that I cannot be uprooted and transplanted to any controlled environment. It is in no way safe for me to try to exist in a place other than my natural habitat - nor would it be safe for him to try to keep me there. I admire the urge toward protection that some men feel, but I will not be kept and pruned in anybody's garden. No.

If someone is to love me, they must see in me a sanctuary. Designate this dirt as holy land - know that its richness contains all of the vital, volatile experiences that have created me. All of my old selves and my new selves are here in this dirt, and I am drawing upon the lot of them to create the beautiful colors and sensual smells that draw you in. If someone is to love me, he must not let anyone desecrate this land, this life, this whole living system of which I am a part. He must keep back all those who would cut me or my sisters down.

If a man is to love me, he must promise to never let anyone tame me.

She-wolf

creature of strange beauty
moving like she doesn't belong
here

staccato floating
disappearing and reappearing
you catch a glimpse of her face
peeking out from behind a tree
only because she wanted you to
suspended in the moment as her eyes soaked up the eternity in you
bright, and everlasting in the mind of the blessed witness

you are in trouble
or
you have won a friend for life

*

she decided 3 days ago
what to do with you


the she-wolf
elegant mystery
and purposed force
her cunning nature
could only be divine

silence

when i was born
my heart called out for love
of a certain kind
and it continued to call and call
for some time

and when it stopped
the echo surged out
through the mountains and valleys
of souls and lifetimes
the sound itself searching through the eternity of me

and now here i am
straining to hear the last faint whispers
of myself
singing for that love
wondering if perhaps its just a memory

soon there will be silence

dentada

she's sweet
but she has teeth

you can buzz 'round
just don't touch down

if she entraps you
you'll be enraptured

until a million tiny tempting scenes
and sweet pink pussy fantasies
dissolve into a past-life dream

without so much
as 'dust to dust'

prize peaches

we sit with our legs open
to give our flowers some sun
let them bloom
and give you a whiff of sweetness
inspire you to climb higher
see for yourself why we're worth it
and what life is like
at the top

cuz we ain't no low hangin fruit

these is
prize peaches
growing wild and free
in funny shapes and rich colors
soft, fuzzy and wet through the skin
heavy with nectar
sweet syrup entrances
natural high from huffin that fragrance
takes you on a vision quest
and you'll come back
a man

if you can reach us

you can reach us
just climb

"climb baby"
whispers in the branches

just climb

Dear God/dess I Luh Dese Wiminz! (Janelle Monae feat Erykah Badu: QUEEN)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEddixS-UoU

These are my people. The Wild Women. The Rebels. The QUEENS.

a truth told and ignored is not a secret or a lie. or a phase.

he loves me
and still, he says things like
"you got on a lot of colors today!"
"what is this your rebel phase?"
"you just wanna do whatever you wa..."

"I JUST WANNA DO WHATEVER THE FUCK I WANNA DO."
I said before he could finish.
I meant it.
might have come out snappy
but I said it with a smile
because I love him.

even if he don't understand

(that it's not a phase)

The Promise

I wonder if it hurts the trees
to have to let go of their leaves
to be laid bare by biting winds
to be made ugly by winter

Are they ashamed
of scarred and peeling bark
of gnarled branches
of the fact that the birds have abandoned them
for full, lush Southerners

I wonder if they fear
the wretchedness of winter
even as spring bestows life once again
and beauty its favor

I wonder if they wince in budding
not from the pain of new birth
but from dreading
the promise of winter winds

dnr

put me to sleep
make me invisible
send me into the mists

if you love me you will

let me go
let me be lifted up to a place
where i really exist

beyond the veil

you may see shadows of who i used to be
but who i used to be was only a shadow
of the real me

the love was real

it's just that
she wasn't

I don't think I care about anything
as much as I care about love

and it's exhausting
because nobody cares about love.

it feels like a burden i carry alone.

and i can't put it down.

but i see why people do.

what i am is real

i've wanted
so badly
to be one of the pretty people
one of the sexy
flipping my hair
with the assurance that it will land perfectly on my shoulder
as i look back over the other
winking goodbye

sassy
prancing
carefree

i've wanted to be unforgettable

i've wanted to be a legend
even if only in your mind
even if we didn't last for ever
i've wanted you to look back on me
with wanting

wanted you to remember me like a movie
bo emerging from the tide
or pam in hot pants, sass-mouthing

i've wanted to be a thing of fiction
when what i am is real

how silly
i've tired of my fake self
but i wonder
when i see you gawking at starlets
if you ever saw the stars in my eyes
if your emotion will ever be as strong as your arousal
if i will ever believe i am enough
if you will...
and if you don't?

Reason

pressing lips together
one last silky glide of
color
virgin blush
reminds them of young pussy
tongue runs over teeth
licking chops
she prepared
to dazzle

no nympho
she liked play
knew they believed it
comic relief
her nightly entertainment
not why
but a pleasant side effect
and they deserved their own ways of coping

she did it
for
arms wrapping around her waist
in darkness
sandwiching of legs
between legs
soft snore in
her ear
approving
after

she loved the darkness
was not afraid
felt most herself
there
like delicious meal
best when shared
eating up
the fullness of herself
no makeup
clothes
constrictions
free
feeling real
Whole
no presentation
fantasy
flair
no dazzle
honey earth smell
dewy softness and hair
flesh
pressing
real
Pleasure
silent worship
form revealed

everything she did
she did to feel loved
in darkness

no other reason.

old friend

i loved you then
and i love you still
but sometimes i wonder
if you've realized yet
that that thing you sold your soul for
is just life
a miracle
common to all of us
your troubles weigh no more heavily
on the mind of god
nor do the angels sing louder
when you triumph
they sing for us all
even those of us
who accepted this glowing thing
covered in plain brown paper
as a gift
free
and cherish the act
of removing the wrapping

you loved me then
but since may have forgotten
and i wonder sometimes
if i realize yet
that your life is worth no more than mine
though you paid for it dearly
it gleams
and mine is still mostly covered
in plain brown paper

that girl

my heart hadn't beat all day
until the moment that you squeezed my hand.
just like that
i gave it up again.
easy.

i try to be hard

except that
it's so difficult to constantly fight against
such essential desire
denying that I need love
seems to me the highest breach of my own sacredness
i am lost to myself
and yet
i won't survive here as
that
girl.

that vulnerable girl.
that open girl.
that soft and insecure girl
gently crying then sobbing
and beaming smiling
that girl who craves your attention
and would crawl into your lap
and curl up like a cat
and just pur.
if she could

she is far
too delicate
to survive here.
in the land of clever detachment
and nonchalance.
there is no milk or honey here
not even any water
no sun
just the dimness turning disbelief into
something we call worthy
and the noxious smells of putrid hearts
rotting from under use
growing roots
and sinking into the soil.
growing into trees of knowledge.
we celebrate, and though the fruit is not good to eat,
we feast
keeping the veil pulled tight around our painful revelries
Love may not lay eyes
upon us now.
Here, the people free their souls from the burden
of divinity
and prefer to take their bitters
as desserts.

souls
will surely die in this place.
and mine is no different.
so I put her away
for safekeeping.
but in all her weakness
she is a risk-taker
and refuses to be shut-up
around you.

but that girl
bright and rapidly fading
will not survive here.

snake and bird

it is hard for me to comprehend
that love is a thing for which some
have no vision

i know love
like a snake knows the earth
intimately
it is my home
my world
the only plane on which i move
belly, heart, voice, soul, womb
pressed up against it always
writhing over it
becoming alive by this awkward
curving way
birthing and rebirthing myself
into its hands
a piece of my soul is in it
and it keeps me drawn close
magnetically
skin to skin
i breathe it
as much as air
i live in its dust

but you
are a bird
what you know of earth
is paltry
air is your way
you seek to rise above
the dirt that is my cleansing
still
you come here
to be fed
if only for moments at a time

your kind
descends from mine
and somewhere
you must still feel it
gravity has not let you go so far
yet
you are still pulled
if not as close
you need this
you need this

a snake
in love with a bird
will never fare well
he is too high for her
she is too low for him
but she is the only reason he is here
and in him are her hopes of evolution
how could it not be meant?

one day
all birds must land

perhaps by then
she will have sprouted wings

issue of blood

sometimes the devil tells the truth
every now and then the devil is you
i know because i killed my savior
and i think it was the right thing to do

but the blood don't stop
the blood just go
out of my body
i follow the flow
out of my mind
where nobody knows
'cause inside is hell
though the hell that i chose
*
don't know how
i'm gonna keep on livin'
even the devil
wants to be forgiven

don't know if it will ever stop
and perhaps i deserve
the kundalini scarlet mark
still smelling of life and earth

but if it doesn't
then soon i might be empty
though i suppose it's better
than being full with memory

so blood, don't stop
blood, just go
out of my body
i'll follow the flow
out of my mind
to find some relief
from loving that which gave me
its poor soul to keep
*
don't know how
i'm gonna keep on livin'
even the devil
wants to be forgiven

Jenny

"Dear God, make me a bird, so I can fly far, far far away from here..."
~Jenny, from Forrest Gump

Jenny was the backdrop to all of Forrest's adventures. Perhaps she was even the reason for them. She was the one who infused him with the confidence that only friendship can provide; a sweet-faced little alchemist who managed to turn her own abuse into genuine kindness for someone who needed it. The thought of her kept him going through the war, and her letter was the reason he came to sit on that bench in the first place.

Over the course of the movie, time changes everything, and everything changes Jenny. I imagine that when she left Alabama, she thought she was leaving her troubles behind. She didn't suspect that they would follow her, and grow stronger from the journey, multiplying, even as she grew weary and divided.

By the end of the flick, she is a thinly redeemed ne'er-do-well. She seems to have regained some strength and learned valuable lessons, but she still must pay the ultimate price for a life gone bad because of good intentions. The sins of her idealistic youth catch up to her, and AIDS takes her life before the 40 year mark.

Thank Goddess for Forrest. He was there whenever she needed him, despite her inability to recognize that his love was the only thing in her life that was constant and true (until it was too late to matter much). He never stopped thinking of her as his girl, and was there at the end to feed her oranges and tea. He made sure she was buried under their favorite tree. He was better to her than so many other options, including not only a life of sickness in solitude, but many of the other men she could have chosen to settle for or stick it out with had she been just a bit more ordinary, and less herself.

Still, her story depresses me a little (and I must admit that it doesn't take much these days, so maybe it's just my perspective). Her character to speaks to me, as I'm sure it does to so many other women who jump out there searching for something better, and only end up finding worse, or at best more of the same. She was a person with real issues, but she wanted to hope for more. She wanted to love, she wanted to feel free, she wanted the world to be a better place, she wanted to connect with others in a meaningful way. She was a seeker, a nomad, an adventurer. She was an idealist, and perhaps even an empath - feeling too much and trying to escape, then feeling too little and losing her sense of purpose.

And she was punished for all of it.

It seemed she made every decision with a two-headed trick coin trained to land in a pile of shit, and every set of consequences was worse than the last. In the end, worn from the journey, and only slightly wiser, she managed to build an almost stable platform for herself atop the shaky ground. She didn't become a star, or a guru. She didn't get a book deal out of it, or write a play. She didn't make songs for the radio about her travels. She barely survived, saved by the earthy reality of a growing belly, and she took a waitressing job to pay the bills. She served coffee, wearing a pink dress, and sometimes a hard-won smile.

And after all of that, well, only a fool could love her.

excuses

i cleaned today
like a madwoman
couldn't stand the thought of
millions of tiny
particles of
you
still hanging around my apartment
laying lazily in my bedsheets
asking me to make them sandwiches

would've been better
just to burn the whole place down
but i don't own it
so


enough
reminiscing
i have had enough of remembering you
and i will continue to call every
exterminator in town
until one
can tell me how to kill
the thousands of tiny
eggs you laid
in my brain

perhaps i should just
get myself
a lobotomy
but i like it
when my spit stays in my mouth
so


someone find me an old priest and a young priest
to exorcise these demons
and remove them from me
what?! - the catholics don't do
exorcisms anymore?!
this is bullshit...
fuckin pussies

what i really need anyway
are a witch-doctor and a moonshiner
to brew up a concoction strong enough
to kill
the hundreds of worms
infecting my blood
slithering through my veins
swallowing the essence of me
and shitting out
you

a fortnight of ritual and booze and drumming and sweating a rough sex and visions and shooting shotguns and riding bulls and bonfires and chopping heads off chickens and digging in the dirt with bare hands bear hands shredding skin soft compared to claws the mother protecting her cub from you beyond warning in the spirit realm worshipping the totems in sacred dance all naked and painted and bloody

but
that's how bitches end up
on youtube
so

revival

i need something soft
a place to lay my heart
as it heals.
it wasn't broken
this time
but
cut
too deep.
it was easy enough
to piece back together
before.
but now
the blood
fleeing
a cruel way to discover
that life force
has no allegiance
to me.

what a way
to be humbled.
crushed by
the one dream
i had protected forever.
until.
and my heart
blames me.
and i blame
my heart.
but we are all
we have now.

so forgiveness
begins here.
revival
in me.
there are no other healers.
and there is
no magic glue
to fix this.
we stick together
because finally
we understand.
only we share
this pain.

i need a soft place
to bleed.
back into my heart.