Wingtips

Avatar Review Issue 11 is up

AVATAR REVIEW --11

Touching Light

An old one recently revised for NaPo.

Touching Light

His liquid thoughts I measure on dry lips.
We huddle in the bed; in silken tangle
of twilight, savage flame, I lose my grip.

He crosses hands around my knees then flips
a copper curl with licks--my balance stumbles.
His liquid thoughts I measure on wet lips.

I press my back against his chest; he dips
into my hips and fingers draw an angle,
then I, ablaze, he, savage flame -- we grip.

Head on my breast, he says he can outstrip
all honeybees, make blossoms huge like paigles.
His nectar thoughts I feel in searching lips.

He slips his hand beneath my neck; I trip
amid wet grass of hair, so our skin tingles,
lets twilight's peachy flames secure their grip.

We watch our bodies' filigree eclipse
as twilight wears an underworld moon bangle.
We taste our misty thoughts till water lips
cool savage flame, let sleep take soothing grip.

Trying to Write about Abruzzo's Earthquake

Trying to Write about Abruzzo's Earthquake

The poem travelled by car, crossed half Italy
all alone leaning its voice on crooked steeples,
echoing voices buried under tons of ruins.
It didn't ask for anything, not even words, arrived
without warning for it had the door key. Once inside,
it offered me a bowl with pebbles, bunches of flowers
dripping dust, bleeding hands frantically digging
and the solitude of an empty horizon.

My heart beat got fast, I searched my bag
for pen, paper, and found respectful silence.

__________________

Excess

Excess

Wind and light write their absurdist script

on the wall while birds get lost

in the quivering calligraphy of reflections

and transparent lizards dart

green transparency

in and out my consciousness

imbued

with the white explosion

of the sun

so white it hurts

it pierces the silence of shade

and roots and the soft conversation

of leaves brushing emerald opulence

against branches

and there in drifting coruscations

between eyeblinks

I feel a weaver with radiant hands

ready to undo  clusters of time.

-----

NaPo at PFFAMonthly Poetry Madness

The Marathon continues

Stone Writing

I will write with pebbles from now on,

will choose the right ones from their smoothness,

the parabola they make before falling,

the music  buried in their rocky heart.

Neither pens nor PC keys keep memory

of why fingers' pressure builds sentences'

scaffolding, while each pebble wears

a river-architect's long labor of water caresses.

With pebbles I will write a song of bridges

set against the lonely horizon, a song for travellers
keen on listening to protean tunes of the sea

of tigers, on cleaving a trail out of swamps.

----------------------

The Shout of Spring

sweeps in the air, dives, with a  fluttering of wings,

through  freshly laundered clothes.

Far away,  restless thaw rivulets drain and drip

brown pine needles and skeleton leaves,

while light-bursts lure girls with flowers between teeth

and frogs that croak their love to waterlilies.

April 2nd

A Question of Skin

She wonders if she'll be the same
after going into her body's nakedness to sleep.
Will she get, her eyes, hair, mouth again
or will she be all touch, smell, color, a rainbow
on the floor, a match to detect prints,
maps pinned with flowers and cities of blood?

She doesn't ask for directions; before losing
herself inside silent lips, she scratches the roaring
lion-tattoo and the red-burning skin will be her
lighthouse when she wakes.

April, the month of poetry

After a long absence I am writing again. The National Month of Poetry is the cause and reason.

The Musician

He stands listening to the rain splashing

on the windowsill like a child running barefoot

in and out reflections of clouds.

A flash of blue, then bronze and fingers twirl,

leap over over the keys vibrating -- everything

happens in music, notes widen, melt

the frozen chords of memory, ripen

grape-clusters and chestnuts that glitter

in life estuaries.