Saturday, December 31, 2011

Ship turned towards sky...

Let all my ships go, let them sail away.
Loosen the bolts, empty the cove,
the docks are at midnight, the ocean a sheen
of new water, soft-frothing, silk-green

beneath moonlight; here comes that old tide
lifting wooden planks, ropes, our sails flung wide
to the wind in a greeting, brief-fleeting, and hushed
as an ocean at midnight; its waters thick-brined

and swirling, with dreams we've charted, now known.
Its tempests familiar, rough waters like home, 
and our damaged sails now dragging behind
we are hopeful, ship turned towards sky.





Sunday, December 18, 2011

The heart, slipped through....

Hold it tightly in, grasp the roughness, inhale
to keep poised and aligned, no one needs to know

what slipped through the ribs, unrestrained: your heart,
airtight, packed up, tumbling now and all for what, over brown bread,
over safety nets, over shared chores and shared beds

and something shared that never should've been: your hands,
knitted fast to a blanket, knuckle-white and gripped to last, but

worn things are better worn through; new things are better made
to undo what's been lost: the heart, slipped through
the ribs, unrestrained, and now sewing it anew,

with patches and stitches and rolls of yarn;
needles and safety pins and scraps of fabric, used.

Friday, December 16, 2011

Heart, you are the redeemer, deemed in half
of what can be gained of love, for love
cannot make known its make, nor have
its honest value weighed.

A Dream of Kuwait

There is a boat on top of the bookcase, wooden
with a flag that reads Kuwait, reads
not of deserts, but something of sailing.

Habibi, I never went, but was told through others
of orb-like towers, built for water, and the streets
grown so hot, you feel a great weight hovering over you, pushing
like two hands folding the earth.

Binti, you would call, little one, and we would lie close,
and you pointed over waters and waters as though to find
that far away coast, where we could watch
the great eye close, and a final surge
of solar perplexity and vague mystery
as green light broke the waves.

This is how I love you: a green burst
among the waves, and every night
when the great eye closes, and again when it awakes.
We are as heavy as an endless summer, and as thick
as stars spread in the wilderness, where I looked
at sand for hours seeing only your face.

Friday, December 9, 2011

Pieces from Fall 2009


Just wanted to talk to you today.

Just wanted to say your name
to someone.

________________________

I am seconds away
from pure color,
from autumn browns
and dark stone,
from flying up to the
brilliant tree cities,
into the sunlight-spilling
gold ridged sky.

Thought you could skip me
across water, did ya?
thought I would sink
like a rock.

_______________

A realization
I have

Breaking through
some inner layer,
didn't think anything
could run this deep.
I think I might just be
invincible.

Saturday, December 3, 2011

We make our way, a thousand days
of dreams; we turn pillars of parking
garages into fortress walls, and kingdoms walked
wearily, we tread to our cars.

Eventually, we thought it would make sense
as violets do, sprouting heads above the dirt. We thought
each ray of sun is for someone blue
and each moment of blue is to remind us of solitude, to
take our hand and sit us down for a talk, like our mothers
used to do.

But we have been reprimanded for changes, for calling names
and praying, we were blamed for the wrongs we made,
but even right things lead into corners and squares
 
like boxes and papers cut in halfway planes. I am fully immersed
in the world, but can never quite fathom its shape.