Revisiting
Now thoughts of you are rare,
a distraction not afforded me.
Life has gotten too perilous
when you are near,
too much a luxury.
Is this how love begins to end?
I am too busy keeping all the lights on,
it demands too much attention;
they fade as I stop thinking of you.
Thoughts of you began to be
forgot, how my heart rapidly beat.
Beloved, is this how? It ends.
And the fire is going, roaring,
tinged with the taste of sour gone sweet.
I have aged
to hunt tigers, to pursue you.
Ariel
Revisiting
Now thoughts of you are rare,
a distraction not afforded me.
Life has gotten too perilous
when you are near,
too much a luxury.
Is this how love begins to end?
I am too busy keeping all the lights on,
it demands too much attention;
they fade as I stop thinking of you.
Thoughts of you began to be
forgot, how my heart rapidly beat.
Beloved, is this how? It ends.
And the fire is going, roaring,
tinged with the taste of sour gone sweet.
I have aged
to hunt tigers, to pursue you.
Ariel
Impatient
My patience is a guttered out candle,
the wax spilled out of everything I wrote.
I despair the only heat I will ever wrap
around me is from my sweater,
or from a heater, not a burning fire.
I don’t want to own your heart
but may I again be its companion?
I sit alone on a long couch,
walk a lonely carpet;
even my cat tires of me.
I long to wear white lace again,
sit on your porch,
feel my heart leap at the sight of you.
Oh, I want to burn this house down!
Ariel
the void
my muscles are heavy with need.
i whisper into the void
still too quiet for you to avoid
all i want is for you
to walk into my poem
let to swirl and whirl around you
perhaps sneak into your ear
work its way into your subconscious
then one day you will start to randomly
think about me
and love
then connect the two
and with a thundering shout
you will run back to me
your muscles heavy with need.
Ariel
earth
let me plant my feet deep and send out roots
let me grow yellow-green leaves this spring
and soak up the warming sun
we are living in this liminal time
before humans burn our mother up
let me disavow them, step away
and nuzzle back into the earth
be her child once again.
Ariel
last six words
You say you’re a bear but I think a boar
a cowboy looking to collar “a filly”
using a bit of flair.
Dude,
women don’t care how many greenbacks
you pull; this isn’t The Wild West.
they want self-determination and respect.
Ariel
draft
Why I’m Still Living
1: I would do anything to spend
time with my witty son. Even endure
sickness and a body of pain.
to hear his voice laugh and tease
give him two rooms, one for sleeping, one for waking
I live to see him stride across the local stage
and I must live to protect him from the snake who attacks without warning,
I must ensure his survival
2: and of course there are my furry cats
3: siblings
4: there is art. and bubbles. trees. grass. daffodils. lilacs. plums. soft fabrics. hot baths. scented candles. there is electricity. piped water. toilets and toilet paper. phones, computers and internet. instant communication. mail that comes. i have purple sheets and blankets. pillows. scented candles. wood fire. a curved couch. money. food. poet friends. art friends, music friends. theater friends. movies. a pool.
last: there’s an infinitesimal chance
you may show up at my door
(you remember where that is)
and give in to your desire.
Ariel
draft
haunted
You’re either a poet or a poem.
I’m a poet
and you my poem.
you hunt my hours.
the ticking of the clock is your breaths,
they echo in my heavy breast.
your hunting whispers to me
a seductive heavy exhale.
oh, merman, you murmur a hunting siren
the ocean amplifies it until it is a foghorn
and the only safe shore is the rocks
your hunting are waves that drown me
then raises me to air and words.
I am a fish and you a monger
I am a poet and you my fish
I am your poem and you are hunting.
Ariel
draft
The Devil And Me
(after Ira Wolf)
I’m not a superhero, though I wish to be.
It’s weird when you wake up to The Others just under that first layer of skinand they are claw, clawing to get out, and you hope that your skin is metal like Colossus to keep them from escaping and adamantium bones to keep them from breaking you inside. But you know you’re no superhero, just a child grown who had to raise herself. Certainly not a Jean Gray. Well, maybe a weather witch. For you make the gray clouds roll in and you hear the thunder roll with all the voices in it shouting over each other. Or maybe it’s the fighting fiddles. The flavor of blood-stained brimstone on the tongue.
And you can’t think.
My mother thought me lost to The Devil. Evil she must purge.
I know what it’s like to be dead.
You know part of it is in your genes. The ones you got from Her mother. But then if I was stuck on an isolated Arkansas farm, I would give in to the voices too, embrace them, escape with them to run away from the fields and crops. At least I think that was her origin story. I think anyone would go mad with the isolation of a farm.
I was lost yesterday, today I ground (grind?) myself with music. Hope the fiddles make sense and hope the devils work with me. I hope to walk through everything, phase, merge. Run away to the forest. It a Pac NW thing. Find a river running red as whiskey. Talk to plants like Poison Ivy. Dance with two left feet around a campfire. Wrap the devils in my webs.
I’m no superhero. I’m no villain either.
Ariel
draft
form, anti-form
breeze sends white
blossoms drifting down
like winter.
the sky is
blue, clouds let in the sun. yet
cats huddle inside.
with a hot mug to sip from
i long for summer’s warmth,
to lay in the sun and let it bake me.
live wearing as few layers
as possible.
Ariel
draft
stained glass
weighted down base, rippling.
tall art novoeu stalk
holds up a reverse tulip.
multi-colored glass formed
into a bell, lilies thin as skin.
protecting the delicate light
bulb. when it’s on it, it glows,
sending vibrant rainbows everywhere.
wooden chair sits three feet from the television.
Ariel
draft
middle
passion month
and the pink moon
is halved in the ink of it.
my honey breast is going places
looking for its north star,
hoping against hope it never moves.
this spring rhythm; again it shimmies
through my skin like a creature
emerging from thawed hibernation;
i wake, i breathe, i write.
i long for your embrace
the silliness of it, like minor falls
and major lifts.
Ariel
Day 30 of National Poetry Writing Month. Continue reading “Apr 30 NaPoWriMo Day 30/30”
Day 29 of National Poetry Writing Month. Continue reading “Apr 29 NaPoWriMo Day 29/30”
Day 26 of National Poetry Writing Month. Continue reading “Apr 26 NaPoWriMo Day 26/30”
Day 25 of National Poetry Writing Month. Continue reading “Apr 25 NaPoWriMo Day 25/30”
Day 24 of National Poetry Writing Month. Continue reading “Apr 24 NaPoWriMo Day 24/30”
Day 23 of National Poetry Writing Month. Continue reading “Apr 23 NaPoWriMo Day 23/30”
Day 22 of National Poetry Writing Month. Continue reading “Apr 22 NaPoWriMo Day 22/30”
Day 21 of National Poetry Writing Month. Continue reading “Apr 21 NaPoWriMo Day 21/30”
Day 20 of National Poetry Writing Month. Continue reading “Apr 20 NaPoWriMo Day 20/30”
Day 19 of National Poetry Writing Month. Continue reading “Apr 19 NaPoWriMo Day 19/30”
Day 18 of National Poetry Writing Month. Continue reading “Apr 18 NaPoWriMo Day 18/30”
Day 17 of National Poetry Writing Month. Continue reading “Apr 17 NaPoWriMo Day 17/30”
Day 16 of National Poetry Writing Month. Continue reading “Apr 16 NaPoWriMo Day 16/30”
nwpoetariel
Ariel, Pacific NW poet 