The Things That Still Rule

The bitter rush of old ocean-

Impossible, yet a ghost of gods

tossed in elaborate song!

Stale and sweet,

The mighty roar of waves rolls in,

A velvet, too smooth with lost wonder

grows brittle claws like arrows-

still at war with the silent voice-

Innocent, yet another soul lost.

The magic still lies, of course,

Deep in the fortress yet untapped-

The darkest stronghold, a dulled enigma,

a palace of the greatest machine.

Forever in tongues few will know,

are enchantments, untouchable on tightropes,

for their false gods who stand,

ready in songs of siege.

(The real demons, the real lords

call those threads a city of light).

Magnolia XII

Is it all the same as before?

her being a goddess once more?

She shines in gold, but

modest blush of her maker.

He falls into her soul, as only he could,

revels in soft layers of cool;

Her word unspoken, her fullness

quiet in shimmering grace-

Born again, as she dances.

Her silver veils fall away,

the cold mists, so exquisitely dark,

does she remember?

Mourning came, morning went forth

from behind shades of pastel,

from the nights of shadows awake,

sprawled and arched in dust.

She was once so wide

she folded up to the stars,

a silent maid, behold!

The kings of celestial court

warred to distant stalemate,

'til the night wind burned with fire.

Endless courts, endless watercolor palette-

One sky of her own, one sky not,

she flees them both- her fate-

The dark dance of years suspended,

illuminated in tossed shadows-

her hourglass.

Another Wish

I'd wish you a million wishy wishes

if I could see but one,

over the crest of the wave of sky

before the day is done.

I'd wish you a million million more

to see them in your eyes-

Such magic meets it fellow quick,

To spark it- how time flies!

A million, million, millionth wish?

What good would it be?

You have the rest inside of you,

except this poem from me.