Tension

Making lace,
Like cross-examination
And well-paced drama,
Is all about one thing:
Carefully-balanced tension.

The strings and wires,
Fingers and wrists,
Must be positioned just so,
Tug here,
Give slack there,
And if coordination
Is met
– Gears in a watch
Turning and ticking
To the eternal circadian rhythm –
Then two hitches
Become one stitch

And there’s just
That little bit
More lace
To adorn her wrist.

A Strange and Beautiful Thing

Flickering cursors,
Green and red,
Dancing across the screen,
Up and down,
Left and right,
Comment and question,
Comma and em-dash,
Connection and correction.

Friday nights on
Googledocs
Can be a strange
And beautiful
Thing.

Another Brick

I’m sorry
Is worn around the edges
From timeless repetition.

I don’t know what to do
Is a little sharper,
Newer,
Clean lines and stark corners.

I love you
Is razor-sharp
And blood-stained.

Each is
Another brick
In a newly-rebuilt
Wall.

Betrayer

Raindrops fall like cat’s paws
Across the slate roof,
Felines circling the house
And waiting for prey to emerge.

Children,
Small as mice,
Grey and hunkering down,
Noses twitching
For the faintest hint
Scent
Taste of the enemy
Linger at the windows and doors.

Officers in black –
Armbands in black, white, red,
North and south,
East and west –
Clutch guns and stamp
In the cold,
Breath misting the air,
Impatient racehorses
Waiting for the firing
Of the gun.

The cat’s meow
Is a smile and a nod,
An affirmation and a sign,
Six points of gold
And the end of a child’s smile.

“Yudas,” says the child.

Betrayer, his mother screams.

One on One

Ivory on ivory,
Ten fingers on forty-eight keys,
And more songs
Than one man
Can imagine.

White on white,
Ten fingers and two hands,
Two fists against a gi top
And his best friend’s
Skin.

Peach on peach,
Fingers and vials,
Acid spilled onto the gap
Between lab-coat
And gloves.

Red on white,
Blisters and blood,
An entire wood floor
Laid out end to end,
A new home.

Don't Remember

Don't remember how once
You thought to fly,
Buoyed up on the warmest drafts,
Circling higher than you dared imagine.

Don't remember the giddy dreams,
The impossible visions,
Of what might have been.

Don't Remember.

Forget the gentle touch.
Forget the whispered word.
Forget the shadowed gaze.
And forget the sweetest kiss.

Forget.

Forget it all.
For the sake of sanity
And self preservation.
Forget what you had.

File it all into the past
Neatly ordered.
Every thought and wish and dream.
Keep it safely forgotten,
Labeled carefully in your mind.
Let it collect the dust of time.
Become yellowed with age.

Until you forget it was ever there.

To the Ground

A hundred steady pairs of feet
Marching left-right one-two
To the beat of synchronized drums,
Banners whirling behind them
Wielded by practice hands,
Horns and trumpets blazing abroad
A victorious army marching onward.

All it took
Was one pair of feet
Marching right-left
Two one
To send the whole thing
Crashing to the ground.

Six Conflicts: VI

Denouement: Magic

The green waters of Aquae Sulis
Wash over him,
From crown to toe,
Warm and cleansing.
He breaks the surface,
Motion clean as a knife through flesh,
And he tips his head back,
Parts his lips in a breath,
A prayer to the stars.

He dresses as he did
At the last battle,
With his own hands –
Linen and gambeson,
Hauberk and pauldron,
Greaves and cuisses and gauntlets.
He smoothes his hands over the lines
Of his surcoat,
Of the blood-red and the dragon-gold,
And then he reaches for his helm.

The final battle is
Without opponent or spy,
Foe or troops.
It is for him alone,
And the voice calls
More urgently, pleading,
Come to me,
Free me,
They need you.

I need you.

He walks longer than before,
One foot in front of the other,
Head held high,
Gaze on the horizon,
Feeling the tug of destiny
Low in his belly,
Like the needle of a compass
Swinging toward Polaris.
Days and nights pass,
Cars roar by,
People yell and shout and cry,
What are you wearing?
Where are you going?
Are you mad?
But he ignores them all,
Because he can hear the call.

For a man to walk so,
Unsleeping, unstopping,
Without food or drink –
He knows the hunger and
Fatigue settling into his bones
Like the weight of his armor trebled –
The unnaturalness of it all is a sign.

Magic.

Like vanishing into thin air
With an icy blizzard for a wake.
Like razing an army with a handful of lightning.
Like summoning a lady –
Gleaming, glittering,
Beautiful beyond words –
From a lake.

The tower is in shambles,
A collection of rocks
Like a handful of pebbles thrown down
By a giant child
(Whose father he had likely slain).

The call tugs faster,
More insistent, vibrating
Through his blood like the
Buzz of battle.
He has Caledfwlch in his hand,
And he stands over the heap of stones,
Listening to the please please please
And hearing the song of the stars.

He drives the sword down,
Into the stone,
Into the earth,
And he knows that he can never
Pull the sword
From the stone again.

The ground quivers.
He casts about for balance,
A new sailor at sea,
And the song of the stars
Becomes real,
Dancing on air,
A weaving of notes
And whispers,
And then the earth opens,
Lips parted in a prayer toward the sky.

Emrys opens his eyes.
Rex quondam rexque futurus,
He says.
Arcturus holds out his hand.
Our people need us.

Six Conflicts: V

Society

The map is shiny-slick
Between his fingers,
Littered with tiny lines
And letters-numbers-words,
But he remembers
Broader maps of
Mountains-rivers-kingdoms
And he knows how to get
Where he's going.

Were he at his best –
Armored,
Weapon-strong,
Well-rested and well-fed
On freshly-caught venison
And thick stew from
The Chief Cook's hand –
He could march it in one day,
Imagine the steady
Thump-thump-thump
Of his knights and soldiers
Behind him
Beneath the fluttering penant
Of gules on a dragon passant.

But he is barely stronger
Than a boy,
Thin-limbed and frail
From sleeping, sleeping, sleeping.
So he folds the map into his pocket,
Seeks the skyline to divine
The compass point,
And he walks.

The grassy roadsides,
Gently-sloping hills,
Footpaths worn by marches previous –
They are his trail,
Cobbled together by questions,
Answers from a man outside a pub,
Puffing on a pipe
Who rolls his r's like the Sons of Orkney,
A group of giggling women-children
With painted faces and innocent-wide eyes.

Those lightning-fast machines,
Cars – steel and cold,
Wild beasts
Without the familiar
Affection and courage
Of a destrier raised from colt-hood –
Speed past,
Littering the air with
Mocking cries and
Honking horns
Like an army of jeering geese.

Only a madman would walk,
Or so these people think,
But then they do not remember
The long marches of tired men
In battered, blood-stained armor
That united this country.

He sleeps beneath the trees
And the stars –
Sky and Starlight –
Until uniformed enforcers,
More brutish, less trained
Than his shining ranks of
Knights upon knights,
Nudge him awake with their boots
And grunt for him to Move along, move along.

Why has he no food?
Why has he no clothes?
Why has he no money?
He is mad – he should be at home.
But he needs none of these things,
He explains, hands still, cautious.
They offer him help, assistance,
A bed for the night.

He cannot explain
That even a king
Can sleep in the dirt
Of his kingdom,
And a man on a quest
Need only be led
By the stars.

Six Conflicts: IV

Destiny

In the daily struggle of
get up
get out of bed
feet on the ground
push buttons
in the proper order
of one two three
red blue green
He forgets why he is
Awake.

Awake –
Not trapped in a cave
Beneath a winding sheet
Caged in rusting armor.
Awake –
Moving through a world
Of sound-light-air
And plastic-paper-electricity.

Destiny, he has heard
From the homeless man on the corner
Dirt-streaked and God-preaching,
Comes in visions
And dreams.
When he sleeps –
Back against the wall,
Clutching for Caledfwlch
With empty hands –
He does not dream.

He remembers –
Jenny, pretty Jenny,
All golden-haired and wide-eyed
And traitor-queen-wife;
Chasing arrows through
A brown-green undergrowth
For snarling, posturing Cei;
The wizened old man with the
Nut-brown, wrinkled face
Who was more handsome and
Youthful
Every day that dawned.

In the middle of the shop
He calls work –
Where he answers to
Oi, Pretty Boy
and not
My Liege –
He remembers the voice,
Whisper soft and piercing,
An arrow through his heart.
He remembers come to me
and your people need you.

He remembers
Stars and Sky,
Gentle fingertips brushing
His eyelids closed in a final
Farewell,
For the next time he sees 
Stars and Sky
It should be hello.

Aquae Sulis is the answer,
The place of prayer and
Cleansing before the
Old Gods.
Kingship is for the pure in heart,
And he has been empty of heart,
Empty of mind with the
Constant pressing of
Buttons buttons buttons.

He closes his eyes and remembers
The Voice
Calling Sire, and My Liege
and my friend.
He remembers the promise
He kept,
He gave.
When your people need you.

I will rise again.

Reviresco.

He leaves the buttons behind.

Six Conflicts: III

Technology

This modern world
- modern; he likes to roll the word
On his tongue
Like a sugary lozenge
That he unwraps with careful,
Weapon-scarred hands –
Is a curious combination of
Inaction and speed.

The pushing, tapping, poking
At buttons while seated and staring
At things bright and glaring
Is enough to drive him mad.
The rush of wind through his hair
- the ghost of fingers
in a hazy caress –
On the buses, trains, cars
Is an unexpected thrill,
The thrust of blood
Through his veins
In the last moments before the herald
Called Slay on.

He feels feeble, less of a man
To press a button and watch a fire burn
Than to perspire over the heave of an axe
And the minor thunder-crack of
Splitting logs.
He feels cheated,
Aching with unslaked vengeance
When police swarm a criminal,
A foolish boy who thought to
Take on a knight.

He is still a knight,
Armor or no armor –
He can hear the clamor
And screams,
Steel on flesh,
Arrows zipping through air
At Badon Hill
and Camlann's green.

A man's strength,
He ponders, and he misses
The comforting weight
Of a sword at his hip,
Like the familiar presence
Of Cafall trotting at his heels,
Is lost to the strength of machines.

The world is clean lines,
Too-bright lights,
Inhuman precision in
Razor-sharp corners on tables
And crow-flight straightness
In the legs of chairs.

The roughness of wood
From a man's uneven strokes
By blade on branch,
Curved to fit human hands
Is evidence of effort,
Blood, sweat and tears
Poured into the soil
Of the harvest of a man's labor.

Under cover of darkness
He roams the cool grass,
Barefoot to slip on dew,
Ears alert for the song of a
Grasshopper, the call of a
Bird, and winds his hands
In the motions of battles gone by.

By day he smiles,
Presses buttons,
Hands slow and clumsy
And deliberately gentle.
He learns to move to the unnatural
Thump, thump, imitation war-drums
Modern children call music
And ignore the constant noise –
Chatter, pings, flood of information –
But Albion sings in his blood,
And when he kneels in an open field,
He can feel her.

I am alive.

Six Conflicts: II

Character

She screamed first,
A maiden confronted by a dragon.
But he raised his hands,
The age-old gesture of surrender,
And spoke slowly, softly.

Her words were a tumble of vowels,
Foreign, incomprehenisble,
The song of water over rock.
She wore nearly nothing,
Boldened to show knees, elbows, throat,
And she carried
A man’s tools,
Metal, massive,
Cave-breaking.

He tried other languages
Rusty from disuse,
Infrequent use,
Disdain for boyhood tutors.

Her French was accented,
Awkward, filled with
Foreign sounds,
But the trip-hammer of his heart
Against his hauberk calmed
At her first, Je m’appelle Celine.

The hunger that overtook him –
Ripped through his limbs
Like lightning across the sky –
Overthrew any doubt
- guilt, awkwardness –
Of walking with a woman unchaperoned.

He followed her,
Wobbling fawn-like on legs
Unused to the smooth, stony black
She called road.

Her food was bright,
Soft, too sweet,
Too light,
And he fumbled at the shiny-smooth
Packages, at the parchment-thin glass
That crackled like popping fire.
But the hunger in his belly subsided.

Hands on skin
Made him shiver, blush
Like a lad at his first tumble,
But she was clinical, neat,
As she peeled his hauberk away from
His skin, eased the weight of battle
From his aching shoulders.

The things she called clothes –
And the whispering voice in the
Back of his skull that
Prodded at his thoughts
And curled at his ear
Like a lover's caress
Taught him words
Phrases,
Hello and jeans –
Were sturdy, strong,
Ill-fitting as if he were
Attempting his father's garb
Attempting his father's crown
When still just a boy.

Aquae Sulis
He was looking for.
Complete with scrubbing and
Praying motions,
Clumsy by his fighters' hands.

She pressed a map –
Shiny, colorful,
Roman tiles polished to gleaming
In sky-grass-earth
Blue-green-brown.

Bath, she called it.
Goodbye. She hugged him.
Good luck. She waved.
My King. She bowed.
He bowed.

No one's King.

Not yet.

I'm coming.

Six Conflicts: I

Self

It’s the call of two best friends
Sky and Stars
Who’d join hands
In a jar full of fireflies
And decorate the firmament with
Constellations.

It’s the sleep earned by kings
Fallen in battle
Whose nations are footnotes
And fodder for bard songs.

It’s the war of the two
Clamoring in his head.
The call begs him rise, come,
Step out of his stone-walled prison.
It’s a voice on the wind,
In the crashing waves on the sea.
It’s begging and pleading.

It echoes a memory,
A woman kneeling at his feet,
Sobbing,
I love you both.

Pleading tastes of ashes
On his lips,
And he wishes the sea
Would wash away the taste,
Replace salt for salt.

Come to me.

The lure of sleep is calm, lulling,
The sway of tall grass in the breeze,
The rough, solidarity of wheat
Between his fingertips
As he reaches out for a handful of field.
Sleep promises
A cocoon of warmth,
Sunlight on a spring day.

It echoes a memory,
The broken sound of men
Weeping, creaking in their armor,
The scratchy-warm half-comfort of the linen
Shroud they wrapped around him,
Round and round, winding,
Wound.

And then they lowered him
Into the ground.

Sleep forever.

Behind his eyelids,
In the hollow in his chest
Where his heart used to beat
Two voices clamor
For answers.

Come to me.
Sleep forever.

Sunlight breaks upon
Starlight.
Fireflies dissolve from between
Fingertips like
Wheat crushed in a gauntleted fist.

Voices clash,
And it’s a tug, tug, tug,
Of war,
Of strength,
Of wills,
Of ex calce liberatus

And he opens his eyes,
Rex quondam rexque futurus.

Your people need you.

Summer Day

Golden sand burns soles and toes.
Waves lap at ankles and knees.
Open sky glows blue, dotted with birds
And clouds.

Sunlight glitters on
Clear blue waves;
The air filled with
Coconut-scented suntan lotion and
Melting ice-cream.

Voices weave a cheerful din -
Children chasing a frisbee,
College boys tossing a football -
And slowly the day wends on,
Suntans getting deeper,
Shadows getting longer.

(65 words)

Happy Halloween

Golden leaves, red, brown
That crunch underfoot
Mean harvest moons and
Pumpkins carved and grinning
On the doorstep.

Chimney-smoke
Like unfurling ferns on the horizon
Smells like family warmth
And apple cider.

Ghosts and goblins,
Fairies and princesses,
Knights and queens,
Laughter and costumes rustling.

Shoes patter down pavement 
In time to the swish, swish of
Leaves in a blue-cool breeze.

Dawn will bring
Candy-sickness and
Sore throats.

Happy Halloween.

(73 words)

Typhoon Season

It’s lightning and moonbeams,
The army-roll of thunder across the heavens
As rain sleets down
In ordered rows, columns, ranks
To pierce the sand,
Innumerable crystalline needles.

It’s white-capped waves
Whipped by the same invisible hands
That bend palm-trees toward breaking,
Fronds of green lashing against the horizon.

It’s thousands of homes laid waste
Like toys scattered by a careless titan;
It’s death and tears and shallow graves,
Oceanic byres,
And alphabetical names.

It’s typhoon season.

(79 words)

Raining Stars

Warm air -
The perfect temperature for
Short sleeves and bare feet -
Rustles tall green grass.

Clear skies glitter
With diamond-chip stars
Even as the sun
Dips its last
Down the horizon.

The last wafts of barbecue
And soda
Potato chips and
Homemade brownies
Fade in the breeze,
And as the moon creeps up

The summer perseids
Start to rain.

(60 words)

Tornado Season Again

Green skies signal
Sirens that
Break city din and
Bring on the wind.

Clouds form a wall
Black
From land to space
Triggering
Artificial night
And too-bright sunlight
Juxtaposed like
Opposing pieces
On a chessboard
Poised to kill.

The wind is
A thousand voices
Weeping and angry
And an army of fists
Battering windows
Breaking glass.

A second siren is
A false alarm
The eye in the sky.

It’s tornado season
Again.

(73 words)

Winter out the Window

Wind carries white
In an upward spiral,
Winter silk in an
Arctic breeze that
Turns my breath to crystal
And my words to
Weight.

Pristine powder on branches turns
Muddy in the streets
Under boots and tires and
Human industry.

Sirens and gales
Sing counter-harmony howls
Against the windows and
Around the gaps between
Doors and door frames.

The sun was
Golden
Yesterday.

(64 words)

Just A Dream

The best dream
Is where I wake up
With someone in my arms,
A warm body pressed against mine,
Heartbeat to heartbeat,
Cool breath on my skin.

The worst dream
Is where I wake up
And realize it’s just a dream.

(41 words)