baby would you like

to take a moment

to share a sip 

of something sweet

when the world has gone to hell

and it's a claw and scrape 

through all the pollution

between the sky

and in the head

to see the stars at all

cause all I wanna 

do tonight

is feel this love

that comes like

a calming wind

and reflect a little time

with the photograph

etched into my mind

of just how beautiful

you are

like clear in all the cloud

and something bright

that shines in dark

to drink the knowing

that I know

that oasis only needs to be

the way I can touch 

the miracle of something

that flows so cosmic sweet

when I forget the noise

and find you in the dream

I wish my mind

was not so much

like quicksilver 

in the way it can't decide

how it should see a thing

and be a little more

like terra cotta clay

to take your handprint

where you have laid

your truth

as something to hold 

as part of me

instead of what should be 

poisoned or darted 

from with fear

but something to bear

as a truth that

I have learned to see

even when the truth

does not agree

with what is in my heart

when truth is as subjective

as the state of quicksilver

and all that we can really have

is what we are willing

to give a place

for witness

in the soft earth of our

own skin

I am sorry for the times

I am so lost in my own

hypocrisy I can't see

it is the image staring 

back at me

and not the mirror

that holds the fault

and am too quick

to pour out words

that should be left

to conversations to have

only within myself

when the effort seems

too much

to take only my 

own heart to heart

and transmutate

that into growth

and so I throw it

out into the universe

and all I can do

is reflect after

the moment has slipped

out of my careless hands

and the damage has been done 

I love you like

an ancient wound

I have tried and tried

again to heal

but always seemed

to fail so that

this life fees like

the last grain

of sand falling 

through the glass

the last go round

to get it right

I love you like

an ancient joy

once lost

familiar as the scent

of earth that drinks

the rain

and laughs with flowers

from its mouth

something warm

and soft to touch

a place I might return

as naturally as any 

nature's way

I love you like

a second miracle

a miracle only

because you are

and then because 

you are all

the wanting nurture stars

I have found

within myself

painted to a constellation

that asks me 

to make peace with light

to heal what I have carried

from this world 

and the last

to let the laughter echo

like sacred through 

each time perceived

to knit the broken bones

of eternal yesterdays

with love that loves

transcendent into blue

to bring all the hearts

that we have held

as mirrors unto the other

in the cosmic divine

of second found again

to close the ancient wound

I came to you as shattered glass

inside a skin too thin

that I thought could still

hold back all the pain

and asked for you

to come to me

so I could hold you

and keep you warm

but the slivers sliced 

through the hide

and then I made you bleed

and still I could not see

the crimson pooling on the ground

because I was so lost in the stars

inside your eyes

I could not find the hurt

but every time you took

the crystal of the shattered blade

the points became more dull

and you were left with wounds

and I a kaleidoscope of light

where once I only hurt myself 

I have loved you selfishly 

for the ways I could not see

beyond what I had seen before

in the ways I begged for blue

then chose to call those colours

by other names

I have loved you selfishly

in the ways that I have grown

and had to heal myself

and ask to many times

for the space to make amends

I have loved you selfishly

in that there is no balancing now

that I have received

more than what was given

and still believed that it was

just the other way

and now when all goes fragile

and I stand holding all these gifts

I wish that I could trade them

for the chance to have known 

what love was 

when love was there

and all I had to do was see

when you are stuck in the groove

and wearing down

the walls to growing higher

when hearing is elusive

and feeling is all too much

when the world demands

and there is nothing left to give

not even to yourself

when there are days like

lived with stars

and days of drift too far away

let my heart be still and calm

to hold what I can near

and keep it safe

not as the storm

but shelter from the volatility

of cold

come take a walk with me tonight

let the stars translate 

our thoughts to light

and our hearts sing the songs

the ancestors will dance 

across the sky

be what we were meant to be

without the echoes of injuries

live the metaphor of the journey

in the miles passed under feet

and I promise I won't take one step

from off the path

if you will only whisper

when I am standing still

I'll surrender fear

and walk with you 

through an eternity of nights

and all the multitude of days

when I can find you there

if only in my heart

the stars have sent

their quiet snows

to mute the screams

that echoed through

the night

when sometimes 

the blanket of a silence

is what is needed

to heal and rest

like the Earth 

and all things sleep

and then return

to love again

the wind comes down sharp

and cold

from the hard white blade

of the mountains' tip

turning the fields to brittle gold

with backs bent past  

the breaking point

but somewhere out there

an ancient fire burns

that won't surrender to the wind

won't give to the suffocation 

of exsanguination    

nor be the kind of careless 

to be carried far away 

into something so wild

it burn its own self down

to so many ashes 

it cannot learn to rise again

this is the fire that burns too dim

when you are such a distance

you cannot see what it can be

beyond the in between 

of caught to manic impulse

inherent to the flame

and the too long without the tending

withered to cold and waned 

but fire is a thing when lost

to be renewed from what 

the spirits let go 

when they concede to cry

and roar for us the rage

that we've forgot to feel

with tears that bring the bent 

and broken backs

of grasses and of loves

to reach up for the sky as if

they never were knocked down

and if you should ever

come back down

from where you straddle 

the icy edge of blade 

that cuts the wind

right off the bone of stars

to serve up cold and hard

the fire that burns of stories 

and of nourishment and warmth

will be unceasing in the night

for you to wear as blanket 

worn as skin

that takes the offering of stories

of where you've been

and the silence of 

doesn't want to tell

as babies to its breast

loving one not more 

than it could love the other

loving only as heat

cannot help but love 

those who have touched too close

the slicing blade of cold

and then returned to fire

if I could be a different

shade of blue

and this lunacy could be

beauty like the vibrational

turbulence of starry nights

from the other side of the moon

I'd give you something new to feel

to make you want to feel again

somewhere safe to land

coming down from the stars

as a human heart

with the waiting of outstretched arms

to take you close and keep you warm

so you could be again as bare 

as you were born into this world

without the fear of how the cold can cut

the tender into scarred 

to lead you deep into the far away

from the predation of the noise

and through the sanctuary of the silence 

of music longing to be remembered

for you to hear without the need 

to dissect the notes

or take it all as something 

held a distance from the ears

if I could be a different blue

I would bring you back 

from where you've gone

the way the flowers lure

the winged to taste their nectar

with the hue that carries the tone

of the song that belongs to you

and promise only nourishment

and shelter for the tired

and the spirit wandered far too long

if I could be that blue

the blue that I am not

when I am just a girl

who is good at leaving too

even though I no longer try

but only try to hold this space

for when you do come back

with not enough patience to always stay

so that some nights I am out there

hidden in the turbulence of the night

searching for my star to hold 

in the dreams I dream of blue

I am trying to figure out

how to walk against 

the gravity of want

the want that wants to dance

through this world 

as if it was not a weight

to be carried

the want that wants 

to hear its name

whispered in the dark

and then to rise up

like molten fire

from in the belly of the earth

to take into its body

everything it wants

in the ways that passions consume

without a taste for mercy

the want that wants to be

hot like breath that has nothing

it must hold back

like eyes that blaze starlight

without shading themselves

from the risk of what seeing sees

when it looks back at seeing

the want to burn the borders down

and let the hungry rush

to drink their fill

and feast on everything sweet

that has stood a lifetime

beyond the reach of hunger's need

and then sometimes

all that want can want

is only to stop wanting

and forget that what it is 

is wanting

when wanting 

does not get 

to want

when wanting
wants most
what is best
to want for you

between all the ins and outs

and secret doors

known only to the stars

I am the woman 

who dreamed of fire

just to be one of them

and know the passage 

to the place 

where I can hear

the way your heart 

beats with the sound

of Mother Earth

all up through

the body of the spirit

that can be touched

and I can taste the breath

that weaves itself

from world to world

chase it through

the inter depths of night

until the dream

steps through the secret door

between the last and next

rising up like smoke

from in the now 

from in between

the ins and outs

somewhere where you

no longer hide

and you have dreamed

yourself to fire

to find my heart 

and breath 

to hold you in the sky

and teach you the secret

of the secret doors

to find your way

to me

let me reach to touch you

through the distance of this world

if only in this humble way

that speaks to let the heart be known

before I am drawn into the other place

and I surrender to its the pull

seduced into Nachine

by what I seek to coax from it:

the transformation into knowing here

what there already knows