he has lips like jimmy page

Dang it's a hot night.

 Cricket.

 A dog barking from way down in the canyon.    Sea swell.    Owl shrill.   

 This hilltop, redolent of ganja plant, Venus retrograding ready to back off and let the men figure it out. 

Fox pups conversing with the night. Autumn in Mendocino.

Feather

There was this thing that happened.

Life took off my flesh my meat my blood my nerves my filament

        moss&lichen replace marrow
                    being awake replaces being taken.

50 ravens.

 Throwing up my/wings/ arms.

 Astonished.

             Bats.

 flippy floppy swishy swooshy I’ll never forget those things that happened

 the difference between deep green and black is now

 the difference between watershed&vein. 

  You.

               Never.

 Coming.

  Going.

   No.Yes.Maybe.

  

                 Never

hymn,

           not  now. not 

                  ever.

ode to margaret goldsmith

Intrinsic coolness.

 The very tiny tips of maple leaf  caught    on    fire.

Flame

Cliff dwelling dashed for mountain top

Sunset dashed for the sea          the color of a pearl 
you know what ?


 I  once thought I knew everything or at least something
 anything
 but     now       no         now
 life
 bears
 haphazard
 fruit 
 figs
 the color of persimmons


 offspring disguised as birds of prey.

this.

The upanishads become oracle&salt becomes blood  here this here.look.

“”When people depart from this world, it is to the moon that they all go. By means of their life breaths the moon swells up in the fortnight of waxing, and through the fortnight of waning it propels them to new birth. Now, the moon is the door to the heavenly world. It allows those who answer its question to pass. As to those who do not answer its question, after they have become rain, it rains them down here on earth, where they are born again in these various conditions — as a worm, an insect, a fish, a bird, a lion, a boar, a rhinoceros, a tiger, a man, or some other creature — each in accordance with his actions and his knowledge.” — Kausitaki Upanishad

Riverview Apogee

  

Do you remember how the trail that switchbacked up to the quartz mine seemed to have gone on for miles                               didn't it ?
 Then        like an explosion   !Kablooey!    a quarry 
of gilded and luminescent stone about faced us as if it were a temple.

 Golden alder leaves shimmy like sequins on the dress of a Parisian chanteuse.
  We danced to the songs of

                        Fortuny
                              Lao Tzu    Black Elk   &the Pixies

                        Acropolis        Eames          Gaudi

                        Stonehenge          Chartres          Altamira

                                        Vortex           Filament            lysergic

                                             Bride descending the Staircase     fragment/broken glass

                        Psychokiller.

 Black mica shards cut through my sandals. 
 I crush the quartz in my teeth as if it were ice. 

I once trusted the whiteness (&the wilderness) but now know that darkness was there, wasn’t it?
           Not in the mica but in the caverns of glistening rock.

My heart    was  tender    as    a mountain peak.
 Your's was an alder staff gliding along the river like an otter foraging for salmon.

 I  have replaced my blood with the green of reflected pools and sink holes.

 My hair has grown mossy and wicked.

 You'll live happily ever after now
 as I remain here

 on this hilltop

 you

 once

 hung 

your hat on.

Saturn enters Libra

 Rolled up all tight like that at the foot of Ana Purna,

Saturn throws his outer rings like a ring toss game at a carnival up
 and over the summit.

           me ?   a cup half full&

 A sow bug armored in grey ribbed shell,

 chanting a Soul Coughing tune over and over again like a mantra.

 Translating the Tibetan Book of the Dead into Arabic.

  Covering my eyes with a pillow of mist .

  Traveling this last path as I grab handlfuls of huckleberries off tender limbs.

  I set the bar to match 14 thousand feet where peak meets heaven where 

  the finest gasses of atmosphere shift
  and change into soulfulness. 

Chanting down Babylon&

 rocking back &

      forth

 the pingy pangy sound of the tap of my foot 

against the glass door that separates us
 from our fate.

i am taking the miles back.

The song the fogbank sang to me

         I drive to town today in torn  brown   sweatpants    covered
 in chicken manure&olive oil

listening to Peter Case and a fierce banjo

chewing the ganja hash from my fingernails

astonished that my creeks are still flowing water

repentant for all the sins and aberration inflicted by my flawed crappy dreams and ideals

chewing the fat from my guilt&self doubt

chewing the finally I am getting pissed finally from my fingernails  but it's that plaintive&

plucky tune that made me stop by the side of a road to photograph a crumpled up paper bag lying on the broken yellow line of highway one.

last thoughts on woody guthrie

the 4th of july

Ella Fitzgerald - Black Coffee

Gloria!

Walk & Don t Look Back - Peter Tosh & Mick Jagger

I have a pink gingham apron, autographed on the pocket with a sharpie marker by exene cervenka

Fucking hell, there are so many disappointments in life. That bonfire that never caught on. Your mother never loved me. My torn fishenets right before you seduced me.. The John Prine eight track that melted in a heat wave traveling I5 on our acid trip in 73. The broken glass. That evening camping in Clear Lake when we laughed so hard we spilled the honey jar filled with peyote. Why I did not have your baby back then when I was in college. The time I sliced open a just line caught jack mackerel in the middle of the Bermuda triangle and had no wasabi.

The Fields of Humboldt

Woke to the tallest trees bathed in different particles of light. Meadow and field benevolent among silent elvin anarchists. A trickster pulled me  out  into  the moonlight , then you know as things go , eclipse and shatter find treasure under the heap of tears and stars. Fifteen girls in matching red stitched up leather cowboy boots ride up the riverbed   gravel    crackling    under hoofs   emolliated    by rain&honey .
              Are all of our meanderings in vain?
  All the beauty of the world is encased in diamonds  gone to waste by the hands of reckless  and    careless men  all our passions dashed by the cloister of moss    by sepulcher    by chalice&two step.

Val Del Omar - Variaciones sobre una Granada

Three Dances Paul Bowles 1929

Ahoy from the Roy Fox

While eating hot dogs with louie out at noyo harbor yesterday

speaking of the ebbing and flowing of tides how the moon can turn you inside out

make iconic and meaningless our meanderings our tenacity our failings louie quotes an old zen koan that goes something like this

one must stay awake while falling down the well

perhaps you’d find a handle in there to grab as you fall or land on the proverbial donkey’s back there may be a spike of jagged metal at the bottom waiting to impale

your already beatotshit heart and there may just be a pool of calm water bathed in light you just really don’t know do you but I suppose if you are awake you’ll remember what inspired you to become human the next time around.

The Sylphs arrival

closing the gate

How does one watch this world end

You just do

The wind will tell you stories but birds will never lie.

The sky will speak in tomes of lavender and Swahili 

 tired    filled    with    remorse.

Yesterday, me and the dogs saw angels flying. I swear.

No one I know is sleeping.

The moss in the watershed is curled up and fetal……….. no birds nests

Raven killed their offspring. No one is telling.

a tale from long ago

A litany of sharp words flow in a berating river of cuts. My spirit tries

to soar above the pain. I draw swords. I cut the little rabbit open. no

blood. Hack! goes the cleaver as I seperate the hind legs from the

spine...She says, "I don't fucking care what you feel!" 

these words spoken by my best

friend.

Each breath or gasp is a genuflection to the diminishing sureness of all

things held permanant and dear.

The skin is pale pink with marbeling of white, Delicate. The kidneys rest

inside an envelope of fat, they're round and red like the lips of children,

I pop them out and slice them into perfectly sliced bits for the kitties,

the texture of thick silk, no emotion, they lie in a perfect pile, neatly in

a White porcelain bowl, the Black cats pounce! purrs and whistles" you make

me Sick" I can't stand being in the same room with you!" Lauren, my sous

chef cries as I sit stunned..  If I don't cook the Yellow potatoes right

away they begin to turn Brown, I layer them carefully in the Black iron pan,

staggering the shapes larger to smaller, brushing each layer with clarified

butter and a drizzle of heavy cream, the white melts into the pale Yellow ,

bits of cracked Black pepper a scattering of Bronze fennel leaves.. the hot

hot oven collides with the butter and edges Blacken, silhouettes of herb

look like the forest after a fire, stark contrasting shapes, delicate and

vulnerable.

"Honey, the shop is my new baby, I don't have time for you anymore, you're a

big girl now. " I am 11 years old.

The steak sears on the grill. The duck fat sizzles in the pan. I flip the

leeks over in the hot olive oil. They burn Black if you don't flip them

right away.

I was never attached to my name, it has always felt like an anomoly, a

spaceship, a crucifix. I have always felt the my given name had nothing to

do with me, when I hear it spoken I am astonished, my name to me is like

margerine or polyester, it has kept me from the actualization of my soul's

desire, my spirit's ease, if i changed it tho, I might remove my history, I

might remove those faded Sepia last breath images of my parents and family,

even though they now feel like a myth, as if they never happened, as if I

was born of coyotes, raised by cabbages and abandoned to the nest of a

cynical yet comedic band of feral ravens. I can't seen to find a place in

this world that feels comfortable, no matter how much I cook, no matter how

many layers of down I sleep in, no matter how many worn pairs of jeans I

own, no matter how many pairs of shoes I have this insatiable need to feed

people, even if they don't want me too. I have people who want me to feed

them, even if I don't want to. I feel like I carry alot on me and I don't

want it.

Yet I did this, this restaurant, this husband who is rarely home, this

barren womb,this tired voice, this kneeling acolyte, this resentful child,

this battered princess, this parched artist.

I ride a tightrope between acomplishment and submission (failure), though

never in the history of my women has there been submission in over 100

years. I find in my matriarchy, the deep green Tree Arm Pit, the place where

I hide all my stress under the limbs of her great strong arms, present.

Silent. Resilant. Alone, not lonely, oppressed yet not victim, clear of

karma, leeway to fuck up, Merrily..

If I put ground Sumac berries in lemon juice the color is Magenta.

If I put saffron in white wine , the color is Yellow.

If I macerate chives, just cut from the garden, with olive oil, the color is

Green.

I know the Cornucopia mushroom will turn Zinfandel Black.

Jasmine blooms in a profusion of sweet scent at my door. I carry in me the

myth of my hands washed in Cobalt, I carry in me an ability to heal.

Within the Red rose or the White calla, A Lilac's elusive sweetness,

thrashing of manzanita blossoms, scratches the skin, airborne acacia lemon

Yellow covers me in fine dust, Here, I feel I can wander about unoticed. I

feel as if I am at the other end of a funnel, life pouring in bigger than it

can come out. I feel in me the light , changing, pouring, diffusing.. I feel

the universe finally colliding with all my pain and I finally feel alright.

"You know, you are commiting a mortal sin! My father says, driving me down

Pico Blvd, to my Confirmation. What?, "Yes, your mother was married before

me and she divorced him, we were married in a civil court, and our marriage

is not recognized by the Catholic Church, so , your birth is not

acknowledged by the Catholic Church, which makes you a liar and a bastard!

"Daddy, what is a bastard?"  I am 12 years old.

You look down at the cutting board and there are substances, some llike

blood... beets.

Some like shit...duck sauce with Figs and Balsamic... Some like tears. The

Ice Water Glass Spilled.

Emotions fill up and flow over , rushed by an impatient tide.

A Moon Thwarted.      The phosporesence postponed by a convoluted tourist.

Mike brings me Blue and pale Turquoise eggs this morning, his Arcana hens

must be especially fertile. Each egg I crack open on the edge of a maple

board is a deep Yellow. Yolk spills from the egg, almost Orange it is round

and supple, glistening in the halo of clear fluid, often a marbeling of

Crimson blood lingers, chips of Blue shells floating. Suspended.. Amniotic.

In Paris last fall leaves brushing along the Boulevard St . Michel were the

color of these yolks, dry now they are souveniers of the street, taped to my

window, with a ocean behind them. I have an ocean behind parts of me. I

languish in  Emotion, like unpredictible tides, or moons given proxy of

orbit to comets. I lanquish in emotion arriving as estranged relatives,

skeletons and,or even apparitions. Exhaustion sets in.

Wounds appear and disappear like old fruit, once ripe and perhaps even

luscious, now somehow vanished into A Perplexed Universe.

I have a tendency to dwell on things. I say" I'm sorry" first, "Oh, it's ok,

it dosen't really matter

"Are you alright?".

The water is boiling now, and steam rises infusing the scents of bay leaves

and lemon and Lampang peppercorns in to the air. I am wrestling with a 25

pound octopus alone in my kitchen and it is longer than me, the long grey

tentacles protruding from a head, a head bigger than mine and a strange bird

like beak. Wise old eyes. Shaman Eyes. I grapple, clumsy and burdened and

ackward and flop the creature into the pot, it turns the most magnificant

colors of Pink and Mauve and Purple and Blue Black and I know this octopus

must not know what an enchanting color it has become, or even seen the

metamorpohsis of shape and texture and essence, upon the aftermath of it's

earthly transition.

We don't think we can take this anymore, this service.. we women who hold

our forts between our legs.. we women who buck and buck and the horse still

rides US we women who long for the soft golden meadow......... a whisper of

wind.

The place where feet don't ache, where the lower back don't ache, where the

fort cuts into our inner thigh, a dent mark

          a red line

          a bruise mark

          a wince in the darkness

The sum of my existance is bathed in olive oil and lemon, perhaps a small

crush of garlic added in the final toss...

The long sleepy ride home, Yellow line buzzing hard on the Black snake road

dead deer drunk rednecks that last table that sent the fish back the tears

shed in the kitchen before anyone got there, the deep breath that sent one

into the arena. Hungry lions, mean like Romans, capitalists, ungrateful.. We

manifested this, we Goddesses so we could feel what it is like to be human.

11/17/99

You can’t ride your pony through the pearly gates

Core.

Emptied out humans taking out all their shit

And dumping it into to the ocean .   

Deva.

“No turning back now       your prayer     won’t  buy  you

   a ticket to paradise   we    know   things   about

 the stars things that you will never know unless you

 move Devotion from journey to the               tidepool

                                                                                sea cave

                                                                               urchin shell “

constellation bathed in fate.

for kevin opstedal

 splayed out at the foot of mt tam

 i mucked about in the mud of the minus tide.

 i spun about
 swirled and danced as if

 i was free

 as if

 i

 was 

 faery

i know things. type. letterpress. alchemy. witchcraft.

Some people say the world is coming to an end. That the vein burst and we are bleeding to death. I think we are. There is no triage for this. Stuff the leak with poems kevin

That what I say.   neruda    cummings    sze     plath   di prima    corso   ferlinghetti

rimbaud

             blake

whitman    kerouac    ginsberg     bukowski   snyder   patchen   mcclure

             yea that’ll stop it.

6. 6.

just lately, right around 2am, i can hear jets flying back and forth along the coastline
this goes on for hours so i finally rise as the dawn cracks at 5 as the ravens arrive with one big
coo as rosie's paw and wimper nudge for attention by then i am exhausted by my dreaming often
apocalyptic often quagmired in some kinda gestalt that i know i got to work this shit out by now
by ebb and flow and often that the dreamtime is more soothing especially these days that the waking time

is


and i know i know i know deep down inside that all my longings and all my hopes all things dashed and driven out by the angry and vengeful fates now make sense now have a clear voice now become
my pony to ride into the mystery.

Looking at the earth from the inside out

Was my collapse a precedent for this one Would I Consider Myself noteworthy enough to Track Every Natural Catastrophe including my own the memo of

Personal sinkhole tornado flash flood oilspill earthquake hurricane volcanic eruption wings broken by crude oil sticking  to every cell in my body were I to write down the tale the devas told me last week of something more terrible  than we can imagine coming at us how they burrowed unseasonably and gathered all the dry wood they could carry built dams carted off acorn killed their offspring denied life to the new generation hunkered down for the fall of man the forest got real quite bat&owl just watching not singing how about this they cried.. how about this.