Cursed ground

It’s just a patch of grass, as

green as that around it, yet

yellow and black tape cordons it off.

Why? What is so different, so dangerous, so other

about this patch?

Is something buried underneath,

alive still, twitching, itching to reach out,

grab ankles, uproot itself using umbrella mushrooms?

Maybe the other grass blades

simply decided they didn’t like that little patch,

that tiny section, that huddle of earth and sprouted seed.

Perhaps they can see something I can’t,

trapped in the details, their canvas of perfection rattled

because of the few individuals declared

broken who refuse to wilt under their gazes.

Or perhaps those cordoned blades

decided to erect a barrier themselves,

electric anger spiking

at being stepped on one too many times.

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Misinterpretation

The day is planned.

Until it’s not. Shaken by a few words

that shift what was stated before

and the fire

from this upending

is scorching my actions,

I’m not in control of myself anymore.

Music therapy

The sound resonates,

the chemical chamber full.

Angry blood sweetens.

Nest

The wasps are under my skin again,

their buzzing taking over

and vibrating my brain into ice,

breath cool but scorched words.

Heat in my face, on my tongue, on my lips

and only a dark cloud in my belly to blame.

I know the wasps will dissolve into sweet figs

tomorrow, or maybe the next day,

but I wish the ointment I brew from them

could be given now, with a kiss of apology

even though you always say you don’t need it.

Lightning Source

Where does it come from? teapot swirling with crackling anger

while its brother gargles out ideas and hurls them to the ground

just to analyse the way the leaves smoke and blacken after the impact.

 

The teacup is held to catch the droplets and cool them,

before watering the dry

and collecting the glass trees from the sand.

 

Ghostly, the surface shines to mirror,

its seed long carried away like beads

on a collapsing table.

Waterfalls

The pick strikes the ice and shatters the fragments

out into the air. Down they go, hearty lumps,

past my feet as I cling to the side.

 

I stretch up, pick ready, and strike again.

My chest hurts – I’m too eager, I know.

Fragments fly.

 

A routine: pick strike, ice diamonds

pick strike, ice diamonds.

Just frozen water playing rain.

 

So why am I bleeding?

Alphabet shapes

Sometimes the words don’t come.

Right when you need them most, they fail,

choked by tears or ripped up by anger.

 

I can block any bullets aimed at myself.

 

But the target is someone I love,

so the barrage fueling the muteness

unwittingly unleashes the beserker.

Water on a fire pit

Meandering

I see the fallen leaves drift away

from the footfall of my own silent steps.

The fire I felt

extinguished

by my own rationality

when all I want to do is break every piece of crockery

I own.

Path finder

You cradle the dragon against your chest,

shielding its sleeping form from the elements.

 

Walking proud

along sandy shores

that soak up your footprints

even as you make them.

 

Waves crash and swell,

music in its most natural fashion,

reaching

for the pull of your hand.

A friendly caress, an age old bond.

 

But it is not yet time to give in

and take its shelter,

Rocks must be overturned and mountains scaled.

 

The dragon already begins to stir

and it is still

far from home.

Ghost-touched

It travels up the cracks between floorboards like rot.

Fibres decaying more quickly that the feet

wearing them down can pick up on. The centre

bubbles and boils daily, vomiting forth rules

and regimes that make the smooth inner workings

catch in halting breaths. A solid foundation

now revealed to be wet sand, washed away

by the smallest hint of tide. Green, orange, red:

a progression of colours mirror the emotional response

of the gathering crowd. Someone offers a hand

but their fingers are blackened by frostbite.