Free Verse # 384 (my book of love)

Batroun, November 2016

In my book of love
and so long as I can remember
I’ve been writing you
a poem each day,
and each day
I’ve been burning
this poem in your heart,
its smoke the incense
that fills my lungs,
the perfume that scents
the vineyard of my nights and days.

~

He drew her to his chest
like the arms of the forest
draw the falling leaves
in heaps over the breast of the earth
to eternal sleep and rest.

~

Dawn finds us,
two bodies shivering wet
interlocked inside the fist
of a single heartbeat,
the vapor of our skin
mist drifting in the wind,
filling the rivers and forests
with love’s ancient voice,
a soft moan unfurling its dew
on the cheeks of the green earth.

~

Like darkness in the wine
she resides in my soul,
the ferment of my longings,
my ache and hope.

~

Avec toi je marche
à l’infini des étoiles,
à la place d’où est tombé
le premier des poèmes.

~

Dirt under my fingernails,
dust on my clothes,
all day since dawn
in her vineyards I toil,
at night I fill my soul
with the wine of her mind.

~

My breath at dawn…
petals burned
in the fire of longing,
their ashes
in the rising sun
an aura of fragrance
whispering your name.

~

…and I with my ear
on night’s heaving chest
hear your name uttered
in wisps of dew and starlight…

~

The owl on your favorite teacup
hoots in the lonely night,
‘where are you? where are you?’
no one crossing over
to touch me with your light.

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Haiku # 438

A moment’s pause…
her fragrance aflutter
amid the pages of the day

~

The flowing waters flow,
the trees and grass
bend in the wind…

Haiku # 437

Winter without rain
and long nights kissed
by the moon’s lonely light

~

With the red leaves
their voices falling…
cicadas at dusk

Haiku # 436

No one in control…
how beautiful it is
to live and die

Free Verse # 383 (her poem stepped into my eyes)

I looked at her
and the wind breezed,
and my heart
like a shivering leaf
was carried
far beyond the silent hills.

~

The wind blows,
the thunder claps,
my hand
into the dark reaches
searching for your hand,
and my mouth for yours
aches
like a wound
for its healing balm.

~

One winter morning
you look out the window
and snow covers
everything;
just like that,
sometime in the night
your poem touched my cheek,
now, at morn, looking out the window,
your breath covers everything.

~

Her poem
stepped into my eyes
and closed the door,
ever since
I could only see
through her veil of light.

~

My breath
a river of mist and fog
circling her neck,
its dew falling thick
lacing her white hills,
her breasts, belly, and back
all soaked with the shiver
of poetry…

~

In the shadow
of the poem
let us surrender breath
and rise again in spring,
two rose-trees
from a single stem.

~

How do I write?
I feel your hand
on my chest,
over my heart,
and writing happens.

~

Howling winds outside,
on my table
a candle flickers
by a dreaming book,
her hovering breath
in the air drips –
the ambrosia of silence.

~

The sound
my poem makes
when touched by her breath…
in the silence of the night
a candle praying

~

At dawn
my breath is a butterfly
from flower to flower
fluttering
searching for her mouth

Tanka # 91

In the quiet
of winter nights
your poem
a forest of tender leaves
aflame in my chest

Haiku # 435

Many autumns hence
the fallen leaves
still blowing in the wind

Free Verse # 382 (the clock is broken)

Distant and apart
we whispered
in the dark,
her breath in my ribs
a billowing sea,
mine in hers
a swelling moon,
and together
poetry…

~

In the heart of the poem
I am a house
full of yearning,
my windows
are burning candles
all waiting for you.

~

Our poems are birds
that flock in twos,
always flying
between me and you,
singing always
our voice combined,
wing to wing
over sea and sky,
and into horizons
of eternal light.

~

Poetry is the medium
and you are the bowl
holding this sky

~

Even you, undying stars, shall one day sleep,
The fog alone over our graves shall silently creep.

~

I tasted poetry
upon her breasts
that lulled me
with their heave
to a rest
deep and abiding
as I curled
my heart’s fire
in their nest.

~

The fire dwindles,
ache subsides,
our bodies as one
sleep all night.

~

Head on the pillow,
my breath
between your lips
surrenders,
a candle burning
in your lungs,
its light seeping
in your blood.

~

Turning and turning
the clock is broken,
it suffered one gaze
from your eyes.

I Want to Touch You

I want to touch you
yes I want,
with my heart’s fire
with my heart’s want,
and spend this life
in this weave,
a spider tangled
in your moonlit dream,
a poem rising
to its eminent height
in the silent sea
behind your eyes,
a poet vanquished
by a breath
softer than softness,
whiter than death.

The Touch of Your Grace

This touch
that is my beginning
and end
O tell me
of its curves and bends
and how it will twist
my spine to break
and how it will shake
my ribs apart
and how
trying to contain you
it will fail
so it will just sing you
to the sea and sky
and all that is holy
and all that is mundane
shall before
the glimpse of your face
suspire
and with a sigh puffed
before they fade
shall say the unsayable
with a word of light
and you will smile
and smiling you will set
the world in motion
the stars at rest
and everything and everything
will be in place
just by a touch
of your infinite grace.

Haiku # 434

Monday’s down…
by the window a bird
chirping on a leafless branch

Free Verse # 381 (sea of moss, sea of stars)

Body against body
we wrestled all night,
each soldered movement
a brushstroke
painting our lust
an offering on the altar
of the burning moon.

~

She read his poem at morn
and it clang to her lips all day long,
taking her by surprise
every now and then
as if she was being kissed breathless,
as if she was being taken
on the altar of love.

~

Beyond the passion
and the cataclysm of fire
we were two flowers
silently opening to one another,
singing the eternal song.

~

Faceless
to the solitary dawn
I turn again
and move along my way,
the way of thorns and pebbles,
the desert way
in the poem’s heart.

~

Here the road ends
and the light
at the end of the world
dawns in my eyes,
here my heart is a garden
blooming with poems
no lips will drink,
blooming with flowers
no one will smell.

~

Artist unknown

Cocooned in poetry
into the mountain of fire
we vanished,
the slow burn of our moans
smoke seeping
on the fervent wind,
arousing the world.

~

On her inside
his poem grew,
sea of moss,
sea of stars,
an infinite touch
sweeping through;
and when she quivered
suddenly and without reason,
when up along her spine
shivers incessantly travelled,
when she found her thighs
trembling with ache,
the softness of their canvas
stained,
she knew
that inside of her
he is growing,
swelling tidal
with softness and rage,
and that his moss and stars
will soon cover her body,
sheathing her inside a skin
of fervent poetry.

Wandering Thought # 42

The power play in sex is one of the most difficult things I had to come to term with. This being said, to make a fetish of the power play, to make it the focal point of the relationship is to miss out on the spiritually interpenetrating aspects that truly form the throbbing core of why two people are together, and what makes them expand and grow together into that which is held above them. The power play is a form of expression, this character or that being suited to this spectrum or that, this essence or that. On its own it does not supersede or form the essence and budding center of the connectivity.

Haiku # 433

Autumn’s clouded moon…
a grain of incense
burning in the sky

~

In a raft
alone
wide at sea

Free Verse # 380 (the dance of change)

One breath of her silence
was enough to turn me away
from a world of vanity and pleasure;
with my first breath of life
I chose her, I chose her love.

~

The dance of change,
summer to autumn rain,
and the day my body
will be earth once again.

~

Restless at dawn,
my churning heart
washing all the stars
in puddles at your feet.

~

I wake at dawn
and write to you
hoping that you will read,
hoping that you will read and sigh.

~

I feel you under my skin
glowing in the dark,
a river of light tearing
my heart into a shout,
a poem filled with meaning,
a voice filled with love.

~

There is a crack in the world
and your voice
leaking through
is now everywhere;
in every sound,
in every silence,
I hear you sigh and whisper,
I hear you call.

~

Your kiss
like a meteor
explodes into my skin
and in the aftermath
I am fire and ash
and a poem melting
through your fervent hills

Free Verse # 379 (the face I loved before I was born)

Silent moon
passing over the hills
and I am here
in the poem’s abyss
writing your breath
a quilt of flowers
covering the silent earth.

~

So I think of you
in the moonlight at dawn
and I am a poem
full of remembrance
of the face I loved
before I was born.

~

Liminal light at dawn
and I swear
with the fingertips of poetry
I can touch your face
made of holy white.

~

For eons I could wait for you,
the moon will be the moon,
and your breath will be the womb
in which I live and write.

~

When I can’t sleep
I hold your hand in my hand
and fervently write
with your breath for a pen.

~

Her buoying breath,
the incense of honey
burning on the altar
of moonlight at dawn.

~

Alone in my poetry,
a moon weaving his verse
on the other side of silence
waiting for you.

~

Night is suddenly
filled with shadows
all falling from her hair.

~

The moon moves closer,
her breasts overfull
with the lure
of immemorial centuries,
the starlight in my poem quivers
reducing my soul
to a shining white.

~

Clad in fog we vanished
into the mystic mountain of union,
inseparable we rose again
breathing open
wide as the sky.

~

I live in anticipation
of your next breath
that will come
like an autumn leaf
to rest against my cheek,
that will come
like a summer breeze
to wrap my neck.

~

I am a worshiper
in the house of mercy,
with the mesh of your pen
drain my blood
then write me in the sky,
with the wick of your candle
drain my tears
then light the dark night.

Free Verse # 378 (wolf, poet, man)

Your breath at dawn hovers
and in the dewing light
I stroke your face
with the brush of poetry

~

Anima,
womb of ardent water,
here, before your altar,
see into me,
wolf, poet, man,
with your boundless desire
open me wider
to the fullness of your moon.

~

Your breath
a wandering wind
pressing me on and on,
to what port?
to what poem?
No, not to a place
does it call me
but to a new way being.

~

Son sein
dans sa bouche,
fleur d’amande,
fleur de cerisier,
lune qui tremble
toute nue dans le ciel.

~

Her breast
in his mouth,
almond flower,
cherry flower,
a moon shivering
all naked in the sky.

~

In autumn
brown leaves
in her hair,
and her breath
the smoke
of burning grass
drifting over the fields.

~

November’s chill,
the fragrant flower
more fragrant still
as if, knowing it will die,
it sets her heart free
in the cold sky.

~

Photographer unknown

Breath of dawn,
breath of love infinite,
sun of my heart,
into your neck
my curled poem melts,
into the sea dreaming
behind your sleeping eyes.

~

Time was a vase of broken memories.

~

She is dreaming again,
my poem is stirring
with a longing
older than the stars.

~

In this life
where we live once
my ache is to touch you,
make you whole.

~

Sleepless nights are for you, for our poetry.

~

She hated the camera
yet when I photographed her
with the lense of poetry
she looked into my eyes
asking me to bare her
a little, a lot more.

~

My lust
your lust
honeydew
in our lungs burning,
from the censer
of our merged mouths
an incense thick rising
and filling the whole night.

~

Waking
for a moment
during the thick night,
the thought of you
a candle burning,
its shadows playing
on the walls of my room,
painting images
of life death,
painting the hidden stories
of my life.

~

They tell me of the moon, I look at you and smile.

Letter, November 13, 2016

The earth looks on, a heavy longing in her eyes; tears hang full on the naked branches of the trees; and in the birdsongs the white roar of winter is already heard. Autumn is deep, pressed on by the cracking whips of the winter winds. And I, with my candle burning, with my book and my cup of silence, weave words in my fingers and pretend they are the dark curls of your hair. Your breath drifts on, the smoke of burning grass over empty fields. I gaze again into the infinite distances surrounding me and hear your voice calling from everywhere. Oh my love, what have you done to me? This ache for you is a wound that wants to heal; and yet, whenever its crust hardens, whenever its lips are about to mend, your fingers, white as winter snow, soft as moonlight, peel through its layers again and teach me the meaning of poetry. The candle is burning out; the incense stick is uttering its final breath; and the camp of the night has laid its siege. Give me patience, teach me how to wait, and let me burn with the oil of your longing. Let me be the moon on the curve of your lips.

Tanka # 90

All the things
I thought I’d be
when I grow up…
leaves are falling
in the forest deep.

Haiku # 432

The birdsong passed…
the branch shivers
naked in the wind

~

Worry or don’t worry
winter will bury you
a seed in the ground