A Peek

“Just a peek,” she says, and eagerly peels 

a corner of bandage away from the fresh wound 
she so proudly acquired in her act of derring-do.
This, another of several preceding “peeks”,
begins to irritate the surrounding skin
where adhesive tugs and pulls.

After week of peeking, seepage leaks uglily
across the map of her knee, the borders expanded,
pushed outward by an invading army. Still, she
cannot resist a look, or a hundred a day,
running recon on the elusive healing progress
hidden under the worn out bandage.

Good Night

As if to foil some clarity
or lack thereof,
the heavens tonight are
obscured entirely
but for Venus beaming
some secret smirk
and the moon reflecting
some shallow thought
onto the backs of the clouds.

And I am bare-assed
and feeling the warmth of
some strange memory of fall
in the wind with a welcome shiver.

A Lake

Hoisted upward by the hips, the body, a drenched hairpin

but for the flailing tornadoes storming rain in four directions,

pauses to admire the face-to-face image just after cresting the surface;

recalling to life the first love a life knows, an infatuation really,

perhaps never outgrown, a child’s favorite blanket

stored in a pillowcase at the bottom of a drawer that over time

is shared with only the closest friends less and less frequently.

Winter claims his kingdom,

petrifies the world below, forgotten

underfoot, under skate, under snow,

under the frigid table of inactivity.

Through the aged mirror pane thickened with chill,
a fading picture, almost recognizable,
is stricken, paused in time. Still,
heartbeats pound out of the red clay, dim
and rhythmic as a dying clock, barely
reaching up to their solid roof.

Boaters part the hair of the water,

swimmers take to the sand,

and Summer dredges up the long sleeping

or long dead flotsam from below.

A deep, rumbling growl, the belly of the lake,

demands the return of what it relinquished:

“Come back and get your sea fins.”

To a Sycamore

Sycamore in autumn,

golden hue emerging from

a sea of green surrounding.

Your trunk, your limbs

stretching appropriately

and with ease—

the unequivocal ideal.

Earned beauty in the patchy bark

with its shades of green and gray

from the bitter and the sweet

sloughed off and scarred,

badged with life.

From under your shadow

the world drinks up, sucks in,

devours your perfection

where it unexpectedly comes;

the form, the function

curving with purpose; age

compounding strength

compounding wisdom.

An Expectation

She returns to ground zero
anticipating a lingering cloud
to remain outside of herself;
perhaps a haze as thick as
the memory that lays siege 
her mind, her being

like the smitten psychopath
who expects to see his love
at the subsequent funeral;
or the life-prisoner released
in his twilight years
grasping at threads of normalcy
from what had become
his security blanket.

Limerick o' the week, a la Mad Kane

Methinks I will end up posting more weekly limericks than other original poetry for awhile, as the fun of their composition is quick and puts me in enjoyable company! Again, I recommend any readers of this limerick click over to Mad Kane's Limerick-off Monday to submit one or be delighted in reading the others!

The beginning line this week is: "A fellow had made a mistake..." and variations thereof.

Here's mine:

A love-struck man made a mistake,
took a femme out for wine and a steak.
After the sup
he invited her up
but heard, “I don’t do sausage, but cake.”

Mad Kane's Humor Blog Limerick-Off Monday

I just discovered the blog of the lovely Madeleine Kane, who creates a Limerick challenge every Monday for open participation.View details via link above. Basically, she writes the first line of a Limerick and anyone is free to submit their own continuation of the verse.

This week's opening line was: "A man who was known for his flash". I highly recommend clicking over to her blog and reading some of the highly entertaining entries!

Here's mine:

A man who was known for his flash
was too quick for the coppers to stash;
garbed only in skin,
his big, toothy grin,
and below a revolting mustache.