no one will ever be praised for
a claim to blame

there is a quiet breeze
outside
it rustles the leaves
at the tops of the trees
outside my window
i can hear the train
bustling
while those around me slumber
dreaming of the dreams
i knew of only days ago
for years long now
i have found my way to the home
inside my being

i don't know where you sleep now
but i am claiming the fame to you

1:11

whatsoever the hour
i've forgotten
it is calm
time is relinquished from her assignment

i am surmounted by sadness
as i don't see time
and i don't see you
and my reflection, it's changing

and the brevity of moments
in which that occurred
begs me bothersome

are your cheeks stained with tears, like mine?

you lay your face,
sticky from the day’s tribulations,
in my hand
your eyes happened on my face
so many times in that moment
it felt like days
that we lay there
with your eyes attempting
articulation
and my mouth,
it perched on time
hanging open like a fool
and now
now i am mournful
at our silence

page ten

a black comma
at the end of a phrase
on a piece of paper
stuck in a mailbox
onto you will never pass your eyes
or engage your mind to read from.

a blue ribbon
poking out of a Bible
saturated with pious
hand oil
from years of arrogance
in the name of Jesus.

I am nauseated with a hunger.
I’ve set a place with knife,
fork and spoon,
iced water,
and a clean plate.
I wish that you would seat yourself at that
setting,
and talk to me.
as
I am not a commonality,
a narrow-minded, blind ignorant woman.
at times I’m unsure
of you,
as you are unsure
of me.
so, when I say I like words,
or that I love the sound of a train passing,
I mean it.
And I trust that you know this.

I want a fluffy pillow

Dear The Internet,

I had a freak out tonight, in the bath tub. I solid panic attack, in water. I got in that tub to relax and get ride of my migraine, but instead, I wound up having a psychosis. I spoke to my shower curtain for a while, too. I guess my only question for the world on the latter side of the experience is, "how do I get along with you, world, when you always prove to hurt me so much?"

I'm putting myself to bed.

XOXO,
Bertha

Oh, P.S. I almost forgot, Happy 5-0, Mommymeister. I love you.

Do you want some butter?

I sang out of tune
Out of key even
And you didn’t walk away from me
you may have actually stood up
And screamed at the top
Of your lungs

The same thing

The same thing that I had read
Sang and wrote
Bowed rowed and ran
The same thing I had cried
For the 21 years prior
To that evening

And today
Tonight
On the eve of yesterday
And the dawn of this jour
I want to hear more
But I listen with the most guster
I can muster, to silence.

voids

It’s a Tuesday
Somewhere
You are nowhere
To be found
I’m on the ground
and there is a sense of
urgency
inside of me
its like remorse or maybe toxicity

I am alone

Not in loneliness
But without you

I reached
I reached up so high
With both of my hands
The palms of them were waiting
With kindness and depth
Honesty and truth
Sweaty and broken and raw
They reached for you
And they came back down
Empty
Holding nothing but sorrow
And more sadness
Your sadness mixed with mine
And I’m having trouble
Emptying them
Perhaps I lack the will
The silent will that you
Attempt to teach

I am filled with gratitude
And a longing
To learn more
But you are in control of the lessons
I abhor such a thing
abiding to it

the air was thick
and now thin
as the moons wax
and wane
reminding me of you
and the nights we spent

I am left with a nothing
A nothing so void and empty
A void defined
In your terms
Terms of hate perhaps
Or maybe of respect
A void that is silent
Such a silence
I respect
Until the morrow
On which you determine

yesterday

It’s difficult to rest my mind on nights when I allow it to wander too much. It wanders itself into a wonder and then I have to write to wind it back up into a brain again. It’s like a garden hose all sprawled out on the lawn in the middle of the night. And there’s no need for a hose at 1 o’clock in the morning because the dew is beginning to settle on the grass and the flowers are asleep like I should be.

i thought i saw you today. But as it turns out, it was only your doppelganger.

puked up my guts tonight
That turkey didn't taste right.
could have been too much coffee
I know it's not the things
I've ingested
but rather those digested.
it's cuz I love and miss you
and am hoping you are well.
I know this because of my stomach;
it's nervous.
at the thought of you

GAI

There is melancholy rain happening outside. It is such a good day for GAI.

Wish I could write like this:

"Virginia May"

slept high up in the Rockies
set my clock for californ-i-ey-aye
and i dreamed up somethin special to give that ocean
man, she cuffs me anyway

so i’m banking on virginia
to keep me clear and calm and straight
just like clock work seems to tell us
with every passing storm there’s just a harder hail

so light my way, Virginia May
i can’t sit still, just pace across this hallway
we spent all this time
just trading crimes,
while the tune-smith packed a lunch,
he’s headed down the coastline

there’s a loneliness thats blowin
well i heard it from the radio man
he’s been locked up in the belfry
listening close, to a string upon a can

me, i’m sailin on to that savior,
she’s a pilgrim living on the modern time
and ever since i found her magic
now every car or cloud that passes is a sign

light my way, Virginia May
i can’t sit still just pace across this hallway
we spent all this time
just trading crimes

and i’m saving all my sleep for another life
i’m saving all my sleep for another life.

Or like this:

"Big Black Car"

you were a phonograph, i was a kid
i sat with an ear close, just listening
i was there when the rain tapped her way down you face
you were a miracle…i was just holdin your space

well time has a way of throwing it all in your face
the past, she is haunted, the future is laced
heartbreak, ya know, drives a big black car
swear i was in the back seat, just minding my own

and through the glass, the corn crows come like rain
they won’t stay, they won’t stay
for too long now

this could be all that we know..
of love and all.

well you were a dancer, i was a rag
the song in my head, well was all that i had
hope was a letter i never could send
love was a country we couldn’t defend.

and through the carnival we watch them go round and round
all we knew of home was just a sunset and some clowns

well you were a magazine, i was a plane jane
just walking the sidewalks all covered in rain
love to just get into one of your stories
just me and all of my plane jane glory

i heard a train last night

I woke up
warm in your arms
your hands were buried
in me
your breath on my neck
and I was so very content

but this is a fleeting moment
it is forever gone
until
you let your bluebird out to play
and you are earnest
to live again

this house is full of words

i took a chance
and glanced
inside the mailbox
you weren't in there

i wished
a reality into a dream
last night
and this morning
when you smiled
in my direction
it seemed true and real

and now
i occasion you often
in the presence of
your absence
because i know you are there
even when you're not

j'espere

you slept soundly
noisily
until the train came
to take me away
to a place warm with morning sunbeams
that fell on my cheeks and made my hair prickle
to a place where the breeze carries mist
that baptizes me in my dreams
and my despair
is that one day you might
join me there

irritated to the point of counting syllables (13)

i want to fill a table
with the things of you and me
pay the bill then walk away
leaving the hustle
and the bustle
of the me and you
laying there
til later there
the you and the me are real

---

you made me pop pills
for a year or two or more

to keep me from her
you made me build a brick wall

you're a selfish bitch
and i will never more brick
and mortar my heart
to ready your happiness

---

a moment in my life
is speckled with you and me and we
a moment in your life
you found comfort within my shelter
i thought to do the same
and found myself wanting for you more
and now there is silence
it is not golden or true but blue

me, you, her and she

I walked that hall
On yesterday of last month
Glancing in windows
To rooms filled with desks and books
In search of you,
Of truth to lies
That otherwise settled
In the forefront of my mind’s heart
You wandered elsewhere
For truths to a lie
I never told
But we will be ok
Tomorrow

I drove that highway
From my life into yours
Sending unempty words
That you refuse to publish
In the book of You
And I wonder and wander why
But I want more than a gander
More than an intermittent conjugated verb of hope
That you are my one true thing
So we will be a me and a you
Until when

I slept next to you
Filling the sheets with renewed life
That you didn’t order
Your slate could have been cleaned
I would have washed it and disinfected it
Cared for it, fed it
Held it and comforted it
And I tried
And it was fine and grand
Until I breathed too loudly
one afternoon
and you wanted the dirt and grime
the yelling and the fighting
the heartfelt guilt and the disheartening lies
smeared back on your slate
and I learned to want the same
until today

friendship

Yesterday
I looked at you
And you and I
Became stripped of our dignity,
scantily clad in a set of we.

A you,
Who,
Stands at the edge of
My faces and angles,
competes
for our endangered we
to complete

your box resides under my feet
finding your voice in my throat
and your hand covered mine
out of honest love
and a scarceness in unity, i have ne'er known before
i know not of this kind of we
but you and me
seem to be

a we for today
and tomorrow.

and now i know

we climbed a tree that day
last year
my shirt was twisted at the collar
and your pantleg was caught in your sock
but we didn't care
because you were next to me
and i was next to you
and that's what happiness looks like

we took a walk one day
last spring
you pointed to a bird
and said so to me
but i didn't hear you
because some man was mowing his grass
but i followed your finger
and the gaze of your happy eye
and i knew what you felt
because i felt it too
and that's what love looks like

we fought in the car
you were drunk
and i was tired
we found ourselves silent
even the radio was turned to off
and i was there, next to your seat
and you were there, next to where i was seated
but we weren't there
and that's what misery looks like

i dialed your number
in the rain, where i sat
completely alone
and you answered while you drove yourself from where you were
to where you were going
and we spoke truths to one another
and i laughed
and you smiled
i could hear it in your voice
and that's what friendship looks like

the scent of lavender

remember
that month
every curve of all the inches of my body
were nestled into that of yours
and we came out
out from behind the wall of a secret
that day, last hour
to reach across boundaries
into the collective conscious
of our desire
and we discovered
mutual identity

but that was so long ago
so long ago now
that you dare not remember it
even when i reach back into the bucket of us
and show it to you

what will the well
of our wills become?

i have never before
gazed into the eye of the tomorrow sun
only to have it stare right back at me
though i cared not to see a reflection
i longed to see a yearning
and your stare painted such a picture

a picture of your lovely face
sunken into the pillow of my bleeding heart
each night i found you dreaming
and each morning i left you asleep

a picture of a song
from the album of you
and of me
of the we
for which we spoke
and breathed and sang
as all of these feelings
existed not in the reel of time

i wanted to be the dew on your face
when you woke up from camping outdoors without
the shelter of a tent

i wanted to be the thrust of your abdomen
in the longest seconds
between the two of us

i wanted to be the cold chill
that ran from the inside of your ear
all the way to your roundest curve

i wanted to be the you that you wanted me
to be

and these are the ways i longed for you to want me
and you wanted to long for me
but you didn't know how

i tried
i tried to show you the when, where and why
so you could compose the stuff
of our next moments together
but you didn't want the these or those
or even the ones over there

and these thises and thats are okay
even the ones over there are able
able to stand alone
stagnant in the moment from which they were conceived
perhaps someone else will want this
and i will do that with them
but i know when they and i do
you will want those over there, in that moment, to be alive again.

and i am frightened so say the this that and those
so i write them instead
to no one
at all.

i still like coffee

your foot grazed mine
that chilly afternoon
i will tell you this later
next month
or last
and you will deny it

my feet sat quietly
(with the rest of me)
in puddle-soaked shoes
from standing water
outside
i will wade in
later today
as i wait for you

your car is green

do you remember
that night
later this evening
when your beautiful sparkling
blue-green eyes
filled with wonder
and secrets
that my heart desires
averted their attention
from my own

i don't even remember
the color of my eyes
i never look at them
not anymore
not in a long while
not ever before
but i remember when you glance
a gaze
into them
i recall the fluttering of my soul
as it flies out of my body
to fill all the space
in the room around me

do you remember that morning
tomorrow
when you will wake up
and not think a moment about that space
you caused my soul to fill
because i will
and do
and have
for a while
and for always

make me a liar
you've done made me a fool