ElizPoetry

Moon Dance San Francisco

For my brother Mark, who pointed me toward San Francisco, Sausalito, and Big Sur, where I found Kathi.

a fire-orange mushroom moon
silently explodes the skyline -
concrete melts against brilliance -
steel relaxes into shadow

San Francisco, silhouetted,
slips into something warmer -
tight rectangles billow into
soft bodies gently swaying

on the bay a dancing pathway
ripples full of liquid flame,
gently burns to Sausalito,
splashes fire through our window

waves of moonlight lap across
our ceiling - Kathi murmurs,
“look the city’s dancing”, then her
moonfire smile touches flame to me

Flowering

Caring for pain
of new growth,
communicate
gnarled experience,
but cast no shadow -
remembering need
for sunlight -
love and let live -
trust flowering youth
to find its own truth
in your story -
thirsty roots
make delicate
distinctions between
caring and control

Rip Tide

Sometimes, when I look
into your smile,
I feel a vertigo -
you radiate a river into me
that sweeps me up
and pulls me off my course

then I must kiss you quickly
or I’ll have to look away,
for fear the flow
might grow so strong
that I could sail into your soul
and disappear

Inside Out

Not to listen
I leave
the radio on all day

not to know
I read every word
in the newspaper

not to feel
I keep in real close touch
with all the girls

not to remember
I watch others
not to see
me

Gift

Perhaps this light fountain
leaping between branches
balanced in our campfire
is some fleeting
parasitic wood bloom
whose reproductive rapture
breathes us heat

Scarlet Fires

Scarlet fires burned in my blood
and flashed through Annie’s rising blush,
like autumn streaking across
the forest leaves

they flared and roared in my brain
when silk ribbons she loosened
brushed soft through ringlets
around her warm shoulders

they danced in my dreams
as she undressed for me,
like a columbine opens to dust perfume
on the woodland wind

now they burn on through my soul,
as through Hester’s breast they burned,
turning passion to ashes;
romance to charred sorrow