~ admin

3.14.24

SATURN’S RETURN

Brick house and Oak porch they may be, but they’re no stationary objects. No. The House of Forgiveness is always on the move. You are just as likely to find it treading with oil-pipe oars in Louisiana swamps, as to watch it soar: cloud-bound and fresh off aircraft crash remains. Often times, after a forest fire, the house has said to be the only un-ashed thing for miles.

The only dry place after a Tsunami.

A structure so large, it houses every immigrant of every country (come on in), so small it fits in the barrel of any gun, in the needle of every addict.

So you see, The House of Forgiveness can at times, be difficult to find.

Unless it shows up, as it has for all of us at some time or another, at your doorstep.

~ admin

6.1.23

SATURN’S RETURN
I can’t really tell what it is exactly we hold on to.

Fear of some type, I’m sure.

Must be something to do with forgiveness. How people say it makes us better. Our quality weighed in part by how well we tolerate cruelty. I’m tempted to call that a happy make-believe-load-of-bullshit.
But I’m too self-serving not to give my forehead the chance to unfurl.

To baptize in Forgiveness’ waters—first find the tricksy bitch of a cunt:
Her home is timber and brick. Her cabinets; aged cedar.
Willow chairs rock atop Oak porch planks.
There, you’ll find every kind of wind-chime, plant-pot, and occasional soda can: some aluminum corpses of bullet-wounds-yesterday. Others repurposed dolls, crinkled, shiny and irreverent to the looming rust.
A less prudent person might akin her aesthetic; clutter. Most know she’s just eclectic.
She’s got chandeliers fashioned from old shower-heads and Frisbees. She makes stacking shelves from pinched airless balls. All types—the grass-deflated soccer and the sun-withered beach.
Forgiveness saves every fortune from every cookie, and she’s never thrown out the wrapper.
In fact she’s never thrown out any wrapper.
She’s fashioned cabinet knobs from chocolate foils, she insulates her windows with the cellophane of post dinner mints, and has a collection of earrings made entirely out of condom wrappers.

She keeps them all. The wrappers, the Happy Meal toys, the knick-knacks, the small trinkets, that one tiny pebble your first love used to knock on your window at night, and, on a different night, when love became heartbreak and window; broken-glass, Forgiveness picked every single shard off the carpet and fashioned herself a birdbath.

~ admin

8.10.22

SATURN’S RETURN / JANUS
last night the freezer thawed
and I meant it when I said it had nothing to do with you

it happens sometimes.
Takes a lot to run this powerhouse, this chariot, this vessel
too little power here, or too much push there
and the flip switches

it used to be worse—one could compost forests from the ashes of burnt bridges

I’m better now
but this isn’t the type of monster you get to walk away from

don’t get me wrong—I don’t shake at fireworks anymore, loud noises are less loud, no shocks to the body draining the life off my face
At least not anymore.

so when I say it’s not something I like to talk about

it’s not because I haven’t told these stories before
I just know what it’s like to tell them to someone who’s never been on the wrong side of
your daddy’s hunting riffle.
camo works on more than deer, you know, imagine being that doe
what if I told you; even deer can’t run as fast the women in my family,
when we hear a loud BANG

you can’t imagine how our windows would rattle
how we never stepped on cracks because
landmines break more than just backs—we’ve all seen enough evidence of that
it’s not a memory you can salt over your shoulder

But none of that matters.
not if the freeze in me doesn’t thaw in time to keep the force of your body from smothering mine.
Not if the fawn in me wont scream fire when you place my hand on your coals.

So yeah, I guess these monsters never fully leave you.

For some I’m sure the bristle in the memory drags orchestras of protests.

Then there’s people like me:
For whom the doe eye is more tremble than innocence
Us, who played opossum to survive
have a hard time knowing when to smile
and when to bear fang

I don’t talk about it now,
because I didn’t know how to talk about it then—
because I don’t jump at fireworks—I learned to know their schedule
because I don’t panic when you walk behind me,
but only because I’ve counted all the exits in the room

because the apology letter to my body (she was just a kid)
left out the promise
that it wouldn’t happen again
don’t believe me? there’s nothing war love more than a blindfold
so I dare you
pick up a map,

and point a finger





~ admin

8.4.22

FOOL.S.GOLD
I want to tell my friend

be brave

to grip the sum of her parts
from the debris in her headspace
sandbags over her cheekbones
plywood on her sternum keeps
her eyes from watching the crumble of the rubble in the tremble of her hands

I want to tell her
to shake off the shackles
before the Earthquake claims her foundation

as it has so many others
as it almost did me

sometimes the bravest thing to do
is to run


~ admin

8.1.22

SATURN’S RETURN
yeah, thunderstorm orgasms are cool
but have you tried honey raindrops?

I mean the silk-gold type
the ones that hug and hold your skin
soft with saltwater and kinship
they synchronize our laughter and delight

there’s nothing carnal here –
no sneak-peak glances, no undercurrent conversations

we traded those in for warm puddles on our feet
for comfortable eye contact
the type that holds no expectations
the type that sees you as you are, right then
the type of eye contact where one heart says to another
“I see you, I love you, you’re safe”

so…. yeah.
salaciousness certainly has a place
and lewdness is cool,

but friendship is better.

one-hundred times over,
I’d trade all the lovers in the world
for these magical friends of mine.

~ admin

7.26.22
LEECH
keep your fucking filthy sausages away from my garden – you hoarder, you glutton, you reptile, you scratch your lint-lidden greased-cheezits sud of a belly button. Swallow back your halitosis tantrums, you disdainful self-indulgent sadistic shit-stain. Slither back to whichever white “equitable” hell you came from. Eden’s not for the likes of you.

You are not welcome here.

And try keeping better track of your own cock next time.

~ admin

7.21.20

JANUS

“In Roman mythology, Janus was the god of doors, gates, and transitions. Janus represented the middle ground between both concrete and abstract dualities such as life/death, beginning/end, youth/adulthood, rural/urban, war/peace, and barbarism/civilization.“


There were foretellings of your coming you know. You’re pre-written in my pages. I didn’t know you then, but I saw you in the image boxes. In the half-opened-half-closed doors.
in the way the weights of past and future forced me present. Fitting then, for your coming to signal the end of the war.

“Janus was known as the initiator of human life, transformations between stages of life, and shifts from one historical era to another. He is usually a two-faced god since he looks to the future and the past. Janus was frequently used to symbolize change and transitions such as the progression of past to future, of one condition to another, of one vision to another, and of one universe to another. According to some, he was the custodian of the universe but, to all Romans, he was the god of the beginnings and the ends, presiding over every entrance and departure


My garden’s suffered as a casualty of my recent chaos. Her branches are brittle, there’s a carpet of grass coloring the places life thrives. Thrive, being the keyword here.
I’ve tended these roots ceremoniously, lovingly. Sometimes compulsively. It was cathartic back then – back when the entire world was becoming entirely too familiar with the inside of their home.
Things are different today. I can tell by the way my car millage jumped higher this month than the past two years put combined.
I patch the stucco and paint the walls. I fix cabinets, lights, and doorhandles. This time the work happens from the inside.
My garden? She’s here, dormant through the heat, dropping passion-fruits of labor at my doorstep. Tangy and sweet – popping hydration soothing the raw, coating the swollen, calming the nervous system to arouse the body.

A dedication made evident in each handful of soil.


“He protected the start of all activities. He inaugurated the seasons. The images of Janus are strange and evocative; they seem to combine time and place with an uncomfortable intimacy. We tend to think of the present moment as the most real experience: the past and the future are unknowable or distant.“


Strange and evocative. Strange as in peaceful, strange like tender, like humble, human, kind. Strange not to crave the chaotic.
And yes, evocative. Uncomfortable intimacy paints your face rose, shakes your legs timid. Not your arms though. Not the way they wrap around my waist. not the way the guide my hips, move me like deeper than those hail circles in lake water….

“Yet, if we think about the hinges of our own actions in the moment, we do move in a constant cause and effect motion—past experiences influencing the present, then a future outcome. The more aware we can link the opposites, the more we can find our way with conscious results.“


It’s the human in us that desperately seeks to justify our suffering. The part of us that still believes we must pay penance for our past pain. The gridlock voice inside your head that says you somehow deserved what they did to you. For the record; we’re not entitled to any particular event. Emotional injustices included. All we truly own, are our feelings, for as long as they’re here.

So what if our wounds aren’t fully healed? Janus, Pentacle King, Keeper of Doors, Master of Transitions – if the past is truly over, and the future isn’t here yet…. right here, in this moment I could care less.

~ admin

7.4.22

PANDORA
so then
I choose to make mosaics from my rubble
cast gold into cracked pieces

do away with the spaces in between
those pockets of air we blamed for keeping us apart

it’s all bullshit

I bond back my pieces with something stronger
more beautiful
a little wiser a little older

something that reflects back
it shakes off the blame
and says
“it’s not your fault, it’s no one’s fault.”

and so it is
not my fault (or yours)
but it is my responsibility
and my privilege
to take ownership where I can
to wash off the stains of guilt and blame
with bravery and accountability

accountability is
after all
the privilege of autonomy

~ admin

2.15.21

PANDORA
there’s no such thing as immunity to the pasts’ joys and grief
grief keeps the heart flexible – scarred but flexible
just ask the willow

~ admin

12.11.2021

JAGUAR
air-pockets are what separates the successful from the unsuccessful
the happy from the unhappy
and so on
air-pockets as in “where things should be”

but that’s the thing
they aren’t
they’re too busy belly-dancing with for happenstance
playing parcheesi with our grandparents
painting themselves with our spice cabinet
they’re texturing our scar tissue, our incoming wrinkles, our sore muscles and graying hair
they’re the paper on which we wrote our story
the footnote, and the ink.

air-pockets, on the other hand
are here to make sure we keep on living
to oxygenate
replace yesterdays red cells with today’s blood
it’s as inevitable as our history

our only part here is choice
to choke
or breath