with all the time in the world
I lose myself in the puckers and dimples of you
your contours under my palm are
a reminder of all good things
I am amazed at the soft pliability
of the most rigid parts of your body
tiny extended blood-pulsing rosettes
cheek to cheek, chest to chest,
thigh to thigh, nose to nose
atop the blankets
motionless
lost in the sadness of all of the world
Chagall 2020
With all doors and corridors blocked,
I retreat to the stairwell, where I hope
to levitate, ascend to the roof
Sentries, from the top floor down,
on each landing
As I begin to rise they aim and fire
and I am forced to alight on ground
A window!
I must find a window
to jump, catch flight,
bleed into nighttime sky
Chagall 2020
Got bit by a tick
shaking hands with Paul Tsang
now I got Lyme and the Hong Kong Flu
but babe…
I ain’t got you
My fingers too stiff
to play a sitar riff
lack wind to blow my harmonica too
and baby oh…
I ain’t got you
(Jerome – to the bridge!)
Used to be pretty now my pits need a shave
and this beard to my knees won’t do
paralysis and sneezing just don’t mix
oh baby oh, I’m in a fix
Comotosis in Manhattan General
with General Tso’s thrombosis
somebody throw me a line
so sweet and sour,
save me from these horse and buggies
wheeling up-down my spine
this final hour
Motionless, breathless,
like after making love with you
but this is Lyme and the Asian Flu
and still…
I ain’t got you
Chagall 2020
Talking to myself again,
the spirit moves me to tongues, jibberish,
shot from the hip, to some point, encircling,
a knee jerk, a spasm, catatonia,
asleep atop a tightwire. Tympani?
Are those really steel drums playing?
Or just the hum of song machines,
there behind the walls? The underground trains
speed, fluorescent murals, painted blacklight
tunnels that rocket to bright midday sparks.
Hot; starched curtains, white; edged lemon cotton.
Key lime pie and peaked, sweet meringue rosettes.
Life is easy in the sun; blood orange
juices run the length of your inner arm.
The parrot also blabbers,
straight from the beak, so to speak, turns a phrase
clean as a whistle or a pirate song.
I wash your arms in clear cold water.
Stickiness dissolves, your limbs are refreshed,
renewed, invigorated, christened.
These streets are ancient; the clay is primal.
The sunlight is primordial. The stars
are the reason for the day, for being.
Raison d’etre. The way it’s to be.
“Marcello!” In the fountains, once again.
Your place has large sculpted window boxes,
arcs, smooth plaster, your own personal asps;
so much fun to kiss in rooms well tended,
in classic southerly light, long lean rays,
from ceiling to floor, in lofts in Paris,
light caught in seams of wood planks, sock-varnished,
colors ride steamed mist, swarms of bees take hold,
so much space between me and the thing seen,
which is you, grace and splendor, at its peak,
where the oxygen is too thin, miles high.
You can gasp all you want, you still can’t breathe.
When you mistake up for down, more than once,
is it time to buy champagne by cases?
Accelerate the deterioration.
Kill brain cells in droves, fly ’em to the moon.
There’s a wind that blows when you’re not around,
scented of nectar suckles and honey,
combs of thick syrups, agave, sugars,
lustrous caramels, burnt deep sienna,
It rains and lifts the mocha, brew of loam,
rich in mineral, organic matter.
You’d be proud to be associated.
Everyone agrees, nothing but wonder.
Smells that evoke another time and place.
Melodious aromas shadowbox.
Mardi Gras and everyone is elsewhere,
despite being right here, smack dab in it.
I am so sorry to have to do this.
i capture the light, a strand from my lips,
small fibers connecting there to her own.
Not yours. There’s something wrong; I feel feint, spent.
It’s another earth, I’m so sure of it.
It’s that other me, I’ve kept under wraps,
a subtext, a prelude to sanity,
an idiot in the making. Save me.
© Carlos Chagall, 2013
We hop on a branch and we both whistle
My love climb higher!
in sunlight
carefree frolic, with big claw feet
we perch on birchwood warm
I side-step the blossom
pink petal, then I think again
and pluck it
for you
beak to beak an offer
for hands I have none
and
we are happy
for now
together
at the canopy’s tip
Chagall 2020
I drink 2% milk
98% of the time
Chagall 2020/8080
A cardinal family has made a small holly bush their home,
very near by garden gate. When I approach I whistle, not hum,
Miles Davis’s opening solo from So What. The modality, the D dorian
riffs and bluesy slurry passing tones, soothe the tawny female, who used to flee the nest when I’d approach without sound. Now as I seed the earth, we are side by side, and I am starting to once again feel my wings.
In the corner of my eye, just atop my beak, I see Coltrane to the side, awaiting his chorus.
Chagall 2020
I scroll the post –
is this a poem or a fucking novelette?, I wonder,
oh God!, teenage angst masquerading as adult insight
followed by adult insight as sophomoric rant,
5 dot ellipses, love, rage, raging love, loving the rage,
mommy did, daddy did, this and that, over and over,
over and under, under the covers, scratch that novelette,
this is a novella, nay – a telenovela aquí, lo juro por Dios,
to God, sun and moon and dying stars, your mouth like honey,
it’s always honey, why not honeydew, breath like bergamot,
her scent like salt and onions, something real, something novel,
to peel yet not flick away, so help me God, help me not fade away…..
Chagall 2020
Loving and caring, or
chiding and derisive,
it’s all about how you
straddle the line.
Chagall 2020
The voice within you you censor
is you, most sublime
Turn that inward howl
out
Screw the essay;
simply scream
Chagall 2020
Alphabet City 