Reader Digests and Others

by Marilyn McIntyre

Reader Digests

I crave words

devour great novels with gustatory delight

savoring each delicate phrase

ingesting blood and bone and soul

I crave words

wolf down whole philosophies in one bite

quaffing some with immediacy

lingering over others by candlelight

I crave words

feasting my eyes on delicious blacks and whites

smelling the sweetness of ink to paper

gorging myself on long winter nights

I crave words

stuffing myself shamelessly on paragraph or rhyme

a repast, a festival, a jubilee

of delectable, tangy, tasty, words

I crave words

I relish and munch and crunch voraciously

I swallow, ravage, absorb, revel

until replete, uncomfortably full

I rest...

digest...

and then

again...

I crave words.

Funeral

somber, muted, hushed

soft sobbing the music

hellos and sadness

family to the left

bikers to the right

children screaming silently

crushed by the shere weight of the crime

a man who left too early

signing a name

leaving a mark

i was here

you weren't

well

they're not taking me fuckin alive

i go kicking and screaming

clawing at life

inhaling beauty

grasping armfuls of love

clasping it to my breast

howling in agony

for any opportunity missed

material, burned and scorched

by my breath

my words dangling from clouds

riding the thermals on hawk wings

no tombstone -

memories

remarks

deeds done

laughter passed

love given

arms not somberly folded

but spread wide as the smile not erased

for every moment stolen

mark These words on my life

she lived

she lived

till the last goddamned second

she infinitely lives.

Suicide

if you had to go

i understand

you hurt, i heal

questions eat my heart

coffins hold no soul

moon slivered in a cold summer sky

stars shimmer and have you now

peacefulness your song

i, empty sky

were you trying to live someone elses life

dream others' dreams

eat too much of the good life

all around you propaganda

filling your ears with pus and gore

family, obligations

these were blessings

not a sign to die

someone has to eat the shit

and spit out flowers

stop the stones from the glass houses

why me.

You never crossed the emotional line

We were such good friends

You called

I answered the phone

You told me on Christ's birthday

You were leaving

I closed my ears and couldn't hear you

You never called again

I have an answering machine

Clean, clinical, messages

You're never there.

Nov 88Numbers

Last night you called me a miserable bitch

I dreamed of you then

Only fragments remain

Hazy flickering images that

I wish were to my advantage

Of course they're not.

The pain of losing you is less than,

equal to, or greater than

the pain of being with you

Mathematics was never my strong point

But even I understand that

less than in relation to pain

becomes emotional rather than

rational mathematical numbers.Hungry

I don't get anything from you

Lots to eat,

But never food for thought.Shadows

Grey gull shadows

Dancing on sun-washed walls

Free, unfettered

Of muscle and sinew

But the price of freedom is high

For the day must end.Phonebook

I leafed through my phonebook

Late one night

and realized there was no one

I could talk to

About nothing at all

all the pain, the indecision are mine

And mine alone.

No one is gripped in my agony

And how do I find words to express it

There are none

Only love and truth can soothe me

And these are illusory in my life

Reach out and touch me

Bring me back to some semblance

Let me find the love and the truth

Or must I be, alone.Alone

And so they sat

He and she

So in love

Yet so alone

Lonely.

The spoke great truths

About one another

Forgave in love

But held the hurt

Alone.

They lay naked

Side by side

Stripped of civilities

But they wouldn't strip

Defences.

And so they moved

He to his

She to hers

Still held together by

Love.

Now he looks back

She ponders

He wonders

Living in grand style

Alone.

The Unicorn of a Blessing

Flying through myself softly

Sliding through even bone

I travelled to a forbidden land

Where one must wander alone

I knew the shape of a unicorn there

Standing blue, in the depths of a pool

A unicorn, blue, but smiling

Gently I traced the tear in his eye

Removing all need of his lieing.

He answered my touch

In sweet, gentled voice

And told of his lady so fair

Of being a two in a world of one

Where blessings had been so rare

He spoke of the sharing these two had done

In the time since then and before

And I knew of the love of this unicorn

Love, yet so much more.

Why is it then that you are alone

He shifted his head to the sky

Why echoed tremulously on his lips

And escaped from him in a sigh

I flew away home with a tear in my heart

Right next to then and before

And the unicorn lover forlorn and apart

Who waits for God and the passage of time

To bring his lady once more.

Now some call me fool, some view me wise

But I have been there and believe my own eyes

so have your own notions or view me with lies

Still I know the place where the unicorn

Stands alone in a pool and cries.

Copyright © 1998 by Marilyn McIntyre, All rights reserved