“Lantern with Words” by Annie Dawid

See Annie Dawid’s art, writing and more at http://www.anniedawid.com/
Learn about Dawid’s writer’s retreat at http://www.bloomsburywest.com/

Three poems by Kenneth P. Gurney

Glow

Lisa massages her breasts
in her sleep, dreams of mother’s
milk, a fragment by Thoreau,
opportunity swinging open on hinges.

The wild horses of the night
graze in the heavens,
each bite they take of sky sparks.

Lisa lives in a house of chaos
without a roof, without a ceiling,
with the finger prints of many men
and the green stain of their money.

A colt cuts from the herd,
gallops down moonbeams and enters
Lisa’s room while she sleeps.

Her hand rubs her crotch 
in the throws of a nightmare 
about the silver pole spearing her, 
pinning her to a skin tone tree trunk.

The colt nudges Lisa with its nose,
moist breath speckles her face,
she rolls, opens her eyes.

With her nakedness aglow in moonlight,
Lisa rises from under the covers.
The colt moves through the house,
moves to the living room.

The colt’s hooves strike through the carpet,
splinter the floorboards, while Lisa
holds its tail as a guide.

Through the growing hole, she spies 
the dreams she buried or cast away,
the dreams this house kept safe for her,
kept by the sofa where she once experienced love.

The colt gallops off to the sky, as Lisa pulls 
dreams out of this hole as if out of a drawer 
and clothes herself, begins to outshine the moon.

Patter

Delphi sings harmony with the wind
as it careens around the corner
of the house and rustles the dogs
like leaves upon a tree.

Meanwhile, the clouds drift
from southwest to northeast, change 
shape, darken, as we hope for rain.

Delphi reads the clouds
far better than words upon a page,
when she loses herself 
upon the wind.

This is my poem for you,
the clouds say, as lightning flashes
and thunder shakes the hillside.

Delphi tries to teach me
to read the brilliant strokes of light
against the dark whorl of sky,
as if it is a fingerprint upon the air.

But the reverberating crash 
flutters my eyelids, and the dogs 
scratch the door, beg to be let in the house.

Delphi takes my hand, extends my fingers,
traces the ridges of air, like letters
on a gravestone.

This is where the story ends, every time.
She does not speak in metaphors or allegories.
My illiterate love lets her hold me 
up against the storm.

God

I traveled this far.

I didn’t mean too, but, 
well, you know.

I mean to do it:  

take the cold dust 
expelled from young stars—
add breath, water.

You have to let go 
from the end of day six on.

It may seem cruel,
but, no, it isn’t.

Move on to the next one.

I can’t explain.
It’s what I do.

Read and listen to more of Kenneth Gurney's Poetry at http://web.mac.com/kpgurney/iWeb/10PP/Home.html

Read Origami Condom, a poetry Web site produced and designed by Kenneth Gurney at http://www.origamicondom.org