Temptress

Meditation on Her Bust
Raised a Southern gentleman, I’m obliged
somewhat to euphemize these sentiments,
oh alabaster goddess. Rudiments
and archetypes of Love coil, and are pledged,
in those ivory hills (it might be alleged
yet that I am a scoundrel), torrents
of allure grace soft lips, curving laments
from mothers lost to sons astray and hedged
all ‘round with Biblical pitfalls, and yet
we [...]

Love Myth

Another Myth of Love
Desire is love’s seed, they said, but I knew
better even as I planted deep my
seed. Their infertile hearts desired lust’s cry
of carnal longing, and nothing more. Few
have learned as we have learned, love, and lust, too,
are but fires within our hearts and selves. Try
as we might, they smolder and never die
while we [...]

Drowned in Beauty

I Almost Drowned
Spring, and the water lilies were in bloom,
so I took my Grecian urn down pondside
to fill with water for my hyacinths
and Labradors. What a delight to find
seven maids swimming naked and brazen
in spring’s mad equinox. And yet . . . oh pale-
fleshed goddesses, how can mortal choose one
beauty’s epitome from others? I
could not! [...]

Desert Nude

Wandering in the Wilderness . . .
It was a boyhood fantasy, coming
across a bare-breasted beauty in some
deserted place where she might rely on me
to rescue her, and her all willing
to reward my capable action with
tenderness and something undefined . . .
 
But now a man, I find myself here
in this deserted place, with this bare-
breasted young [...]

Showers

After Spring Showers
Her beauty is the sky of my world, her flesh
my earth, her blood the rivers and ocean,
her eyes peridots faceted and star-brilliant,
her bones and hair are every forest and brush;
I fall to worship as drops roll down those hills
toward southern climbs, where the triangle
of her altar to femininity calls me to worship
and I [...]

Kill the Critic

Killing the Inner Critic
You can’t do that!
          I hear far back in my head.
Poetry is serious stuff!
          It is my voice, when I’m dry.
You must be deliberate!
          Best ignored.
Where’s your rhyme scheme?
          Can’t speak—only scream.
No wonder nobody’ll publish you!
          Narrow and hostile, too.
Poetry doesn’t work like that!
          Protective of something sacred.
Don’t you have [...]

Temptation

Temptation
I never knew Eve. Never spent time in her
garden or orchard. Any Eden, for that matter.
But I loved her from the time of my first
erection, first hint of manhood. My heroine
not because she gave the fruit to Adam,
not because she was the Matriarch of Rebellion,
nor because she blamed the serpent—
Because she opened the true gate
to [...]

Dionysus of a moment

Pouring Wine
This is my sacrament
nobody’s blood—
save maybe Mother Earth’s—
simply an elegant wine
full of the richness of life
and incomplete
without the ambiance
created by this gathering
fine folks sharing in common
this wine
this moment
this evening.
 
For this moment
in this conscious action
I become Dionysus
to drink my own blood
and know
that we are all
holy and blessed
in the sacrament
of this communion
this wine
this moment
this evening.

Narcissus to Echo (on a Waterhouse painting)

 
I Hear Your Beauty in My Reflection
Oh Echo, Echo, my beloved Echo,
what fell god damned me to this contemplation,
what terrible fate, my fascination
with that wonderful-evil image, wet woe
over which my head hangs. Oh sweet, sweet Echo,
I hear your song, your forlorn cry—obsession
dear and heinous as my own. What illusion,
this slipping life, rooted in glamour’s woe.
Nevertheless, [...]

Young Man’s Dream . . .

 
Shake Your Glitter Orb
Young romance is a glitter orb, shake it
and watch red rose petals float like snowflakes
until age mellows the urge, or cools it.
We race here and there, chasing elusive “it”
because our blood races and nature makes
us young with romance. That glitter orb, shake it
to see the petals once more. Springs will sit
within awaiting [...]