| Author |
 Topic  |
|
|
Ailinn
Windchimer
2197 Posts |
 Posted - 06/16/2013 : 21:02:14
|
| The old smells of turp and linseed oil. The uncovered easel in the corner. The woman in the painting in a white wicker chair on a bougainvillea-framed balcony. Her canted hip, her sun-tanned legs tucked under. Her hands doing different things each time he paints the picture. How many times does the man appear in the painting? Leaning against the balcony rail, hazy and out-of-focus. I could be that woman. So composed. Not swamped with tide-rising emotion. And the man in the background, omnipresent... I could be that woman if you were that man. |
 |
|
|
Ailinn
Windchimer
2197 Posts |
Posted - 06/22/2013 : 18:27:19
|
On hot days they'd walk down to the salt-heavy harbor. Hallowed heat clinging to the Virgin's stall. Guadalupes in plaster with sea glass crowns. Crosses of leather and hammered tin. The "relic" vendor asleep under her umbrella. A saucer of pickled carrots beside her cloudy cash drawer. Four baby teeth in a stoppered bottle. A stickpin of polished bone...
"...jus' means we're here..." he said. |
|
|
|
Ailinn
Windchimer
2197 Posts |
Posted - 06/22/2013 : 18:32:11
|
| ...back at Miguel's things are different now. The worn counter gone. The duck-taped booths replaced with those climb-up tables you hate. No proprietary condiment caddies or roll of paper towel. Menu with the flags of two countries unfurled on a laminated cover. I drove straight through this year. |
|
|
|
Ailinn
Windchimer
2197 Posts |
Posted - 06/28/2013 : 20:51:05
|
Asleep in the car in the dream-riddled darkness they're caught in the water story. Stormy weather. Nimbostratus. Two souls in the lifeboat waving goodbye. |
|
|
|
Doug L
Firefly
Canada
5446 Posts |
Posted - 06/30/2013 : 09:41:16
|
EAST OF EUGENE
The rhythm of the wipers
Just east of Eugene
Highway sign for Springfield
White letters on the green
The great Willamette River
About to overflow
Drive a little faster, Billy
This highway’s gonna go
We’ll be drowning in that river
And no one’s gonna know
Billy, you up for some grub?
Let’s stop in Albany
About ready for a clubhouse
A cup of strong black tea
We’ll both be feeling better
Once we get a meal
Afterwards you catch a wink
I’ll take over the wheel
Get us into Portland safe
Find a cheap motel
It’s gonna work out perfect
Make Seattle Sunday noon
Ballgame starts at one o’clock
The Yankees are in town
Look up my friend, Cyndi
If the phonebook’s got her name
Call and say we’ll pay her way
If she wants to see the game
I did her show on the radio
Last time that I came
Before you take a little kip
Dig out that tape to play
The demos from the Graveyard
We made on Good Friday
Hey, Billy, what do you think
Ol’ Corry’s doing now?
Is his front door still guarded
By that donkey and that cow?
Is that Trix there in the background?
Still sounds good, you know
That’s how we always did it
Drive and drive and drive
Until the highway’s all there is
And we’re the only ones alive
Drive as far as time allows
Refill the tank with gas
Overtake the semis
Let the sports cars pass
Try not to let the state patrol
Sneak up on our ass
The rhythm of the wipers
Rain still pourin’ down
Bill asleep in the tilted seat
As we sail through Salem town
I’m listening to that long one
About the orphan, Bill McClynn
Look forward to that ballgame
See that southpaw pitch again
He barely has a fastball
But all he does is win
God that rain is something
Look out! What was that?
Could’ve been a squirrel, Bill
Might have been a cat
Sorry that I woke ya, pal
I was entering the curve
Almost left the mother road
Was dangerous to swerve
Could’ve run him over
Guess I didn’t have the nerve
The rhythm of the wipers
Just east of Eugene
Highway sign for Springfield
Ghost letters on the green
Years later I remember
That midnight highway sign
It came clear to me in memory
Last September 29
A spirit went out of the world
Just east of Eugene
DL |
|
|
|
BarbraG
Windchimer
1825 Posts |
Posted - 07/06/2013 : 01:00:10
|
There is no going forward now, and there surely is no going back. It's a terrible thing to know that, and know it to be the truth. The snow is cold. The fire is hot, burning. There's just one thing. They are not close to each other. So, it really doesn't matter. The snow can blow and the fire can burn, hundreds of miles apart and never be able to do anyone any good. The thought of freezing to death is almost equal to the thought of burning. The end is the same. If help comes before morning, life could win and death could lose. But, I'll need a fast horse. I have to make sure I get back on the road to where I was going, and the irony of that is .. it isn't far away. I lost my dog yesterday. He knew the way. I don't think I'm going to make it. I'm getting very sleepy. I need a fast horse .. It feels like warm hands are touching my face,
trying to warm me and get me up on my feet. The aroma of perfume washes all over me, and it's the sweetest thing I have ever known. It has to be an angel, come to take me home. I hear the sound of angel's wings .. or, maybe .. I am freezing. I know it. Sleep is coming. I know it. ........ |
|
|
|
Ailinn
Windchimer
2197 Posts |
Posted - 07/30/2013 : 18:43:12
|
| He disliked having his photograph taken so she focused on the scenery around them. Outline of leaves on the trees. Framework of smoke and of willow. Pepper and palm. Silver dollar eucalyptus whispering across Mission court yards. Sharp or aromatic. Variegated green. Benches under shady trees. Flowers in a vase on a table. Something beautiful to look at. "Tell me a secret," he said one early seabright morning, "...something no one else knows." Watery edge of North America. Glass beads with their tiny flasks of light burning color onto the walls. |
|
|
|
buckman
Firefly
USA
2825 Posts |
Posted - 08/02/2013 : 22:13:18
|
There's a certain sound a heart makes
When it starts to break apart
Some say it happens little by little
Some say it's there from the start
The Indians take their fables
and make them into a special tea
It takes their eyes inside themselves
But it blinds them when they see.
The only thing I wanted to learn
Was to enjoy the passing of time.
It turns out while it was passing
I was learning to lose my mind
They stood in a circle around a fire
Jumping in and out of the sparks
The leader was a large man
Painted and very dark
He called me by my rightful name
and ordered me into the arc
The magic words were spoken
Then everything went dark
There's a certain sound a heart makes
When in starts to break apart
It ends up roaring in your ears
But it's quiet at the start
Like a freight train moving slowly
Building speed along the way
You find yourself alone again
With nothing left to say
There's a moment when a heart breaks
You can almost mark the time
It happens when it comes to you
That there's no reason left to rhyme
When there's no way left to make it work
No magic that's not been tried
When a soul and body go separate ways
Nobody knowing why.
There's a certain sound a heart makes
When it starts to break apart
Some say it happens little by little
Some say it's there from the start
http://youtu.be/LF_sALAMPoM
|
|
|
|
buckman
Firefly
USA
2825 Posts |
Posted - 08/04/2013 : 11:46:16
|
I've been walking in the shadows so long
My eyes have completely adjusted.
I see things in the dark that are
long past wanted, tossed away and rusted.
One of the things God gave us
was an indeterminate amount of time.
Did we have too little, did we have too much
It all depends on the paths we've walked
And the songs we've found that rhymed
The sunny days and the restless nights
Are never up to us
Those events are left to chance
Like fairy tales and dust.
Did the angels come to sing you a song
Did the demons come out to play
Were you the winner of the battle
Or were you the one that was slain?
We struggle and strain, we run through the rain
All for a piece of the pie
When all we ever really wanted
Was someone to see through our eyes.
The path to my future was going so well
Until it went through the path of my past
The friends and memories grow hazy
As if they don't want to last.
Decisions are made and some choices are wrong
But some never make it that far
Sometimes it's fate and the Gods do the choosing
And they're the ones that tear at the heart.
I've been walking in the shadows so long
My eyes have completely adjusted.
I see things in the dark that are
Long past wanted, tossed away and rusted.
Rev Buckman http://youtu.be/PryGEIQu65s
|
|
|
|
Ailinn
Windchimer
2197 Posts |
Posted - 08/04/2013 : 17:42:50
|
I used to ride my bicycle all over town. That's how I got in trouble. Watching the hang gliders sail off the cliffs and lift into the crowded blue. "...sky full of wings," he said, suddenly beside me. He dropped a fistful of stones in the bucket. Stones I was collecting to level the sundial in the courtyard. "True North..." he said. And something about sun time versus clock time. As if they were unidentical twins...
It's Sunday morning with the photographs I found last night propped up against the sugar bowl. Not just the heart of the past, but the breath of it. Insistent. The myth in the trunk under quilts growing stronger year after year. Pentimento of ten thousand days. What flew out of the sky those decades. His quicksilver mind. His DNA on all the pages.
|
|
|
|
Ailinn
Windchimer
2197 Posts |
Posted - 08/11/2013 : 19:27:12
|
| It was August. Hot blooms in extravagant gardens. Blinking lizards randomly quick under the pepper trees. His bold strokes set down when the easel was up and the fine brushes from Spain seduced him. Misty morning in the painting. A man and a woman at a watery edge. Liquid shoulders touching. Layered clouds. Sky on sky. Some daystars showing through. |
|
|
|
Ailinn
Windchimer
2197 Posts |
Posted - 08/25/2013 : 19:46:43
|
"...Soooo... What are you waiting for?..." he said. She said, "A guy named Sully taught me how to hit a bag when I was seven. A big clock on the wall behind the ring. Red second hand wide as a sword's blade. "Punch THROUGH! Punch THROUGH!" Sully shouted. "True" was how he said it. "Hit da CLOCK, kid!" and he'd knock my fists higher up in front of my chin. "Pugilistic Art," my daddy called it in that tangy humid air. Later it was ballet and drama school to poise and grace me up."
He collected the stories as if for a book, and he dealt his own out on the table. Random as a hand of Solitaire.
Just ink on paper. Paper and ink. Written to see what it was. His sapphire and diamond highways. His ruby at the top of the mast. The way he saw and said things. |
|
|
|
buckman
Firefly
USA
2825 Posts |
|
|
buckman
Firefly
USA
2825 Posts |
|
|
buckman
Firefly
USA
2825 Posts |
|
|
Ailinn
Windchimer
2197 Posts |
Posted - 10/11/2013 : 11:54:45
|
| "...and steam rising from grates in the sidewalk," she says, "...and all the streetlights in halo...all that carbonated blood rushing out of the tunnels. The risk you miss that you're used to!" "Lay down beside me," he says, and he closes his eyes. Listening gargoyles outside the window. A landmark bridge. |
|
|
|
Craig
Firefly
Kyrgyzstan
3793 Posts |
Posted - 10/11/2013 : 18:44:19
|
...She said, "The way you are now is what I like the best."
My heart melted... |
|
|
|
Ailinn
Windchimer
2197 Posts |
Posted - 10/12/2013 : 19:34:59
|
| Fog three feet deep on the bedroom floor when he leaves the balcony door open. A whisper of ash on the grate. Invisible ships in the harbor. An ocean too close to see clearly. Nights leaning into the oars as waves sweep across the starscape. |
|
|
|
Craig
Firefly
Kyrgyzstan
3793 Posts |
Posted - 10/14/2013 : 18:20:03
|
Yes, I watched the ultra-lights from La Holla, above Blacks Beach. Sailing down to climb back up to the top. All for nought... Or was it???
|
|
|
|
Ailinn
Windchimer
2197 Posts |
Posted - 10/14/2013 : 19:03:41
|
Glider Port. 2800 Torrey Pines Scenic Drive, La Jolla, CA. Just down the road near Salk Institute and UCSD. Mostly paragliding now. (Catch those thermals.) "The mecca of free flight in the USA."
Blacks Beach. Clothing is optional. |
|
|
|
Topic |
|
|
The Nightly Vigil