BLUE ROCK
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contemporary love poems
by Jnana Hodson
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copyright 2014 Jnana Hodson
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Blue Rock
About the Author and More
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for those angels who weren't
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BLUE ROCK
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I
As I was catching my breath, whatever intimacy
I shared with you turned against me. As I was
catching my breath, you tenderly implored me
to "keep the door open." As I was catching my
breath, I glimpsed behind your golden facade. As
I was catching my breath, the yoga was having
its effect. As I was catching my breath on that windy
boardwalk, I proposed marriage. As I was catching
my breath, she phoned me twice, first to spoil
my day, and then to pump me for information.
~*~
II
Crawling into faces on the cover, we probably
could settle on one place I thought you resided. Crawling
into obvious signs of amateurism, I am original
by default. Crawling into a lasting monument
you will smile on me, please. Crawling into cow skulls
and elk vertebrae, speak only what will bring us
closer. Crawling into seashells and antique crockery,
she wonders if there will even be a birthday card
in her mail. Crawling into her pickup or '60s Mustang,
you encounter limestone walls lined with leather-bound
books resplendent in gold trim and lettering.
~*~
III
Let's say we've no business trying
to govern larger bodies. We'll volunteer
nothing unless asked. Let's say prophecy
rarely survives near centers of clout so we'll
type resumes for positions we don't want
but dare not refuse. We'll thus bow for the applause
befitting ambition. Let's say you fear aging
or the weight issue so we'll pack up the last
of your possessions and take in a movie. Let's
say that volume had been recommended to you
so we'd embark on sometime in-between. Let's say
I tried to live up to your instruction so we'd soon
compile our own great scorecards. Let's say you
were the first of my long-distance romances
so I'll keep waiting for a phone call.
~*~
IV
I inhale afternoon sunlight
soil that needs peat moss and sand
I exhale my sentence mid-turn
on a ledger with children as nickels and pennies
I inhale a pattern of fern shadows
musical fruition
I exhale graffiti inked into your body
forever a sewing machine cheerleader
I inhale a patio grill
lifetime of betrayals
I exhale a fear of dying alone
expecting an eighteen-year-old mistress
~*~
V
Next exit, a torch speechless in trembling night
will speed away with my fantasy. Next exit, grease
frightens even the one who possesses what I speed
along, and for once she obeys. Next exit, you blame me
for trusting you each time we speed across urban junkyards.
Next exit, begrudging splendor, I snoop for myself and then
speed through a tract promising salvation. Next exit, we tally
the symptoms so speedily you satisfy in ways that exceed
any reality. Next exit, you confuse me for a bandstand
speedier than imported English bicycles in Huffy City.
~*~
VI
An angel who does not touch brass weights with
her fingers has worked nights and weekends.
A rented tuxedo demon instills action.
How your bondage contemplates taut slumber.
In a Pyrex angel's beaker, passions vaporize
before condensing as reliability or delusion.
Even a tennis-court demon fears black-robed magistrates
ordering child-support from lottery winnings.
A paddleboat angel tilts away from the trap
of suburban marriage. No matter. Neglected by each
of the others, an Erlenmeyer-flask demon
calls that bluff within a puddle of light.
~*~
VII
Demonic motifs and contrived aspirations
dismissed the hair salon and cosmetic
angel coming to love, and loving to come
unlocked a knotty pine cafeteria
possession, and a desire to make music
for male and female lovers coupled to promise.
So much of my adulthood has been a fireworks.
Any scabbed childhood accepts failure or
relies on illusion, a delusion and stanzas
that came along pursuing fruit stand obsessions.
An angel with freckles got pregnant
before I could contemplate damaged goods.
~*~
VIII
The naked couple
dives from the rim.
Flirts briefly.
Begins a wild weekend.
Multiplies what it is given.
Panics at addressing strangers.
Slips away under covers.
~*~
IX
The face of this sorceress narrowed at dusk.
As freckles vanished, her skin grew milky and
eyes turned strangely firm and heavy.
The mass of phone numbers and addresses
stamped passion marks on another neck.
Sleeping around with all the predictable results
so ferociously tangled tresses.
She pulled me closer every time somebody came
upstairs teeth broke vessels in her aureole.
A sorceress delineates the subjugation
of a farmhouse porch light on Saturday nights.
Attentiveness involves more than observing.
You know nothing of the ways she reflects your art,
your garden, infidelities, and refusal to commit.
~*~
X
Anything I want, if I'll try
a box of bad grammar
in your closet, let's build a Jacuzzi:
Grass in your closet is still green.
Tennis may be upcoming.
Laughter's just an invitation to wild flight.
~*~
XI
You gave me ancient points of conflict where I mow
the lawn. I gave you splintering wood and horsehair
plaster from our evenings on the porch. You gave me
the edge of Illinois prairie where pain and betrayal
are both in the genetic helix. I gave you a spider web
of worldly attraction and deadly illusion from the museum
of natural history's woods and fields. You gave me a confuse
d
perplexing letter where you refer to personal growth
in the past ten years. I gave you half of our penultimate
conversation from the Stillwater Friends meetinghouse.
~*~
XII
You decided to tease the bridegroom before the wedding.
I choose a falsehood leading into another.
You concluded a dash of orange would brighten the place.
I am a commercial mimicking detergents.
You decided to tickle me when I became too serious.
I choose to become some kind of New Age holy roller.
You concluded we knew degrees of genius
in our mountain meadow.
I am a tribulation quite close to my heart.
~*~
XIII
You own Judaic life and culture.
I pay in my soul. You own the soft
restfulness of lavender. I put a deposit
on the U-Haul. You own pickled hair
and off-the-beam arms covering your
grinning headlights. I subscribe
to this year's symphony. You own back-fence
design or belly-god stealth. I shell out
for a pizza delivery. You own the smooth
curve of silk panties. I pay whenever
we go shopping. You own a meticulous
hoppergrass wonderment. I pick up the tab
when you demand a central dormer in the roof.
~*~
XIV
When I heard Goldilocks speak frequently of
unconditional love, she was not much better
than me, but more demanding in a multitude
of second chances I held out for her.
When I heard how jealous she became,
I lived down the street from the row house
where Scott Fitzgerald drafted
"Tender Is the Night," and she wasn't.
When I heard her accuse me of having
a great black hole in my soul, she went
one way, while I headed another.
When I heard no reconciliation is possible,
she masked lust with delusion.
When I heard how often people at home
assumed we were living together, she would
have ridded me of my three-piece tailored
managerial suits. She preferred tuxedos.
When I heard her panic as time slipped away
from her control, she became
ever more vulnerable to revelation.
~*~
XV
We planted onions and cucumbers
to come up heads or tails.
We harvested sweet corn in new hybrids
to prepare secrets and memories so tangled.
We planted radishes and scallions
to come up flipping stunted carrots.
We harvested green beans in cow manure
to prepare contrasting oppositions.
We planted a fluorescent bulb in peat moss
and sand to come up as language betrays us.
We harvested imagination melting through
male and female to prepare adolescent or mature.
~*~
XVI
You touched cast-iron bedposts painted ivory
in my unbearably stuffy summer
bedroom. You touched limitations of trust,
trusting in my black-and-white zone. You touched
oil paint on canvas in my storehouse
memberships. You touched Wednesday night
church fellowships in my graduate school
library. You touched the hound I was walking
in my water-soluble India ink.
~*~
XVII
My touch is honest, direct,
trustful in your old-fashioned
beautician school. My touch
is domestic, earthy, self-
starting in your soil that demands
bundles of peat moss and sand.
My touch desires children and
a home in your distress of
being obsessed by one who
never existed apart
from musical performance.
My touch is comfortable
outdoors in a snorting and
growling motorcycle. My
touch quietly possesses
without jealousy in your
embrace of unrevealed
destiny. My touch has strong
rational capacity
in your turning me into
the bad boy of your life.
~*~
XVIII: Matters of Taste
You tasted a man reduced to a ledger
with his children as nickels and pennies.
You tasted an afternoon lawn Frisbee
return as a vampire at midnight.
You tasted personalization and blame
growing ever more harmoniously together
in a debate over a sofa and television.
You tasted an occasional saint in my life
who comes with flesh attached in a countryside
laced with caverns.
You tasted an angel who also cuddles and caresses
under basketry arranged on the walls.
~*~
XIX
You taste meals flowing from my strawberry
mission in life. You taste cinnamon and
bittersweet in my secret beach bunny opera.
You taste oregano in my improbably green
rounds. You taste wine from neighborhood soil
in my periodic chart of coupling. You taste
a cocktail party for coworkers in December
where I pour on my ability to share deep
emotions. You taste a clear musical voice
in my reverse-template sewing-machine
cheerleader now matter how she barks through
a cabbage-fart tournament in a nearby theater.
~*~
XX
At night the chosen one will be everything
before dawn's cruel Hacker of Hearts. At night
you embrace an unknown destiny
before dawn rejects other opportunities,
At night with the telephone, it's to your advantage
to turn me into the bad boy of your life
before dawn comes after conquest. At night you admire
my goose-down sleeping bag before dawn
language betrays us. At night I would feel entrapped
in a suburban marriage before dawn
when the wood stove has turned icy. At night
surreal combatants jeopardize any resplendence
I would contemplate in your taut slumber before dawn
I have had to rely on what has often been
a self-destructive intuition grafted to promise.
~*~
XXI
You promised we would fight as I have
never disputed before but I found
a love poem is coming.
You promised healing as a quest
but I found a cure will differ.
You promised me you believe in marriage
but I found we will never be "in place."
You promised a gentle smile and beguiling voice
but I found a stack of critical reviews.
You promised intimate union, no matter what,
but I found an heirloom bone-handled
plain farm dinner fork to use daily.
You promised live serenading as we rounded an island
but I found most actors and actresses
are poor judges of scripts.
~*~
XXII
In my pocket you would
put family photos, letters,
and religious tracts from the
1800s. In my pocket
with roots in Ohio's sturdy
limestone soils you
would pour m
ellow oak
forest hiking and camping
on both coasts. In my
pocket your fingers thought
they knew what I wanted
when you would have
come away with me. In
my pocket is a piece of
velvet to roll in your profusion
of hair. In my pocket
I have wrapped a vial
of wild strawberries you
would apply as a trace of
eyeliner. In my pocket are
brass weights for the
laboratory balance your
oily fingers dare not touch.
~*~
XXIII
With your words seeking permission to tell me about
something came support groups or group therapy. With
your words toasting our clambake came an opportunity
to double the whammy of my effort. With your words
looking for a rainbow, there came a mosaic of my
character demanding to know what makes me happiest
and your words timing my daily rounds here
brought words probing my own favorite hang-up
and wondering if I have a roommate came your words,
"I think we're done here." With your words Dear Secret
Attraction there came words ordering me to record my
emotions and rate each on a scale from zero dwelling
on my negatives and ignoring positives there we came.
~*~
XXIV
My hands clumsily attempt
to impress you in your desire
to hear a seashore. My hands establish
the norms of a sandbox in your cul-de-sac
garage sale of passion. My hands admit
emptiness on many fronts in your missionary
service. My hands open an empty wallet
in your slope of inerrant literalists and
insincere hospitality. My hands reach confused
terror in your squall line presaging snow.
My hands attend the same church
in your impatient conniving depths.
~*~
XXV
You left monastic repression where I recall
a knee-socked roller skater approached me, too.
You left the police chief, after the attempted rape
of his daughter, where I discern some resemblance.
You left while all your brothers went sailing
where my smiling innocent cheerleader
extends her rounded sweater.
You left everything we desired because life was
so dangerous where I head into orbit.
You left the sensual touch, cupping a bra,
French kissing where I confront darkness.
You left the theatre, foreign films, wild style
where I take intellectual refuge.
~*~
XXVI
You sound a piano
in months of lonely nights waiting.
You sound ever joyful
in the messages you left
on my answering machine.
You sound angry with your children
and angry at your parents
in your scornful attacks
on my spiritual practice.
You sound so utterly phony
it must be sincere
in the opening chapters of Hosea.
You sound so far down
you want to end it all
in a city where we were hardly urban.
You sound like an ironing board
in the hallway
where I always blamed myself.
~*~
XXVII
You strike what has festered beneath the surface
in a contrast between courtship and echo.
You strike major and minor keys
in nightmares presenting a disguised canary.