wyrdwind

Under Covers

Pushing Poppies

It’s a bit like when a cat

presents you a dead animal.

Functionally dependent or an addict,

that’s splitting hairs, and courtesy

of a botched spinal surgery,

there’s a certain significance.

Mmm, thanks for the oxy dad,

I will treasure this…prescription opium

right here under my statue of Isis,

though I won’t tell you that.

Had period cramps so bad I threw up

one time

and he was traumatized.

Oh my ex was the same way.

I’ve got terminal cancer meds

from an old folks home—

they don’t outlive these pill counts.

Fun fact:

many don’t “go bad”

they just take longer to kick in.

Why do I know this?

America.

No healthcare,

everyone works half or mostly dead

with no retirement

and your only constant is pain.

But no pain I’ve ever experienced—

and baby that’s a lot—

was so bad I didn’t think ahead.

What if? Just in case.

There might come a day

when only one recourse remains,

that I’ve held on for someone I love,

a painless death.

A Happy End.

Silence

Breath, rhythm, vibration, touch.

The fundamentals of pain management.

You must be present. Waves. Move with,

not against. Gravity is your friend.

Do you need cold or hot? Listen.

Water. Bread. Mint. Floor.

Naked in your struggle sweat?

Shit, text my ass.

No TMI between us.

Seen all this shit before.

No pun intended.

Just throw those out,

we’ll get you new britches.

You might feel stinky, sad, and gross

like a forgotten potato in a dark cupboard,

but I promise I only love you more.

Long past wrinkles, arthritis, and dust.

If the worst appears over, get up

and take a shower. Just stand there.

I’ll support you if I must.

Sometimes staying in range is all you’ve got.

I’ll lay you down.

It’s enough.

1001 Kisses

I’ll hold you close,

brush your hair, trace

the shell curve of your ear

and the shivered nape of your neck

and tell you how we met,

a place I’ve made inside.

The first cool sighs of autumn,

when night lingers long past

previous predawn.

When you open the door and pause.

Churning star pierced sky, low melodic chimes,

a dog startles in the distance,

restless willows, clattering signs, groaning eaves,

fan palm fronds sails at high sea,

in this darkness

you can be anything, put the road

beneath your feet.

They all lead to me.

The tension upon delivery,

awaiting a newborn’s first cry.

Nothing so lost I can’t find.

Who stole the whispers and wonder

in your eyes?

Come outside.

Try. Try. Leave it all behind.

Remember where you belong,

you were always mine

stolen child.

Open Pollinated

For three nights

I was visited, I dreamt

first a moment so real,

from my phone an ethereal instrumental

somehow, when I woke had to be sure,

but it was still storm sleep sounds.

Next I coursed the brick walls

of a pub-ish industrial room somewhere and there,

in the middle must have been a man,

if a man were a fluffy sound cloud,

ram took off and turned up wow-round.

Atmospheric disturbance. Overlapping signals.

Soft rain blue, some light show. He sang

but I couldn’t tell what, tender as winter birds at dawn,

interview simultaneous,

he was to be wed and no one more shocked

about that than himself. An unspeakable

joy he dared not name lest it slip from his grasp.

At last. At last. Ambrosia

on the tongue of mere mortal man, some kinda

intervention. Are you a thing that exists?

Am I allowed to have this? But one magic

the gods can’t possess,

for there is no love without death.

What kinda woman

takes a tempest to bed?

Puts a rope and a bell on it, he’s

in there somewhere, breaks ten pair shears.

Settles him all the way down. Finds the right shape.

Trouble though. His most beautiful song,

food for the gods, hung in the balance.

Wouldn’t exist

unless he made the right choice.

Waking dropped barometric in my chest

as if my jurisdiction, when ya boy

biffs it so hard his gods dial up my spec ops ass,

Steve Irwin of ho handlers, said

with utmost affection. Godspeed

whoever he is, don’t make ’em tell you twice.

Last, through a stilled memory I carry

from a park festival where a daughter

sat on the ground hiding

in her mother’s bright skirt at a food truck.

A woman’s voice

sang through the sunlight and towering trees

in an accent very clearly

ancient Irish. Celtic, rather. Old Gaelic.

The oldest.

When I woke then, I wept with release

and wrote Aisling Aengus. How it must go.

Look,

I know when I’m being told. I know what I know

when I’m meant. Haven’t been wrong yet.

There’s so much more

to being human

than you think.

Does a caterpillar

know what a cocoon even is,

what it becomes upon entering

a state of living decomposition,

or does it just have faith?

True Oak

What is true is always true

and may be observed

through presence of mind.

Who has need of locked rooms,

musty robes, and tomes

has need of lies.

We have need of trees.

Music

is the only valid currency,

the spiritual blood of humanity,

that which remains in motion,

the purpose of your mother’s pulse,

how blood is made inside bones,

and yours grew from hers and hers

and hers all the way back

to the First. Ancestors.

Conduction

is a mitochondrial function.

Before we rise in unison, first

I must convince you Tree is Good.

Back to back to basics,

real toddler shit. Uh oh, that hurt.

Tree is Good. Oops, fell down.

Tree is Good….Dog is Good.

Hey. Hey. Dog is—okay, Dirt is Good.

I can sit here much longer than you.

See that kitty cat?

It’s Good.

Life’s just about

taking care of your pile of things.

As many as you can reach.

The only way

to attain impressive height

is living to love longest.

Love the most, variety

is riches.

Where

have all my trees and creatures gone?

In the name of your “wealth,”

a false God.

Mabon

Once upon an autumn equinox

as a young girl I’d found a book

describing the Wheel of the Year,

it seemed quite practical, sensible,

oh I was no fan of any church.

But I’ve always appreciated rhythm.

Relationships. Webs of cause and effect.

So I said fuck it why not,

on a breezy morn much like this one,

and cooked a meal for a happy family

I didn’t have. A harvest

of foods no one would miss. Open

invitation I guess.

Well afterwards I took a bath

for the warmth, even though water

always made me homesick.

Suddenly exhausted,

I fell asleep. My first

hyperrealistic dream. Looked down

at my hands, and my silver vine ring

I always wore on my right hand

had been joined

by a gold vine on the left.

I suppose if my mind must concoct nonsense,

I’m grateful it showed me what it feels like.

I’d always be well aware

when something isn’t Right.

Striking Beauty

Your real totems

are the media you consume

when you’re Going Through Some Shit,

dicking around on YouTube down

some kinda hole,

blanket up over your head

and haven’t slept.

My thing is grainy nature documentaries.

This one guy devoted his life,

wished to be remembered as a lover

of the wild. An amateur

in the truest sense of the word. Spent months

alone in a tiny hidden tree tent, unmoving,

eating so plain he lost his human stink.

He waited.

Then, he woke in the night, half

gone out his mind, and saw a tigress,

mouth dripping gore.

He cried. Named

her Bloody Mary in reverence.

When she bore cubs, he had privilege

to witness. Named Snow White, Sky White,

and Moon White respectively.

Professionals declared his work

of highest caliber. Quality. Never before seen.

Another time, some grizzly bears,

I don’t remember where. When the narrator

declared the forest a vast cathedral, I felt it.

Did you know bears, in the midst of fighting,

fattening, and fucking will sit

just to behold the majesty?

They give birth during winter hibernation, asleep.

I imagined tearfully what a mother bear might see

in her great dreaming.

Then in Central America some men

sought the apex predators of the overstory,

the all embracing canopy. Harpy eagles.

Elusive. They mate for life. One or two young

every three to four years, devoted parents.

Cascading effect,

keep every other species in check, in balance.

Their preferred diet

is monkeys and sloths. Grizzly size claws

on a twenty pound bird.

Those men fucked around and found out.

Jungles are noisy, and they tracked a male

back to his tree. If cacophony critters

weren’t worried, why should they be?

One begun the climb. After all,

they were busy right? Besides,

he wore armor, so it was fine.

Right? Right.

A sudden quiet,

deafening.

If you can’t hear her, it’s too late.

He didn’t move and scarcely breathed.

When the female takes to sky.

Without that armor

she would have lacerated

his cervical spine in precision dive.

The impact

alone stunned him, no stretch

to play dead, could only pray

she lost interest.

I remembered ever after that,

no matter the size, dress, or supposed intellect

he’s just a foolish monkey climbing high

like it’s his business, groping at your nest.

Put Him in his place.

October 12, 2025

gothic, meditation, mystery, nature, spooky season, The Old Ways
Fourteen and Foreshadowing

Ember

I remember

her whole rib cage in my hands,

lifting her tiny frame over my head

to support her pull-ups.

She was so proud.

My picky eater middle child.

At first she wouldn’t read,

until one evening I corner glanced

from my own book.

She’d crept out

with a book of her own

just for an excuse

to sit with me on the couch.

I sent a picture to her mama

in the next room.

One winter slept over

and at midnight through a cat eye

I watched the little sprite

stoke and blow on the fire

half asleep herself.

Woke to her favorite stuffed animals

piled on my pillow.

She cleaned her brother’s blood off

his laptop

so her mama wouldn’t have to.

Everyone calls her selfish

without heat, comparative relief,

but everything she does

is something I would do.

Favorites

My direct line

is a heavier cord than 911,

nobody calls me without a reason.

Your best bet is text. That day,

her mama asked ahead

that I answer, said

it’s important.

She couldn’t make a sound.

I sensed what happened,

but not which one.

In retrospect,

she’d always said

the one death she couldn’t recover from

would be her son’s.

Weeks gone by, some months

and change,

we had a fire, us three.

Babygirl was grumpy

until we brought the brisket out.

I can always tell

what’s attitude and what’s hunger. Tired.

Demolishing gas station barbecue under the stars,

a tallboy passed between us, her mama’s glock

within easy reach like big girl Ouija board.

She asked if I ever played before

and I said girl

I don’t even check my phone

or my main inbox.

Miss me with that ghost gossip.

Two piles of long wavy hair

from under a tie blanket—

have I mentioned it’s the best?

You will hear about it

several more times.

Finally she said, Miss “I’m fine,”

the recurring dream is where she cries,

confides in a witch whose face

she cannot see. Keeps

trying to tell him about

the witch’s house. Endless

rooms. A different demon

behind every door. Searches

for her brother’s there.

Last Responder

I assumed

someone had binge watched

CW Hulu in the other room

while I was asleep.

A surprisingly tame dream for me.

Some boy I didn’t know

fussed and acted a brat

while I tried to show affection.

Pouted. Swatted. Said he didn’t want

to fight demons. I said son

you don’t have a choice.

In this family, in this house,

we do not opt our or back down.

It is enough we’re not alone,

all of us who fought before. Now

get back in there.

But when I took his arm

I couldn’t turn the knob.

Something he had done.

That door was closed forever.

He stopped pulling away, cried.

I fixed his hair and sighed.

The road before my house became

a river.

Told him fix your face

before we get there.

Discovered

that had been the night of.

Blind Spot

Inside you

there are two sons.

One belongs to your mother,

and the other is His.

Boys are sensitive

and taught their feelings are facts.

They do not question

or introspect. Listen.

You are not tough. To be blunt,

there is no point

where you outgrow your need

or reliance upon a woman’s love. That’s

the way of our kind. Humans.

Mama is the universal

word for God on the lips and hearts

of all children. Ask again,

where has she gone?

If your mama is so worn

that she can’t hear herself,

if His voice is too loud,

then the last message

you receive on Earth

will be from that girl

who chose him,

your best friend,

but with a kindness

a boy can’t understand

texted “I love you.”

Quick Draw

Well every gun is Chekhov’s Gun

and so are most men. A truth

women don’t wanna inspect.

Her mama was shocked

when Babygirl said

her second

recurring dream sees

her father possessed.

He attacks her mama

then kills himself.

She is too small

to intercept.

Her mama said ignore it,

but we’re friends

for a reason. Her final surviving

instinct.

Those plural require rest,

deep sleep, the ability

to dream, interpret accurately,

breathe.

On the scene.

I’m the dust,

creaky shutters,

raven in the field,

slow solar saturation,

parched bottle wind.

The fastest

trigger finger in the West.

Order of Operations

She can’t recall

the witch’s words when she wakes.

Nerves wracked when I howled

to soothe a litter of coyote pups

far afield in the dark.

Looking for their mom

we passed, dead on the road.

She said the room was pitch black,

but she found him in his bed, called 911.

Bullets make a mess. Miss

“I’m fine”

broke down

building a shelf

for her brother’s ash box.

Joined Builder’s Academy

keen to move on. She’ll learn

struts, joists, columns and support beams.

Imperative,

the right tool for the task.

This and then that.

She picked a four post bed,

something soft and grand,

to replace the biohazard

removed by the coroner.

Washed and painted the walls.

Analog architecture

of a safe space. No therapist.

She doesn’t wanna talk about it,

and we both know

to let sleeping dogs lie.

She’ll know

what that witch been tellin’ her

in time.

Night Drive

When I was a small girl,

in dreams my legs mangled,

useless, ravenous demons in pursuit.

The first thing I ever learned

was Fly. High. Far. Fast.

The second was Hide.

Of course without legs

you don’t land. You crash.

It hurt.

I wasn’t small for long.

The third thing I learned

was Hunt.

As for the fourth,

we’ll call it Outside.

I never had walls to play inside,

indeed no sign of human life.

Grew to fill the space given,

spread my wings and worlds ended,

nothing dulled my senses, if it was a lot

then I was bigger. Lucid containment.

Now we’re in the car, the three of us,

windows down and distant city lights

spatter beyond dark desert mountains,

Babygirl open mouth sleepin’ in the back

to the sound of her mama and me singin’

Wildflowers and Wild Horses,

hair windswept.

On long journeys

the lead bird in a flock

works the hardest,

cuts the draft,

so those comin’ after,

some more tender,

have a chance. The benefit

of experience. The construction

of wings:

Don’t let that punkass chase ya,

tell him I set the fuckin’ terms son,

came here to find friends, eat, fuck,

and draw blood

and you’re fresh out my kinda man,

so it’s welcome

to the Thunderdome bitch. Take bets

who’s gonna win. The one with the most

mama midi-chlorians.

October 5, 2025

family, grief, loss, mystery
Sharp Relief

Gray

When I was small

I asked to remain awake

for the procedure. Instead

they held me down

to administer anesthesia.

I fought. Clawed.

My screams scored the halls.

Try tranqing a Tasmanian devil,

sedatives are like slapping a gorilla.

One drop of Down

triggers a surge of adrenaline,

and my needle swings fight.

I prefer to know what’s going on.

Feel everything. Which is also not great.

Normal people

just take heroin. Instead, one day,

I discovered a broken heart unattended,

left long untreated, exposed,

will just Do That

like some fuckin’

Tolkien elf.

Arrhythmia

I laugh about it now.

Worst of both worlds.

Sand in my limbs, iron

coffin at the bottom

of the ocean.

Drowning over and over.

I felt everything.

Every day.

Grasped for a shore

where nothing and no one

waited for me.

Reality.

Minimum wage with a smile on my face

or else customers complained.

Coach wondered that I could take

such pressure on my neck, my diaphragm,

cage fighters twice my size sooner tapped,

holding out when my lungs

could barely expand.

Made an appointment with a psychologist

once,

before insurance cut off.

The only one for a hundred miles

whose completely unrelated specialty

was addiction.

He said as a matter of conscience

he couldn’t prescribe medication

because what I needed

was help.

Blood Eagle

My one wish then

was the same as it’s ever been,

that somewhere on the open road

there’s another, just one Other

whose insides look like this.

That order’s tall as it gets.

I’m aware.

But what’s a bad bird

to do without her dance partner?

The torment of every zookeeper

with a species endangered.

There is no next best.

No nest eggs.

Not even some cousins or sisters.

Wears on past a point

you doubt you’re a bird at all.

Something older. Reptilian.

Some nameless grief’s regression.

From the crushing depths you learn

the way of Sedna, of Tiamat,

fingers raw for the work

of endorphins.

There’s a place on the cusp of sleep,

wade-waters, and I wait there warm

and golden.

Where Tiamat met her mate

who was stolen.

If it’s not my hands

it’s not real.

That touch is mine alone.

The disturbance is coming

from inside the house.

Salt

They hate this shit in a girl.

Oh how people revile

my ability to say No,

put my rage where it belongs,

keep a target in my sights.

Draw a hard line.

Consecrate.

I’m “difficult.”

I “hold a grudge.”

Left my own uncle at a church

because he spittle shouted

and slammed a door at me one time.

Came begging after tasting Life.

Wouldn’t let him back inside,

homeless with one leg and nearly blind,

I knew he was about to die.

He didn’t.

But I wouldn’t bat an eye.

No difficulty, I will do a tough thing,

a dark deed.

I define family.

Here’s a new maternity leave:

This is my territory,

with or without babies, what could be,

those who may rely on me

for tranquility.

The privilege of my space.

It’s true I don’t feel guilt

and seldom apologize.

But if you’re mine,

you’ll never wonder why

I didn’t fight.

The Wild Hunt

You know how it is.

My voice is either swan down

falsetto sung at littles in the dark,

or commanding legions of undead.

Rabbit’s fur or thunder whip.

Pillow bliss or wet the bed.

There is no in between.

You’d never guess

my favorite holidays

are Yule and Samhain.

Do that kinda caroling

makes kids whisper El Cucuy.

I start my holiday

shuffling around my shower spider,

I leave him alone, he’s doing his job,

black coffee and steel cut oats,

both with butter—

I only fuck with Kerrygold—

call that an Irish Exorcism,

if it was in there now it’s not,

mama needs Jiu Jitsu fuel.

All of this to limber up,

heartwood sapwood strength enough,

long shots like a yew longbow,

taxine toxic in your cup,

Thoughts and Prayers double pump.

Some of the boys, well they play rough,

it’s hit the mats or else do drugs,

come find out it’s perma-Lent

anonymous. Whole laundry list

of former sins,

and I’m the “Beast”

who tests their stamina,

straighten up and fly right, yeah,

right before the Octagon.

Gods know I muzzle demons,

awfully out of breath son.

No secrets just announcements:

I shaved my back! I washed my hands!

I wore a cup! I ate Taco Bell!

I pulled my first double!

I got a girlfriend!

I was molested

so I’m always Clown On until I’m Not.

Boys.

Yggdrasil Aril

It’s said

that one man and one woman

will survive Ragnarok, sheltered

by the deathly sacred yew.

From them springs the next epoch.

Now there’s a thought. A proving ground.

Standing at the edge of everything,

ravaged land and endless night,

put your hand out.

Who is by your side?

Why?

I once dreamt of a fallen world,

the story of every soul written in the hollow trunk

where disease had struck.

Their men spoiled. Turned.

Had their tree bore fruit, they would live still.

The People. The dust planet.

The mission as I understood it

was to protect these trees whatever the cost.

Old growth. A Celtic knot

is a closed loop. Ecological. No domestic

differential, outer and inner spheres.

The natural union of Death and Love,

each the eternal muse of the other one.

Who dies dares to love.

Who loves is forever young.

Meet your lady

with a story to tell. Head full

of fleece for her spindle.

The fabric of our song.

An archer

aims with her heart.

Her focus and subconscious.

When is a yew safe to touch?

Where you’ve made the right bed,

however many bodies built it.

When she’s in the flesh.

September 28, 2025

life, meditation, philosophy, storytelling
To the Tune of Say My Name by Destiny’s Child

[chorus]

Say my name, say my name

No matter who’s around you, know who you belong to

Ain’t out here playin’ games

Say my name, say my name

Ain’t pressed about your crazy, that’s my spooky baby

Plenty of spare change

Say my name, say my name

Ain’t pressed about your crazy, that’s my spooky baby

Better for my name

[verse 1]

Any given day when I call and I say

“Baby, how’s your day?” But today, it ain’t the same

Every other word tired out, “…I’m okay.”

Could it be that you lick a wound like a dog’s been shamed?

If you dug some holes, stole some bones, let me say

I am not the one to puss out and look away

So give it all to me if I’m the girl that you claim

What’s that in your mouth and why are you so sticky?

[verse 2]

I know people talk and assume some things

Sneakin’ around like Aengus flicks our feet

Call you a danger when I’m twice as strange

But nobody’s holdin’ you back from me

I know that knotty heart is true

For all its bumps and loop-de-loops

You and I both know the truth

Burn it all down just askin’ who

[chorus]

Say my name, say my name

No matter who’s around you, know who you belong to

Ain’t out here playin’ games

Say my name, say my name

Ain’t pressed about your crazy, that’s my spooky baby

Plenty of spare change

Say my name, say my name

Ain’t pressed about your crazy, that’s my spooky baby

Better for my name

[verse 3 rap style]

Never in vain taken

I hit straight gold in your veins

Go to your head like giant’s mead

Have you trippin’ side to side

Can’t even see the line

Cookin’ up hard dopamine

You don’t come here for easy

Sun’s name up in my spider weave

Chewed glass before I could speak

All of these are cuttin’ teeth

Have you flyin’ everywhere you bleed

‘Bout to give a swan his wings

That’s my favor when he sings

Mere mortals can’t compete

Saw his end when he saw me

[verse 4]

I know it ain’t all puppies and sunbeams

Somewhere lost your fight and flight to freeze

I’ll pull up with a fourth to flank those three

Bone appetit four horsemen we

Miss me with that aerial view

I’m in the trenches takin’ scenic route

Holy rollin’ all night through

I’ll put the rhythm on your blues

[chorus]

Say my name, say my name

No matter who’s around you, know who you belong to

Ain’t out here playin’ games

Say my name, say my name

Ain’t pressed about your crazy, that’s my spooky baby

Plenty of spare change

Say my name, say my name

Ain’t pressed about your crazy, that’s my spooky baby

Better for my name

@~^~

Notes: You know how I do fam. Throwing heart darts at the Composite Haunted Goth Husband collage wheel in my ongoing murder investigation because real boys bore me to death. It’s not much but it’s Goddess work. Got a few other irons in the fire so this is it until next Sunday!

September 21, 2025

Destiny’s Child, gothic romance, humor, lyrics, music
The Other Woman

Metronome

Lemme preface this,

just for the record,

I’m straight as a razor.

A woman’s woman.

I bring a certain

energy to the table—

the bar is now here,

no return.

Some asada drunk,

whole familia up,

and you’re lazing around

while I’m dancing with your girl,

serenading with Bad Bunny,

and she returns fire passionately

in English, so I can know

what the lyrics mean.

I hit David Bowie, Billy Idol,

oh I fuck all over my baritones,

maybe some other stuff, say you want

Tenor But His Balls Dropped,

I wreck beats when these hips drop,

she’ll show me what she’s got,

a slow grave your name on it,

comes home later horny and mean,

you try to be cute then it’s a fight,

maybe that flew before your oldest was five,

sorry.

Do Better

How we always in the kitchen

but eating first, at our leisure,

remembering her grandmother,

more than you’ve seen her

eat all week. Ask why

like worms for brains,

who serves the plates?

Bit of a lady rooster,

find fun treats for the girls,

good places to nest,

whatever makes life easier.

Fuck a gallito up at the bar.

My dance more threat display,

if I’m on the floor men stay away,

and bitch I don’t take breaks,

but don’t think you’re safe,

one of these days, been steady

dove beat breaths on her heart,

I never neglect a fire,

when some specimen turns her head,

I’m the snake tickle in her ear,

you’ll find I’m a boa constrictor,

I’ve got the girth, the rhythmic grip,

the patience

to sink your battleship.

Screech Owl

Now I’m no home wrecker,

I just

tease the truth of your desires,

I’m here to keep you honest.

Don’t fear this creature of the night,

no sense my silent flight malign, talons

plunge at what you hide.

Consider me the pest control,

she won’t leave unless it’s time to go,

I sense the scurry, all

she won’t let herself know. Skitter

under leaf litter and heavy snow.

Privy to pure stream of consciousness,

every dream she ever has, this

is the mantle of Best Friend, spectral

analysis, your walls have ears, Holy

Ghost in the shell. She said,

after Jurassic World Rebirth,

that many marriages can’t handle

the death of a child, lingered,

they fall apart.

That was one week

before.

Sanctity

I say, I say, nah

I’m no Jezebel. Lilith

is the proper noun to spit at God.

Got them traditional values,

my she shed’s a cave in the desert

and I do tinker. Doing People so soon

took too much out of her, whisked away

to the property, sushi platter, blankets,

Practical Magic and a dream.

No electricity. Okay,

pillow bed on the cement slab,

and the new hearth’s maiden fire,

and the thrush of desert life more

than sound enough. First

full moon of autumn adrift

off starboard bow, blushed

over pastel mountains. Pinks,

blues and purples.

All we did was talk,

saw two shooting stars,

she prayed to Jesus over spider ants,

wild donkeys fuckin’ in the foothills—

don’t know what else on a Saturday 9 pm—

coyotes in the distance with pups.

Only pulled the gun twice.

Once at some idling guys,

and then because our only flashlight

for the toilet we couldn’t see inside.

Arizona amirite?

Wide open space, crest

of a breeze, creosote studded

recently wet valley.

Our voices carried,

did others sleep?

On our bellies kicking feet,

I hummed Adesso e Fortuna,

Eternity in the English version

by Akino Arai. We mulled

the twinkling residential lights

on the far side.

Even worked up a cackle,

grief’s sediment dispelled

for a moment

when I mentioned

being warden

of Husband Hell.

Reverend

Been passenger

to what women do to themselves

in a mirror. They wouldn’t recognize

their whole self, much less

true desire. They can’t be honest,

and men don’t know how to be wanted.

The truth is

most would go untouched.

It’s too much

of a chore or performance,

she’s fetishized her own oppression,

he’s attracted to ritualized submission

and fucks according to porn

to please other men.

The absolute state of this bed.

I’ll say this once and never again,

I do not care how many men were harmed

in the making of a woman’s pleasure.

Out here in the fog of what’s fair

in love and war.

I’ll show you a fuckin’ body count.

The leading cause of death in obstetrics

is intimate partner violence. Homicide,

60% of those deaths at the hands

of a man she knows. Partner, close or calls friend.

One in three will experience

attempted or completed rape

in her lifetime.

Harassment?

High.

I’m here in spirit,

snappin’ necks is more efficient,

instead I’m on the couch

with a traumatized first time

soon to be mom

massaging her scalp for hours.

That’s right. Hours.

I don’t take breaks.

Fingerstyle

Wanna know what it’s like huh?

How it feels when you’re the One,

somethin’ like somethin’ like

pull your hips back against mine

and rock-a-bye rock-a-bye kiss,

pluckin’ at your waistband ’cause

you’re in range man. I just feel like it.

Put you on your back every chance I get,

in the dirt, in the grass, or half in public,

won’t go to my death wishin’ I touched you less.

To the tune of your fine ass asleep in my bed,

but all heads present and accounted for,

just pettin’ your baby hairs and there’s Jr

like I might beat a dead horse.

Best be prepared. Clean underwear?

At least three pairs. Wanderin’ hands

at the grocery store. I don’t let up.

Your tears on my tongue singin’

Eyes on Me by Faye Wong

and Cosmic Love

like the cosmic ice melts for Audhumla,

lappin’ your chatter like a panther

with a plate of milk. Puttin’ everyone

on notice, best tree in my forest,

or a very good post. If I can’t be there,

I leave notes. Callin’ cards.

My devotion leaves exquisite scars,

every piece you thought lost made art,

stained glass harmonized, I resonate,

weak palates scoff at “plain” vanilla bean,

but my mouth savors every intricacy, delicate

tremble and sweat with relentless

sweetness and simplicity. Done right,

hunger

is the best seasoning.

September 14, 2025

friendship, life, love, womanhood
Wind Chimes and Dream Catchers

Roots

When working an affliction,

how a person feels is as important

as what you do. Two truths.

Ó Muiris of Connacht

became Morris of Mississippi

became father

to a Choctaw daughter

at the end of the Trail of Tears.

She never knew her mother,

who gave her Georgia,

called only what he named her for.

Na yimmi ishi ho in full,

the closest words for faith

in her mother tongue. Command form.

An anglicized abbreviation, a blessing,

and the only child to outlive him.

One disarmed a white man

and shot him dead with his own gun

point blank, only to be publicly hung.

One jumped onto a moving train

and it was just his time to go.

Sons.

He stood by his only girl

when she escaped residential school,

killed her husband and “fell out” with the church.

Got right with God on their own terms.

Father, daughter, granddaughters,

in their patch of forest

out in Oklahoma,

guessing at the grave

of Hotonah Honobia.

Their defiant

200 year keepsake

my mother given me.

The literal translation

is “you must believe.”

Lesson

There’s power in the place

an animal goes to birth or bleed.

Honor the inconvenience

when given vulnerability.

Stop pretending

you’ve somewhere else to be.

The price of money

is so much life.

Learn to mind

the hearth of need.

What burns hot, or slow,

throws smoke, or kindling.

Chips and curls crack

and shiver as they breathe.

Turn over.

Whether it’s something or nothing,

I want you here with me.

Laughing or sobbing,

I want you here with me.

Silent.

Those ashes cold

with me.

Unfit for Human Habitation

I can tell

cats apart without looking

from the way their tails twitch

against my legs.

Hear electrical currents, smell gas

better than utility company instruments.

No matter how faint it is,

I know what kind, where.

I know the difference

between natural and synthetic cloth

from the brush of a single fingertip.

The point is, precious little

never escapes my notice.

I only seem impassive,

a fathomless moonscape.

I remember

every subtext or story, every drop

of joy or pain you ever left with me,

a regolith reliquary.

Never had the safety of an atmosphere.

Mobile homes have hollow walls and floors,

you can hear

roaches clicking when it rains, mystery

mouths gnawing as far as the kitchen,

everything your mother really thinks

about your existence.

Hear your father’s deafening

lack of resistance.

I learned to sing

when I covered my ears.

In dreams

I was still stuck here,

but blessed silence

and all the rotted, gaping

holes held

happy dogs and cats.

Going Native

He had some Latin and Gaelic,

English and Choctaw fluent,

when Andrew Jackson ordered the march,

bitter successive waves, at last

they pulled him to translate.

For Adam this trip was one way,

the people arrived and he wished

to remain.

Some say

he stole Hotonah away,

the daughter of an influential family,

one of the thirteen clans.

They were the same age.

She perished when Faith was two,

he never remarried. Cared

for three generations of our matriline,

his wife’s blind and disabled sister

until she died. Granddaughters named

Salt-Mighty in Battle and Pearl respectively.

How often rumors reek of jealousy.

Certain facts speak on a man.

Buffered the colonizer government,

walked through hell, left his family behind to stay her side,

then spent every day of his life—

thirty years without his wife—

proving that when Hotonah chose him,

she chose right.

Electrolytes

Entertain the inner lives of children.

If he comes crawling up meowing,

that’s a cat.

The floor is lava, Hey Mom,

why this, what’s that, silly dance.

Charades. Redirect. Can I help?

When all your friends have kids,

you pass from house to house,

seven conversations at every table.

Darkest secrets over a pot, fate of the world,

triplets squealing around your skirt,

middles showing you their favorite stuff,

oldest nursing teen drama.

Here’s where I have patience.

Only adults are full of shit.

Act like it’s just diapers at the start,

and not diapers at the end.

So important.

A young woman,

dress in shreds,

drug her wagon to our station

once a week. Family hospitalized

with salt deficiency. That means

no electricity, means no A/C,

means death

in this heat.

I’ll talk about anything

at length. She’d say

we had two ghosts at our place,

but don’t worry

they’re good ones.

Ask what the temperature was,

dripping stink of Fucking Hot.

Ask questions about products.

Pray for clouds.

Said if someday

I found a strange shopping cart,

that’s her best one.

Said I know its worth,

and would find who needs it most,

if someday she’s gone.

Boo

My favorite things about Cinderellas

are the kitchens, animals, and tattered clothes.

Her kindness dearth of hope, how she shares

her home with humble creatures, hay or soot.

She’s happy in a barn. An attic.

I’d be happy in a tent, a mud hut.

When I say I want

the maximum amount

of physical affection, that’s

queen bee status. So much cuddles

the whole hive wears my pheromones,

and no one fights. I close my eyes

to the sound of busy fluffy bodies,

our heartbeat. Do bees sleep?

Anyway, I relate

to necessity and improvisation,

turn bare bones into something greater.

When as far as those kids were concerned,

my dance brought sudden thunderstorms.

A story told still if there’s a single cloud

on an otherwise spotless radar.

Rain will fall if I dance again,

for all the Ellas no one saved,

I refuse to write their ending tragic,

for all the tears and dirt and blood,

those girls grew up

and became magic.

Tidal Lock

Faith had a good run,

I was a toddler at a reunion

and someone yet lived remembered her,

our clan’s principle matriarch.

Mother wanted me to know

my sore thumb name’s on a tombstone.

Where I come from.

To meet my elders.

She loved wild garlic and green onions.

Delicious weeds called ramps.

That tracks.

My blood’s vamp battery acid,

sorry what infection?

Eat that shit right out the ground,

fuck whatever’s crawlin’ on it.

Nobody used the name first

’cause she was the blackest sheep,

everyone said she looked mean.

Her centenarian grandson cried.

It’s funny.

My great aunt’s black Chow Chow Fluffy

who disdained everybody

blocked my immediate family, growled

if any of them tried

to put a hand or took tone with me,

basked in all the kisses

I showered on her face, unbothered

while I nuzzled into her fur all night.

Infinite patience.

So auntie left me her cedar hope chest.

Rubies and silver.

She never had kids.

Called me closest to her heart

in her will.

That’s the secret when there’s no escape.

When your mother ignores or screams

in front of friends to humiliate,

when your dad throws chairs

across the room so hard they break,

when your drill sergeant thinks loud makes right,

when your minimum wage workplace

is a den of OSHA violations, venom, and lies:

go blank.

Turn to the cozy dark inside.

Let them learn on impact,

kick up a cloud of lunar shards,

lungs full of lethal diamond dust,

gasp for breath in shreds.

Put what’s soft so deep no one can touch,

in the shadow of your hope chest.

September 7, 2025

family, history, storytelling
Walk Two Moons

Standard of Living

A roof or a car, not both,

thanked all my stars for the cold,

miles through Ponderosa woods each morn

on my way to work.

On trail through thistle hills overgrown,

coarse as steel wool and undisturbed

at least until the crossroad.

A gas station open early enough

past the overpass I’d risk for breakfast.

The homeless man there insisted escort,

put himself between me and traffic

to ramble wild about raping “gooks”

to death in Vietnam.

He was banned from grounds.

Better than the packs

would attempt outright abduction

I suppose.

Our warehouse fully furnished

with only the finest dumpster finds,

we loved a good daybreak dive,

washer, dryer, toasters, microwaves,

mismatched tables, mismatched chairs,

invisible in our grungy work rags,

happy as a pile of rats in a trash palace.

Best job I ever had. Not the trash.

We did whatever was needed.

Things no one else wanted.

A liminal campus within cemetery triad,

more corvids than human folk, well

we did touch frequently on death.

At lunch pondered how each of us

might go. But when it was my turn,

Irish said no, no, no. One day

I’d just walk out into the forest,

just keep on goin’. Until the rest

of my hair turned white. They’d find

me in 1000 years’ time just the same,

deep in some evergreen cave,

too scared to meet my gaze,

and ask me how it happened,

the End of Days.

Northern Lights

We’ve established

my mind is a tricky bitch.

Things be happenin’ montage sequence,

clair-audience, voyance, echo location, you name it,

primarily contained with dreams.

When I bought my land,

chose four acres unrestricted,

won’t be answerin’

to anyone but myself.

I don’t dream of ease.

Bears, moose, wolves, several

more species, a whole biome of trees,

a bit of bog to the east.

Cloud swept volcanic peaks.

Cool ocean breeze.

Electricity at the street.

How did I get it so cheap?

A junkyard neighbors me.

I stay on theme.

Not the usual wild streak, I dream

my labor belongs to me, I make

everything I need. Land is life.

We never did see eye to eye.

Underestimated how many hits I’d take

to be free.

I don’t dream of ease.

Cards dealt, cards played.

Not the kind can settle

when it comes to my mate after all.

Too late anyway. So got my grid paper

and drew a house. Made those walls

and frames extra tall. To accommodate

who can say. I just like them that way.

I’m no master of architecture, but even so,

I woke late that night and shit you not,

lumber cuts and measurements came pouring out,

some hollow whisper inside throwing hard math down

until it was done. My mind’s tricky

but she don’t fuck up. Ice cold. Rock solid.

Call it the Doc Holliday. Don’t need to see straight

when you hit everything. No TB please. Jokes

aside, it woulda been nice, the right

kinda hand in mine, a place, a DarkSky

where my lover bursts so much milky starspray,

hungry as the black loam where we lay,

in another life.

Ugly Swan

As a general rule

I most graciously accept compliments

from little girls. Usually a shy twirl

and, “I like your skirt.”

One gasped at the airport,

punched her dad, thrust her finger

at my pants. Another

came running for my autograph

at a truck stop with my dad

and her dad said sorry,

we just left Disneyland,

she thinks you’re a princess.

Could not convince her otherwise.

I’m the most famous nobody

you’ll ever meet. Overnight

on a Greyhound and someone still

remembers me. Walking.

God forbid a girl do anything

unseen. I don’t aim to be pretty.

No make up, no flesh out, chin up,

when I speak loud it’s man down,

not the fun naked, he’s dressed down.

Gut, sword. Death rattle. Skull

floor, cracks like a watermelon.

When abuse rocked dad’s church flock,

shook his head,

said mouthing off at a woman

is taking your life into your hands,

said I’d slit his throat

ever came to that.

A princess

protects her constituents.

De-escalation

It’s been observed with emphasis,

I eat with both hands. Approval

of a Denny’s waitress when I bodied

a Lumberjack Slam. Me and the girls

go full Maenad for a meal or a dance,

he’s either stupid or a gamblin’ man,

sniffin’ ’round hikin’ a leg like that,

thinks he’s got fuck all add to that.

Rolled out, left the kids and husbands at home,

the cool single aunt and two Texas moms,

discussed the family over darts at a pub.

Innocent enough.

But come 0200 hours

between Fastrip and Carls Jr is where

lowlifes go to die. Human sewer. This guy

saw young women and wanted to try.

Us women ain’t never known DEFCON 5,

shot 3 to 2 that night.

Sneakin’ ’round the back our minivan,

fuckin’ ferrety where he packed,

’bout to get capped twice.

Right between the eyes.

That solo graveyard cook

opened the drive-thru window

right on time.

Hadn’t seen brainless scurry off the other side.

Bag in hand, dead inside,

ready to meet God or Valhalla

in the golden glow of a smiley star sign.

My girl flipped straight sunshine.

Sweet tea sundress fine.

I chimed in with customer service byeee.

Wondered if he thought maybe

we were mad about no biscuits and gravy.

Arizona Asphalt

Out here we were tumbleweed hog feral,

city brats a breed apart from us rural,

bare feet on 150 degree gravel

just to see who’d puss out first.

Our playground game was Scorpion,

dug nails into each other’s skin

just to test each other’s grip.

Pain tolerance.

Hottest peppers, meanest sours,

blackest bitters. Your first beer

was either Modelo, Heineken, or Guinness—

take a guess. We took care of business. Fight

Day right before summer break

in McDonald’s parking lot.

Got a problem? Punch it out

or let it go. Don’t

take a face shot or lose a chain though.

In school with my peers blindfolded

I was taught to issue marching orders,

they called that a game too.

Said it was about skill, trust, discipline.

I preferred it

when we snuck off campus

just to picnic under stubborn

desert trees and brush, taily grasses bristling,

broken foundation just enough green

to pretend someplace far away.

Memento Mori

Sexy on a man is softness, sincerity, effort.

Childlike wonder.

Do you know the difference

between submission and surrender,

a soldier and a warrior?

Love.

I like expensive gifts my sweet,

that is respect, affection, and loyalty.

You have to give what you receive.

Not a man among you could ever

manage to meet me. Ask a mirror

why I had to leave.

You couldn’t even recognize my altar,

couldn’t stand bare

before my wedding best.

.

Dress dewdrops on orb-weaver webs at dawn.

.

Hair busied purple-throated hummingbirds at nest.

.

Aisle off-roading at speed in a Datsun through rain shadow desert chasing rolling thunderstorms overhead.

.

Threshold full moon total eclipse breathless brilliant stars above red canyon carved somewhere near the start.

.

Bed everywhere seeds pop tendrils towards the sun, dripping musky rush of the rut, or glittering blush snow blanket dormant.

.

Choose the right soundtrack.

@~^~

Notes: Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech is the best novel ever read aloud to me in school. The saying lingered.

August 24, 2025

climate change, life, mother earth, romance, storytelling
Nanih Waiya

First Woman

The Sun smiles upon her.

Nanapesa is not God

as androcentrics and na hullos

know it. We do not worship.

Crosswinds, breath of life,

wheel of time. Mitochondria

stem from your maternal line.

The core of every cell,

what makes you alive.

Its name means

The One Who Sees, she

is always

a daughter of Great Spirit,

the woman who would make

a people. The Choctaw

awoke from clay and mud deep

in the dark of the Mother Mound.

She brought them into the light,

given form. Peeled back

to reveal fresh skin beneath pottery shards.

Wonderment.

So much more than home.

Your first loyalty

is always to the woman

and the land who bore you.

He who done so wrong

as no woman smiles upon

is cast out or put down.

She keeps

a clean house.

Children of the Forest

You must never force

a woman or the Earth. Care

is required. Patience for pleasure.

She has the right to choose.

Well it’s been about 6000 years

since men removed consent

and called it civilization. Love

left the bedchamber. Razed

194,000 worth of Before.

Back to us. Trauma

causes mitochondrial malfunction.

Paired with perverted natural selection,

leaves you wide open to disease. You recognize

PTSD, Depression, Schizophrenia, so on.

This moniker by which we signed

our meager donation, do you know why?

Master agriculturalists at our height,

our forests thrived far and wide.

Starvation scarcely a spot on our minds,

a shriek in the night,

we ferried colder nations through suchlike.

Then the colonizers came.

A Choctaw never numbs

to a woman’s pain. Your Mother’s cry.

We would not countenance. Naked,

bow-backed, clutching her children

to her nurse mud as long as she could, forced

to eat them to survive.

To play by numbers.

Only monsters

force a mother to choose

what percentage

of her children must die.

Nalusa Chito

Know the face

of your enemy. He

is the Soul Eater,

the big black thing,

prefers women and children,

oh but he’ll take anyone.

As many as millions.

Alone in the woods,

in windowless bedrooms,

or swaths of black slime in your fields.

Droves

of emaciated men with shovels.

Hollowed out.

The difference

between death and annihilation:

one pushes forward, one festers within,

one serves the Mother, the other serves Him.

Never forget that wretched stench.

The appropriate amount of wages owed

to live on your land

is none.

Blackthorn

An extinction burst

is a temporary increase in behavior

once reinforcement is removed,

and the warmest hearth of all

belongs to the harshest of crones,

soothes the most wintered of bones.

No one strips you bare faster

than a woman’s lived long enough

to be ugly and alone.

No one comes to visit anymore.

Means you already know

it’s so far gone

you’re threshing marrow.

Ripping every stitch out.

When every elder at a craft store

wishes she’d cut her hair, husband died sooner,

just to become herself,

to be at peace in her house,

ask yourself

are men any better now?

Count the cost.

For a Choctaw

he could be a treasured companion,

never undermined her strength of position,

rose his voice or his hand to her children.

If she sent him away

he gave her a reason.

It was the end of his season.

Even the oldest of women

could know youth yet again

had ever been born

a worthy man.

Little People

Bohpoli or Kowi Anukasha,

that is Throwers and Forest Dwellers,

about two feet tall.

Playful.

Sometimes they steal

a child away to their elders

and that child is given a choice.

Poison, medicine, knife.

The first cannot heal its people.

The second becomes a shaman.

The third is evil.

They measure your nature,

test your patience,

wits and reflexes.

I like to think that Old Woman

is well known to them.

Well at first glance

herbs of woe and wellness

look very much the same.

Chance, fate, or the inner eye

help that child decide.

These children grow up

surrounded by signs.

Whispers, omens, neon lights

adorn their growth habits

in perpetual springtime.

Their innards are obvious,

if you misinterpret

you’re blind.

Or dead

in the event of Knife.

Now Poison

might die ahead of its time.

It takes too much or can’t stop,

means well but chooses wrong.

Feels purpose and power

but can’t finesse its own compounds.

Not enough sense

to cook a raw sloe.

The eaves of its heart

a cursed bower.

Careless, overgrown, thorns.

But given over

to Shaman who knows,

we find that sometimes Poison

can heal its people after all.

Blends and amounts,

pruned, rendered, distilled.

A trove of radiant vials,

a mad woman’s little house,

full

of all the medicine love saw.

Banaha

She has the highest calories

and the highest yield

of all staple crops.

Her modest roots can piggy back

in floating gardens atop bogs,

swamps, or fens. She likes it wet.

Achieves symbiosis,

no strain on her environment.

In moderation.

None can match her raiment,

every color of the land vibrant

as crown jewels, pound for pound

the heaviest hitter for oxygen.

Tanchi is the most sacred.

The key is nixtamalization,

apply an alkalizing solution. Lime or ash.

Pound the kernels in torched out stumps—

we used hickory blown by river cane.

Use whatever you’ve got.

If there’s long winter, you want flint corn.

It’s extra work for delayed reward

but if you thug it out

my girl won’t let you down.

That flour lasts however long,

give her plenty of drippings to soak up, fat, plump.

Bear, hog, butter, whatever you’ve got.

She’ll take seasons and fillings, loves

to be stuffed. Or not.

Now swaddle her tender

in those corn husks.

Nice and snug.

Boil, steam, or fry up.

Fresh potato rolls hard,

keeps it real through the green times,

but corn brings it home

all through the longest night.

It don’t matter how much snow’s outside.

@~^~

Notes: See also Tanchi Story in my earliest post, the specifics of which have traveled down my family line for about 200 years, likely much longer.

August 16, 2025

Choctaw, folklore, history, Ireland, Native American, storytelling
Dear Diary, My Un-iversary

Covert Operations

Espionage

is a web of leverage.

Among professionals, it’s many years

before you encounter that white whale,

if at all. Love.

A person you can’t turn.

No other force on Earth

defies law, religion, custom, tradition,

self preservation, common sense, addiction.

If you want to stop them,

you have to kill them.

No hesitation.

It’s much rarer than you suppose.

Our cities but clots of complacent rhythm,

piling up. Plaque in a false artery

the CIA protects.

Don’t tell my uncle I said that.

So much clockwork

instead of a pulse, they thought

we wouldn’t notice.

Dad said if I were a font,

I’d be Wingdings, once.

But he didn’t know,

none of them did,

to this day don’t.

Lost in Translation

Don’t know the half of it,

the third, the fourth. Less

than five fingers the number

of times someone heard my heart,

how to explain it? Their game

is productivity and medication.

Boxes, debt, and payment.

Sooner scatter my brain

on the pavement

than be any less

than this.

Ocean of sunlight overflowing,

all things, a song inside so beautiful I weep,

the hands of every ancestor on me,

every fur, scale, feather,

thorn, petal, and leaf,

a world of colors and textures to greet,

why else be given body? I can make

you see.

Check Engine

I got by,

a given value of fine,

when the man you truly love

only exists in your mind, you negotiate.

Big mistake. Been callin’ it

the Big Bored of 2024.

You might use a different term.

Some shit I never felt before,

triggered in the car.

I hit my limit.

The world didn’t exist.

An unreality. Absolutely nothing

was okay. I was a trapped animal

willing to gnaw my own limb off

to escape. To feel again.

Gods blessed me grandma’s poker face.

Time to lose the man. Eject

baggage. Sit in my garden

with my cats. Music. My tricks

are numerous. Sails. A hammock.

A safety net.

The broken girl I put to sleep

woke up.

Grandpa said

keep an even keel.

Oscar Worthy

“Are you bored of me?”

Ouch. That’s vulnerability.

There’s no kind way to say

baby I’m bored of everybody,

all the time. It’s not personal.

You’re dial-up

and I’m fiber optic hun,

you’re humping couch cushions

and I’m top tier tantric, fuck.

I go deep for distance,

and you can’t achieve penetration

with a thick nine inches.

Don’t listen to other men,

it’s not about size.

It’s about rhythm. Connection.

You’re talkin’ Formula One and guns

and I’ve analyzed this establishment

and rebuilt it three times.

Deconstructed our lunch, more flavor,

some crunch. Better sauce. Spice. Oh look,

a dog. Askin’ me

which ammo you should buy,

what the Plan is, the Mexico

shopping list. Logistics

can hold my interest.

Yes dear, gun go bang,

car go fast.

Ladies it’s not worth it

just for some half-assed

rubs and licks.

Anyways, I lied.

Tomoe Gozen

Always said

unfaithfulness is like laming

your own warhorse.

They who share your heart

in a world wasn’t made for us.

Men have proven unworthy

of partnership.

And a woman

is every day at war

the moment she gains consciousness,

pays any amount of attention.

The scope of what’s been done.

Movies deceive, desensitize,

take for granted,

but it’s important to remember

she was real.

Her feats impressive.

Women were chattel,

worse than expendable,

baby pushing rape receptacles,

and from a murky bed

of pond scum, useless toil, and blood,

a lotus blossom.

She went from concubine

to top commander,

second only to the general himself.

Wielded not a naginata,

but a longsword from mount,

and an armor piercing longbow—

draw weight between 80 and 140 pounds.

Not an onna bugeisha.

A samurai.

Led 1000 cavalry to victory,

took seven trophies in a single day—

from mount, I say. Let that sink in.

Surgical precision on horseback in battle.

Extremely difficult is an understatement,

sheer amount of shit has to go right.

Seven times.

Commanded 300 against 6000,

one of five survivors, for the win.

What went through Lord Yoshinaka’s head.

Something beyond merely

lover, warrior, wife.

Oh these two were more than friends.

Their forces dwindled to five in the end.

In a move unprecedented,

against all expectation,

he ordered her to quit the field.

Would cover her escape.

She took one last trophy on the way.

Men spun stories as to why,

diminished the legacy, her feats,

any reason, any ending

but the most obvious point.

He was just a boy

supposedly divine,

and once in many lifetimes

you cross a creature outside.

Proof of something

beyond your present confines.

When the gods ask you to ride.

To what purpose?

Choose between drudgery,

monotony, field or factory,

privilege in society,

men are fine with domestic slavery.

Obedience. Or is she

a seven severed heads,

20 to 1 odds,

fight 1000 men, a demon,

or a God kinda bitch.

My bet is

she was pregnant.

August 10, 2025

history, humor, mental health, storytelling
Marianismo

Uses and Customs

“First the woods

and then the women,”

those talamontes taunted.

Forest rapers.

Illegal loggers, bad government,

and cartels.

The village men?

Didn’t know what hole

to shit out of, sooner raise a hand

to beat their wives

than wipe their own ass.

70% loss, mushrooms gone,

mother tongue starved.

Fifteen women had enough.

Sticks, firecrackers, threadbare

shawls, and masks

against thugs and police

with AK-47s.

They took five hostages

in a stone church, made barricades

of burnt out cars.

Those bells rang

high over women with seized

machetes and guns.

The villagers rallied.

Purged them in one—

a menstrual clot.

Their fogatas burned

for nine straight months,

became a pulse, a forge.

Signals, defense, cooking

and more.

From mothers they learned,

everything that ever mattered

passed kitchen to kitchen,

Mother to daughter.

The right to rule

their own territory upheld

by Mexico’s judiciary.

The women restructured

their entire society.

They replanted their trees,

went jogging at night.

One bonfire

remains, the beating heart,

where ten women gather

to discuss affairs.

“Things can always be better,”

said sensibly over stew.

If the forest is a house,

and Cheran is a kitchen,

you might say

a woman’s place is the home.

As usual, men get it wrong

about who’s got

the huevos.

Archetypical

Listen, listen,

gather ’round my cauldron,

the best pair on this green earth

is some stern, gruff warrior woman

and her fancy peacock husband.

I’m talkin’ imperial concubine shit.

Long, thick hair, thick lashes, chest resonance.

Raspiness, accent curly and homey

like tigrado sheepskin.

Listen, woman’s got preferences.

Don’t you ask this fool

’bout no power tools, hell no.

Does electric guitar count?

He should make good sounds.

I’m talkin’ Spike Penny Dreadful Gomez Addams shit,

‘cept She’s a sunshine Terminator

full fat froth over those hot goth lips—

do you see my fuckin’ vision?

My love, Osiris.

I’ll pull a Frankenstein.

It’s bedtime with Isis when I read his rites,

way I spit tongue twisters off the Book o’ Life.

Remix on Dracula, Castlevania,

Hades and Persephone—

yeah, I know, I rolled my eyes.

I’m talkin’ satin bowerbird shit,

his woman’s favorite colors

are his entire personality.

She is not easily impressed.

Lemme tell you ’bout men:

They gotta know who’s Boss,

who’s Baby,

who’s a Good Boy,

and who among them

is the Best.

Writers’ rooms hate His ass—

shit, just ask Jesus—

’cause he’s the only One

a Goddess be fuckin’ with.

Want a better world?

Build a Better Man.

Ya’ll just petty sons

of Judas Iscariot.

La Llorona

Heard people dream

’bout goin’ to work naked.

School or some shit.

Wouldn’t know what that’s like.

Dangers of a creatrix,

they ain’t just nightmares,

it’s gore-ing the lily,

a crucible amaranthine,

older a woman gets

it’s hardly hyperbole.

As it goes,

if you would know,

do not fear to see.

Notice she’s always crazy

for shrieking, weeping.

Only his hurt is holy.

Take a plain clothes office buildin’

and put a sea of howlin’ faces

strainin’ through metastasized flesh

burstin’ at the seams.

Fry that amygdala early.

Don’t ever look away.

Call your target by name

and incinerate.

Remember that scene

in Smoke Signals?

Where the very worst insult

in Thomas’ arsenal is to say

you make your mother cry

and ask

what are you doing with your life?

When my Mother greets me,

her smile’s all teeth.

Dog Star

Some dreams have sequels,

total recall of more than you know,

something greater

than the sum of its parts.

My back was injured

and I bed bound, and boy

if you can’t move topside

you’ll do it underground.

All the way down.

A place I know well.

The sky was pitch black,

like the backside of time itself,

unblinking over an unlit below

somehow visible. I know now

that it was the sprawl of Mexico.

Lost to a flood. Uninhabited.

But trust

some asshole left their dog behind,

still chained in the yard.

Guess that’s what I came for.

A big fat black lab or some such.

This boy ate good. Largely unconcerned

with his fate. Made no move

to escape. Glossy and healthy.

I broke the chain easily,

hoisted this jolly idiot

into a fireman carry

only to wade

miles

through unknown territory.

Shit, he was heavy.

But, he was happy,

so much potatoes

on my shoulders.

I made quick work

of the labyrinth.

Junk jungle of refuse,

tangled.

I found

the farthest edge

of “town.”

Then

by the dumpster

of a pristine gas station,

the ugliest dog

I’d ever seen.

Hairless, emaciated,

twisted into unnatural shape,

backwards legs, missing teeth, drooling,

cowering.

Said alright buddy,

you’re coming too.

I’ve still got arms so

we’ll figure it out.

He was so scared

of the light,

certain I’d hit him,

nursed his abandonment.

For all I’ve got teeth,

I can still be soft and sweet,

and there’s never been a dog

wouldn’t come to me.

So Fatty ‘cross my neck

and Scaredy ‘cross my chest,

I hit the last leg

of the journey. Jumped

onto a moving train

into night, we got out

us three.

Xolotl

Round two

of Disaster Pet Rescue

had me digging rubble

off an aquarium.

Buried

this pale fish lizard thing,

frilly and gilly, smiley face.

God damn it

gotta carry a tank.

When I woke,

where pain had been

full tilt orchestra,

now a shut door.

A dead silent room.

Where the fuck

did it all go?

How?

I never took drugs.

All oxy accounted for.

I am occasionally

somewhat stubborn.

Cold body, spine sweat.

I could walk again.

First of all,

no way that guy was real,

Google triangulated his ass up.

Axolotl. Water dog. I’ll be damned.

In shrinking and polluted waterways

they choose to stay

instead of mature on land.

Stuck. Backward. Yet.

They outlive their peers by wide margin,

and unlock an ability medically significant.

Axolotl regenerate.

Dismemberment, damage

to body, brain, or spine matters not.

They just…fix shit.

Put it back

the way it was.

It was there,

and then it just wasn’t.

Another thing:

named for Xolotl,

a god of the underworld.

The ugly twin.

Hideous, mutilated, misfortunate,

filthy, diseased. You guessed,

a dog.

Finest Moments

I wandered

as a child. Knew every dog

in the tweaker ghetto.

Also some old folk, here and there.

Knew enough

to never trust men. But one friend

in common, man’s best.

I farmed affection,

muzzles, tongues, and tails

through a chain link fence.

All I needed.

Now dogs like to dig

places they shouldn’t,

get into shit,

things people want hidden.

That’s what Xolotl did.

Dug up the bones

of humanity, drug them out

for his beautiful twin to see.

The winged serpent of heaven

had to bleed.

Regenerate.

I have a spot

in my garden. It’s dark red.

Stained the cement, naked

when I hit downward dog

to vomit wine.

No running water, not even a pot

to puke inside.

Me and Guinevere

in the moonlight.

Corgis were bred for herding.

I have a spot

on my low back. A mole.

Looks a bit like a dog’s nose.

‘Bout where she’d boop ya

if you broke formation.

Biggest lie the devil tells ya

is that you’re alone.

August 3, 2025

environment, folklore, history, mystery, storytelling