or that I stay from only
a sense of duty.
There was always a chamber
of my heart meant just for you.
I wanted you sitting there
on a heap of velvet pillows,
laughing and caressed
surrounded by clusters
of candles and bright poems.
I wished only sunlight
to kiss your smiling windows
and soft and rainbowed flags
to float above your bed.
Stars, and not tears
were meant to prism your eyes.
Forgive me that my hands
grew cold and trembling
and that I let the breath
of another whisk out
too many of the flames.
Please do not suppose
that they were never lit
for you alone, or that any songs
falsely wear your name.
Do not desert that room
and leave me collapsed
in black and icy dust.
Truly I built it for you alone
and without it I have lost
what remains of my own being.
Please know that in my own way
I have loved you
I have loved you........
Tag by Delorita
~*~*~
~El Mariachi~
Give me the strength
to be what I was
and forgive me for what I am....
I stand here searching
for the sun of innocence
that lived behind my eyes
the song that skipped
from lips stained only by joy
the hand unpierced
by the knowledge of screams
the face that never turned
to meet the stink of death.
Looking to you I mutely plead
for the warmth of your wonder
the cleansing of your wisdom
to be allowed to climb your stair
into a dizzy purity
leaving all guns and bloody water
sinking into forgotten mines.
Is it fair to expect you
to let me curl in your soft place
and grow me anew?
Or will my failure poison your path
paint your beauty with weeping
and pull you down
into the pit
where I lie gasping?
No, I will not have you be
the cellmate of my shame;
I must go. But there,
you have followed
asking for my thanks
and what now can I do
but bathe in your white flame?
~*~*~
~Alejandro Murieta~
Be careful, señorita,
there are dangerous men about....
Take care where
your innocent slippers tread;
hold your white skirts
clear of the mud.
You stand high above me
although I look down
at the top of your head.
Your eyes ask
for the crystals of my being
to hang across their purity
like prisms from an alabaster lamp,
and so I will find
as many as I can
paving your path
with unstolen gold.
Then I'll wash the choking dirt
from my sweating pores
grow colored wings
and pull scarlet buds
from unexpected heights
all for you.
Horses of passion I'll ride in your name.
My steel will guard your honor
even as it slices away
all maidenly reserve
and fear of fevered joy.
Truly, all bounty shall be yours
and all slag lie buried
never to bruise your dancing toes.
~*~*~
~Ché~
Forgive my intrusion....
Yes, I am the one that you fear most.
I am the eyes which
pierce your careful wall
seeking out the lies
that you polish into prisms
and know the nature of their colors
when all other eyes
are blinded by your stars.
I am the silence
you hear above the happy shouts
the fire that chills you
the ice that scalds you
the critic of your opera.
It's my face you see
when you send kisses
through the footlights
even as the bouquets
fly in heaps around you;
it's mine that you pick up
and hold closest to your smile
however it bruises your chin.
For I am also your salvation
it's my eyes that see your pain
your guilt, your longing, your failure
and your love also.
I am the stairs you climb
the leader in your dance
the mirror for your feet
the draught that heals
despite the pucker
it draws upon your lips.
You know me as you know yourself
and you know it is I
who truly loves you
because I have loved
our children foremost.
~*~*~
~Miguel Alvarez~
These are candles that were your eyes...
No, say rather that your eyes
contained an unchained chandelier
in which the hungry flames stretched high
as if to ask questions of the stars
and sometimes bent low as if
to dodge the riddles of the wind
and flickered as if to heed
the unkind litany of the dawn
and often danced to celebrate
both the music and the pending arrest
of their lucent fame.
I wonder if they ever grasped
the true importance
of their brief vanilla mystery....
Click on wallpaper to see full sized. A version with the poem on it may be seen on this page.
~*~*~
~Mario~ (La Blanca Paloma)
Sometimes in the unlit harbor of sleep
I hear my name as if
it were a bell in your mouth
and I lie still remembering
the dance of our faces
and the smile of our bodies
as we studied the rustling chart
of solar possibilities.
All that remains of you now
is the dust of what might have been.
My futile flames could not purge
your innocent shame.
How can you put back a feather
once it has been torn away
the sweet wing wasted
in the teeth of need?
How can a dove
rise from the ash?
Click on pictures to see full sized.
Gracias Cat Waters and Cris Cizcher for pictures and ideas!
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