Celestial Yee-Haw

up close
they rip
with punishing
speed
faraway they drift
at a sleepy
crawl
ancient orbits
known only
to primordial
ice
looping
in the empty
dark
yip yip yip
plenty of seats
at the comet
rodeo

Night Crawlers (A Tale for Halloween)

"So what do we have here? This patient looks non-responsive."

"This case is a fascinating one for sure."

"When was she admitted?"

"Admission through the emergency room two days ago."

"Catatonic schizophrenia?"

"Yes, your instincts are excellent. Rigidity. Fixed eyes. No organic cause. Normal neurological function."

"So it's catatonic schizophrenia."

"No. Actually it's not. Take a look at this. I trust you'll find it interesting."

"I've never seen an EEG like that."

"Nope."

"Ever."

"Neither have I. At least not from someone at rest like this. Last time I saw anything close was when we started a test on a man who flipped out and started tearing up the treatment room."

"That graph is from this patient?"

"Yes. We even thought the equipment might be malfunctioning. But biomedical checked it out. It's working perfectly. Her brain appears to be in some kind of fugue state. Hyper-excitement."

"And it's like that all the time?"

"Yes."

"But how could all this be going on in her brain with no physical manifestations? No tremors. No sweat. No seizure activity."

"I know! I can't find anything like it in the literature. Not in humans, anyway."

"But what's that tint to her skin? Discoloration. It's kind of yellow. Like stain. And there's a strange odor in here."

"Well, that's where this case gets really weird."

"We're not there already?"

"Oh, we're just getting started. We think those are organics. Rotting plant material. Peat. Some minerals, most likely."

"I'm not following."

"Well, we found her buried in soil."

"You what?"

"I had that same expression when the paramedics told me."

"As in buried? Like dead?"

"Oh no. Her nostrils were protruding."

"Of course."

"There was some kind of frame set up in the basement of an old house. Huge. The best guess from the investigators and the police was that it was used as a worm farm."

"You mean like night crawlers? A dozen for a dollar?"

"Exactly. Maybe they had some kind of business going. I don't know."

"Was she abused? Was she held captive by some maniac?"

"Actually, she tried to wriggle away when someone reached into the dirt. They thought they had a dead body. But she tried to burrow deeper."

"I don't understand."

"She moved like a worm. Tried to tunnel. Her mouth was totally filled with dirt like she was devouring it."

"That's absolutely the strangest thing I ever heard."

"We actually have a theory about the catatonia. Want to hear it?"

"I don't know."

"It's actually related to the worm bed."

"Okay."

"Dr. Savour, our Chief of Psychiatry, thinks it's fear."

"Fear?"

"He thinks the EEG and resulting catatonia result from acute anxiety overload. He's noted that only the most primitive areas of her brain are involved. Take a look at the PET scan."

"Interesting."

"All this started when they pulled her out of the worm bed. Dr. Savour believes it's the light. Being exposed to light. He tried an experiment last night. He turned out all the lights in here. After a minute, she came alive. She rolled onto the floor and tried to wriggle herself underneath the cabinet."

"You're kidding me."

"Oh no. And guess what? This is your lucky day!"

"I'm afraid to ask."

"I received a call right before I met you downstairs. Apparently, they didn't do a completely thorough investigation. When they probed deeper into the worm bed, they hit something soft. A man has surfaced. They're on their way with him right now. And he doesn't have arms."

Autumn's Lament

the lady of the wood
lived in the North
and the south where the ices reach
she lived under Cygnus
the celestial swan
and Cetus from Arctic seas

the lady of the wood
looked to lands
steamy in between
she coveted the man
born of sun
whose heat makes forests green

but he never yields
those arid lands
where her mists can never breed
so her bowered paths
bled with orange
and blew with withered leaves

winter is long
in the veins of hope
and the scratch of skeletal trees
in winter he shines
with his father sun
while she dreams darkening dreams

The Man Who Couldn't Play

He didn't know how to play the piano.

He was just babysitting a cat. That's all. His friend at work was cruising with her sister on the Mediterranean. She had plants in the apartment too, so he watered them. She didn't ask him to, but they needed it, and the cat liked to watch him.

He didn't know how to play the piano, but she obviously did. Not just because of the baby grand piano where he now sat. She told him once, and she not only played, but studied in college. He sifted through the sheet music. Chopin. Beethoven. The black storm of notes and markings were incomprehensible. It was nothing he could ever hope to master.

Still, he opened the cover and exposed all the keys.

The cat watched from the back of a high, leather chair. It had eyes like an owl. They blinked slowly at him.

He sounded a note.

It resonated in the wood floor. The wall. It wandered the room like a living thing. He let the key go, and it silenced.

He stared at the collection of white and black patterns. Not quite so incomprehensible as the written music.

He played another note. Then, joined it with a second and third. He sensed how they intertwined and became something larger. He could hear the adding and subtracting sound waves. Their interrelationship.

He played more. He let the sounds happen on their own. He felt notes yearn to join, or slip away. His fingers just obliged them.

He played more. His hand began to feel wholly apart from his ears and consciousness. He was the listener as much as the player. Maybe more.

The sounds grew huge, with their own booming voice and melodic lines. It seemed like a composition, but far beyond him. It felt like it could move the furniture, paint the walls, rearrange the pictures on the walls. It could tear down the apartment and rebuild it near a pounding ocean or under a moonlit sky. It could--

He heard her voice behind him.

She had been expected a bit later.

The music trickled away like the aftermath of rain. The clock ticked. His hands rested on his lap.

"Oh my God," she said. "That was stunning!"

"Sorry."

"I've never heard that before. Nothing even like it. Who's the composer?"

He felt fogged, like waking up from a heavy dream.

"You never told me you could play," she said.

He shook his head and sighed. "I can't."

A Night of Nightmares for a Sunday Sleep

i dreamed i was in the room
and she was too
she walked like you or i
strolling past the bed from the bathroom
with not normal cares and a twist of anxious worry
and she was dead and she knew it

we talked a little about she where was going
the needs pressing her
and an undercurrent of fear
i even thought for just a slice of a moment
that i might try to save her
but those are just my old ways
and she was dead and we both knew it

that room in the hotel had mildew in the bathroom
and bad bad green and blue carpeting
i'd only love that worn bed if i were super tired
but i stood there as she approached almost normally
and i was afraid even though she even had pretty eyes
because she would always be dead
and i knew it

You and I

It's been a long time since you came around
Been a long time but I'm back in town
This time, I'm not leaving without you
     --Lady Gaga, You and I

He grabbed the coffee from the counter and wove back through the half-sleeping, half-inpatient line.

Not many people actually sat in the coffee shop that time of day. So close to nine. The chatterers came much earlier and already filtered out. That's probably why he was drawn to glance up from his IPhone as he approached the table where a woman was sitting. Or maybe there was some weird kind of vibe that caught his attention. Or maybe it was the sense of something familiar in his peripheral vision. But, he did look up. And it shocked him.

"Holy crap," he said.

Probably not the best thing to say to a former lover, in retrospect.

But she didn't flinch. Or act insulted. Small things like that didn't move her. They never did. She just sat as if the two of them hadn't gone their separate ways three years earlier. As if she didn't live more than half a country away these days and had no business at all being back in the city.

"Hello to you too," she said.

He scrambled. Blinked. Tried to string together some words. They just fell apart before they reached his mouth.

"What am I doing here?" she said for him.

He nodded, more relieved than annoyed that she still read him effortlessly.

"I'm visiting."

"Oh. Visiting." He nodded more. "I see."

The coffee was burning his hand.

"Are you surprised?" she said.

"Um, yes. 'Surprised.' That would cover it pretty exactly. Very well, in fact."

"Not what you were expecting this particular morning," she said.

"No. That's right. Definitely right. You are super, totally right."

"Aren't you going to ask me who I'm visiting?"

"Whom, you mean?"

"Always the comedian. I miss that. Yes, aren't you going to ask me whom I'm visiting?"

"Yes. Tell me. Whom are you--"

"You."

He choked. On nothing in particular.

"Are you okay?"

"Sure. Mmm hmmm." He choked more. "Excuse me," he croaked.

"Take your time."

He put the coffee down on her table. Now his eyes were tearing. Great.

"Maybe you want to drink a sip of your coffee. That might help," she said.

He shook his head. "Too hot," he managed to get out.

After clearing his throat, wiping his eyes, and coughing the rest of the tickles out, he tried to get his voice back on track, "but…isn't it…kind of…usual…."

She was ever patient.

"…to make some arrangements, before, I mean, with the person you're visiting?"

"Arrangements?"

"Like to make sure they are there, and available, and all that?"

"No. Not this time," she said.

"I see."

She looked around the shop. "You still come here for coffee," she said.

"Apparently. Do you want some?"

"No thanks."

She stared at him.

He wasn't good at staring back.

"We're having dinner tonight," she said, finally.

"We are?"

"Yes, I've made reservations."

"Wow. Dinner? Reservations? Okay."

"You'll get over the shock of all this by then. We can have a bottle of wine. That will help."

He inched toward the door. Backwards. Kind of a clumsy, low-speed escape.

"Wow, it's almost nine?" he said. "I'm going to be late for work."

"Probably. I'll pick you up in front of your building at 6:00 p.m."

He reached the threshold. "That's perfect. For dinner, I mean. 6:00 p.m. Great. Got it."

He turned to the door, but stopped.

He stopped, and thought, and breathed once or twice. He moved aside so the other customers could go in and out.

"Are you okay?" she said.

A new emotion has managed to piece itself together in from his initial, scattered wits. "You know," he said, "it's actually pretty incredible to see you. I mean, I just…." But he didn't finish.

For the first time, she didn't look so controlled or confident. Her voice wavered.

"Me too," she said softly. "Me too."

Victoriana

the ghost blends with the patterns in the wallpaper
it shines in the crystal lamplight
it trades darkness with the nighttime hours
it sits on the dusty picture frame and waits

you used to walk around the bend
you used to enjoy a nap in the summer shade
you used to ignore the days when it rained

the ghost blends with the patterns in the wallpaper
and waits on the curving stairs
the ghost glitters in the reflecting window glass
it sits by the fire when I'm not there