My black-rimmed glasses
September 30, 2000
Black-rimmed glasses,
sliding down my nose,
creeping down a slippery slope
of wacky indulgence.
I won't give up this silly plunder--
your cat-eyes fill my soul with wonder.
They make me tangible--real.
They make me feel
as though I should be baking
in a cozy kitchen somewhere.
Plastic frames, look the same
as my mothers did so long ago.
[Black glasses feed my soul!]
I am locked in a vortex
of old-fashioned beauty.
Pour into me all that I am
and all that you've made me--
Intelligent, beautiful, full of glee;
oh black-rimmed glasses I'm enamored!
Blue eyes blinking, peeking out,
batting thick spidery lashes against the lens.
Nothing that my soul amends
could ever change the way I feel--
giddy and spirited. I am made alive
by a new pair of eyes.
A shadow settles
on my cool blue form,
whispering that the time is right
to leave an ash impression
on this world I call my own.
My body to dust,
and then it's gone;
scattered by the winds of time.
Briefly I think of you and how you'll
find me here, early morning,
perhaps after coffee and a muffin
from that place on 31st.
I forget the name,
but I know you stop there often.
You'll come in with your yellow scarf
draped neatly across your shoulders,
shrugging it off to find me
dead,
my soul spread in a crimson Rorschach.
[I wonder what you'll see...A bunny? A tree?]
What will you see when you look at me?
With instrument in hand I consider,
(as I have so many nights)
the preparations to be made.
Will they show my hands?
Will they cross my arms and
spread them thick with putty paint?
I do not want a suit.
I should have told someone that.
As the blade comes down
on the clock,
eking out
another restless hour,
I close my eyes and
begin what began so long ago.
In one swoop it is done.
The interruption I impose
is harsh;
and from the dark
and endless fount
my overeager life
spits out
my secrets,
pooling in a dismal plate of shadows
as my head falls,
heavy against the window--
pain evident as I draw
a fleeting breath,
fluttering into weightlessness.
I disregard my curtain call
by bowing softly
in a clouded dream,
forgetting all I see or seem
as I slip into that desperate sleep.
Under a tangled canopy of words
my poetry lives in humid complexity,
clinging like lichen
to a puzzle rock
where rhymes and phrases
slither underneath,
finding nourishment there
in the fertile soil of imagination--
nestled in the cool
black quiet of another world.
Many things are born of this,
and live, ages old
on the rainforest floor
of my waking mind,
to sometimes burst forth
from the canopy a new
and twisted creature
blinking at the sun.
I was but a girl
when I looked out
across the empty fields
and said, "you will bear fruit."
The sun-kissed valleys gave no answer.
Slowly as the seasons changed
the seeds I planted sprang
up in jolly swaying rows.
The earth was good
as I tended my crops
and made my rest beneath a tree.
The fields grew, but so did I,
molded on the potter's wheel of Time
I found a new and joyous treasure.
Even now, I can see her,
large blue eyes smiling
at me through a curtain of red curls.
I can see the feet that fit perfectly
between the rows,
walking hand in hand
with the sunburned man
who taught me how to love.
Such were the seasons of my life...
long and lovely and full of joy.
In the end there was only me;
and the fields,
and a pocketful of memories
I dare not say I made alone.
---
I was but an old woman
when I looked out across
the empty fields and said,
"I am well pleased."
And made my rest beneath a tree.
Like sand slipping through,
rainbow ribbons of truth
make lazy snake rings on the floor,
slithering off towards the door.
Centered in the eye,
legs folded
on a dirty carpet I consider--
regret drips from bone-white fingers,
too bitter to lick off.
I can remember mapping the stars
with chubby sidewalk chalk,
hopscotching through the meteor showers
and black holes of my life
until warp speed slowed down
and I was just another
twenty-something passerby.
I need some chalk
to calculate what happened
to the starry-eyed teen,
full of love and music
and words from the heart.
I should have known from the start,
but I wasn't rueful then.
Perhaps I should have been,
so it would come as no surprise to see
the tendrils of my destiny
slip out and under the frame.
To me, it's simply not the same
as it used to be,
leaving me to pick up the pieces
of another galaxy-hopping prodigy
who got swept under the rug
on which I now sit...
thinking of how to fix it and move on.
In here
where no one lives but I,
(and as far as I can see
there's nothing more but more of me)
I look around for the backdoor
but I cannot tell you why--
there's nothing out there
but the inside of here.
Off sticky walls things boomerang,
stay the same but somehow different,
reflecting the inside of the outside
and filling me up when I was never empty.
Days stretch long
and snap back with a crooked smile,
winking at me before the lap
is complete around my aching brain.
I've seen the same
in a dream
but this is real.
No rules apply to you and I,
only primal instinct.
Tripping over trappings
of a dead civilization
I remit, and submit my obstinate
mind to the pull of the
Klein Bottle, sliding down
its long neck I accept, and lose my logic
somewhere along the way...
mixing in a particle spray of carbonated fizz.
In the low light of
the upper room I write,
pouring my soul
into a few short words before
the Eternal Footman
holds the door for me.
He has given me this at least--
a chance to write of my life
and things I've learned.
I have walked along a river with
hyacinth in my hair, and lying there
in the moonlit grass
I listened to the frogs
in their private language speak so
fervently, each to each.
I have yet to hear a sweeter song.
In my youth I visited a village,
walked there and found truth
in the hard faces, cool and distorted,
reflecting in my Western-treated smile.
I kissed the hands of beggars and moved on.
After all, I cannot save the world.
In my time I leapt from mountains,
tall and free and found peace
in the valley there.
Praying in a Buddhist temple,
I left my body.
I wish I could do that now,
but my time has long passed.
Earlier, in the lamplight dim,
I paused and saw the face of Him--
with outstretched hand He
beckons me to come,
but not before my page is done.
In the seat near mine
an old woman sits,
lined and brown
and leaving town like me.
The child who balances on a lap
across the way is
quite inquisitive, it seems,
asking me a hundred things like
"Who are you?" and "Why are you here?"--
I consider, but cannot answer.
Instead I offer candy and
she accepts with a dimpled grin.
Behind me
a man counts his change,
and I wonder briefly
if change is his trade...
or if he changes trades
with the trip we make.
I wonder if he comes from the city,
or if he wishes he does like so many do.
[I wonder what you wonder too,
as you stare at me from your place
beside the window.]
From my seat I view
the town through which we pass...
green and blue and white rush past--
picket fences like jagged teeth
curling into a wicked smile.
It's just a flash,
but enough to make me turn away
as the steel dragon rattles along
the path we take together.
Floating past vanilla incense
and candles
and kudzu coiling
in a velvety consciousness
I slip away,
dreaming of the day
I can finally stop falling.
Half awake I whisper
words of love on soundless lips,
in a final attempt to be noticed
but it doesn't work.
I am wallpaper peeling,
clinging with gossamer fingers--
to be scraped away and forgotten.
Remnants of another house
and not for you.
[hang a painting and I'm good as new]
but I bet you never thought of that.
How flowers bloom on a dark ledge
I might never know...
but I am here,
without root or room to grow
but insisting on existing nonetheless.
I feed my leaves the hopelessness
that rises on the hot breath of sorrow.
In the mustard yellow smoke that floats
along the streets there drifts
a burned and greasy smell through shot-out
windows from frying pans ignored
while on the phone to a neighbor.
I long to turn the burner off,
but it smells like home to them.
By the trashy puddles warm from sewer gas
I pass on tiptoe daintiness, too good to touch
but I won't admit that.
I still think I can identify with
the clothes strung out like a lifeline
between buildings, sifting murky sunlight
through threadbare cotton.
Old and ugly patterns dangle
from a nylon cord--
cut it and they fall
against the wall and are dirty again.
I shove my hands in my pockets and walk on.
The sun rises
on a virgin morning
spilling onto the hard ground,
burning like your gaze
in an instant all that remains
of the late night frost;
exposing green grass,
black dirt
and creepy-crawlies
getting up to face the day.
Tulips,
shaking off the early chill,
nod lazily to humanity as I
pull on my coat to get the mail.
The satisfying crunch
as I step
rings hollow across
the open field where
the truth from which I hide
resides hunkered down on all fours.
Oh, remembrance is the jackal of early morning,
and you're still gone,
as I lick away the leftover crumbs
of last night's dream
and walk back into the house crying.
©Brandi Clark
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