Happy New Year Everybody

thanks for reading here and sharing your own worlds on your blogs.

you're all brave, honest people, who i am proud to know.

i hope 2007 brings you all that you wish for. and then some.

love

Michelle

seabiscuit

that horse and i have a lot in common. for one thing, i won't let just anybody put a saddle on my back. for another i've plenty of heart. incidentally, i'll ride for you if you know how i like to be treated. we're cut from the same cloth, after all. and i'll always be on your side.

full

stop.

if you wan't more you'll have to come down from the sky.

please. for the love of all that is

take the red pill. i've some water. but i'm not sure you're ready to end your suspension in dreams.

karma

is a lady with whom i'm well aquainted. she surprised me one day when i was weeping in the dust, holding onto a photograph far too tightly.

i'd introduce you, but i'm not sure you'd like her stilettos.

melting ice sculptures

have a wonderful way of nourishing the grass beneath our feet.

the road to YOU

i'm not as jaded as you think i am, or as naive as you'd hoped. i've just stopped loving with my eyes closed.

i've insight into this that you can't grasp. not now. the thing you seek does not lie with me, or her. look, beautiful boy, look and see that the magic you seek is within you.

half-moon holding pattern

peter pan flew and flew and flew and flew. the girl sat on the bank and watched. she knew she'd eventually have to deal with singed wings. but he was, after all, so pretty to look at.

underthings

jack fell down and broke his crown and jill came tumbling after. fortunately, peeping out from under her pink lacies - knee pads. well used.

fuck

it.

just let me get that out there. so the pinkness can get in.

he was gone

before the next full moon. like destiny. oh yes.

we talked today

with humor about getting older.

and in my 35th year (about halfway perhaps), the voices of debate seem soothingly stilled.

i see them still, the men and women who talk passionately of black and white, of war and peace of hell or not. sometimes i almost start to speak. and then, quietly, my eye drifts off into the distance.

towards wiping away a tear, reading a bedtime story, holding somebody who needs it, listening when it's wanted, loving when it's asked for and especially when it's not. there is no perfect here, in this heart, in this mind, in this soul.

just today a small bubble of anger and then...it fades into pinkness and understanding. until there is nothing left there, but, warmth.

there is no all-knowing-anything here within. it's just the tongue which tires of speech and instead wants to act with love. in the quiet spaces that few see and even less talk about.

scrubs.

disappearing acts

leave a note.

unknown country

when navigating your way through dense junglescapes, overconfidence can be a:

fatal error.

chinese astrology

bad piggy. no biscuit.

minefields

i don't dare him to take hibiscus from between my thighs, anymore. and i'm less of a cynic.

he says.

except on bad days, when the soft breeze won't cool my skin and my angles feel hard and clumsy. on days when my pinkness won't twirl the way it wants to. he admires the way i don't care what anybody thinks about who i am. I know who this girl is, even when she thinks she doesn't.

"i won that hard baby, you'll not take it from me"

and the italics are mine.

they drift, the little splotches of ire and rise with the heat of the bubbles in my bath, till they burst into a smile that is a little about heat, a little more about roots and a little less about you.

the smile is mine, too.

in italics

and here the fingertip touches the lip, fixes itself below the chin and simply looks.

here the eye centers on the color of your shirt, the angle of your bicep, the line of your chin, the thrust of your hips. and here, even now, the brain surges up and over, between pink shaded layers, underneath candied tickling tones.

and the heart listens and hears and speaks and dances and straddles you and cossets you and sings to you. it grieves your grief and licks the notes off your lips. the hands cross over the knees into stillness and the eyes focus diagonally. not seeing you, and seeing you.and having looked for the first time.

to see the tinsel reflected in your eye, to taste the salt-spatter on your cheek, to count a woman's tears, that still lie on your pillow like slug trails that you follow into the night.

flash forward

365 days later, i sneak up behind you and cover your eyes with my hands.

you barely feel my lips brush the space between earlobe and jawline. reaching up, you remove my fingertips, and not with your fist.

lovely boy.

a piece of my heart will always shimmer with the angles of your name.

four-leaf clover

he is beyond beautiful.

in spaces where men strive, he simply is.

as complete as breath, as raw as earth, as gentle as morning.

we are already home.

remembering gaia

stop

breathe

eye vs. eye

"you know, don't you, how much i despise all this touchy-feely stuff?"

"yes"

"it's not that i have anything against feelings you know, I just don't...really know why they're there"

my eyes have become rather large. the soft strains of guitar music beginning to permeate my consciousness.

"have we met?"

photograph

his eye is intimate agony against her skin.

she is never part of that dull landscape

unspoken words fracture
the air between them.

through the lens she smiles
he screams.

beautiful girl

let it go.

mostly

she loved the way he played.

interlude

"it gets really dark in here, sometimes" said the girl with the butterfly wings

" i don't mind the dark and i'm not scared" said the boy with the beautiful blue eyes. "i'll sit with you a while. Your eyes will adjust to the light"

evening

the girl liked the way beads of sweat collected in the small of her back. and the way her breasts fell together when she lay on her side. she liked the way she smelled and how her panties fitted her just right.


she moved restlessly under the covers. she liked the way the breeze touched her bare shoulders and the way the sheet felt under her hip. she could feel a single tendril of hair lifting in the breeze tickling her ear and she liked the way she chose not to wipe it away.


a single candle flickers near the bed and the girl watches the shadows it throws against the wall. she watches the tree from her nest. it's majesty, the lights playing on the resin in its leaves. she likes the way she can hear owls in the distance and how she knows a peacock will sing at precisely 5h15 a.m. hopeful in the dawn.

vortex

the difference between you and i she said, planting her feet squarely on the ground, is i don't believe you've ever played with glitter.

I don't think you'd know how to open the bottle, toss it into the air and dive underneath it for no reason other than to feel it fall onto your skin.

i don't believe you'd know how it feels to want to lay down amongst flower petals and feel them against your naked skin, just because they're there and you can, and isn't that what life's really about?

it's friday and you've suddenly remembered.

"it's no matter", I say.

"i haven't really been here anyway"

urgency

"I've no time for idle anythings" she whispered. to nobody in particular.

she pushed her hair up onto the top of her head then slowly let it fall again. the sigh that escaped her lips woke nobody.

slowly she sank her head down to the desk and rubbed the aching space between her shoulder blades.

she stayed there for a very long time.

dreamchildren

they feared the ancient spaces, the tiny rivulets of wonder between breath and blood
so long hidden, now, in locked boxes underneath beds.

in pockets against strong thighs. inbetween the pages of dusty books.

the recognition hurts them, like white-hot fire lashing against their bare knees.

dying to warm the still-flickering embers of their fragile hearts.

to resurface in the slightest whispered breeze.

william's brittle eden

some days I live in reverse.

but you've already heard this story.

remember?

“once upon a time a princess lost her way in the woods, and try as she might she could not find her way home”

it happens. and not just in fairy tales.

these are days of kneeling horses and unframed mirrors. here, juicy, gypsy violins mock this Eden face and I follow your grassy imprints into the olive grove, once again. and again. and again.

and you’ll adore me and undress me, and I won’t say no because I never did and I always do, and it’s who we were:

juicy

and I’m soothed by the rhythm of “that” song, the corazon of that song. and all its bloody damnation. as though somehow you are forever trapped within it, a tiny chalcedony butterfly.…..

“and I’ll do anything you ever dreamed to be complete
little pieces of the nothing that fall
oh, put your arms around me
what you feel is what you are
and what you are is beautiful”

i might have listened harder, heard the inequalities in those words but I played for higher stakes, and I lost. and i don't go there anymore.

later, when the Braille days move forward, I’ll tell you that I didn’t lose the lesson, just you. I’ll tell you that your red leather dreams were just that. dreams. i’ll convince you that this misted season is over and that, you, philosopher king, have been relinquished to the engravings of the past. i can be quite convincing about the white cliffs of Dover. especially since you’ve tumbled over them.

next time will be different. next week, next year, next month, I won’t let you take me there.

and then I remember my twelfth year. i think about the boy, Sean, shy and lanky…a philosophical politician…smiling sadly and handing me a love poem scrawled on a piece of pink paper, a drawing of a dove flanking the title. and, just for a moment, I feel, no, I know that love in all its forms leaves little pieces of hope-etched pinkness curled up inside your heart. And that you’ll come back again for more.

even when it’s over.

but next year, I won't go with you. I'll stay home and eat watermelon instead

won’t i.

(lyrics from "Slide" by the Goo Goo Dolls)

cancer

you are a festering whore.

perfect?

not here, not love.

inner knowing

to touch you, even once, would be to never walk away.

mr rorschach

i know this might come as something of a surprise.

you and i both know how long i've held on to the dusty, rose-colored corners of my mind. and i love a titillating mystery the way i love old books and what did or didn't happen at roswell.

but quite honestly, these cards you've been showing me...

i'm beginning to see, well...

inkblots.

moving house

export quality arrgghh.

irritation

there's something about him that i just can't stand about myself.

you exist, i'm sure

but only in the spaces between breaths. a bond built on a lie means you have to keep pretending it's something it's not.

what is it, exactly, we're pretending it's not?

on any other night

this isn't a love-hate relationship.

it's just love.

tossed around on stormy seas, a sullen strand of seaweed fastened tightly around its wrist.

DYI

"you'd feel better", he said "if you weren't so self-aware all the time"

"really"

"yeah! i suggest dumbing it down a bit. it'll help.

"really?" is that what you do? is that why you hardly ever have a feather out of place?"

"no. i'm just naturally stupid"

"oh. cool. so i need to just stop thinking then"

"er..yeah..what are you doing"

"oh, just a little lobotomy"

definitely reccommended

dancing Shakira style to the delight of your bedroom mirror.

things to avoid

placing yourself
in inverted commas.

things to acquire

a little more brain in my heart, a little more heart in my brain.

i was sad

when i thought i'd lost you.

quotations

"well that was a total rocking, kick-ass blast, and i'm not even tired! woo! let's do it all over again in the next life. that being who you really are thing i decided to do when i was thirty-five was some serious good shit!" ~ capegirl age 99.

addiction

i never thought i'd ever drink less coffee. but then there are a lot things i didn't think i'd ever do. like push-ups, and letting go of you. it's never been the object - it's the feeling you're looking for. i just want different feelings. it's work i'm happy to do.

unbearable lightness

my desire broke and fell. scattering into a million prisms. down and down and down and down. deeper and deeper until the colors became your name, sang your name, spiralled into you and melded into a single glowing, desperate light.

and then

my skin would taste the sweat from your skin, and trace hearts across your pain.

until

the pearls that nestle
between my breasts
wait for
whispers from
your heart

special offer

and he gave her the night and the moon and the rush of blood and the sense of succour. batteries not included.

and each time the boy appeared

rapunzel let down her hair.

for a good time call:

somebody else.

unless you like your girls covered in Vicks and sneezing paroxysm-style.

a boy and a girl saw stars

they were brave, they were determined. and even though it hurt to look, they did.

intimacy

its all in the hips and the sweat and the hair, you see.

and the lips and the whispers. its in the hard and the fast and the sweet and the slow. and the being and the aching and wanting. its in the toes and the knees and the biting and the rough and the gentle and the exquisite and the plain.

its here in the heart and here in the brain and here and here and here and there and everywhere and everything. its in the 'where did that come from?' and the 'i knew that was coming' and the 'let's do it again' and the 'i've never done that before'.

its in the bucking and the swaying and the heat and the breath and in the moment that isn't and is and isn't and is. its in the passion and the tears and the inside and the out. and the neck and the need and the taste and the feed.

and in the more and the madness that words can't measure.

gut feelings

shall we dance, sweet pilgrim? or should we remain just so with our backs against the wall? i enjoy you so much it hurts. right where it shouldn't. but such is the way it is at times. the scales are oft dreadfully unbalanced. ask any chinstrap penguin.

today

a news broadcast tells us 18 people were thrown from trains this week, that there is snow on the mountains and freezing temperatures. that people are freezing on the streets and hungry and wet. icicles stick to their foreheads and the cash-strapped salvation army is all that stands between them and more misery. houses are flooded and hailstones the size of duck eggs batter already tattered homes. it's another day in south africa. another baby dead, another corruption trial. another dark night. somehow it feels hard to crack a smile.

what they tell me, what i know

i have a brain that sometimes doesn't work too well. it has moments of fogginess - much like a television with too much static. my senses on the other hand are an entirely different matter.

sometimes

our best friends are the ones that call us on our shit. not the ones that hide in the dark with us, talking about tragedies.

william part 2

courtesy sinead lohan ~

"We went down to the edge of the water
You were afraid to go in
You said there might be sharks out there in the ocean
And I said i'm only going for a swim

I was swimming around in a circle
I wasn't always in view
You said we might get into red flag danger
And I am alone when i'm not with you

But I am no mermaid
I am no mermaid
And I am no fisherman's slave
I am no mermaid
I am no mermaid
I keep my head above the waves

We were swinging from the centre of the ceiling
You were afraid to give in
I said I know i'll always live for this feeling
And you closed your eyes you said never again

We were dancing in the middle of the desert
You said we'll burn under the hot sun
I said i'd rather be the colour of pleasure
Than watch like you from under the thumb"

~ and that, my love, will make all the difference.

truthfully

put away your long-stemmed roses and red, silk scarves.

i don't seek the kind of power you long to possess. long before you were a gleam on the horizon, i watched my father with a keen eye. there is not much i cannot guess about a man. daddy was a player like that.

but what do you bring that i have not yet seen? can you stand before me naked, and love without the promise of gain? can you loosen the silk ribbons of your casanova cape and weep before me? will you hear your own heart?

and, right now, before this goes any further, realize you are not the answer to my prayers. i don't pray that way.

residual image

my fathers stout frame
is nothing like my own
but i mirror his stubborness
quite robustly

when there's something weird

i ain't afraid of no ghosts.

sleep waking

these dreams are shouting at me. i wake in abstract wonderment and remember each detail clearly. you are vivid in a way you are not once i have washed my face and swallowed my first dose of morning coffee.

closed doors

tonights mindwalk leads me, via vine covered ground, straight to your door. i would knock if i thought you would hear me. but i'm not sure you're home. maybe you're just out, knocking on your own silent door.

william

of all the places i have ever been you were the warmest.

saying goodbye to yesterday should feel like i'm losing you forever, but i've loved harder and longer than things that have cut me too deep. i'll never feel i've lost you, not like that.

when you feel in your very core, deep into spaces that have never been touched - you cannot live around it, or manage it, or move on from it. you can only live within it and it within you. as i have and do and always will. even as i know that a part of me will always feel the sadness and the joy of you. a big part and a small part all at the same time.

but you were many things all at the same time. and so were we and so am i, now.

i'm not the mermaid i once was. i'm different now and i sing different songs. a lot of that is thanks to you and even more is despite the loss of you. but i always knew you'd be big and so you were. and so you always will be.

like the ashes that were never scattered you and i were locked into something that would never really end. it's not wishful thinking when i say you're eternal because you are here with me now and in everything i do and in the colors that have never seemed as bright as when you were near. and in the colors that i still seek, even though they look a little pale. because while i am loved and cherished greatly, nobody can do it quite like you. but that, of course is the story you wrote me.

these steps

are not small.

amigo

to the friends who have stayed true no matter what changes they witnessed in me in the past five years. thank you - for not being a slave to instant gratification. to those who drifted off because i wasn't as much 'the giver' as usual, i hope you're happy too. we all can be.

magic

there is nothing quite like the sound of a beating heart.

whatever you do

don't blame the boy. if his trinkets caught your eye, you must have been looking in his direction.

silence

is also an answer.

hindsight

i was mistaken

~chicken little

blogs

make effective weapons of mass distraction. don't they?

waltz

i dance an intimate dance with myself. when i am done the sticky sweat seems to indicate that muscle has been stretched furter than i thought it might go. you are responsible for each and every way that you feel. sucks don't it?

dear me

people who write books, write books. i'm just saying.

pulling the trigger

this is a pretty word, followed by another pretty word, punctuated by an intelligent word and an interesting insight. three more pretty words follow. all this amounts to: very little in the absence of action, presuming, of course that you wish to move.

i have it on good authority

that sadness doesn't kill you. it also creates the kind of wrinkles that lend to the face an incredibly mysterious appeal. i quite like it, these days. i see life here, in this face.

to answer your question

that boys heart is so rigid that it's almost locked in a box. to distract himself he almost falls in love, over and over and over again. it's a pity that only he has the key because it's a really good heart. you can see the light shining through the airholes.

resolutions

this year i'm giving up control. i never had any, anyway. it's a bit like perfectionism, which i gave up when i was twenty-four. imagine putting so much energy into something that actually doesn't exist. it's rather elitist.

ar some point

who you are becomes a choice.

bloggerlution

and as they changed, so too did their blogs. some were left behind, their once cherished nicknames no longer needed. some wait in sleepy silence. there is, after all, the possibility of regression. some are in flux, soon to be discarded on a pile of no regrets. some are simply not required, right now. maybe soon.

or soonish.

some die with one posting. perhaps the writer did too. or maybe, instead, he lived.

i really don't care

in which fashionable literary magazine your poetry has been published. i want to see the ones you didn't send in.

where do they all belong?

i looked up and saw loneliness..

i saw it in the girl wearing chagrin like a badge and punching at little things that hang in the air like tail ends of lullabies.

i saw it in the girl using sex like a fishing lure. as though being able to titillate a man was any great feat or a triumph worthy of the effort. surely there must be more to you than your need for attention? and a better way to get it, if that's all there is.

i saw it in the girl determined to be honest against all odds as though losing her grip for an instant would see her shatter like a crystal star against the night sky.

i saw it in the man who thinks his way through life as though one day, one day, when the stench of his fearfulness is covered in answers he will know... anything.

i saw it in the written and most of all in the still to be penned.

if loneliness is feeling like you sometimes cannot relate to the world, then i, too, am lonely. if it means whoring who i am for a little attention, then loneliness may be the only feeling i have ever escaped.

you are all worth so much more.

namaste.

conversations in the kitchen

you

with your earthy focus
ask me (daily)
why i do not
use my beautiful voice
or make use of the
dance i have longed
to perfect
to express my feelings

i twist a strand
of hair around my fingers
and tell you (daily)
that I am thirty-four going on six
and I need to get this
off my chest before i do

you

with your inexhaustable urgency
ask me if i think
i'm going to live forever

don't be daft, i tell you
that is why god gave me
the hips and legs of
an eternal sixteen year old
and a voice that grows
more rich with age

he knew i was going to be
slightly delayed

for transience

one does not have to be direct to be honest or real. some of the most direct people i know hide much and lie plenty. you're plenty talented and plenty realistic. rock on haremgirl.

dear camera shy

i peek through my right hand.

spring cleaning

as he fell off his pedestal, i heard a tiny "thunk". it was really rather an anti-climax. absolutely no rosy glow afterwards.

folk tales and other interesting tidbits

like all good folk tales, each time the story is told it is a little different.

how wonderful, then, to embellish the details slightly or leave out certain parts of the tale on any given day; as old men did around campfires in an ancient Swaziland. as twigs crackled in the dwindling tangerine light, these men would not have believed that one day such tales would appear via wireless technology.

but if they'd shared this information, no doubt a gasp would have escaped the lips of their listeners as they wondered: "what sort of alchemy is this?" because it's easy to make people believe what we want them to...when we're telling stories.

like bits of indigo-dyed cloth given as a brides price our reward is a wide-eyed audience eager to hear the next installment of our journey, the next train ride into memory or helicopter flip into a much-hoped for future.

but i would be alarmed if three years on i was still telling the same tales. repeating the same understandings, treading the same murky water, or bouncing on the extent of my own mind. so let's not do that.

i love all of you who comment here. you are all individuals with good solid minds of your own, but able to reach and stretch and think outside the box and that is huge...HUGE in this life. you are my favorite kinds of people. for those who visit every day but remain silent, i would love to meet you, so please say hello next time you pass this way. i often wonder who you are.

i will, probably continue to use this space as a way to express what otherwise would remain deeply hidden. it's my way of processing my feelings. the trick here is moving on, not staying stuck in an endless stream of words, where i say the same thing in a million novel ways . if i'm still writing this way in 6 months time...stop me.

yummyness

these memories smell like cinnamon.

tiger

or lily? it really depends on who you are.

untitled

tonight a visit to you-topia leaves me breathless and tingling. how warm you are.

immovable

your name is a mountain. i would travel it in circles and crescents, if that would move you.

it's ok

to color outside the lines. i wish you fun and joy with your crayons. and hope you use lots of purple. it really is a fabulous color.

truth

i complete me

but i wouldn't mind sitting on your lap, with my head on your shoulder hearing you read poetry. i wouldn't mind a bit.

short stories

i do believe that we have re-written the whole story. sure, we argued over the editing for a while, but in the end we just created an ending that suited our unique fears. you wanted a story that flowed and swelled into something whole. i wanted it to feel and look more fragmented, the way life really is sometimes. rather commercial for two such maverick souls don't you think? i've never known two people more in love and yet so afraid. i think we should talk.

memory

there's a little bit of you here in in the lines of my body. i feel you on misty mornings and star scattered nights. i swing my thighs over yours and we do not need any more.

favorite fantasy

lips eyes skin heat
you lust moan pout
lick take give need
hair sweat tongue slide

d o n t

e v e r

s t o p

its all in

the pudding you see.

she walked away

taking her ribbons and scuffed suitcase with her. leaving behind ghosts of the past and the pitter patter of tiny heartprints.

big brain

1) i run an anti-virus program on my computer (Y/N)

2) i use condoms when i have sex with people whose HIV or other STD status is unknown (Y/N)

foreplay

how to get more booty part 1:

lesson 1: women are not men.

sure, men aren't women either, but well fuck, it's the mating dance isn't it? ask any horny lion if he has to at least roll around a bit, protect the harem or mess with a few other lone males before he gets the pussy so to speak.

the truth is, whether you like it or not, that us girls like a bit of the flashy stuff before we give it up. i personally, am quite demanding that way.

p.s. i know when you're faking it.

clean hands

dear A

i am fascinated by the way in which you have distanced yourself from any emotional responsibility for what has happened between us. i always had the feeling that Pontius Pilate must have had trouble sleeping. perhaps by making the choice to not be accountable he assured himself of a good nights rest - at least according to the evidence you place before me.

i'm screwed if i know. i might never have slept again, if i was him.

dear pillow

i held onto you like my life depended on it that night. tear stained and crumpled you were. thank god, you rolled with the punches.

obscure reference

i close my eyes so that i can't see you or place my palms over them, just so, but sometimes, late at night
i peek

no more of this

for you

and you

and you

and, especially, you.

but you...i like you. you don't keep taking.

*none of you fine folks of course*

i want you

in 57 different ways. some of them involve poledances. and while i don't exactly feel that food and sex mix, i make exceptions for lollipops. red ones.

fog-filled days

imagine we stood, you and i, bold and naked before each other and spoke, with no pretense, all the words shielded deep within our hearts and sang songs of ancient loves realized. and were not tentative about the wild abandon we want to show each other. and started sentences with "and" just because we want to.

imagine we said "i love you" and it was not a need-filled expression and imagine our mouths were supple vessels of pleasure and not bent into rationality like carpenters molding trees into boats and buildings and other vessels made to withstand the ferocity of storms.

and picture, if you will, the you and i within the us who are brave enough to accept love instead of two lost souls who build up walls of self-protection and on the seventh day declare them good. walls designed around logic and rationality that keep out barking dogs and bitter battles.

imagine, my sweet love, that your words were symphonies and cheese and crackers all rolled into one and that my caresses were angel kisses and warm chicken soup and that we fought for peace, not victory.

and imagine that these words fall on your ears and you know they're for you and wonder how you know that ....and then imagine me wondering if you do.

but today, a day for hopeless romantics and the pain and the pleasure of you seems to have closed around my heart. like the fog outside that obscures the mountains and the road that brings me home to you.

holy grails

are just really old cups. when shopping in that arena choose something more modern, functional,perhaps even a multi-purpose item.

oh, and make sure it's not going to runneth over. excess is really not a good thing.

cricketing tips

let's say you're bowling at the death and you only need one wicket to win the game.

useful advice: don't squander your men at the boundary.

and on the other side of that coin...

let's say you're the last and most laughable man at the crease and the light is fading.

useful advice: forget about looking pretty.

mr right?

let's start with somebody who knows how to be wrong.

to the little one

as yet unborn, your seed lying dormant and waiting within this indecisive womb. you will not hear me list the reasons why you should be mine. instead i'll think about reasons you might find to call me mother, proudly.

eye

of the tiger

why i cant:

i will not make you what i need to be for myself.

note to self and all: that's not love

statistics

roughly one thousand three hundred women can be expected to be raped on any day in South Africa. in an Interpol study South Africa was revealed to lead the world in rapes.

a woman is raped in South Africa every 17 seconds, not counting child rape victims. It is estimated that one in every two women is likely to be raped. Between 28 and 30 percent of adolescents reported that their first sexual encounter was forced.

Of South African men who knew somebody who had been raped, 16 percent believed that the rape survivor had enjoyed the experience and had asked for it. A recent study by the south african police estimated that only one in 36 rape cases was reported and of those only 15 percent culminated in a conviction.

LET ME JUST SHARE, HERE AND NOW WITH THE WORLD THAT I AM ONE OF THE 35 WHO SAID NOTHING. I THINK 18 YEARS OF KEEPING SILENT IS QUITE LONG ENOUGH, DON'T YOU?

wonderful boy - part 2

i want you to know, that should we ever evolve enough to that point - the place where we let each other in and it's real, and unafraid, and vital and big - that you won't need to ask twice. there are none i love so well as you.

wonderful boy

my tears taste of you. the good things about you. the things you don't say. i see your protections and i don't mind. be whoever you need to be right now, boy, it doesn't change your sweet, sweet taste.

boy

and as the sun makes it's slow climb skyward i feel you, here, slip-sliding between my thighs. i see you between the yellowed, pages of a dusty book and hear you in the ramblings of tragic, comic theatre of old.

and here, in the echoes of souls gone before and souls still waiting, you rise from the ashes of long abandoned thoughts. i whisper your forgotten name in moments that are not quite dawn and no longer dusk. and, here in the quiet moments, you are big, like immovable mountains and songs people never stop singing. and overly dramatic blog posts, just like this one.

sweet, beautiful you, do not look into my eyes. they belie my words, and all the logic that runs like rivulets through my brain. by my soul, i have taken pains to deny you and yet i seek you in all the markings of my skin, and the memories of moments that never were. if i no longer look so completely in your direction it's only because, now, i see you everywhere.

you're here in the stories of the London blitz. in tales of people sleeping in underground tunnels listening to the sound of doodle-bugs and fragile hope. i find you too, in the moments i try to forget, to relegate you to a knee-jerk freudian lapse of judgment. yes there you are, your eyes not taking no for an answer, your hand brushing tendrils of hair from my shoulder. your love, not asking but offering so much more than i could ever give in return.

masked ball

we hide behind words, like revelers at a masked ball. each understanding why the other can never reveal himself fully. hiding instead behind gaily colored lanterns and other festive embellishments. how beautiful then, when we loosen the ribbons of our capes and naked ourselves on the floor. to weep, to laugh, to choose. i'm on my way.

gratitude

i declare it preferable - this measured, impoverished communication - scattered like exploding globes - that light the room and then plunge it into darkness once more - than no more words.

honesty

we're too wise to woo peaceably.

irony

she has an unending capacity for cynical humor. at least, she laughs at her own thoughts. which is a wonderful form of entertainment. i imagine much like masturbation - but far less sticky. this is evidenced by starting this in the middle of a week long blackout. if you're used to a more sensitive side of me i suggest a crash helmet and knee pads.

an outstretched palm

he coiled his hand into a fist that day and yet, did not place it around her heart.

instead, as darkness settled into secret, raw places, his fingers lifted the ringlets off her cheeks. his neck arched forward, and the motion was slow and unsullied by configured grace or charm.

he kissed the coiled loops that lay over his knuckles and the light from the tiny window that fell on them. she did not look at him, and did not move, but her breath lingered on his cheek for just a moment. he felt the warm air lift and then vanish into the world, no longer part of her.

i do not think he knew what he did that night, as hours passed and the stars dissolved into skies the color of flamingoes. the city began to stir and with it the filth and waste of progress. she lay curled against him and slept, her bones touching his.

it is not always a beautiful thing, this world. but if beauty is to be found it exists in the moments when we find an honest place to be. i wish for you, such places.

95

unanswered e-mails.

hello darkness

a world without electricity. is really, really quiet. so many candles, so many cats calling outside my window. so much time to think. back soon.

welcome

to my emotional stonehenge. feel free to erect a triolith and make yourself comfortable.

happiness is

an unlimited lingerie budget.

internet romance

push-button pugilism.

free-fall

he is tightly curled and glistening with the sweat of madness, his rage at the world, his utter selfishness.  suddenly he strides confidently to the ledge; the tiny pigeon-shit-spattered brick that offers the choice between mastery and free-fall.  the 'thing' stands on its little brick of choice.  I stay where I am, squashed between a wall and a billboard.

love

it's the letting go that is the real thing.

visibility

our love looks real through this veil of ironies.

living in the wild

never, ever, run from an attacking lion.

...

supercalafragilisticexpialidocious

dear W

i miss 'i love you's' in spanish.

hide and seek

whose turn is it?

anatomy 101

the brain has no feeling.

poetry

writing poetry:

a little like performing open heart surgery on an anesthetized patient...to the sound of Beethoven, naturally.

the formats we come in

on my arm, from wrist to shoulder, 107 different versions of your name.

certain metaphorical memoirs

there are only five miles to the nearest alchemist. and in my valise the pinkest of pink ribbons and a jar of sweet, sticky honey. and i'm reaching for you along dusty tracks and in angel skies and in smudges and whisperings of exotic skin smoothings.

oh, yes, i have dreamed of this. and there have been so many rest stops along the way, my angel dove, and thinking of you at every dirty, greasy, desperation-filled diner.

and everywhere the caged birds sing their mournful songs in lonely night and smog-filled day. as though the more loudly, the longer, the more tumescent the song, the greater the freedom. and many a bird dying in mid-warble and trying so hard to make half-things whole.

and when you set the caged bird free, will its song sound as sweet, my love, as it did when it was singing to be free? and where will we be, my love, if we both run away? and who would we be if we stayed? and did you ever want to love something so badly that to do so would crush the life and breath and blood from its fine, yellow feathers?

and when you kneel and suck the nectar from between my sweet, sticky thighs, darling one, will you, then, be king? and when i grind my hips into yours will the world stop spinning? it's not, you know, an easy question.

still, the ribbon is for you, sweet boy, and i want you, and only you to tug the ends and take it out. and when my hair brushes your hand, you'll know it was me, and only me, that set the caged bird free.

but this is not a love story.

(look instead for a cheap melodrama with a two-ply tissue ending, where the destination keeps hoisting baggage over its shoulder and moving out of my reach).

but, come now, there's a chance that somehow, tonight, you'll find a good cigar, just the right single-malt and a whore willing to grant you your illusion. and who knows, just maybe, by morning the chill might have warmed enough to make you want to do it all again on a day just as vapid.

because we do so want to believe in something whole, don't we?

caricatures

as a girl with a flair for the dramatic and prone to speaking without pause and with passion (while beating my fist on a pillow and waving my hands intensely in the air) i vote for freedom of expression. and when I say what i want, please don't come and burn down my house. but where do I draw the line? i suppose when it would hurt somebody to express myself with such gay abandon. well i try.

they came, they saw

and made such small things a universe.

tears

on my pillow.

perspective: second edition

imagine no book, no poetic reference, no wisdom from gods or google, no mirror image from those who dance the same dance, comforting you in shared experience of this mortal coil. no masters to quote, no woman to soothe into the shared creaminess of submission, no keyboard to tap or sushi to guide you. no demons to slay, no others to imagine you are more than. sweet pilgrim, who are you, now?

such incredibly

beautiful venom. all dressed up in sophisticated sadness.

he

is lost somewhere between a tear and a scream. no woman's arms. no fat cat, no shiny trinket can soothe the little lost boy within.

searcher

the circus came to town early that year. with its side show freaks and clowns, and us spinning inside like big tops. i laugh, hard, and salt water clings to my breasts. you say, "come here", and it sounds like pearls. and it feels you're dripping honey into my open mouth. and it wants to be mine. and i take it, because it's you and you're a a 57 Chevy caught in a half dream. my angel-demon, my idle, idyll, idol. you tell me my morning-after-mascara doesn't turn you off and you love me because I'd sleep on the beach with you.

and just as suddenly you're gone like the tribes of mapungubwe. buried sitting up, facing west. a golden chalice, sceptre and rhinoceros, along for the ride. i laugh and i think "you've finally reached the point-break".

and now, you're only this...

a modern savage in the flare of my camera. your little boy face and big man arms kiss me in the silhouette surf, down a hill of water, and i try to find the place where we lose ourselves, find ourselves and fool ourselves. (there are no signposts, so watch out for the fire breathing dragons).

[daddy, you didn't know your child had the heart of a butterfly. and a mind so sheer that it absorbed everything it touched. so you left your handprint on her skin and threw her dancing shoes into the gutter. and now you ask why she holds onto everything so tightly?]

somewhere there is a place where what's mine is not yours.

three-three-niner

sierra.hotel.indigo.tango - and so far, today, frustration, sounds better in radio code.

the story of two

they knew it would only take one look, one touch, one fragile confession to bridge the ancient seas between their shores. then, the tide would rush in, bringing with it all the truth they had covered up in the dust of denial. so they simply looked at each other and said nothing.

now

there's just no way of knowing who i might be by the end of the day, so stop looking at me that way and take me to bed before we both lose this kamikaze moment. i'm not a girl who makes promises, it's true, but i'm good at loving in the small spaces. places where travelers seldom go and the cafes are empty, except for the woman who sits in the corner waiting for lovers who pay her in hope.

take my hand, it'll help me decide who i'm going to be when my thighs touch the sheets. if a meow escapes my lips, don't worry, i'm interesting that way. i'm a toddlers book of finger paintings you know. all stapled together and littered with handprints, things that glitter and the accumulated colors of heartscapes. no mistakes, you see.

hold me, here, and we'll look at the moon and her crescent gaps. those, too will change. give her time. the phases are necessary. you'll probably think me a cynic if you knew that i know you're unlikely to rock my world. but my world is beyond the dips and dives of a man's amour. i can't seem to find the commas and full stops to fix the punctuation. and anyway, my hearts always been in italics.

but, let's do it anyway. there's nobody else I need to be right now.

imagine

if you and i could view each others hearts like satellite television. plug in, switch on, find the channel of him and her and them, reduce the static and know. but there is only this, this lonely hunger. you know it and you and you. and you, too. this thing is yours alone and there is just no way to broadcast it the way it really feels.

cape town burns

the mountains that surround my city are on fire. it will not stop tonight. table mountain, lion's head, signal hill, are lit up like out of control fireworks.

here is a link to some recent pictures.

there are 18 in all and they are worth looking at to see the extent of the blaze. In case you may worry, I live about 40km out of the city, so I am fine. However I know several people who are involved in trying to get things under control. In fact they are my whole circle of friends. The last I heard most of the residents in the area have been evacuated and stand at the foot of the mountain gazing up at the blaze in absolute silence. I do not know where they will sleep tonight.

tuesday morning

there is no tree,
bird or butterfly
outside this room

with its cat's claw
telephones
and leperous
machines

a girl in the
sterile chamber
next door
starts to speak
stutters,
then stops

her lipstick is
smeared into
a scarlet
hyphen
her hair a greasy,
gothic tongue

I think about
chocolate chip cookies
and this
mornings news

story of a snake
that befriended
its hamster dinner
and by all
accounts is
still hungry

i move to refill

the paper tray
with the ghosts
of a thousand
dead trees

and think of the girl
wearing nothing

and of how she
likes to lick
apricot
jam
off her
fingertips

colors

i try to hold onto you but your colors keep

c
h
a
n
g
i
n
g

even as my lotus hand reaches to part the veil
your smile becomes a kaleidoscope,

a c h e s s b o a r d,

the blue-orange flash
of a kingfisher wing,
an island of hibiscus and
soul-cradling

h
a
m
m
o
c
k

faith is as much a part of
my world as
green eggs and ham
you see

and even the pope
sometimes rides behind

g
l
a
s
s

perspective

your lips taste of an indelible hunger. is it yours or mine?

to the mosquitoes

who are biting my feet as I type this: are you really creatures of the earth or can I squash you?

to the little bird

who devoured
the peach
i left outside
on the rusty
nail:

glad I could
help

dear greenpeace

whales cannot be saved by stupidity, not now, not ever.

secret fears

i harbor fears
that one day
i will choke
to death on
perfectly cooked
ramen
(the use of the word "ramen" courtesy of the original Ramen Messenger)

pseudo nymph

i must, unfortunately, change my profile name, because, well there are stalkers you see. I do not wish them to see what might next appear on Ghost Dance. Any suggestions from the harem, or those that stalk the harem?

little wonders

the tiny sea
on your lips
anoints the
wilderness of
my nipple

and then again...

this karmic church, on nights when the moon hungers, sees dusky souls enter, kneel in silence, light candles and hurry back into the ravaged night.

upper class twits

egoists entranced by their own "greatness" and rather cruel to "lesser mortals": not pretty, not pretty at all. you in your little club don't forget your own peccadillos.

in a city somewhere

i pressed my bare
breasts between
a cold glass
pane and a cat's
whisker

nostalgia

1983
jo-anne and i are
rollerskate queens
in short shorts
and rose-cheeks

that are warmer
than this city
of narrow alleys
and steep hills
that end where
harbors begin

for william

a tiny island wrapped
in rice paper
a frameless portrait
a vanished city

to and from

love letters in repose
and ruby flesh
makes a slow,
steady crawl
into my cheeks

prisms

i feel my way around glimpses of you through vivid crystal prisms, a gush of blood wrapped in promises of submission-swollen kisses

snowflakes

when snowflakes fall to the ground they do it softly, like you my love, like you my love. delicate patterns meet the ground, like you my love, like you my love.

likes and unlikes

tonight I saw a black rhino in Kenya and men were bending over it sawing its beautiful horn off and you asked poachers? and I said no they are trying to stop it being killed by poachers who are too poor and stupid to know the difference and you said and what can we do about it? i don't know but it's a shocking shame and it makes me weep stinging tears and i feel like i want to blaze a bullet through their brains and castrate them and sell their penis dust on the black market so men can feel virile and soothe their egos and you laughed and said that is so like you and there's a market for penis dust and i said it breaks my heart and i feel sad for that magnificent animal and for what it feels lying in the dirt being hacked so that it can feel one more heartbeat and you said that is life and there is not much to be done about it and i said that is so like you to be so unlike me about rhino horns

nowhere and everywhere

dear J you say you like the way i can go anywhere and set up house and arrange candles and fruit bowls on batik tablecloths as though being elsewhere were nothing new to me and i was from nowhere and everywhere all at the same time and you could never be that way not even if you tried and i said i like the way you touch the ribbon in my plaited hair as though you always wanted to and now you did and that is quite rare where i've been and you said have you travelled much? and i said i've moved around frequently and you said that's what i like about you you're somewhere else all the time

endless beginnings

think instead of the day when forever cracked wide open and you wiped your finger across the beads of my spine and the sun set in the corner of my eye and you held hibiscus in your teeth to see how frenzied I would taste think of tigers and lilys that open their mouths so wide you can see all the way into the womb of Pleiades birthplace of new stars and nowhere near places like Rome

eve

was no more tempted than i envy a penis.

foam and other moments

the foam from that ill-fated cappuccino seemed to linger on her lips for a long time after that last resolute swallow.

you...

...come here. i want to paint you with my fingertips.

schoolyard

the boy and the girl played games. soon the day came when a game of chess ended in a stalemate. the girl huffed and threw the board onto the floor. she stamped her heel and sat and stared at him. he stared back. silence filled the room until it burst into a thousand heart-shaped pieces.

strange behaviors

i write to know you are not alone. you of the short, sharp, gentleness.

The Hush Room

past the perfume-soaked whores
on the corner,
in their inches of heels
and pink ostrich boas
(she swears she only uses her hands).

past the pimps in shimmer suits
and platform shoes;
their beacon-wide brims
casting shadows
over greed-grimed faces.
(touch but don't look)
(or pay up and leave)

past the cathedral ceiling
of Motown and Malcolm X
whole souls cry

miles from The Hush Room
where drag queens
and faggots
have to feel it to believe it
in compromising positions
that guess at the truth
from midnight
to 9 a.m.

removed from the spaces
where men don't
have penises
but Gods of Thunder
and every woman thinks
a man will be different
for her

nowhere near the crooning
of The Supremes
(ooh, baby love, my baby love)
vs. The Impressions
(people get ready there's a train a-coming)

past the hate crimes
and lynch mobs
and street justice
(we're through the looking glass now)
all men
whether naked
or in costume
are created
equal

she

in darkness made love to him like there were no yesterdays.

soul-siren

you, soul mate.
your breath, your boiling blood, your heat, your skin, your lips, your love, your heart.

your you-ness.

yes and no

goodybes are wayward butterflies that tease her lips. she is still entranced by his wow factor.

i do

you know...love you.

Eve

i know why she did it.

Believers

she only ever fell in love with Lost Boys. this is how it works with Neverland Girls.

Closed in on three sides

did you say Chinese love bed?

on my way to you

i slipped.

untitled

there are so many things you do not know.

goodbye

changes nothing.

And so...

he loved her in the forgotten places.

Alice

went through the looking-glass barefoot. later she wore stillettos.

Pillows

make good lovers.

Untitled

slowly she pushed his jpeg. up against the wall.

Yes I am...

Never Leave Me

~ Ernest Hemingway

Dance of Rememberance

an island king gazed at his lover with a jaundiced eye, but found no lack. the dance lasted the length of his longing, then gently slipped away. she never spoke of love with any conviction on any day after that.

I know

i know why you're afraid to jump. i know why you sleep with a book next to your bed. I know why you don't need anybody.

This Boy

folded her lovingly in quiet acceptance. The shock was much too much to bear.

I go by

codename: musturbator. yes I do.

It seems

that all good harem girls have secrets

Lifesavers Have Holes in Them

at first it seemed the man was waving from beyond the ocean foam. when she realized he was drowning it was much, much too late. for a long time she did not speak, her eyes remaining fixed on the horizon.

In and out

his eyes covered her breasts and the flushed flesh of memory.

Connection

they spoke of love and menage a trois. not necessarily in that order.

Asleep

you lifted the cup up to her lips and she tasted the sweet liquid. then she pushed you away and slept once more. not even the dawn would wake her.

Shaken

great northern winds spoke of her crooked smile.

Something like...

something like madness straddled a sweat-soaked horse and raced toward the twilight. nostrils snorted obscenities and hooves beat broken ground as a heart broke free.

Boy

silly, beautiful, frightened you. your intentions are matched only by your confusion.

Upstream

They ripped her spine out inch by breathtaking inch. When she could no longer swim, they threw her back into the water.

Casa No Va

He came bearing gifts. All the girls in their ivory towers loved to love him. Much later they understood that he was only trying to distract them from who he was deep down inside. This was the real reason he brought so many shining trinkets.

A Moment Please

for just a moment the world seemed to fracture. bliss fell slowly, embedded itself in the grass beneath her feet like an athame. when she awoke five years had passed. the light that shone on her eyelids was almost unbearable.

Memory

here i am on the beach strutting
a young girl
with perky breasts
and supple thighs

Here and...

now, every wrinkle speaks your name.

oh!

your kiss, your kiss, your kiss, your kiss.

The Patron

It was her custom to remain seated until the end of the performance. Tonight the flickering images appeared grainy and harsh. Had she seen the same theme somewhere before? She left early and picked her way across the grey cobblestones back to her womb-like room.

You

You read me like Tarot. First one card, then the next, interpreting each puzzle piece correctly. Sympatico. I knew you were irreplaceable, even then.

Unspoken

Karl wasn't home. Undetterred, we sneaked into the house to collect the food we'd stashed in his freezer while we moved. As you hoisted me up and onto the window ledge you said, "hmm..she knows how to climb" I looked down at you and said, "of course" and we both knew what we meant.

That Day

We sheltered from the thunderstorm in a narrow gorge. Your body shielding me from the wind and lashing rains. My arm around your naked waist, your head arched back onto my shoulder, I noticed the tiny purple flower growing in a few grains of sand.

Journey

She stood in the sun with her arms outstretched. Her face, she remarked, was beginning to reveal the roadmap of her journey.

Tonight

He tells me he loves me because I have the most amazing heart he's ever known.

Jesusfuck.

Mirror

There were things they could not say. Would not say. Did not say. Wanted to say. Should have said. Will never say.

Must Hurry

Run, run white rabbit run. It's gaining on you. Might I suggest rollerblades?

And so...

Hot milk, pyjamas and moisturiser.

oooooooooh.

To You

You loved me like surfers ride waves. I keenly feel the loss of those rhythms. Now, the riptide.

Ego

Our ids battle like fighting cocks or pit bull terriers. I'm willing to bet any amount of money we both end up bruised, bloodied and feeling used. Still, baby needs a new pair of shoes.

Faux

His social skills were impressive. For about two seconds. Now its time to reveal a heart.

Antagonist

You smacked it down onto the table as though it was supposed to matter. In a different life it might have. In this life I sniffed and turned away. You are not as relevant as you think you are.

Molehills

You and I are unlikely to be as monumental as we presently think we are.

Codeword

Your fortress is impenetrable. I can guarantee you, I don't have the secret password. I'm too tired for code.

Fizzle

Now, out of the corner of my eye I see the blaze reduced to a flickering ember. I marvel at how it ever warmed me and I don't feel cold anymore without it. Isn't it funny how that works?