the muse is a strangled messenger tonite
hands clenched, cloth-bound
thoughts escaping from tendrils of hair
like so many red-ribboned kite strings
up there searching out safe clouds yet
snarled in the black fingers of trees,
tethered to snake-skinned telephone lines
and no one electric is talking on the wire.
words backsliding, kicking and biting
doubled-up, dropped, uncoiled nonsense
a tired, escaped lover leaves
a cold kiss like the pelt of sleet
a callous, sandpaper caress.
the endless white noise of fictional rain storms
and his name so close to water, pours
through my broken, cupped hands.
but the words won’t come with tapping
nor gathering –
no puddle collects in sand.
into hopeful shallows, a shining line is cast
while empty hooks come back, silver glinting
eyes and teeth smiling still, the dead promise
of sleep.
the muse he used to keep me up at nite
incessant chatter until i heaved a sigh
and agreed to write.
but the muse is a strangled messenger
the scribbling not a song, just a rhythm of
the t cross line little e open eye
half me still i m tied up in the two-looped
l and the double-hump of m
waving goodbye dropping two consonants
g (ee)
(wh) y
below the line.
two cat tails switching in time
to music i cannot hear through my
own wild whispers
and deafening cries.
~ Andrea E. Janda
