Stale coffee

Sand, musty ocean

Misty rain coming off

The back of the mountains in Manoa.

 

What does your skin feel like right now?

 

Taut from the sun.

 

Hair. What's it doing?

 

Frizzy.

Bleached.

I'm in an old beach car, a Volvo

Sitting outside of a drug store.

 

Automatic or manual?

 

If you weren't a poet,

This would be the strangest conversation.

 

Can you see the sun?

Yes.

 

Look right into it and then turn away.

Close your eyes as tight as you can

And in just a few words tell me what you saw.

 

Trees bristling

Birds circling and clouds

Rambling on in a faraway storm.

 

Is the storm coming or going?

 

Coming, I think.

 

I wish for the water in that storm

to cleanse you.

I wish it to moisten your lips

And to taste like tears.

 

I wish for you to smell the flowers

On the breeze of the storm, and their heavy musk

To penetrate you.

 

I wish for your heart to skip a beat

And for the thought of death to arise.

As it kisses you, it breathes upon your bosom:

A jealous lover, who can taste the perfume upon your skin.

All of these poems and more can be found HERE in the anthology “A Cartographer”.