Cartoons
by Sue Clancy
Table of ContentsPoetry | ||
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Upon Thinking of Ruth - M. Coleen Woody PARADIGM SHIFT - Dorothy Alexander -Visionary Over Experimental/Dream Absence- - DN Old Lovers - Dorothy Alexander Vernal Equinox- Big Bend, Texas - MEC |
Old Man Who Smells of Pee - Denise Fox Life, One Breath Long - Pego Malone That spring and summer we lived on hot dogs - Peggy Johnson The Day Grandma Checked Out - Denise Fox | |
ArtAll material copyright of author. Reprint with permission only. | ||
I would like to write a line that would make a difference to someone, somewhere - if only for a moment. A line that would touch an open wound - and cause it to heal, That would touch a frightened soul - and make her brave. A line that would touch a heart and bring it back to me. I would like to write that line. . . But I wonder now if I would write it to you.
I see we have yoked and bound ourselves together in a mad, plodding race across the yellow desert sands of the infinite universe of love, hot seeds in the eye of Time. I know the vast expanse of Maya's plain, the way to be traversed, the black holes. I feel the scope of what we shall do when we are one energy flowing, our fragile bodies bursting purple light, split skins freeing us to our godness.
August night in a summer before youth became a stranger, partying and, on a dare, drinking beer in a gay bar in Amarillo where cowboys on stools cruised with exaggerated campy wrist flips and mincing patter that passed for cool in those faraway 60’s. When last call echoed through the blue smoked air, someone mouthed images of a midnight drive through Palo Duro Canyon. Lisping our way to the parking lot a buxom dyke named Phyllis fell in beside me and pointed to her slick red Chevy convertible all lines and planes, chrome-studded and open to the dry cool air of a high plains night. I slid into the leather seat beside her, waited for the breeze to stir my hair, while I replayed the worst moments of my last three marriages.
When we are together, I whisper words and Expressions of enjoyment. When you are not with me, I whisper more than I'm afraid of telling you. These words of emotion that I wish to whisper when we are one are I want you, I need you, I love you. These words come to mind every time I think about you in the hallway, When I hear your name, When I taste you, and When I feel your touch. I want you, I need you, I love you.
I used to long to touch the Pietà-- the flowing solidity of such smoothness would surely teach my touch all that could be learned of the feel of beauty. That was before my tongue explored the lifewarm curves and crevices of your hidden masterpiece.
To be able to see you is enough;
Yet when I do, I want more.
To touch you is all I want
But then I'd want to touch you
more.
To hold you should suffice;
Yet I'll soon realize,
I will never let go.
Her touch surrounds my thigh Embraces my back Holds on....to my Abdomen....to my Words....to my Life. Never hinders their meaning.
I arise before dawn, take my morning bath. Afterward, I go to her bedside, lean over, let my breasts touch her face lightly. She half wakes and slowly takes my nipples, one at a time into her mouth. Gently. Then, closes her eyes, slips back into sleep. I straighten, put on clothes and begin another day.
I stand naked on the hillside
in the desert night.
The full moon rises in front of me.
It bathes my soul with
its radiance and power.
A black smear of clouds rises behind
me;
it bathes my skin with
moisture and coolness.
The desert lies all around me;
it opens itself to
the sustaining rain.
Ravens shake dew from
white yucca blooms.
I shake death from my being
and open myself to new life.
The doorway pulls in the smells of summer’s goodbye, dried leaves, geranium pungency, air smoky with the prodigal’s homecoming. Soon we’ll hear the wind whining through clapboards, we’ll sleep in high-necked granny gowns, I will wrap my arms around you and we’ll curl into a curve as perfect as the rim of an orange moon climbing the harvest sky. We’ll wake in air so pure that our breath will heal the wounds opened by loss of summer sun and our youth. We’ll make an oasis of potted ivy, aloe, Christmas cactus, and steam rising from coffee in chipped mugs.
I was lost and you knew how to find me; But… I thought I could Do It Myself. Bearing the weight of empty years on my back, on my soul, I return to you for direction.
Battering the walls down between us leaves us standing naked in the rubble. Shards of shattered history pierce soft souls so every step we take toward the empowerment of love leaves its mark in blood.
It's easy enough to start digging into the earth find a small shovel, your muddy boots and stamp down, then shove and scoop the dirt underneath your nails, you don't like the feel of the rough garden gloves or when the sun is eating your back alive with its consistent heat of a tongue its wild sun stories you prefer the cool fat moon It’s time to duck under water, slip off your shoes and start swimming. your arms, your legs the whole world is wet. at this moment you are far from this morning when all you knew was the hiss of the hose as it lapped against the pretty sweet tree and all your toes were screaming about how glad they were to be alive
We were kissed by the sun, our only passport our thumbs,
dancing in our blue suede shoes on the side of the road,
two young girls looking for the pirates booty
baby, even the moon followed us home.
Running from our families, renting cheap hotel rooms
and sweeping the floor for pennies.
sleeping in someone's kitchen as long as there were
mushrooms
or little pills given out at concerts.
janis was already belting out the blues,
morrison was opening doors but falling off the stage
and dylan was warning us about the fifties
while the 6o's were taking over the room
making fun of anyone comfortable with the status quo.
we were chasing rainbows and playing air guitar,
the star of whatever scene we found ourselves in.
some of the musicians we had just heard on the
covers of magazines
spoiled by luck but living our dreams.
There's more than 2 sides to this story,
the way your dad kicked the dog and suddenly left-
how you found bitterness almost sweet
and the way nobody told the truth anymore,
not our politicans, the priest or the actors
but what they were singing and what they suggested
as we danced under the sway of false promises
and how it was the first time for everything
under the sun
Gilded, glowing, almost bright enough to squint at, the man in it looking cheerful, cherubic. This one comes in late-August, so technically..... but just walk outside right now and then tell me it doesn’t have the reaping of crops written all over it; tell me you don’t hear the snuffling of horses, creaking of wagon wheels; tell me you don’t smell the pungency of picked pumpkins, the sweetness of just-mown alfalfa, the dry brittle of newly-shucked corn, and tell me you don’t feel a certain crispness in the air, and your mind doesn’t pick up the faint strains of a Saturday night barn dance, down in the valley.
I allow you to bribe me with money and smothering love, as payment for ignoring the father's cruelty. Never will you be heaven bound and free, for the heart of a martyr is forever chained to bad men who need mommies. Who will you become in the next life - an abused child or abuser? In this fantasy world, your desire follows me like a crow, unknown to everyone, even you. What will you do Mother, when your customers demand a refund, for this entrapped butterfly has died upon having its beautiful wings stroked.
I’ve never known my life to be so dark in sorrow That your smile was not a promise of the brightness of tomorrow.
When I close my eyes, the rush of life surging by catches me slings me into the current and, like the last soft piece of an Ivory bar headed for drain-death, I spin toward darkness. "Goin' down, Ma'am?" No way Jose. She loves me, and there's no way to go but Up. It's just that I sometimes take the alternative route.
Our hearts seek to be both imprisoned in love and eternally free This love has no why but to pad the sharp edges twixt now and goodbye. I see in your eyes a glow that peels the blackness from the day-Sunrise! Knowing you has taught that the sky-side of a cloud cradles hope, sun shot. This little moment has no name but “Now”-a facet of Forever. Writing in your hand Makes any piece of paper Aphrodisiac. The flash of your smile makes rainbows of my tears and Super-Glues my heart.
Sitting in the dentist’s chair with a gumful of Novocain and a heart full of you I guess that as a patient I’m a pretty good lover because when I think of cavities I think of days empty of your presence and how you filled the spaces of my life with gold and silver.
Suddenly I miss you and it hits me like an ocean wave almost knocking me off my feet. I brace myself for its next onslaught, but it sneaks up and catches me off guard as my body feels the feeling of you tucked up next to me in sleep. Tears sting my eyes and I push away the thoughts, knowing all the while they'll come back to haunt me taunt me. Such wonderful memories create such terrible longing and would I have it any other way? Isn't the depth of our love equivalent to the breadth of our despair and the length of the leash? So I welcome the rush of the waters against the shoreline of my soul Knowing in the aching lies the beauty of our love.
A shadow falls across my heart
And leaves me in dusk,
A feeling I can’t shake.
The reality of losing you.
I know what we still have
It’s what we don’t that I long for.
All the unrealized potentials,
The dreams yet to come true.
My future once wrapped in you
Is now a giant question mark.
Who - where - doing what
Is all unknown.
A shadow falls across my heart
And hides the light of our love.
What once radiated so freely, so
fiercely
Now hides, afraid and waits.
Only time will tell
If the shadow will pass
And allow our love
To shine once more.
I start to cry. The gross disfigured man only wanted a box to move his belongings on a luggage carrier through town. Do you want a luna bar or a new pair of shoes or a new CD? I form the words but they stagnate in my mind. He flaps away wearing stupid red socks, while I, like a ghost, let him.
I know the nonsense of waves upon snow, laughter in fear, sorrow and wisdom that multiply in the dark. These long tunnels have taught me to recognize the sun through its reflection and not to assume that darkness signifies night. Imagined thresholds never hold my vagabond demons at bay for even sages cannot set boundaries on a loss of faith and even angels, even the angels, even compassionate angels have no because to meet the why of a violated child.
Is Life so short,
One breath
Long?
Strawberry, dripping chocolate,
Goddess taste,
From kissed lips.
Love’s arrow pain
For one gone,
Two gone.
Summer on the porch,
Gentle time.
The wren trills.
Squeaking yelps,
Staccato phrases,
Dog left outside, alone.
Sound of Drum’s hush,
Voices falling, slowing, _____,
Memorial Song. Haw!
Her smiling look, how are you,
Caring pause to listen.
Treasure chest of jewels.
Rainbow flag is set.
Begins waving.
Women are here!
Women’s giggles,
Boil out of scrabble board,
Cackling fun brewing.
Secret one, secret two, secret three, secret
four,
Tell one, tell two, tell three, no more.
A last secret.
Bread cast on the waters,
Lovers approach,
Wavering: visible, invisible.
Death, one breath long,
As hard to remember as
Life, one breath long.
That spring and summer we lived on hot dogs
And the occasional hamburger
And we felt guilty everytime we put that meat in our mouths
in our system
And the vegetables scared us too
with their pesticides, insecticides,
Fertilized with toxic waste
While war raged in Iraq and Afghanistan and Israel and Palestine and Africa
and on the southside
And we felt guilty guilty guilty
And lazy lazy lazy
While we stayed up too late
calling just staying alive
Work
And we worked worked worked
too hard too long
Appropriately guilty
as if as if
The guilt would assuage our crime
would detoxify the chemicals
would neutralize the over abundance of unnatural ingredients in our
food
would take the calories out of the fat, the oil we crave.
The guilt would unblock our arteries
would save us from getting old
Or at least being old
We could die in our sleep
instead of alive until our bodies decay around us
Eaten away by microorganisms called “too long, too long, you’ve used this
thing up and you’re still breathing”
As if the guilt would make us thin, make us buff
Our minds and brains beyond their ability to comprehend so they go they go
they go
Crazy like a labyrinth, a maze with no ending, no beginning
Just tumbling down, falling forever into
Peace, serenity
That’s what we crave
Peace through guilt
Peace through war
Love through hatred
Resentment breeds freedom in the complex guilty world
Where all we’re really looking for
Is a pure, ripe tomato
And an ear of corn with just one or two worms
And a bushel of butterbeans to shell with our family
While mosquitoes buzz
And the children do their chores
Preparing them for their guilt free freedom
While the hot dogs cook on the grill
And the charcoal emits its pollutants
Past and through the hole in the sky
Out there
Where we presume life like us lives
Unfettered by our failings
Where we can be reborn
There
Not here
It’s too late here
I live across the street from our apartment staring through the broken pain of the broken window of our love while shards of memory cut tears into my eyes. and all the rooms are vacated leaving only ghosts of images to haunt my gaze. I live across the street from your apartment that was never mine just like everything else. where only you existed us visited on weekends and I was a distant neighbor. but really its okay I never loved you like I wanted to anyway… I live across the street from the floor where we had one bad make up fuck or maybe it was the fuck before the fight. and the bed where we made good love that left like a whore by the morning light. and the porch that knew my tears better than you ever would flowing from the fright of your episodes of absence. I live across the street from our silent battlefield of our quiet worded war where you shot me with honest lies lost in your own battle with truth but really its okay I didn’t love you like I wanted to anyway. I live across the street from where you held me softer than I had ever known and opened me deeper than I had ever shown and pushed me farther than I thought I could go and where you promised me the same more than once and pulled me back to safety after pushing me over the edge and promised to make a change more than once. I live across the street from where your push and pull strung me out and ripped me open and laid me down in front of your doorstep on top of those daisies I’d picked for you that died without water but its really okay I didn’t love you like I wanted to anyway I live across the street from a blur of confusion with clarity lost amongst the boxes of pain where the honest lies in some deep closet that only you have the key to and maybe you’ve already shown it or maybe you’ve shown us both just honest lies but now I’m choking on the truth that I never really loved you just like I wanted to.. I loved you more.
little grandma, baby grandma where did you go? let me doctor your soul with monkey blood I remember the moment you left - at lunch you asked for the check and ran out in the rain damn your poor mass of mangled brain You laugh easily but tell me, aren't there tears underneath the mask? love eluded you and finally ! you have your man What dark comedy of the gods though, for the one you've pined for is now in your grasp but instead of sharing your bed, he cuts your meat and wipes your mouth.
I’d seen more heads roll than anyone, in a normal lifetime, needs to see. I nearly suffocated from the stench and sheer volume of blood covering my floor, nearly drowned from the water thrown afterward to wash it all away, wincing at the feel of hard-bristled brushes; endured hours of grating, grinding rasp from the large blade being sharpened, the glint blinding in sunlight; heard it thousands of times dropping down with startling speed, toward targets of naked necks, the scissoring finality of separation, the muted thud of head coming to rest in basket; studied the black masks of hundreds of executioners, identifiable only by the sound of their boots on my nine steps; and now, at final rest, I sit silent and wooden-faced inside a museum somewhere in Paris, endlessly listening to the oohs and aahs from visitors. It isn’t the same.
Your touch stalks my mind refreshed by your gift of a sparkling stone; Your lavender note reminds me of touring down the pasture lane to the pond. Your present of fanciful wildflowers surprises me into dreamy longing; Your hug attests to the poundfuls of caring that quicken my pulse. Your lingering kiss excites in me images of illusion and delight; Your gentle fingers saunter down my exposed arm as we gaze at the sizzling fire. Your dance lead frames each meeting of new tastes of apricot or mango; Your hesitant guitar song plays with my senses like a whirling paper in the wind. Your elated ideas of nature and the moon become my frame of reference; Your book of writings pecks at my soul like a bird on berries. Your creativity quilts my calendar with adventure and romance; Your gestures frolic over me like the liquor of love.
"Have you ever questioned your sexuality?" Even with those words ringing in my ears It didn't quite dawn on me What you were saying What you were feeling That you were attracted to me even then. That you were closing up, realizing the enormity of what could lie ahead for each of us. And yet here we are. A couple. A family. Raising our children to be proud of diversity, As we skirt the intolerant, Giving them the opportunity to be better than they are. Proud of our love, Yet protective of those not quite ready To see it for what it is -- The fulfillment of a basic human need to love and be loved to nurture to bond to share life's experiences in the course of growing old.
I’ve never known my life to be so dark in sorrow that your smile was not a promise of the brightness of tomorrow.
1 in 4
mothers sisters daughters lovers wives ladies grrrls
babies-
women
just payin their dues to the bigotry of misogyny,
receivin’ the patriarchal pap smear…
smearin their thighs, smearin their eyes
smearin their
lives.
1 in 4
layin down for the law of the land, the law of the man
forced down in every land upon their backs,
against their will
upon their stomach
cause the perpetrator is too pansy to face his prey.
1 in 4
ripped and ruined realms of beauty.
by fathers uncles neighbors teachers strangers preach-
ers pigs monsters demons
brothers.
1 in 4
consciously convincing selves that its their fault,
that they were weak…
forcing commonality on such an uncommon
or is it?
1 in 4
now just a number.
their pain-their suffering,
lost time-lost lives.
my pain-my suffering,
lost time-lost mind
reduced to a nameless
painless
statistic.
1 in 4
times a day, times a week, times a month-year
life.
ripped and ruined
sheets clothes cunts
hearts.
1 in 4
justifications
sleazy clothes, coming ons, pick up lines, just the right
time,
“she owed”
deceitful duties, forced atrocities…
she used to let it be
in cars bars alleys classrooms workrooms church
pews…
I used to let it be
at home
he used to push it in cars
bars beds…
her bed..
my bed..
with child’s spread and child’s toys..
I was a toy, she was a toy
we were toys
everywhere.
1 in 4
No more.
No more justifies, bitter lies, muffled cries
its time to rise.
Fuck over the misogyny that fucked us
up
screw the system that screws this gender
gluttonously gouging out our hope, honor, pride
spirits.
We must succumb
No more.
1 in 4
Shes
Hers
them…they…me…we
Us
No More.
Mirror Mirror on the wall Britneys the fairest of them all. And maybe shes born with it.. or maybe its Mabelline and just maybe I sometimes wish my mirror reflected her image. With my stretch marks instead of tan, love handles just lovin’ my shirts, hair engulfin’ my legs and zit scars as my make up I sometimes don’t feel beautiful I sometimes beg for change… dreamin’ of my own personal make over genie maybe a little bit smaller maybe a little bit tighter maybe a little bit smoother maybe a little bit of Mabelline and a lot less of me but then I wake up and rub the shit out of my eyes I smash the bottle and give the genie the finger. Cause such self loathing thoughts just lets.them.win. just serves the society of men who disgustingly define beauty as 5’8, size 2 waist, size D silicone tits, pouty lips, 1 inch thick make up face perfect hair perfect smoothed out body perfect….fakeness. But MY beauty is real and cannot be mass marketed no genie in some bottle no artist with some touch up brush no doctor with some scalpel could have made this body its an original and we all know that copies aren’t worth anything… and I realize that when Miss Britney turns 40 and her silicone starts to sag I’ll be ready and laughing. Cause mine.. have sagged since I was 13 and I have grown to love them and my stretch marks are really beauty marks or roadmaps of where I’ve been or where you should go and my love handles give my lover something to hold and my hairy legs are never cold and zits are better make up they don’t take 20 minutes to put on and cost absolutely nothing. With weapons of mass deception the billboards and mag ads glare into our souls past our perfect imperfections to glorify contained created perfection and bow down to the Almighty necessity of attractive quality but my perfection is unkempt and will not be harnessed. Everytime a women diets for the wrong reason vomits to please the perfect image pops pills for dinner and diets for a snack Everytime the mirror reflects hatred and disgust We perpetuate the unfair unreal unkind standards of beauty upheld in this man made society. So shatter your fuckin mirror. And shatter those fucking standards. Create your definition of beauty and embrace it and embrace yourself. I got some guns up these sleeves and pack some power on these handles and I’m ready to fight and ready to win cause recreation is the only option when beauty was beaten bound and gagged tied up with logos, beaten with expensive bodies and thrown overboard to a sea of blind and bod thirsty sharks. So employ a mass conception of your own beauty definition cause its yours cause its ours cause they can never sell it never own it and soon enough if we fight hard enough if we recreate hard enough if we love hard enough there will be no Britneys and there will be no standards because all are beautiful.