somniloquy

  It keeps building
              & I keep
        swallowing my spit
        even   though
                I notice the taste
                is metallic/ like blood
  Have I been biting my tongue?
        Have we spoken///
                 have had conversations
                        while I’m asleep?

         If it occurred more than once
              I want to know where it is you go
                   when I open my eyes|

             If you die in your sleep or
                because of a stroke
                  I hope you’ll visit
                    just to kiss me goodbye

          Do you hear me?
                Are you responding?
                   Did you plan on it?
                      Am I just dreaming again?
               

–LM
                

no poet here

I had a flash of makeshift memory
          I guess you could call by its
            true name: imagination
              
                   there were streaks
                                        of acid rain
         everywhere, yet, there we were
                            《  crumpled 》under your
                                    plastic umbrella as
    you swore in a low tone you’d stand
                                until the storm passed

             & I laughed, I’ll take you up on that
       because this weather is never ending
       & so seems you’ll
                                    be
                                       standing
                                         until your legs give
                and you are forced to admit
                    I do not mean that much
                        and the umbrella drops

          & goes floating, far into the distance
                              I am melting
                                 I am wax, fashion
                           a wick    &     candlelight

               Watch me, ignite the night

–LM
                    
                                          

Tragedy in Babylon

she caresses my cheek with tarred tips
& willfully
mars the flesh
                          underneath

she leaves
                 Her youth
            behind

& calls me weak
                 watching me weep she
           glares through glassy, venomous eyes
                                   
     she, grotesque, snarls in my ear
           as her tongue wraps around
                      my jugular
                           vein____ [_]

promises echo: we are one in the same
                  I speak as your creator
            none else exists. . .
                     Keep your eyes on me
                               she cries gleefully
                         
                        dancing & swooning
                             in purple silk ribbons   
                                             to                            
                                        Revelation

                        
–LM

Signs

Yearning can know no interchange
                                [NO SOLICITING]
                                [NO >>>>TRADE]
it is the same record on mute
or so the sign says
The bold misunderstood translation

Along a bouquet of funeral flowers
                                &
           crushed wedding day doves
laid an eerie pastel flute
tuning ominous notes
for a deaf woman
            She has the most magnificent
                                  summer garden
            Asiatic lilies as big as your head

Goldenrod dreaming
Minus the gore
Sunrays on whisper white feathers & grey

–LM

{I passed out on the couch,
and I saw her benched there,
reminding me to ride her coaster.}

2 AM on the Dot

Nightmares trickle down the
Thinnest lines from each
Nostril and they’re bombshell red

Moments before/ a stoic man plunged
his termination sign into the snow

[paying no mind to the bumbling creek

                            BE
                            LOW]

I met a man in a coffee shop, I don’t drink
the lot, but the tip I leave is nice and sweet

You have the bluest eyes I’ve ever seen

Our conversation was short lived
because I tend to
              bodge it
Refute it of all logic

You claim to know what I’m hiding
& it’s quite intriguing
You claim to know what I refuse to see

My wily subconscious mind
Are you also my enemy?

you must be_
Waking at 2 AM on the dot
Just to show a death plot, vividly

–LM

Thralldom

I dreamt I was on a sort of house arrest
& knew where it might’ve manifest
The police officer overseeing me
A big and burly thing but with shaded,
kind blue eyes lecturing. . .
& when he turned his back for a second

Just/ long/ enough

I’d hustled my way
out from his cage but
He gave chase &
dragged me back
Don’t try it again, he warned,
Exasperated,
Instead of adding to mine,

Do your time

–LM

Fever Dream

A woman sits across from me
dealing cash for tarot dreams
her shawl laced with owl wings &
bronze ankles swaying/dangling
flickering gold & crystalline beads

by candlelight she’s peering up underneath
two black satin fans of lashes
Then she centers her gaze on You
You’re here too?
The magic woman gnashes her teeth
She says: don’t you know
what’s always next?

High Priestess, I guess but you don’t
believe in these things I know it—-
Death, dealing the skull with a smile to show it
Funny way to say Change you spit
Laying the Devil card flat with a hit

–LM