Manistique in March

We walk along the beach against a steady wind that whips my hair in coils around my face, twisting against the restraints of my hood until they fly free in the breeze. 

A steady roil pushes the heavy glass of frozen waves until they smash and break, piling in fractured heaps along the beach.

Fragments of ice fringe the shoreline, a chaos of crystals refracting the rays of light brave enough to escape the caliginous gray.

Holding gloved hands, we gaze across the waves to a crimson lighthouse, a monolith standing solid on the breakwater. 

And I feel the lake. Her nature heaving, gyrating, releasing, and reeling back everything she is and leaving all her heaviness in the sand.  

March 23, 2023

Laurel 

Cacoethes

I am craving

he breathes in my ear… 

and suddenly I’m lost

and there are no trails

through the tangles

each inhalation an ache

an indulgent shudder

and every exhalation 

a reckless invocation

his whispers

twist around me

wisteria words twining 

gauntlets and corselette

of fragrant vine

I turn to taste them

inhale the sun-soaked scent

and sample their exquisite 

honeysuckle nectar...

I am craving

Corners

There are still days I find my way 

to the corner of my ache, 

curl around your memory, 

and fill an old grief with fresh tears. 

Days when nostalgia is an echo 

calling from red canyon cliffs 

and dreams fold familiar 

fingers around mine 

as I search for a handhold. 

A ghostly apparition of virga

is a caliginous curtain 

in the gathering storm

and when thunder shudders 

through my pane, the flicker

in my pulse reminds me

I still search for you 

between bolts. 

Laurel 

Dec. 23, 2023

Hangover

last night's vodka 

fogs my tongue 

as the words he pierced 

into my heart

form a storm front, 

press against temple walls 

until they tear through ducts.

the aspens in my dream 

have shivered all their gold 

away, and my eyes open 

to high desert and dusty 

sagebrush littered with 

ticks and dust devils.