Heaven (in progress)

Here, the furnace is blasting like jet engines in our ears.
This is heaven.
Our dwelling, filled with toxins, tools, sparks, and flame.

Sweat is already beading at my temples.
My blond hair curling frizzy around my face.
I bend over to finish re-lasing my steel toed boots and button up my welding jacket.
Bruce yells, “I need my pour crew ready!”
I smile,
Adrenaline surging through my veins,
Hopping up onto the steal grated walk way, I secure my face shield.
Everyone’s smiling, cheers coming from all around.
Wanders flock in and a crowd is forming a safe distance behind the pit,
The aroma lured them in.

Yes, the smell of molten bronze!
More satisfying than any other,
More invigorating than any romantic experience.
Nothing is sweeter,
Nothing is better.
They all wish they were brave enough to choreograph this dance.
But they stand paralyzed, intoxicated by the scent.

I’m standing my place with my skimmer in hand.
Rotating the spatula-like base in the furnace, to keep it hot cherry red,
getting ready to remove the slag and expose liquid bronze.

Slag colors differently than bronze,
Itself an imperfection,
It rises to the surface and sits like a bruise.
I will be the heroine in this story and bring purity back to life.

Just as the Live and Dead ends lift the crucible from the furnace,
The gawkers let out an exasperated sigh,
My heart is racing,
Smoldering candy for my eyes.
The entire pot busting orange with life.
A color you only experience through photographs,
Even then, a photo still not vibrant enough.
The color holds you mesmerized.
Now we proudly bring our works blood, sweat, and tears to life.
2100 degrees of heat passing before our bodies.

And so,
This is my last pour,
Right until the stars decide to align again,
I'm savoring every ounce.
If I could always dance with fire.
If I could always perfect the imperfections.
But everything has to come to an end some day,
Even bronze has its own impurities,
So life will never find an ideal medium.
And somehow, that is reassuring.
Nothing has perfection.

The Forest Contained

For the wild man,
Forever ago.


Today is The First of May, Two Thousand and Nine.












Knowing nothing about life,
Let me say,
Polished stone and rubied jewels sink fastest.
A bandaged hand may be kissed by a crusader,
But swollen glands take longest.
And the trinkets of yester-year will pass,
All of them contained within the rose colored shoebox.
Together these words with these pages, will return to dust.


1.
It was when you held my hand, walking down
the wooded, muddy path.
We were following the river.
You stopped to pull me close and
Leaned in for a kiss.



2.
My wild man of the woods lies searing in pain,
Please stop moving my sweet, it’s making you hurt.
Groaning and moaning, his whole body a fracture.
Hands still scraped bloody,
I tangle my fingers in-between his and caress his arm.
Please don’t hurt my love.
He’s pushing the gurney buttons up and down looking for comfort.
He’s pulling and tugging at blankets and pillows.
Oh my sweet,
Please God let me carry his burdens.
My wild man should never have to hurt.
He asks me to leave.
I kiss his hand, kiss his cheek.
Despising myself for the day I first decided to walk away.
I turned around,
His face wincing from the pain.
Looking back I quietly closed the door to Room # 9.



3.
Where I grew,
Men wore camouflage and sprayed
Themselves with urine, to hunt their prey.
They sat in silence on tree limbs,
taking in mother earth.
Come evening they would return
to hug their wives,
holding close their trophy prize.
This is how things worked…


4.
When I said I wanted to walk in the forest alone,
I needed mother to cleanse my eyes.
The brush it snagged me and I forgot my compass.
But I had to be lost in the woods to regain my vision.
I needed to finish what I had started in the city so I knew how to feel.


5.
In the hospital,
Your mum told me,
“Young lady take care of yourself,
Too many people jump into love before figuring
out who they are and what they want.
So you shouldn’t feel bad. You were smart and
Knew you weren’t ready. And now you’ve told me
what you’ve learned. So don’t regret. You kids,
I would never want to date in this day and age.
The world is different now. I just hope you all
can find someone you can be married to for thirty
years like me and my husband.”


6.
“Weird Wisconsin” brought us here.
The tiny hairs on our necks turned up right in the night.
I think there was a full moon,
Its light reflected onto lake,
The air was a light mist.
The dense forest was to our right.
We felt we were not alone,
Witchy spirits and ghouls were watching from the trees.

Yet we were walking for miles through the sand,
I was in your arms,
A million miles away from evil lands.



7.
The woods never looked so bleak.
The fog
it fills
and fills.

My body is laying on the ground.
Looking up at the graying sky.
Chills running down my spine

These evergreens are brown and decaying.
What happened to the woods when I was gone?
This space is silent,
Time killed what love hath rooted.
Mother nature set fury to her young
I think my body is decaying as it lays.

Mother, what will resurrect life from death?


8.
Your face turned to look into mine.
My chin resting on the plastic rails of your
inclined hospital gurney.
Those same eyes fell locked into mine.

Pale blue eyes,
Softened yet upon mine.
Please forgive me.