Most
Recent Poetry:
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poems from the last few years
Some Poems
of Gabriella’s from 2001 (mostly)
(All poems
© 2000, 2001)
11/01
I feel like a loaf of bread,
brown from the oven
hollowed out from the
heat of Your love.
Tears splash dutifully on the page,
necessity of joy’s ardor
I dust off flour,
remembering
I was
baking
or was I writing poetry?
in this room
they are one and the same.
after
September 11
Beloved,
you’ve flattened me –
ironed me clean and soft
laid me out to sun bleach
with the other tired angels.
I know I’m not alone
and most of the things
I could say
sound vain and pretentious
so my voice has been stilled.
but not-speaking makes me ill
or
is it not-crying
in this
time where madness
has taken hold of us
by the necks
and shaken us still.
We must find a new resilience
and
an old wisdom,
do not throw us to the streets, Lord,
like
a forgotten dog.
I used to write lovesongs to You
full-sure You would meet me
and touch my hand –
now I know not
if
this civilization
will
make it
across the next square
of the game.
so I’m numbed my
amazed pain
with shock.
Oh God, I need You more now
than ever
I cannot afford to be
self-conscious,
sick, vain, worried, attached, needy.
time is pure now
running light between
me and You
and I treasure
each splendid moment.
but I’m sick and old and tired
figure out a way for me God
and I promise
I won’t turn off the spout
I’ll pray Baba,
I’ll pray –
can you do everything else?!
------------------------------------
Baba Center 5/01
The bliss knocked my thoughts over
like a bunch of bowling pins
the night breeze sings into me
like I am the flute.
--the player?
oh Krishna – this longing
has become ridiculous
I appear like a hippopotamus
on tightrope
a dragon breathing flowers.
tired – exhausted like a rusty pipe
which can only withstand
so much
blazing water through it,
I split and crack
open.
I cry.
these tears are the weariness
of old feet, coming home
coming home endlessly to You.
they are the frayed sleeve
of my coat
which is rubbed across
my chin
in a thousand contemplations
they are ears which
have forgotten
and learned essential languages
that heard a tune, caught it
on themselves like a cloth catches a branch
and won’t let go –
well, it is always the same tune
in another key or candle
and the story is always the eager
youthful willing soldier
meeting the village maiden
a spark of ecstatic
dancing
and trillions of children issue forth
to complicate the universe
with questions
about faith.
still I’m dancing at another wedding
while the nerves of my eyes are
racing against time’s hammer
to see the moon
and the merciful light of God
forsakes me not
even as I ransack His
storehouse
seeking images and idols –
but He has left me only rubble
I sigh, fall into the dust
crumpled in the sign of mourning
and the glory touches my lips
like a kiss,
a
flower, a drop
of dew.
A few love poems of
2001 and before
seems i must write a new poem
when i love new and serious sweet
when the bomb goes off in the heart
releasing the poison and the grief
and the lotion, the motion, the potion
of love.
oh yes,
you have touched me
and now a vine has grown between
my belly and yours
which is silent,
invisible,
carrying nourishment
of ages
and healing
of ice and clean,
warm and vibrant release
you are elegant in your
eccentricity,
mad and merciful
a rough gem
which found its way into my palm.
now i come to love you
and it is grand
how to thank a blessing
when it comes
in the form
of man.
------------------------------
ahh but this was 2000
Oh baby - you are kind but more cunning than you
seem.
I thought I could trust you, but you lie to yourself more than to
me.
You say you adore me but you do not have the capacity to
be my lover
and I want to believe that
because that is the most kind truth for me to hear.
So kind and cunning can be one.
and you are to be praised for this.
but not for leaving me.
your bravery did not extend so far as your right hand.
and I am never really sure what is real.
You want it all, cake and eat it too and batter and plate
and life has given you most of that in the women-department
perhaps
because it took so much from you
in other ways
and it's only fair....
me, I have it in all the other departments,
I just wanted a good man
you were the surprise of my delight
a tempest of trumpets
a crescendo of thickets of
song, tufts on your chest,
I would die for you
for no good reason, just because.
always drawn to depressed people
I picked up on you
quickly. "I have two kids I haven't seen in 4 years"
I saw your heart (you showed me)
I spilled my coffee (you helped me)
we were 'twine
in a second's time.
-----------------------------------
i had forgotten you by your phonecall
but then was alight
and ready - would have slept with you
even on the first date
(later you said, "Oh damn!" when
you realized you "could've".)
but that was the challenge part,
you're a soldier,
you've carried a gun,
you start arguments with people on the street,
i like it - (my teenage part does)
i want to be so free
but i know it's nuts
and once the fight is over,
what's left?
a bunch of rubble
a ruined city....
you didn't need your warrior skills
(in that way) with me
i was a pushover,
you were right there
so was i
looking at astrological charts
i just want to do this, you said
and kissed me
you were right there
so was i.
i never lied to you by
pretending i didn't want you....
i've never been good at lying.
but i do have something to learn about my own
inner city
and keeping the rafters in good repair.
you kept showing me the
hidden cellars
there were sweet wine bottles down there
left for years
and rats that had eaten out
the foundation
which needed to be scared out
and the whole place
needed to be fumigated.
so we did that
hard-fucking
and laughing
and
things got clean.
i've had alot to deal with in this life
and you were a king to me
coming in as you did
to give me love and show me i am love
not in some new-age idea
but for real.
honey i am love
golden and sweet
and clean and swift,
and i am desire
intricate and musty and
perfect and hot
and i am patient
which you are not.
and i am ready
which you are not.
and i need to be
even more patient.....
i am trying.
-------------------------------------
been waiting to see am i pregnant
felt real good inside
like a bushel of flowers
in one of those old round baskets
they delivered fruit in
back in the old days.
like that smell --
the oily scent of paint
inside the theater
and being backstage
and you're just 13
and the guy you like
is 16 and every now and then
he treats you like a woman
and you thrill...
i've been waiting to see
the tests said no
but there is no blood
maybe i can't let go.
holding this last little crevice of your presence
close
this maybe in time
maybe you'll leave a gift
which could be a twist
of fate.
just the other day, laughing
you told me another name you liked.
funny - i had not told you
i'm waiting.
------------------------------------
last night my mind was askew
tipped by wisdom's overreaching
into reflections of moon and planets
which had no business being at my window.
still I saw the underbelly of the sky
and Pluto's tail sailing by
the red explosion grazed my eyes
leaving me with soot
and the spit of some God
on my pillow.
wholistic light
leads me to dark.
buttocks flip to breasts,
daisies upturn to roots and sod
man is woman
and woman is man.
Morning After Chaos
My being is in
some kind of swoon,
a deep sobering licking love.
I am upset in my applecart
and I am full of tears
wishing I had known this man
since I was small
and hoping I will know him
'till I am old.
To say, "I want to marry you"
is simply a way to say
I am half of you and you are the other -
and how can I overcome this impossibility
of 2 separate bodies.
We come to the precipice but cannot jump
Oh God - the predicament.
I have no idea if we will fall or rise in love as they say
but the foam of the ocean is sweet
and the angels are giggling in mercy and light.
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