Stars Like Us

Quasar
1201.2009

tonight the dark is set with jewels
where I imagine you

it’s you leaving me disturbed
as my breath flees from its home
you the astronomer’s lover
as far reaching as the ends of the earth
as endless and layered as time

tonight you stream before me
as a quasar dispersing radiance
the illumination of my universe -
you made of one trillion suns
blinding me from your error
and lighting the night under which
my lovelorn pen writes

from your face stars tumble
as I pluck them one by one
from your warm throat
your velvet mouth
wide cerulean eyes
and into my hair and hands
when they are gathered to my breasts
then carefully locked under my rib
for these are the tiny treasures
of your conscience

you my love you

with your tired heart frightened to feel
and too damaged by era and blood
with your anger too troubled
to even fight for its justice

my skin wishes to shelter you
until you go back to the stars
from which you are homing

take me too so we can rush together
as a ray of light or star burst beam
dispersed and undying as cosmic dust

take me because without you
I am just this one dying star


- Marni C.M. Fraser©

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Of Narcissists and The Downtrodden

Those Kind
1127.2009


I want to tell you of those kind


those kind walk outside the restaurant where I sit
black coffee and hard cigarette watching
as they burn their secret lives and selves


those kind victimize naivety
leave their impressions with niceties and good words
make the mind yield and twist
in the secret life of everyday parts


those kind don’t come face to face
talk a blue streak of broken words
or stick around for the end game
but my want stays their hand
so they are a lie
are my life
and my life is a lie


- is not a lie


sometimes those kind don’t receive
the flowers my voice delivers
so my quiet colors bleed to a dirty ground
dying because we are all deaf
mute and blind
because we are dying -
because the attempt is death itself


those kind are the lemon you suck dry
drink in water you can't swallow
a suicidal cabbage and carrot
a vegetable’s apathy
sitting on plates in restaurants
here in this joint where I’m telling you
I hang my neck on time’s line for those kind
want to kick over the chair that can still
my suffered steps, and theirs


I admit defeat as evil’s whore
everyone wins in the win win state of affairs
of lemon sucking and vegetable fuck-ups


oh the circle of those kind
it’s a loop like traffic lights
(stop go slow down)
sunset and sunrise
falling in and out of love
like hate and forgiveness, then hate again
like lies laced in warmth to hoist hope
then lower it with disillusions lover
like wanting forever
not being able to have ever
like longing for someone
then reaching for safety
like praying you get good
but needing needful things


let me tell you of those kind
let me tell you of them
let me tell you in restaurants
among people with no name
plates full of apathetic vegetables
over coffee and cigarettes
burning their secrets and selves


Marni©

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For An Artist

Canvas
1122.2009

canvas in this room without a voice but ours
when words fail my heart in walls where nobody cares
you let my hands mate themselves to your bloodless face

in this room where silent echoes stay
you breathe into my unaccompanied life
the faces and scenarios of our fidelity

the milk snakes of my hands
coil around their sable branches
and flick their tongues against your agile body
stroking traces in sienna, cobalt and crimson
against your breasts

I barely contain my joy for such a patient lover
one who indulges passion and answers wishes
who builds our orgasm with a slow steady crescendo
giving what he takes without expectation

my lover
my canvas
my life

Marni C.M. Fraser©

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Love Opens All Eyes

Tree Heart
1112.2009

my heart is a tree
each branch reaches for a thing
but this one branch reaches for you
it knows what it needs to cultivate its love

you are nourishment, wellness, vitality

see how it reaches toward its compassion
its fettle?

then watch as the others reach for
what they think they need –
they haven’t a clue
they have been so wanton
in their ignorance

now they are filled with regret

but this one bough knows

your eyes follow the direction
of her little rust colored stream
because their master knows -

see?

let your feet chase your glance
do not run away as she reaches
her hand for yours.

Marni©

"No pity in this world for a truth. You will be the end of me, perhaps the ghost of you waits laughing in the shadows. Oh you infuriating man, fall into my arms - for you have changed me to Sjofn!!" - Marni C.M. Fraser

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Marina's Fingers

My Hands
1110.2009

What are the ten limb animations
Of air and considerations

They have become obsessed with building bridges

For dying languages

And now most days
They are my ill-mannered daughters
Curious about everything you

They simply won’t behave themselves

They are ten artists of
Song and story
Told through sweeping lines
Of lament and joy bursting in their dawn

They just want to know
They just want to sing

They are the stubborn geniuses
Of my arms and shoulders
So I’m never alone

Now I will only tell you once
Because I hope you forget
That you must be careful

But do not lay your milk skin before them
Because they will see you as you are
A pale lake to drown themselves in
The keys of a piano to lower themselves upon
A canvas to emboss themselves

An excuse to behave even more badly

You see how they can be impulsive
And Yes I am shameful to admit it

Their mind is very absent
Just leafs of skin and bone
Coupled to their joints

It’s a means to an end
For them to be so attached

Oh these slender branches of my bough
These harvesters of my garden

My hands my hands
Oh my maddening hands

Marni©

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Just Drive She Said

Driving Haiku

fucked streets tenuous
convolutions in control
cars streaming birdlike

Marni©

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Love †

Storm-less Storm
0930.2009

To look at you
A sorrow breathes beneath my breasts
Where the arms of my ribs meet and cradle
A heart bleeding like red leaves
Ruptured from their wood fountains.
Down my life falls in its autumn
Landing with barely a whisper or splash
Upon the cold ground it almost warms
Where my almost dead feet walk -
Their ash skins trimmed in sorrows threads.

My existence is this way
Each day the same beginning
Each day the same pain
Breaking from its branch
To drift downward, to seek your hands:
For in your hands, my safety.
You, the earth I curve to,
The bell from which I sing.
You, with your skin of white milk
And eyes like a sad storm lost in its life.

Heavenly body fallen from its sky, still proud:
My king, though nobody sees your crown
Or the red carpet you must step upon
As you go from sunrise to sunset
Proud, bold, noble -
Yet I see what you hide from artless eyes

And this bleeds me most:

That in the third season of my life
As I watch you greet the day that kisses
Your mouth of good words for everyone -
I love you while unable to say that I love you,
I love you unable to look I love you in the eye
And though I don’t know how or why
I love you, usually when I think I don’t
So that when I feel unsure you love me,
I love you the most.

My earth, life, king,
My pain, storm-less storm
The eye of my love
The love of my eye.

I love you.

Marni©

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Bullied
09.12.1972

Beside crawling ivy beneath wet leaves
Feet under sunless autumn left school
Searched the ground its for scars to lead them home
Away from the shame of richer ways of living,
Of children with curled lips parodying poverty
Their mouths not aware of their future chains
Or the silence I unwillingly swallowed.


Marni©

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A Fairy Tale

Childhood Tale
0904.2009

Home was the hill of a troll
With a dragon mouth
It took mustangs one by one
Chomped them two by two
Swallowed in threes during a blue moon
(Though only if they were broncos
The riders fat)

Crusaders woke to campaign
Donning garb before sun lit the day
Warming their rides in quiet mist
Feeding them at food stops -
After plodding along black roads

Peasants worked the tills hoes plows
Dodged bad spells of witches and warlocks
Dreamed of end to thriving and starving
They also made merry by night with spirit
(Their own magic)
To prop up
Lay down
Forget

Most children staved off the evil curse by
Eating scarabs
Telling stories
Their innocence

But I remember

When the angst of a King
Chose death by hemlock
Over his dissolving joy
(The queen had fled
Taking with her his ere)
A pair of childhood eyes noticed

Even then Knights and Maidens passed
Wearing their finest robes
Peasants celebrated bondage
Smoking stoked wild plants
Showing sexed complexions
Everyone Smiled

My childhood?
Must you ask?
T’was of fairies and tales
It was spared no moral.

Marni©

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Nature's Tune

Rock
0903.2009

So alike you and I

One
Hard
Grey

Of many strewn

Traced years putrefy me
Immeasurably minute me

Gravity draws down
Steep
Sloping
Burying

Winded

Missing in clouded wilderness
Gone in miles of barren wasteland

Won’t step ahead
Won’t step backward
Wedged

Insects crawl over me
Animals piss on my head

The human disturbance
The earthquake activity

Pitched
Thrown

At the whim of debris
Lost in creeping
Rhizome
Water

Life


Marni©

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