Magpie those diamonds
glint in dark eyes
silent, like strangers
stroking my thighs.

Smooth secret steel
sheds feathers like martyrs,
crazy black crispy
childhood lies.

Sharpening shivers,
Trickster wisps by,
prisoner of laughter,
mimics my cry.

Beneath the tree
upon my back
into the sky
I stare.

Your feathers shine
iridescent circles,
shadows that fan
the biting flames I hide.

Brenda Warren 2014

Notes:  I started this piece yesterday, and was not satisfied.  Three times, while walking the dogs, a magpie yelled at me.  The magpie worked its way into this piece.  The piece started with “you” rather than “I” but confusion between the narrator and magpie ensued.  Thus, the narrator is an “I.”

Visit The Sunday Whirl

my name falls broken from your lips
dis-
connected
hidden beneath sheets of speech
decoding my existence

is it me you hate?
or is it the reflection of yourself
you sense in my life
like unwritten poems
vital but stripped bare
where gnats
swim circles in goblets
and red wine sighs its ripples
down your throat

turning away you mutter about
irony, signs, and metaphors
while I tread wine
with the gnats
in your glass

Brenda Warren 2014

Visit The Sunday Whirl