Breath

Breath,

the mighty purifier,

is like water.

When you breath deeply and

know this breath to be God,

you are cleansed. 

Simple as that. 

When you breathe asleep,

inhaling and exhaling the maya of the world,

and the water isn't recognized as the 

healing elixir it is,

then it cannot give its gift.

Then it remains murky.

Then we continue on the caravan of despair.

Let it be known: Our participation is needed

if the flowers are to wake,

if the trees are to teach us once again,

if we are to take into our being–

with every breath–

the might and majesty of God. 

We must not be lying rocks.

A Poem About God

I woke up today with a palette that made it 

impossible to taste anything but God. 

Everything I'd ever known

to be good

sprang forth from the light and

illuminated the clouds like a neon frame. 

And then, and only then,

I began. 

The Sunset, She's Playing With Me

Now you turn a
turvy orange
red

(and smirk as I notice)

as if I'm not
paying attention,

as if I'd dare
close my eyes and
miss a minute
of your madness,
your theatre.

You change like a flirt
and play like a child
like a  god

and at the end of it
I swear I wouldn't
have missed a minute–

I wouldn't have missed

a thing.
 

Home, Again.

Bathed in the dark yellow
light of now,

not quite washed–
rather, your glow shows
me where I've been
slow.

Not that good kind of slow
but slow, slow.

But if I can hear it and
if I can see your love in all these
different shades
and shadows of light,

then I know
I am welcome
home, again,
again.

I am welcome
home, again.

Moonlight in Larkspur

You are so close, like muppets

and waterbeds filled with gems,

like singing cupcakes and bliss on repeat,

or any number of things I can dream up.

You are so close, like when the wind

bristles the small hairs on my face and for 

a moment I am like that game where you

press your hand into the small metal pins–

amused, impressed upon,

without shape and shaped again.

You are so close, like when night flowers

are kissed by moonlight,

stirred to divinity in their sleep,

and light careens through their pistils and souls.

Something is remembered, whether from the

moonlight or their own imagination, they do not know.

It does not matter. Light is light any way you look at

it and you 

are so close.

Like dawn breaking over death, like the rubbish

getting picked up on Mondays, like dirty fingernails 

filled with life and chocolate, like the refrain of 

one soft and supple body.

Like vivid life stampeding across my heart until

it is sullied and gone,

sexed to God, consumed and remembered,

you are so close.

Holy Water Springshine

I am
chocolate.

You are
electric puddles.

I am
holy water springshine.

You are
the trinity of the moon.

I am
a rush of white lilac.

You are
the sun that warms our cup.

I am
the force that spills it over.

We are
swimming in a prismed overflow.

You are
the magic of the ages.

I am
the pearled tears of God.

And when I nestle my face into
that dynamite space between your
chin and your neck,

you must know I am
turning into stars.

Yes, the very same ones that we count.

The ones to whom we say
thank you.

Kingdoms

by Tehya Sky

As the kingdom grows,
as the cathedral erupts from
precious dynasties below,
as new bells blink into sight,
cleanse themselves to
seraphic glistening, to angelic
imprints of timeless hymns,
as the palace opens to show chests of
secret gems, bustling, aproned love maids
knitting scarves, laughing, quiet as the
moon, baking bread that tastes like clouds,
as the bells break into sound, as the
scriptures cascade and unfurl,
as its promises float upward with
the rising rising,

I look to you and see only the sun.

Imperial Kiss

by Tehya Sky

Death.

The blanket of an unknowable sky.

A sultry kiss makes it way down your body,
humid, foggy, ardent, solvent. Clouds that cried forever
whisk into the fragrance and the stringy, elusive steel
bars you always peered through so well own up to their
greatness, turn back into sanguine chords that only ever
wanted to be part of the caress.

You are going to die. Your body will lie deep in the
ground and the details of your life will not matter.

Everything else,

is a choice.

Syrup

by Tehya Sky

The syrup of this love comes to me like the soul of a small boy in a man’s body. It comes to me like flowers, the microphones to god, ripe at my mouth: damp petals that when simply considered, stick to my lips. It comes to me like washcloths forgotten in the dryer, lost socks and hairpins, the maudlin musings of every corner cello and the sex and slow motion of my unmade bed. It comes to me in dreams of John Lennon and Yoko Ono, painted over their image in cursive writing, telling me about a poignant something that, when I wake, I don’t recollect. It comes to me through butterflies caught in netting, never there for long, through the braids my heart makes of limbs: You know, the happy drunk. It’s the pleasant glass coffee table that holds our crochet of daily life, the languid siesta of every resting guitar. The tree in our garden plays the piano. I hear it, you hear it. The hammock records every inch in her quiet design. The soil gives thanks, confirms that yes, there is nothing here we can deny.

Excruciating Rose

by Tehya Sky

Wrapped in a day that tastes
like roasted cigarettes and molten rose,
excruciating rose,

dusty sunrise
where cowboys abandon their belts for kiss,
lay supine, helpless in the sand.

In a world where womb rhymes with tomb,
where dog spelled backwards is god and mom is
always mom, I watch as my wit forgives
the excruciating cosmogony,
bends towards the sun,

and the rest of me is rose, molten rose.

And Pluto Shakes

by Tehya Sky

The well of which I am, in which I find myself in gorgeous apocalyptic swim is neither here nor there, is the conglomerate of ether this, ether that, of a cosmos of feelings, of questions, of the moment mystery is relinquished, this well is swirling madness. Savagely creative, deeply mirrored specks found through so many eyes and when love burgeons, as it always does, and Pluto starts to shake, vibrates and rattles like the rattle of the heart, when the reflection of this seraphic, savory chaos becomes impossible to see, and this unknowing does its Radio City tralalala dance from head to toe, ruffles its wings, kicks up its legs, the dance takes over. And blindness lifts its violin. The inability to see anything, to know anything play their supple chords, and the only place to rest is upon the great breast of mystery herself, the obliteration of starry midnight therein, within her endless protean givings and rich river milk, you are carried through her warm bath, and Pluto shakes, and you are no more. All that remains is you as the shifting symphonic of the stars and the milk, of the earth and this grand, rapid fire, exploding and unfolding one breath at a time. The gift of travel, it is the gift of being. And Pluto shakes. This rattle of the heart, its illusory handle, the moment you take grip, it turns to dust. And you are so cloaked in mystery, your very shroud is a constellation of stars. And your sweat. And your kiss. And Pluto shakes, and you are no more.

The Chuckling Sun

by Tehya Sky

A wintry mix of soul purrs and
sacred snowflakes drenched in the
pattern of God shower from the touching
of a new depth, hush away the
imposition, the frozen tears,

and crystalline now in the soft chuckle
of the Sun, melted, glistening,
together again, falling from the sweet
kissing tongue of new day.

Carousel Galaxy

by Tehya Sky

And so, what is it, anyway,
this dawn that beckons at our heart,
this carousel galaxy that plays in precious drawls,
ringing us around the courtesies of love,

this tiny thimble of world that enters our mind,
slowly exploding through the gel of
a timeless truth,

this stretched landscape of
sweet humming sound, gently blazing away
all hurried embellishments,
spanning itself through a relinquished chest,

blitzed in the song of silence,

bringing us back to peace.

The Chalice Harem

by Tehya Sky

Twinkling chalices brimming with
the full spectrum of a french kiss
bow to your hungry lips,
undress in your mouth, (drip
golden through your mmmmm),

teeter at the crest of all that you know
to be true,

’til you’re fastened to
remembrance, nothing more
but a star.

The Dervish

by Tehya Sky

the invisible within my chest is
open canyon, blown wide by the
meteor of your love, and where there
were both of us i now dance alone,
sufi whirling silken scarves about my
body.

pushing weight upon my toes
as the movement takes over, looking to the sky
sun kissed and emptied,
filled to the brim by a grace
immaculate, ablaze, precise.

frightened to the point of
radiant absolution that there could ever
be anything else than all of this.

horrified to the point of dissolution,
to the point of realizing this as love.

the memory of your kisses hits me like
moonlight, teases itself upon my lips,
dashes this gorgeous, cratered space with the soft
sandstorm of mystery and here i am,

dancing alone in this round valley of
love unveiled, knowing the greatest parts of you
are watching on, holding me in reverence
as i pirouette and fly,

and die.

The Three Day Man

by Tehya Sky

you are the three day man,
appearing at this red door after
years of traversing all of space inside out,
arriving pure and easy with the next
breath of air and not leaving my side
for three days.

you are the three day man,
our kisses found each other straightaway
and melted into their own sort of something
by sunrise day two, and with each inch and bristle of the
paintbrush they became followed awakenings
of colored sounds from some other life, so long ago.

you are the three day man
and our hearts are wings of
untold feathers of chromatic,
harmonious magic, one big wing speciously
of two, speciously of trillions.

within the feather is the wing and within
the wing is the feather. together we jumped off
so many cliffs in these three days and in this
mystery spell of life the more i lose myself,
the more i find.

you are the three day man.

we know the form is irrelevant and
we know the tools of art we share are
everlasting and now i tell you in words
all we needed were these three days.

the painting made and complete and the
three feathers awoken in their entirety
to the life they are, stretching the wings
further open, letting the falls turn to flight,
letting the heart be the only thing it ever was,
open wings made to soar.

and we didn’t need forever in the way most
people understand the word,
because we had forever and this is already forever.

and you will soon know the clear language
of the wind, i have no doubt.

you are the three day man.

The Cantadora

by Tehya Sky

The church bells of my throat,
what of them? Of the way this
gusty love breathes out my fluid heart,
through my willing body, billows,
sounds them off in silence
while I share these luscious truths
with you.

And the quiet wind chimes
nestle their flirtatious rapture into
each whispered syllable. And the
birds and their angel wings. And your
lips, the beatific cantadora who is
weaving these moccasins.

And your face.

Eagle Wisdom

by Tehya Sky

Ever the wishing well, said the cat
to the dog, ever the doe-eyed kiss
monster, won’t you look at the red
robin up in the tree and stop looking at
me?

But you, began the dog, you exude
a coniferous charm I’ve only ever seen
before in the moon, and she is far too far away for
me, or so it seems, or at least I’m not her
kinda guy.

Both of you, said the robin,
both of you sing songs of tapered dreams,
eyes quietly nestled in the wax of the soul.
Remember the wick, the heart’s bible therein.
 

You speak like the wind, murmured the cat,
while the dog, dumbstruck and silent,
moved a paw to her back.

You are the heart of the eagle, not
a different bird, it is so?

Dreambags & Violins

by Tehya Sky

day five hundred and nine.
dreambags and violins fly
together in a Z, scathe scraps of
crying sky; turn it to juice.
four days prior you were meat, eyes
epic stones of churning erotica unblinking,
steaming permission of the heart.
my legs inhaled, faltered like
baby deer, regrouped like woman.
deep in the potency of the jungle,
contained in that puissant silence,
fuerca,
around the sort of fire that protects
no one but Nirvana, open heart,
maybe John Lennon. day five hundred and nine,
within eight fractions of what you
call a “second,” atoms of crying sky
turn from sweat to chocolate milk
to soured daiquiri before that sweet
and systemic rasa. and our bellies,
(bless them), drink, bathe, savor, they
save none for the News.

The Ineffable Faux Pas of the City, I

by Tehya Sky

The city says,
Halos like frisbees.

Me: Are you asking?
City: Yes.