Poetry

thanks, Toots

/ mbrazfieldm / 11 Comments

dear Reina Señora de Los Ángeles

thank you for the myriad places

that sprang forth from your womb

beautiful whore open to all

from east north west south

thank you for your alleys overgrown with trash

and dirty smoky bars that only take cold cash

thank you for the pruned faced

multinational hookers

who tuck until they’re blue

and thanks for Hillel’s guitar

and X and punk rock hungry bands

i love to look at my reflection

in the puddles of the damned

and thank you for letting me slip away

from La Chata and La Sad Girl at Lil Chuy’s wake

thank you for the tacos sushi and McRib

colonics pilates and knock off designer shoes

and the beggar at every freeway exit

who cleans my windshields with his shame

thank you for the Salvadoran Iranian and Korean

who managed to call the fire men

to save the homeless Viet Nam veteran

while the GOP and DNC

squabble over shit

my Queen misguided angels by your feet

thank you for my complexity

for surviving my last fix

i appreciate you looking over me

thank you for the high end malls

fake nails lip fillers fat cell freezers

and my beloved 99 cent stores

the beaches and the valleys

the mountains and the roads

and for all the hardened gutters

you softened for me to sleep in

the soul we are your people

good bad papered or unwrapped

we are all your seeking children

but i’m your only brat

tallith

/ mbrazfieldm / 9 Comments

at moon’s end

i find myself

trying to stitch

back together

what i so vehemently

spent so many years

tearing apart

the light is subtle

too feeble for me to thread

needles of apology

remorse or redemption

yet i continue on

finger tips pale

pricked by bitter reminder

of gaping tears

i tore into the fabric

of decency and self-dignity

with offerings of woolen prayers

i attempt to mend and patch

a heart sullen with snags and rips

to no avail

on most any day

then every so often

the rays of light

knit me a magnifying glass

and in subtle ways

i toil at weaving

a better human fabric

for myself

of which i make offerings

of tzitzit embroidered with the shame

of tails in between my walking legs

with seams of hope

that mercy will be granted

at the ending of my new day

aerial was i

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twilight is a little jagged

rays of Sun’s arms

tremble as Earth opens his

blue doors to her

the marriage bed set

and i’m growing my wings

to fly in the mocha of the night

he beckons my common senses

and i dive into a certain

constructed abyss

my back it labors

as the vestiges

of alabaster hued flight

carries my sins away

then just as quickly

as the virgin blossoms

my wings disappear

into the waking Sun

her face beaming with hope

and as night and i

we go our different ways

my back rested

city aflame

my life clean slated

soul light as a feather

a conversation

/ mbrazfieldm / 2 Comments

i remember that garage

atop of the Echo Park hill

pretty in spring

bikes built to thrill

now my hands empty

mind full of memories

that fueled my entire life

the end nears by

we come close now to the station

we could never use words

only cryptic sensations

what sets me apart from the Godly

she asks

i can’t forgive what’s been done

i explain

all that is left

are two daughters

and a conjoint broken heart

cheveux indisciplinés

/ mbrazfieldm / 10 Comments

i love the color of my hair

brown red and in some places pink

my tired legs and lined filled hands

eyes that stare flat beyond the sky

and a mind that has lost the hard shell

of youthful indulgence and inexperience

i love my lips still round and plump

and the new found freedom

of spouting my own thoughts

that are crafted with the filigree of wisdom

i love my face

oh those expression lines

that will never be usurped by botox

my cheek bones high and tight

to frame a genuine smile at the wind

i love my hair when she gets wild

and i walk the streets of Beverly Hills

stroll in the Rolls Royce isles

worn out Chucks with the strategic tears

where the toes are too tight

salesmen follow me with Lysol cans

and their neat white gloves

that eradicate the traces of the hoi polloi

the hair a right of passage glorious

furious bright riot

reminding me that my agedness

is a catalyst to the third eye lens

from where i can finally see

the dimensions of the world

the good and the bad

and really only give a damn

about the moments that matter

the functionalism of dandelions

/ mbrazfieldm / 31 Comments

supple eddies of wind

caress and tickle the yellow

little matted heads

and their thin arm stems

shooshes it away

they stand firm rooted in packs

patchy green grass

sprinkled with crinkly caramel leaves

some dandelion families

those of five and six

adopt a stray apple tootsie roll candy wrapper

that found its way from Halloween

a few rebellious dandies flourish

in one and two and they grow up pretty hardy

before being crushed under a running boy’s tennis shoe

i like those that grow up nice and tall

with shiny pea green fuzzy stems

that little Mexican girls harvest on a Sunday

to place on the altar of the Virgin mother

when they end their day in church

then there’s the really rugged ones

with sparsely yellow tufts

they are angry little spiky things

surrounded by the trash cans

punctured by the littering

wrapped in sheets of rust

those end up having to bear the brunt

of needy cats and dogs

looking for a litter box

this thing

/ mbrazfieldm / 5 Comments

the thing it is fantastically big

dark with some pockets of rainbow

like an oil spill choking oxygen from the sea

this thing it creeps upon me

looks me in the eyes until my glance falls

to the ground beneath my bare feet

such a crazy thing it is comes when i need to rest

and like a vine above my dreams there it hangs

menacing the angels and their holy valor

the thing it swallowed my St. Christopher

when i was three it crush my compass too

ripped my maps to smithereens

left my raft broken in many places

now that i am old and sunken in

this thing still haunts me

it shakes me shrieks at me and makes me cry

i have tried to fight with fire water and dope

then i thought i’d be nice and slept with it

but to no avail this thing grew denser and denser

not even the sacred doves could pacify it

but like all who have come before me

and to those who come this way

i have learned to exist amongst it

this thing my fearful monster

i chained to it

both night and day

desperado

/ mbrazfieldm / 6 Comments

when the armor sheds

and the spirit is bare

he likes to sit on a swing

legs spread across the grass

thighs dangling between heaven and earth

he doesn’t have to plot

on how to bear the brunt of sin

when the struggle rises yet again

instead yonder down by the willow trees

the children playing hide and seek

remind him of when he was a kid

teetering between his mother’s hallowed hand

and the inevitable curse of becoming a man

Venice beach man

/ mbrazfieldm / 3 Comments

i love the way you look at me

almond blue eyes laden with innocent sin

i love the way you steal a kiss from me

and sometimes hold me down

by my cat-like wrists

and tell me how you’ll take me

i love the texture of your ear

on my tongue rugged and sun burnt

crisped by the sea salt and the sand

i love to hear the song

of your primitive throat when you cum

i love how you scold me when i’ve had

one too many of the L36s

and i respect you

as a man who tells it how it is

with compassion while you grieve

for the slow motion death of my free spirit

at your service

/ mbrazfieldm / 5 Comments

i pluck a lullaby from notes that the wind makes

and i sing in la-la-la’s just for you

i pretend that the fellas can hear me too

as the warm sun makes me take off your old army shirt

hold on i got a text

but before i scroll on screens i loved your stories

of bayonets and the history channel’s gruesome blitzkriegs

and when you’d sit in the garage

crying hysterically like a heart broken woman

i would weep too by the old fig tree in the afternoons

why do we fight when we fight each other

and when we fight ourselves will the world be better off