River of Eyes

“Bone by bone, hair by hair, Wild Woman comes back. Through night dreams, through events, half understood, and half remembered...” ― Clarissa Pinkola Estés

With the moon hanging from a question mark,

and the wolf drinking from a river of eyes,

I walk the shore of shadows searching for answers

among star shells at my feet.

 

Christened with the name Impatient

by Pew Huggers of the Worst Intent,

I am tongue slapped with I don’t

have enough faith if I keep dropping why

into the offering plate of affliction.  

 

Caught in a murder of crowing

I pace in circles trying to find my escape.

 

In the pfft and hiss of judgement’s posturing

the wolf howls and then speaks,

“A clock doesn’t hear, nor a calendar predict.

There are questions that will always question.

Answers you wish to never know.

Understand the flame of human will only

burn as bright as the one who strikes the match.” 

©Susie Clevenger 2021

The Sunday Muse #189

Blackberry Bruised Moon

 

I’m daddy’s girl,

blackberry bruised

moon shadow of dread.

 

I never speak because

the walls listen and

tattle tale to ears

that grow fists.

 

Inside my head words

walk my teeth trying

to find an exit, but

any sound they risk

would open a river of blood.

 

Hell has a cradle, a salt thread quilt.

Daddy owns a Bible…I hold the truth.

 

For everything there’s a season,

Now’s the time for Daddy's blackberry bruised moon

to shine light on his guilt.

©Susie Clevenger 2021

May the Turpin children never know horror again.

House of Horrors

Created from Shay's Word Garden Word List #2 (Plath)

Words I chose are highlighted in list

Word List: blackberries, brag, coiled, counterfeit, daddy, dithers, exit, gobbledygoo,

hearing, idiot, lilies, lioness, mailed, maniacs, mend, moon, peacocks, shadows, space, water

The Impatience of Learning Patience

 

I roam the dark side of the moon

teeth grinding flint hoping fire

will burn the last thread that

binds me to his eyes.

 

Their black mirror has stolen

my secrets, and dances their demons

across the black ice of revelation.

 

How foolish to surrender my skeletons

to stars thinking they would deliver them

to Luna’s heart where trust would keep them safe.

 

Sinful light hungry to roam the veins of hidden

carried my words as bounty to enter the valley of night,

but the dark orb swallowed their candles, and

hung my confessions on his iris of nightmares.

 

In the impatience of learning patience, I study

every wink, weigh every word, and wait for

any cracks in eternity where I can place a match

to start the fire of my unbinding. 

©Susie Clevenger 2021

The Sunday Muse #184

Mapping Silver

 

Be pretty…

Paint yourself

into the shape of his eyes.

 

Are you kidding?

Conjuring my mirror

into his vision to erase mine

is silvered hell I won’t enter.

 

Does the moon dress in fear

or kohl its face to appease

night devils who stalk light with evil?

 

I have lines on my face mapping

the journey of calendars I’ve traveled,

dark hours I’ve survived, bright days I’ve danced.

 

My face is my face.

It holds gifts of my mother and father, ancestors,

shapeshifting, joining the unique reflection I possess.

 

Bare or painted, smile or frown, it’s taken several wrong exits

to finally reach the truth, the only voice in the mirror

that matters is mine.  

©Susie Clevenger 2021

The Sunday Muse #180

 

 

 

Wherever Mascara Takes Me

 

I’m drunk on neon and chasing yellow lines to my next thrill,

too many empty Tuesdays, too many nights to fill.

 

Still pretty when the light is right,

still pretty when the glass is spilled,

a thousand miles past heaven’s exit,

one parking lot closer to hell.

 

I’m tripping on easy, counting dimes I don’t own.

just another blond in Vegas where wild glitter is sown.

 

Still pretty when the light is right,

still pretty when the glass is spilled,

a thousand miles past heaven’s exit,

one parking lot closer to hell.

 

The house owns all the gold, the bar bottles of red wine,

I’m betting on mascara the next win will be mine.

 

Still pretty when the light is right,

still pretty when the glass is spilled,

a thousand miles past heaven’s exit,

one parking lot closer to hell.

©Susie Clevenger 2021

After seeing today's image I searched Google for things about Las Vegas and it led me to INXS's song Pretty Vegas...So my poem sort of has the song's rhythm and no, it is not about me. :)  

The Sunday Muse #176

Breaking a Concrete God

 

We drink the last drops

of sun from the lips

of the horizon as a sea of ravens

crash their wings against our ribs.

 

Our roots grown deep in the broken hip

of a concrete god we stretch our limbs

into descending sapphire to greet stars.

 

Ancestors of the White Oak and Mother Earth’s promise

we sing the canticum of leaves into the night wind

to stir the blood of wild sprouts to revolt against

the damning fingerprint of humans.

 

Quietly the moon runs her hand along our spines

to send light into our scars and strikes the match of tomorrows

to give us visions of what we must do to defeat man’s

knife blade of sorrows.

 

 ©Susie Clevenger 2021

 The Sunday Muse #175

Umbrella Lemons

A toast for the empty glass…

the swill of optimism flooding

the back of my throat

to water down sarcasm.

 

Reduced to a moment’s purr

I plant my chin on the bright sunny

and catnap on warm fuzzies.

 

Before I slip too far into escape

umbrella lemons test the tightrope

my mind walks to see how much rope

they can walk before they trigger

the last straw.

 

In the background Pandora’s clock

taunts hell’s picnic is still messy

and I’m the assigned joker with a mop.

 

Like an automaton I stir in my rewinding,

stare at my empty glass, and wonder

how much work it will take

to portray Eris’s chaos as comedy. 

©Susie Clevenger 2021

Eris (Ερις) is the goddess of discord and strife. 

The Sunday Muse #174