SUNSHINE MORNING

by Michael Keshigian

She looked so good that morning.

She seldom looked that good so early,

like she made herself up the night before

to look as fine as the sunrise,

gold tresses surrounded her peaceful, pale face.

So I stared at her instead

as she shook dawn from her brow

and I whispered between the rays,

“you’re the light of my new day.”

She smiled

and opened her eyes enough

that I fell into her trance,

a marshmallow float

in the blue cube

enveloped by sunshine.

HONEYCOMB BLUES

by Michael Keshigian

This is how it used to be

with him and his lover,

she taught him

a new song

every morning,

a different line

with her head

on the pillow,

climbing the stairway

of his spine

with a weightless melody

until it filled his brain

and he sang

as he rolled over

to lock his lips

around hers

so she might sugar his mouth

with more honey,

her tongue tipping sweet melodies

backwards in his throat.

The day was longing

after mornings like that,

sunlight a lonely companion,

though the song droned

like bees in the hive

all day in his head.

WILDFLOWERS

by Michael Keshigian

What is love

but the dried-up bulbs

the gardener insists on planting

to everyone’s objections

that irrationally burst

into magnificent dahlias.

The lunacy of uncertainty,

a fascination of delight,

most often unpredictable.

Wild grow

the flowers of the heart

in the garden of our lives,

wilder still

blooms affection.

WRITER

by Michael Keshigian

He imagines us on the beach,

soft sand at our feet

just after lunch

when warm rays and a delicate breeze

bid us rest.

He considers my arm around her waist,

my body sideways against bikini curves,

surrounded by seagulls

that squawk for attention

and the litter seas throw.

It’s been so long for him.

He has difficulty deciding

what may be real

and occasionally doubts

the idea of our very existence.

PANDA BEAR

by Michael Keshigian

Because he was terrified of loneliness,

he granted me life

and the ability to share with him

what little time he had remaining.

I placated his hours of isolation.

With no mobility,

he carried me everywhere,

onto the veranda with its view of the lake

on most sunny days

and nightly, in front of the television.

I could hear him limping

as he approached from the hall,

his gait, a telltale sign of concern.

Will he discuss his wife’s departure

or the considerable ineptitude

of political leaders?

Neighbors never visited,

they thought him odd, reclusive,

yet I know he would have welcomed

even the most abbreviated conversation.

No one complained about him,

he once entered a burning house

across the street

to save the wailing dog,

observation, his forte,

he knew no one was home.

The woman, living there,

who sobbed incessantly,

occasionally waved as she pulled

from out her driveway.

These midnight thoughts

are my only escape

from his ceaseless chatter.

I stare at him as he sleeps.

In the morning, he will open the blinds

and the sun will continue to melt

my button-black eyes to a faded gray.

How I envy him. I yearn for eyelids

and a single night of obscurity.

THE SILENT POET

by Michael Keshigian

In the beginning it must have been

that the Neanderthal

emerged from his cave

early one day

into a cold and ruthless world

and noticed for the first time

sun’s reflection glistening

upon lake serenity

between twin peaks

of a snow-covered summit.

And speechless

as he might have been

for images never seen,

he fell to his knees,

stared mutely,

unable to excise

the swell in his soul,

and realized

each morning thereafter

would speak differently.

PERSISTENT DAYLIGHT

by Michael Keshigian

He was caught in an endless day,

persistent sunshine, no darkness,

a day that curdled

green leaves falling,

rotting upon dried lawn

spotted with insects desiccated,

fragile carcasses littered

beneath the lessening shade of trees.

He walked between sagging sycamores,

crossing the street,

asphalt which singed his soles,

his face aglow,

burnt to a crimson hue,

on his way to the river

where others must be waiting.

Soon he will swim under the soundless sun,

water easing his burns,

submerged in the cascading current

in order to survive this day without end,

dressed in a white shirt and shorts,

a luminosity that mimicked the sun

as he approached the shoreline

where the crowd swam,

he whispering how the sun

became a threat,

that all will suffer then dry,

so we must sing

before our remnant ashes disperse,

that an earnest song

will bear us wings to embark

on our journey from earth,

for due to our negligence,

the rules have changed

and our bodies can only go so far.

REBIRTH

by Michael Keshigian

Mindless, aimless,

devoid of harm,

somehow an amoeba

ingested me,

wrapped its protoplasmic

single cell

around my world

with one pseudopod stroke

and stuffed me into

a vacuole

where I was maintained

with digestive acids

that burned my skin

and cleansed

with random enzymes

that floated in front

of my eyes,

my psyche reduced

to its lowest denominator,

a fraction of the computation

that was me.

I lost my arms and teeth,

my laugh and travails,

left with only a nucleus

until mitosis,

when I was born again

with a gelatin brain

and no definite shape.

ready to ingest

without prejudice.

FISH COVE

by Michael Keshigian

Beneath the dock

from which he casts,

the water is shallow and clear,

the sodden earth

that bears the weight of liquid

is speckled with shoots

that will eventually surface

into a stage upon which

the basso bull frog

will perform his aria.

Occasionally, a cloud of dirt

smokes the clarity

of the transparent lake

and his searching

reveals the tail fin

of a scampering bass

near the shore to spawn.

He sits and watches

amid the Spring warmth

and delicate breezes

which incite the lake

to gently slap the dock.

He no longer dangles the bait

to tease the unsuspecting,

no longer allows temptation to linger,

that same lure

which spurred him to seek

refuge and the simple poem

this silent swimmer

strokes with her fin.

To read her verse

within the enclosure of this cove

is the remedy by which

he turns from the commotion

in his own life,

a commotion he has no desire

to impart.

THIEF

by Michael Keshigian

Two days ago

the sun caught me stealing light

to illuminate a poem,

demanded restitution,

then reported me to Mother Nature

who posted my likeness about the land.

Soon, the ocean, forest, birds, flowers, et al.

filed suit for substantial abuse

and complacent philandering without permission.

I pleaded guilty;

admitted taking breath from wind

for deliverance,

marshmallows from the sky to sweeten song,

and rage from the ocean

to instill a sense of urgency.

Convicted and confined to a windowless room

no writing, visitation

or glimpses of stolen sights,

I was sentenced to imagine beauty

without embezzlement

and the wholesale exploitation of words.

SWEET PLEASURE

by Michael Keshigian

Sweet little chocolate

in the candy shop,

I gave your brown shell

a bite when no one saw,

took your creamy filling

for a ride in my mouth,

on my tongue

to all those secret places

where I might sense the nuance

of your flavored butter breath.

As you awakened my palate,

I tried to appear innocent

from the guilty pleasure

your confectionary sin availed,

greeting the clerk

with a tight-lipped smile

as I perused the display

with you discreetly perched

behind my teeth,

slowly melting away.

COURTSHIP

by Michael Keshigian

She handed him his heart

after she found it amid the rubble on trash day.

He gave her eyes,

a pair she lost long ago on the beach

under the boardwalk.

She gave him skin pulled from the air,

cleansed and dried it

to replace the layers of back-alley soot.

He was stunned by the purity.

She found hands for him, discovered hers

as she sewed them on his empty wrists.

For the first time in his life

he could feel as he then continued

to carefully assemble her spine,

spit shine every piece

and set it in perfect order.

It was a massive undertaking,

but he was inspired.

He attached it to her brain

and she perceived subtleties,

laughed and twisted her torso.

She attached his feet,

he stood proud and fashioned her hips,

buffing each piece in place,

they gleamed, renewed, and working well.

Finally, she mended his skull,

closed the soft spot,

tended the wound till it was smooth all over.

He fastened her throat,

and attached her breasts.

She cooed, then oiled the tips of his fingers,

he wiggled them and mended her tongue

with a delicate silk thread.

She traced his neck with soft pink scrolls,

he sunk into place between her thighs.

Two souls discarded, they gasped

as they brought each other to perfection.

MIDNIGHT MOLT

by Michael Keshigian

He sat upon the veranda,

straining to put pen to paper,

pursuing thoughts

that might relieve

the unexplained irritability

haunting him

through the cold, dark moments

following midnight.

Dim, iridescent moonbeams

created ominous silhouettes

from shadowed branches

upon the wall behind

that undulated menacingly

in the gentle breeze

like a cobra with fangs bared

that without notice,

precisely entangled his hair

and delicately penetrated

the smooth surface of skin,

reaching the recesses of his brain

to charm stubborn words

and nocturnal thoughts

from out the lair

that incited him to inscribe,

upon fresh molt,

a venom which would devour

an unsuspecting prey.

MOMENTS BEFORE AWAKENING

by Michael Keshigian

From the bleak canister of a nightmare

the sun suddenly blazed

and he leaped out from the flames,

swept up by the wind,

cruising the fiery rays

that melted crimson layers of burning clouds,

catching a flock of cardinals,

bloodied and dripping red,

soaring then diving

like bombers on a mission,

globs of matted down,

splattering upon barren landscape,

their orange beaks

snipping gobbets of ash

from embers

that crowded the air,

gobbets that darkened his face,

slickened his hair with soot

and buried his feet

in the residual cinders,

his toes curdling

in the puddles of black rain

like the talons of a red-tailed hawk

about to yank him out of this dream.