The first warm day

Posted on April 2, 2015 by Susan L Daniels

before crocuses
there is softening into thaw

or not quite (almost)
spring

Posted in New Free Verse | Tagged | 33 Comments

His father speaks to him in feathers

Posted on October 24, 2014 by Susan L Daniels

He says his father speaks in feathers;
a calligraphy all quill and no ink,
a scripted spiral through air
and into hands held open.

I am more basic.

My father does not haunt, but waits
at the edge of sleep,
where dreamed things go
not quite memory,
but unreachable;

his words not saved in a pocket
or balanced on a windowsill

but gone when morning comes.

Posted in New Free Verse | 12 Comments

There is no Prince

Posted on June 28, 2014 by Susan L Daniels

You are no prince riding to my rescue.
The castle is long breached, and I still sleep,
covered over by nettles, or roses–
it does not matter which, as long as there is that sting
to thread blood in cursive across skin,
a language of no, though it is unspoken
and sounded in bloom.

Bring me no roses, as I cannot hold
their color of loss, of remembering
the hot metal stink of what drives us,

I will save myself from them, from us,
from you; broken glass
the only vase I own.

Posted in New Free Verse | Tagged , , | 12 Comments

silver (anniversary)

Posted on June 18, 2014 by Susan L Daniels

You have become less you
and more an if only.

You are bigger
than the reason I hate Februarys.
You are more than a sound.
you are larger, but lighter
than the sum of your bones
and the shape of your name
adding to a greater absence,

a negative space
where memory should live.

Posted in New Free Verse | Tagged , , , | 24 Comments

Mangoes

Posted on May 30, 2014 by Susan L Daniels

Unripe fruit hangs heavy
on these branches
untouchable

and bitter as tears
in a throat, unswallowed.

Still, the sun kisses
what can never be sweet
and will never seed anything
but anger,

forests of it.

Posted in New Free Verse | Tagged , , , | 12 Comments

There Are No Words

Posted on May 29, 2014 by Susan L Daniels

We should be boxed
and ribboned,
candy everyone wants,
a sweet we give
and pass around,
but say nothing
and be eaten.

There are no words
we can use, when yes
is whore language
and no becomes a knife
in the chest

or acid in the eyes
he said
were beautiful
before they looked elsewhere,

before the legs
so slim and easily broken
choose to walk
somewhere else

when they should have been
running.

Posted in New Free Verse | Tagged , , | 17 Comments

Tilus series–dVerse meeting the bar

Posted on May 15, 2014 by Susan L Daniels

At dawn an unbroken
spiderweb

glows

delicate, like this day,
easily

snapped

Posted in New Free Verse | 36 Comments