Perhaps no it was the smoke!

The drama and screen of mystery,

Undoubtedly draws its allure.

But nay, it isn’t the beauty

Nor reputation accompanying it.

Wasn’t it then sacred Time!

The seeming deft concentration,

That suggests a real timeout.

So hard to steal a moment

Of reflection with an empty hand…

Cutting the pattern of alter ego

     I trace my image on dotted lines,

     hand slips and reflection shatters,

     ego slides to one side away from me.

You whirl and twirl in vivid impressions

     but polish on your toes is not like mine.

     I stroll down my path on timid feet

     but you spiral and spin the other way.

I smile plaintively at your reflection

     you turn your head and don’t smile back.

     I painted your echoes to be my shadow,

     to numb the pain of walking alone -

     but you flash back on my emptiness.

I wear the stretched skin of alter ego

     if you had your way, you’d erase me

     so you could waltz completely alone -

     nobody’s watching my early demise!

Lazily adrift

buoyed by teal ocean ripples

emotions spilling.

When I looked at him, all I saw was a polished piece of fine steel. His wide smile sucked me in like a magnet and when I succumbed to his charisma, I could see nothing else but the glint of his charm. I could not know that his half-lidded blue eyes held such imminent danger just as he had no idea that deep within, I had a bladed reserve of resourcefulness and strength.

Yet, I went with him through the chiseled tunnel of no return without ever looking back. All I could envision was his muscular, tanned body, honed to perfection. I braced myself for the ride, climbing atop his fine tempered metal. But soon, his cutting edge began to bore into my soul and I felt impaled on his stiletto of emotions which lanced me to my core. I knew that I had to escape his toxicity and deceit before the shank of me was obliterated.

Every blade has another side and the war between us could not be bandaged. Both of us suffered penetrating wounds from the onslaught, from which we would never recover. Neither of us would ever look at a knife the same way again. A knife of bitterness can cut the flesh of a person or his throat; can be his sustenance or his poison, his reinforcement or his destruction.

My nightmare started like this. I was standing on a deserted street in some little beach town. It was the middle of the night. A storm was blowing. Wind and rain ripped at the palm trees along the sidewalk. Pink and yellow stucco buildings lined the street, their windows boarded up. A block away, past a line of hibiscus bushes, the ocean churned. Florida, I thought. Though I wasn't sure how I knew that. I'd never been to Florida.

A man came swiftly up behind me and grabbed me roughly by my right upper arm, dragging me forward as I stumbled on the wet road. “What are you doing out here? Didn’t you know a hurricane was coming?”

I yanked my arm out of his grip and fell forward into a teeming puddle which was running in crooked channels down the sidewalk, skinning my knees in the process. I looked up and saw the man standing over me threateningly. I was horrified when I noticed he had a knife in his right hand as he gestured for me to get to my feet.

I looked around to see if anyone was around but the idyllic little beach town was empty and forlorn. Anyone with any sense had scurried to shelter. There weren’t even any rocks on the ground for me to defend myself, just windblown sand plastered to my body.

“Who am I?” I wondered, as I saw my wavy reflection in the puddle. I was running from someone but as hard as I struggled to remember, no awareness came to me. I just knew the man was malevolent and I had to escape this uncertainty.

All of a sudden, I felt like a lightning bolt had hit me as the past came flooding back. This was my husband who had followed me from Maine to Florida in order to kill me for the large insurance policy he had taken out on me. I was so frightened that I forced myself to wake up from my nightmare and opened my eyes wide to the realization that this was no nightmare.

I kicked him as hard as I could in the crotch, causing him to double over and fall on the knife. I watched in horror as his blood mingled with the driving rain in crimson splashes.

I jumped to my feet and ran as swiftly as I could down the little empty street, trying to escape my past. Feeling powerful as my pounding footsteps mixed with the roar of the seething ocean, I could never have known that he was not dead as I kept sprinting, trying to outrun his anger and boiling venom. The struggle would last for many years as more bodies would be left in my wake. I have to admit that I was no angel and there was a lot more to my story which will gradually insinuate itself into my narrative in little staining drops of pure evil.

She cut his tight strings

with a pair of scissors -

a clipping sound

of new adventure,

a wandering

of wondrous things,

just over the hill

but far from home.

Pulled on hiking boots

over her restless feet

walked on down the road

no longer carrying her load

free to be me, she said

before I’m stone cold dead,

encased in strangling dread.

No longer tied forever

or poured in cement,

she’s let off the hook

and absolved of rules.

But what’s that rope

blocking her trail,

anchoring her soul

and tying her

to man she just left?

Elastic rope pulls her back,

snapping against her skin,

to the jail she knew

and tried to escape -

a nightmare of strings

choking her will

into final submission.

We once were more

than just once upon a time.

I clung to your subliminal words

desperately with both hands,

remembering black lashed eyes

manipulating me like putty,

as I wandered desolately

in empty stretches of unpaved road,

my heart helpless in your cage,

frantically peering through

your blue tinged soul windows.

The darkness of you grew cold,

while midnight halted at the gate.

I spoke to you with desperate teeth

clinging onto your threads of dust,

prone bodies on moon’s floor.

I paraphrased your face in

heavy anchors of pain, watching

as pathos grew within my heart,

while smoky nights and loneliness

lingered in fabricated promises,

spitting in longing’s face,

kicked cavalierly to the curb,

my twirling globe of love,

hanging on a clothesline of empty.