The Blind Girl

She has blessed
all that has vanished into her evernight
and made forgiveness of eyes that have creased into surrender
gifting her, however,
with scraps of light and shadow.
By the cane of an arm, she stirs
and transfers patience.
By the dry weep
she gathers
the veils that make up her memory.
It is the release
of a beauty she’ll never know by mirror.
How exquisite, the gallery of shadows
museum’d in her head.

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As Shadows

Were we to cry now, we'd cry forever
And for us, all other emotions would
be so damned. Yet we rationalize sin
to defend our names and charity. All
to dream the dream that is reality.
Listen closely and you'll hear my heart beat
soft. No other sound as unspoken words
belie the haunted life where I have missed
myself for as long as I've missed any-
one. And yet, you writhe in me. Standing me
firm in the virtues of antiquitous
romance. Within darkness wanting you near
where sky and sea collide; for a thousand
sonnets could not a lady more adorn.

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Primroses

i

Starting with Millay
needless were naked forms
or words unprinted
Starting with Millay
the birth of a bloom
a perfected tapestry
of all stars that have ever
bounty’d the night

Starting with the poetess
lips soon to part
and deliver fulfillingness
Thoughts never again to meander
uncomposed by the heart

Starting with Millay
ends meet at Heaven
and the dreams that survive
are the cusp of this love

Where her blood flows
doth mine blood flow as well
starting with Millay

ii

Doth thee remember birth?
No – a muse would not.
Neither remembering ancient Greece
nor being a mistress to any number of gods.

Age by age
coming newly again
with each blink of thy lashes.
Tirelessly inspiring breath
that will outlast all,
even thyself.

Unable to remember birth
for there was not one
in the struggle to supply verse
and refine the lyre.

It is, after all, the poet that must be created.

iii

She will have her seas
          in bluish swirls
By paint she commits to
          an empty voice
          replaced by slivered moons, faceless
          women, and Rimbaudian-infinity
in connections strengthened
once they have withered aside
Beyond all she comes to discover,
there is a will and want
at the tip of her brush

She has the eye that knows touch
She has the volume of her voice
She will have her seas in bluish swirls

iv

The same garden
The thirty-fourth planting of annuals
Bloom is firm
          only restrained by the soil’s reach
Each leaf has name
as does the center
These names are the same
That name is
          “Within”

All once buried –
sprouted
unearthed
O’ passionate revel, O’ fortune’s wonder
O’ lamb of beauty
unable to detach. Indecipherable.
Woman made of girl.

v

There is the hymn
that rivers over no tongue
It is unhoused by throats
Finds itself blasphemous to the church
as, while it is prayer,
not a prayer gifted to God
Sung
but sung in your beauty
Hummed and reverenc’d
in the small miracles of
your lover’s exhale
Pious in its refrain
Ripened with each of your wakings
Known to your eyes
in the Primroses
bloom’d from my inaudible words

vi

Unassailable
is her placement to dreams
The silhouette she holds
against dusk
it is a wine delight cannot abandon
Here, were there anything forbidden,
it would vanish
more rapidly
than does the sun linger
at the horizon
Were there anything forbidden
what could she be to dreams?
No,
unlike the tradition of sunset,
she never to bend
‘cept o’er lilac bushes
complimenting their scent with hers.

vii

This quell,
it comes with a dozen textures.
A bloom of silence
staggered and sharpened by a calm all your own.
All I am sentenced to remember is hereby
sealed like the first pressing of roses.
But away in a comfort that is akin to
the bearable moments of loneliness.

To soothe such a night
is to soothe everything short of God.
And yet,
you accomplish such.
Age has made me vague.
The tongue has found me bitter.
If I keep solely to nights
time and talk will turn me often.
Beyond this,
what I have of me
is you.
Save thee my days for sanctuary.

viii

….still I cannot accept
the belief of your love as boundless
in the latest hour of evening
thinking I will awaken
          to have never felt you
          beyond the torturous dream

Left my eyes to narrow,
Muttering your name
To the wish of
The last candle dimming

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D. Garcia-Wahl lives on an island on Lake Minnetonka. His first novel, Ashes of mid autumn, was published last year. His first full collection of poetry, All that does come of madden'd days, hit bookstores a few months ago. Currently he is putting the finishing touches on three more novels (two of which to come out this year) and a new collection of poetry.