Michael Mark

Waking before me

It is my dream to wake
earlier than my mind
freshness filling me
before knowing
it as sound
Before memory
presents its encyclopedic files
and names it a note
C sharp
produced by a bird,
a Common Starling, in this case
Before thinking
overtakes being.

everything

Because I am weak
I am given a body

Because I am unsteady
I am given will

Because I am simple
I am given guidance

Because I need
I am given riches

Because I want
All is taken

Baby, when you going to tell me your mantra?
For Lois

Baby, when you going to tell me your mantra?
I'm cramping up in this unknowing position
Tonight, let's strike a long match
Sandalwood, lemongrass, Eucalyptus
Or give it to me in dark's silence
The black velvet for your diamond sutra
I'm not asking to swim on your heavenly sea-filled breasts,
drink your sweet thighs
I'm begging you
Trust me with your sacred nonsense
Utter unto me
I won't repeat a sound
I swear
My friends will never know
I will abandon all my relationships to this world
Just whisper it once -
Forever
I don't have to be in the room
Turn on the shower, steam the mirror,
Disguise us in dense vapor
Free your voice to dance in the water's laughter
Wash me up and down with your syllables
I will have knowledge of you beyond your body
Breathe it for me baby
I want to hear it the way your insides do
In blessed stillness
Lay me down on your yoga mat
Stretch me open
to receive deeply
Rub me with the essential oils of the Gods
Free my Chakras
Navasana, Supta Baddha Konasana,
transformational Savasana
Pour your emptiness into my namelessness
I will hold your silence in timelessness
Let it go
Scream your soul into my animal bones
Fill my form with nothingness
My spirit has a primal dream
To be
Home
In your Ohm

Michael Mark is a hospice volunteer. His poetry has appeared in Angle Journal, Empty Mirror, Everyday Poets, Forge Journal, OutsideIn Magazine, Petrichor Review, Spillway, Red Booth Review, Red Paint Hill, The Thing of it, The New York Times, UPAYA, Word Soup End Hunger, and other nice places. He thanks you for looking at his profile, though this isn’t him.