Noted the military man

Your character of steel is
Wound so tight to places one could
Easily dismiss.

Frought anger in that protective place,
Battling that bullet-proof mind of yours.
Slammed with defiance.

We ran the roads therein collapsing.

Plans were suspect and pulled.
My chaired chaperone.


Let’s play a game of illuminator!
Scrap-yard maker.
Inaudible audiences surmise
the inflatable atmosphere.

Opening the wound lets the sun shine in
While security likes to check everything twice.
Giving fire to one’s breath,
Sucked in and held.

Souler-Gypsies advanced upon us
Blowing hands and blessing our backs.

Breaking the glass,
And allowing an opening.

© 1-Dec-2011 Sonja J. Johnston

Big Head Ed

This week, on the day you took yourself out of this world, I spoke of the the evening I was hanging out at 69 Main Street New Paltz and you asked me what kind of woman I was. I didn’t know how to answer. You came at me with a sharp knife and I just sat there. You nodded your head in confirmation saying, “You are a woman that doesn’t react.”

Today,  I read from a friend you took your life.  I guess I needed to go back to that cut throat, bedeviled moment with you that seemed so calm and small, but so poignant in my life.

© -Sonja J. Johnston 29-May-2014 for Ed Buchanan (2-18-57-5-27-14)

A Model Life

Standing here at the baggage claim
waiting for someone else's dirty laundry.
Trailing a lost suit on the platform
as the skyway transforms.

I try to lift off the heavy baggage,
tightly sealed with no keys
under watch of security dogs and
air that smells of rubbing alcohol.
They are too heavy to lift.

Now, I find myself back at the staging area
picking up pieces of light
that somehow shattered under pressure.
Vivid colors and several healings that
must have dissipated in the mist.

I am breathing now from the clouds
and sending up smoke signals.
Sage-ing and engaging
Sending off that baggage to the doors
behind the doors for someone else to mind.

© -Sonja J. Johnston 12-May-2014

Vanishing Cream

Vanishing cream
spread on thick
gives me chills;
drives me hot.

Life is finding you're gone;
fighting for air,
suction inhaling
between the scenes
and flickering.

Queen in the keyholes
with white gloves
points a finger.

The castle moves forward
and back.

My sanctuary is lost.
I am left shaking this
crackerjack box.

© May 5 2014 -Sonja J. Johnston

The Dance Unbroken

Hanging on the thought that you are gone.
and  humming the bit of you with me.

I was biding my own
when you walked right up to me.

Stared right into me
and had me memorize
without pen or ink.

Persuading me with your mental dance
Entranced in the evening air.


With all said and done 
I was happy the day was won.


Through all the facts you had shown
and honesty freely spoken;
the letters on the window open
to all that remains.

Stated frankly with precision 
here is the time and place in
which we stand.

Mirrored to you,
Mirrored to me.

Waltzing the Wood
Playing the dance in full
the heart having spoken.

Pushing through the commotion
of this insane forefront
a vision was being documented.

We stole away from the world
driven by journeys of
divine will.


© 2011 Sonja J. Johnston

Witnesses

In his grieving, he still finds time to argue.
One hears the scuff-echo of shoes on flagstone.
Strings of lilac span across my lips and I am frozen in this shroud of amethyst.

The children at the scene
like two glittering gems in the road
unable to move under such circumstance,
continue to witness.

In the face of rage
outside the corners
and deep within the
dark meadow holes
boring into the rich soil
of brain.

©-Sonja J Johnston 25-Aug-2009

Dolomite Tornado Evergreen

There's a tornado swarming beneath my sleeves
that rises in the distance.


The movement, twists from the vines.
Slumping up edges, hiding away the rain beneath the shine
formed on freshly grown evergreen.

I have built a space, but it is a tornado
ripping loose.

Hang onto your boots.
Don't let them get stuck in the black marsh.

Pieces of me like dolomite 
amplified by self inclusions
Tornadoes  from my resting,
no longer sleep; exploding into this space of morning.
Traveling with the missing,
forever in search of the living pieces.

Rocks picked up in distant meadows
A garden of heart shapes
and bony outcrops.

Wildflowers hardening on our dashboards.

© -Sonja J. Johnston 19-Apr-2014

Hand Trembler

Tonight I drink these words in search of cure.
With my hands, I tremble and find those that are lost.
Numbing the stretch of my body;
The healer teaching itself how to heal.

Zaire, Zaire
sings in me like a cradle.

The steps and hands turn and remind me I am
found in a position, a hand gripped hand.
I run the bridges away.

It is tomorrow
with limbs missing.
I wait on the wall watching
to be last.

Making true thought through hands
shaking find the future.

I knew of today
It was beautiful
the thought of me
healing the mad in dance.

© 1984 Sonja J. Phinney

Transisted

The cold drum
Coked.
You know the best drummers have blood in their urine.
Where is this going?
Underground
Like a subway screaming.

First it is like this
Candy storm of images
Housed in a pair of scrubs.
Shaken like a branch full of cherries.

It could be tomorrow
When the wet soul is
Thrown loose and you are
Left watching it soar off
In the distance with your first love
Like burning a history.

The makings of tomorrow,
Going up in smoke
An uncontrollable laugh,
Hiccup in time
Standing, transfixed with our mirrored images.


© Sonja J. Phinney March 2006

The Capture

Attracted to the spider,
To it's web
And and it's bite.

The boundaries
Stick and preserve to my
Wings and feet.

I tell the spider,
“I love you many legs, many eyes,
Spinner, hunter;
I love you.”

I do not understand as he speaks,
‘tic, tic.”

Bundled I am dazed

I am to be of nourishment.

I am one with closed eyes.

A jewel, sweet to the taste.

© 09-Oct-1993 Sonja J. Phinney

Craic

I bet no one ever warned you;
That I could fold you up and send you,
Straight on down to the ground.

Why wind yourself up
And let yourself go
When the circus is in town?

That act will get you tied up in a knot
Where there is no escape
From under the cape.

There are no more cake walkers;
No more prizes to win.

It’s a sucker’s walk
That’ll land you empty.

In those eyes vanish
What you’ve set out
To begin.

© -Sonja J. Phinney 04-Mar-08

Sling Shot

You ask me when?
I say, "Ask the one who holds the grains of sand."

Waiting for the change
to re-arrange a new gear.

All you want to do is
shatter it
Platter it
Toke it up to victory.

It is all you need.
It is all you concede.

Hours and Hours
Welcome to the drop zone
where the sparks fly
into the hanger.

Don't get sand in your eye.
Don't, Don't, Don't
let it pass you by.

You ask too may questions
and stick yourself inside the hourglass
confined by time.

I am wind brushing against
it's glass.

Sling Shot.

© -Sonja J. Johnston 23-Apr-2013

Casting Sails

The Pope mobile resolves into the distance
He is waving to the crowd.


Confession time is here
As are the demands for miracles
On the conveyor belts of time
and it's remains.

Forever moments
in stop delay
a postcard
set aflame.


Today's yells
behind the shelves
of a fabricated job.

We catch the news
between the elbow room
and sip our beers when we can.

The eggs get dropped
our friends get popped
returning home again
and placed six feet under.

It is quiet
and still this
ghost of a town
where we once knew
is a shoe
and a pipe
a fragment

diddle.

©-Sonja J Phinney 1998

Following The Direction

You gotta set it up
just to break it down.
It's a method of self destruction.
Under constraint
and all the red tape,
you just gotta wonder
who has the gumption to hide away the infrareds
from the series of misconceptions?

Bring to me the mystery,
the masters of show and tell.
Breathe life to the wisdom among us,
heavy with harmonics,
amplified by sight and smell.

Tired eyes
follow western skies
with predetermination.
Aching thighs
seek mortal cries
a sweet indiscretion.

It comes in waves
and stays for days
Leaving little trace
of it's perfection.

Then it melts away like a
snowflake on the tongue
leaving an olfactory glimpse
and an element of intrigue.

© -Sonja J. Johnston 20-Mar-2014

Fire Proof

In this three tiered transparency

laughter hits me with tears of history.

This poverty assembles its attributes;

detaching the beautiful sad glow

beside me, sparkling.



The proofs are washed in red

Forced to confront the dregs.

Eyes utter landscapes

intact.



Pleading liberties by name

in the pockets of soldiers.

The underbrush echoes,

strained and off-shot.



Under deconstruction

scattered places extend

to where I must attend.

Fallen absence marches

and is privately eaten by fire.



©-Sonja J. Johnston 18-Mar-2014

Venom

We are charged by the very thing that becomes poisoned to the charge.



I am bringing flowers

I am bringing a gun in a pillow-case.



This misunderstanding is just a standing, misleading.



Troubles asphyxiate.

The heat is packed deep.



Still, the movement of energy in motion;

Of gallant emotion riding in, igniting.

We eat off our flower heads.



©-Sonja J. Johnston 17-Mar-2014

Samadhi

Listen to the house speak
while all are asleep
Hear the hum of a lullaby.

Samara twirling down
makes a sound
in spoon cupped hands,
Samadhi.

Regenerate while awake
Become the one fresh from the vine.

Be pulled
out of the heart
Of pure divine.

© Sonja J. Johnston 27-Jan-2013

In My Hand

This path has found us prisoners.
Dark with patches of sun.
Scissors and gourds hollow metal.
Strings in our lips shrunken down.

See how you are controlling the seas
And upsetting the weather?
Breaking chairs and conflicting our mothers?

Opened mouths
Opened eyes.
Bent and broken your breath feeds the flame.

You are playing horse shoe
Ready like a ringer.

Harpsichord child in a sleepless night.
A shrunken head in my hand and a
Documenting traces of a hungry hunter.

Running and returning
With gourds and scissors
in my hand.

© -Sonja J. Johnston 24-Aug-2013

The Fourth of Yesterday

From the bleachers our friends could see us walking the high wires; switching lines of finer foreign design.

We tempted new destinations, sweet stepping to victory.

Was it the shake in the line that pushed our souls into a perilous pole dance?

Or was it just a false offering?

Other wire walkers found our shadows and wondered how anyone could have prepared for such a fall.

We were flocked in white feathers

unsure of where anything was

Coming and going.

Only that the image was covered by thick wood and a hungry noise was flickering about.

Our shakes in the shadows,

were bound.

As far as the length of an eye, the time bird flew off into sky.

 Tiny threads arrived with th sunrise.

I looked down.

We still had the ground,

A parable.


The bleachers rumbled
with shouts resounding and familiar.


© 04-Sep-2011-Sonja J Johnston

False Distribution

He will not talk
I can't listen.
Words, actions, meanings
twist.

A wanted correctness
Blunted blur in confrontation.

Think a moment and connect the past in
and all the possibilities.
I am confused with all this false
distribution


© 1982 Sonja J. Phinney

White Charade

The light is hardened
in this season of white.
All is not forgiven.

You have become pale.

In your waking, I am a passing stranger.

Your arrival is unprepared
and must be hemmed before
too many seams are pulled.

I can not dwell with your reason
in this season
of white.

© Dec 1993 Sonja J. Phinney

Dandelion Hill

Panrious hears my sideward footfall,
Gravel Sounding.
I enter like a waitress with Betty Boop smile;
Skirt fluttering in the breeze at the doorway.

Panrious reaches down into his record collection
And pulls out an album.
He knows the record by the grooves.
“Duke Ellington right?”
“Sure is” I say as I play it for him
While he swings back to a steady rock in his chair.

Ellington plays glass ear tones.
While the black cat sits like a musical note on the windowsill.

Scratches like sparks from a fire
Jump up between synchronous notes.
Dust dances in the light.

I bring a wine-glass
He holds with two hands,
Listening for pouring vibration to cease.

Squeaky Chair
Toy horse on springs
Flowers in the meadow.
He smells the cork in my fingertips.

“Caterpillar Dust” he says as my skirt flutters against the chair.
I remember when I used to hold him in the fields,
Blowing dandelions into his face
And kissing him in supreme joy.

Panrious reaches, touching the glass on the window.
His smile is vast and timeless.
Fingertips capturing the sun.

© Sonja J. Phinney 1990

Today's Catch

Ho Jack bear
Toes mossy,
Bees hived up.
I trot myself up to the cabin
and eases my feet to dangle.

Pappa cookin’ fire good
Fish is good.
Back, hands worked.

My favorite is the fish’s tail.
Pappa cooks for me.
I eat and grow strong
Beat my drum
and rattle my body in youth.

© Sonja J. Phinney 1974