Tag: Katrina

Muse

Katrina Kaye

She returns as shards
of glass in heel
hindering escape.

She takes the breath
from my mouth
and blows it back
in my face.

She makes my
eyes sting.

She whittled words
into my skin
and left me there
to scratch at the scabs
till they scarred
in the shape of tin can,
brown boots, bad luck,

a promise made and then
unwoven like a web
on a cracked window.

I am not sorry
I took her home
that first night.

The way she
enveloped every
part of me,
the way she
recklessed through
my unconscious

filling the empty
inside my chest,
rekindling a spark
that had long
gone to ash.

I know now
she always remained close,
waiting for the time
when I was brave
enough to call on
her again.

Andromache

Katrina Kaye

I was not made of metal
but there was iron in my hold.

It took a tamer of horses,
but once bridled,
I absorbed my part
like husband’s body.

I dressed him,
helmet and breast plate,
securing sword and shield
with a kiss too genuine and devout
to be any less than natural wife.

A woman of battlement,
I never pleaded the gods for his return,
I demanded it.

I waited for him,
patient in bed chamber,
silently sewing white to purple,
knowing,
once screams dried
and red sun subsided,
he would need me
to sooth dirt from face and eyes,
tend split scabs,
bandage newly broken skin.

I was tenderness
to a tyrannical time.

But not all husbands
return from battle.
Front doors receive knocks
instead of familiar sways,
armor remains on front line,
flags are folded and delivered,
bath water ripples cold.

The last sensation I felt
was husband ripped from arms.

Resonating through me
was the tangle of limbs
dangled from Achilles’ chariot,
skin scraping from face in laps
around Trojan Walls.

I regressed to wide eyed beast
as child tore from hip,
body reined, and
led from home.

I didn’t stomp my hooves
as smoke slithered fortress walls,
brick collapsed to dust,
glory crumbled to ash.

Inside husband’s skin,
as though it were my own,
I was struck down,
desecrated,
traded for gold.

As though strapped to Hector’s chest,
I burned atop his body.

Clay molded as wife
and kilned;
I was made
a woman of Troy.
I was made for this.

Unfinished

Katrina Kaye

there is a trench
dug against my navel

running between breasts
concaving into clavicle

a ravine
through the center of me

this is where
I need to be filled

it doesn’t matter
if it is love that floods the chasm

or pebbles of hope piled
one upon the other

it doesn’t matter if it is a spell
to resurrect the dead

or songs which conjure oceans
and summon the mountains

it could be the sweetness of sunrise
kaleidoscoping before my eyes

displayed against bare ceiling
while last’s night coda repeats in my head

it could be anything that is pure
simple and peaceful

it only needs to complete me
fill me, make me whole

but these fleeting sentiments 
have yet to fill the hollow

for now, I remain gutted 
with little hope of being finished

 

Mule

Katrina Kaye

I am mule.

My bay, an obnoxious yap
from graying muzzle,
as I move from under master’s whip.

My velvet ears twitch
with distrust for the acts of man.

I will not be owned
and have grown impatient
with the repeated deeds of
those who claim to know what’s best,

so I become obstinate
with mud to my knees
rebelling by standing still,
immovable in open stall
despite the whistle on the wind.

I want only a gentle hand, but deny
those offered me as though
their compassion was insult or pity.

No longer do I hold plough forward,
but I long to safeguard the moments
as they are gifted: one sunset, one thoughtful word,
one cube of sugar, one kindness at a time.

Surely, this perseverance
will lead me to dry pastures where only
the occasional fly distracts from
solitude and peace.

Everyone has a Summer

Katrina Kaye

Mine involved boys and alcohol,
late nights, loud music and bonfires,
a little red dress I bought on sale.

I balanced on platform shoes,
etched black eyeliner around lashes,
eager to be a little more than what I was.

I used to smoke cigarettes.
It was an excuse to make
eye contact, slip away with someone,

discuss poetry — or was it
philosophy? — share a strawberry flavored
kiss, and whisper a secret or two.

There was a summer I danced
on a block at the Pulse nightclub
to Siouxsie and the Banshees

almost every Thursday night
in that little red dress with the open back
and side slit, neon light and billowing smoke.

Everyone has a summer,
but there is no reason to be dismayed
when the fall comes.

Even in autumn months,
a night or two may recapture me
to a place of little consequence.

There are still late nights
when I have a drink too many,
kiss the boys on the patio,

kiss the girls on the neck.
Smoke a cigarette from
the brand I quit years ago.

But then I watch myself in mirrors
shadowed with soot, see my city lie in dust,
wondering who else feels the chill in the air.

I’ve grown past the green of my prime,
and, although I wilt, there is a young woman
with a too loud laugh wearing a red dress

who still exists somewhere in the pit of me,
because giving in to the animal
until the sun rises can be so breathtaking.

 

Another Poem About Grief

Katrina Kaye

Stop trying  to be strong.
You do not have to make vows or resolutions or promises.
You do not have to put on a brave face.
You do not have to be patient or kind or tough.
All you have to do is allow the reality of the events to wash over you.

You will have the rest of your life
to learn how to live again,
to become the person you used to be,
or a new stronger version of your former self,
for now, survive, in any way you can.

The days won’t stop,
no matter how you may wish them to do so.
Time doesn’t stop for a broken heart,
although we wish it would,
although it feels like it might.

You do not have to listen to their
sympathies if it does do not suit you.
Be silent. Be alone.
If conversation doesn’t provide comfort,
let the calls go unanswered.
You have nothing to prove.

Let the coffee grow cold in the mug.
Look for him in the familiar places.
Reach out to his side of the bed.
Collect the pictures, all of them you can find.
Leave the television on so that you can chase off the silence.
So you feel less alone. So it can lull you to sleep.

Your armor and shield have been taken from you.
Feel shock, feel helpless, feel overwhelmed.
Feel nothing at all, if that is what it takes.

Your world will not be rebuilt in a day,
A week, a year. It will not be rebuilt the same.
It will never be the same. Nothing will.

Learn how to breathe without him beside you.
Learn how to speak to a man who will not be able to answer.
Learn to walk on your own.
There is no rush. The world will wait.
There is time.

For now,
grieve in whatever way suits you.
Survive the day, hour by hour,
survive the hour, minute by minute,
second by second.
The world will continue.
All you must do is survive,
survive, survive, survive.

Silence

Katrina Kaye

Silence sat
still on the
corner of
cheekbone
and 12th street.

It goes unnoticed,
defies the wind,
flits the skin,
begging recognition.

It is the same
silence that
barricades the
veins with oversized
platelets causing
the heart
to cease a beat.

Creating a moment
of complete
stillness between
our bodies until

with the tip of finger
eyelash is removed
and with pursed lips,
blown away.

Hot

Katrina Kaye

It’s a hot night.

A walk around in bra
and cut off jeans night.

A what I wouldn’t give
for refrigerated air night.

The kind that leaves
sweat on abdomen.

Beads of moisture
around hairline.

The kind of night
that makes me crave

a cold beer to press
on heated flesh,

a swirl of cigarette smoke
over my head.

It would be a good night
for honest conversation,

for philosophy and poetry
and genuine laughter,

for being close to the
heat of another body,

but far enough to not
burn from the touch.

I lick my teeth
and raise my chin.

I transform
animal, untamed, restless.

I am eager
to turn off the lights,

certain I will
glow in the dark.

On days like this

Katrina Kaye

One days like this
I feel like the pills
stopped working, that
I need a higher
dose and I consider
calling my doctor,
saying I can’t
get out of bed, saying
there is nothing
here for me.

On days like this,
I hug friends for no
reason and don’t let go.
My dog’s brown eyes make
me cry when I have no time
to take him for a walk,
and I think I need a
new prescription,
to call someone,
to disappear for a while.

On days like this,
on days like this,
I think of my mother
and how she has made it
through days like this.
I must make it too.

On days like this,
on days like this,
I think of the clever words
I should have written
in bathroom stalls
in big, black sharpie marker.
I think about what
I should have be said
the last time we met
and how that moment is
forever gone.

On days like this,
On days like this,
I think of the woman driving
the bus the same age as me
and wonder if she’s happy.
I think of all the little
lost marbles and pens
that never had a chance
to run out of ink.
I think about the rock
not pretty or special enough
to be collected and
the way the world ends
when you die.
I think of the promises
I made to myself and
the silence that came
when I broke them.

On days like this,
on days like this,
on days like this,
I don’t know if I can
make another day
like this.

Transparent

Katrina Kaye

I am nothing,
if not transparent;

skin a shallow
cloak
clearly
spotted with
intentions
colored and
shaded by layers
of cells
unfurling.

I am missing teeth,
the stubbornness
of religion; I am mourning
more than I thought I would.

I am combat.
I am ridiculous.
I am nothing
but a smile
and a lazy morning.

I am coated in silent patience
and an empty womb; I am settled
in the sunlight of afterthought;
a million miles removed.

I am nothing
if not easy to
see through.

I am ghost,

transparent,

nothing.