Eyes Downcast

We go out walking
explorers and navigators
Adventurers
But with the first discovery
a colorful stone - 
a bug on a branch -
We become something else.
Our research takes over
There is no more landscape
no vast, blue sky
no far off mountain
Only this square meter where we stand,
Eyes downcast,
scanning for a treasure.
We take small steps,
carefully placing our feet 
on a spot we have already checked.
Methodical finders
prayerful monks
A vow of silence
not as necessary
as a vow to see everything
a fossil
an arrowhead
the archaeologist in us
will carefully unearth
a slightly exposed bit of white
bone or basalt?
Everyone come look
a funnel spider!
And we are each entomologists
A traveling lab
Mentally documenting our discoveries
Sometimes even with a camera
Geologists, anthropologists
theorizing about 
what happened here?
who lived here?
Did the flood do this?
Animal trackers
wildlife experts,
and survivalists.
Moving slowly
getting the entire hike into a specimen jar
carrying the Great Outdoors home 
in pockets, backpacks and lunchboxes.
A shell, a seed pod, a pellet.
here a bullet casing - proof of human life!
An old indian beer can
a smooth skipping stone.
These expeditions make us
doctors
truth seekers
history keepers
creation lovers.
And we go home with the 
backs of our necks tired and red.
 

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Under the Hood

These days, you know,
I'm hardly more than
a grinding clockworks
a shoddy transmission
ready to seize.
I churn on
I scree like a terrible locomotive
halting on the tracks
A dry tank
A friction machine and
a stripped out thread.

Those old contraptions -
ones referred to in a feminine
personal "she" -
require more intuition
to operate
More subtle artistry -
It's all in the wrist.

She must be spoken to lovingly
shifted and maneuvered
with a gentle touch
Oil and chamois at the ready
and easy, easy with the clutch.
And she will drive you where
you need to go.
Her engine will sing and purr
with the deep, low, hum that comes
from really knowing her.

(C) Tasha Chinnock 2012

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Utility

An umbrella gently
bounced down the sidewalk,
dwarfing the small frame
that sloshed beneath it.
Wet wellies kicking spray,
forming tiny wakes
that rippled softly and
once again spread over the concrete.

It was navy blue,
not bright and ostentatious.
It absorbed the light.
It defied notice -
a mere shield -
a little pitched tent.
It glided along,
bobbing and swaying,

Growing smaller down the way.
No gust of wind
disturbed the pace.
The gait I counted
down the walk:
one, two, one, two.
The roof-like tarp
steadily took the patches of block
until at the corner
it escaped my view.

(C) Tasha Chinnock 2012

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Wager

I dare you, days,
To try and outlive me.
I was built to last.
I'm cast in brass.
I carry on.
On my knees,
I'll just get stronger.
Lonely and sad
Convince me to wait.
Angry and scared
Keep me breathing.
Hungry and tired
Are a challenge, a dare.
They remind me to care.
Feed love, starve hate.
Music and rhythm
Are always right here,
Singing and pounding
My heart to a prayer.
There isn't a secret
Or a darkness so deep
That it can stop me
From taking my next step.
I keep getting up.
I'll never retreat.
Competition with life itself.
I'm a finisher.
That's how you win -
You just don't give in.
So, let the world turn.
Let the sun burn.
Let the wind and water
Grind and persist.
Time is only a measured thing.
It was made to run out.
It falls short of eternity.
Eternal me will outlive Time.
Outlive the aching
and the inadequacy
of weekdays and weakness.
I plan to be around
To see the Plenty when it comes down.

(C) Tasha Chinnock 2012

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Metanoia

It is true I never loved
the way that love was meant to be
I loved with fickle, selfish stuff
and all centered on me.

And yet it was a greater love
than ever I'd felt before
A willingness to die to self
and live for something more.

But in my flesh such passive love,
Inadequate at best,
You felt like a nagging wound.
It never let you rest.

I love you still, but selfish love
Is forever gone from me.
I learned too late that all is lost
If I put me before thee.

And yet I plead with God above
Fill me, O Lord, with perfect love!
Give me what lacked in all those years
I've paid for love with all my tears!

Now see, I'm still here looking out
at a world of unknown fear
And I will face that world again,
side by side with you, my dear.

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Conflict

My heart and my body
don't understand my spirit.
They are all fighting for me
but at war with each other.
Like life-long friends
engaged in a constant cat fight.
My body fights for its needs
the cravings,
biological demands
of my humanhood.
My heart fights for its desires
My hopes and dreams.
It tells me they are my right
It drives me forward.
My spirit fights for my freedom.
It reminds me who I am
in the eyes of heaven.
It whispers the promises
that can't be broken.
It calms my body,
It soothes my heart.
It chants to me
Peace, peace, peace,
Be still.

(C) Tasha Chinnock 2012

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What is a Man?

What is a man?
He is put together
of muscle and hormone
and other hard, hard stuff.
He is instinct and reflex
and all for self.
A man will bury the bones
of all his past sins
in the soil of your heart.
A man will hold tightly
to his dreams, unaware
that they are choking the life
out of everyone around him.
A man won't wake up
and see you.
He is basic and static.
A man is an island of disregard.

(C) Tasha Chinnock 2012

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Idolatry

I have always carried around
in my raggedy heart
Your pains and worries.
I have allowed all your burdens
to be my own.
You didn't deserve my love
any more than you deserve God's love.
I just gave it to you.
A whole lump sum.
I poured out myself
And became a vessel of only you.
I walked and talked and ate and slept
as unto you.
I allowed you to be a god to me.
Some would argue
you weren't all-powerful.
But you had power
that you didn't even recognize.
You had so much at your beck and call
I would have done it all.
Killer, sinner, beggar, slave -
your fool. Your willing fool.
You are still here.
Carried on my back.
A burden I cannot loose.

(C) Tasha Chinnock 2012

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Goals

I want the woman I see in the mirror
To be the same one I see in my own heart.
I want to stop seeing as the world sees
and see myself as God sees.
When I lay my head on my pillow
and silently reflect on my day
I want who I was today
to be something I am proud of -
not something I defend.
I want to be who I was created to be.

(C) Tasha Chinnock 2012

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Grace

How can it be
that you will cry out to God now
after so much is all said and done
and broken and lost
and damaged and hurt.
After all your rebellion
how can it be
that God will reach out to you
and you will get your way?
Still free from me
Still there and not here.
But back in the light?
How can you deserve that?
The miracle is that you don't.
And you don't have to.

(C) Tasha Chinnock 2012

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Making a New Friend

I can sit here and snuggle with the heater
Alone. Alone. Alone.
I can be solitary
Fall in love with myself
I'm meeting myself
And it feels like the first time
This person -
I never knew me at all.

I can think about things
for a long time
And sometimes, when I wish
I had a reason to
speak a thought out loud
I try it out,
Weirded a little
by the sound of my voice,
like looking into
your own eyes in a mirror.

I can ride it out
Wait for it
Stare down this season
of empty
of quiet
I'm better than it.
I have power
this silent house
Hasn't even seen.

(C) 2011 Tasha Chinnock

Isaiah 42:3 [ACROSTIC Part 2]

Read Part 1
"He will bring full justice to all who have been wronged."

Heaven's glory
Emits passionate love

Where the dark of the world
Is oppressing
Loved one, your God is
Listening.

Be still.
Remember His promises
In the day of your affliction.
Nothing goes unseen,
Give it to Him.

Find a place to rest
Under His covering.
Let Him act on your behalf.
Look to Him to be

Judge of righteousness;
Undertaker of your cause;
Swift rebuker
To the wicked and corrupt.
In His mighty power, the
Creator and finisher of
Everything

Takes up your case,
Orders His armies.

Angels in ranks
Leap to obey,
Live to do His will.

Why are you cast down?
Heart, be lifted up.
Open your eyes and see

Him fight for your honor,
Avenge you at last,
Victorious,
Eternally fair and faithful.

Behold your conqueror,
Enthroned in the heavens,
Even now steps down -
Name above all names,

Wielding truth and holiness,
Raising His awesome hand.
Order will be restored
Now and forever.
Give your hurt to God.
Everything is His to
Decide.

(C) 2011 Tasha Chinnock

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Our Alliance

Our alliance
Speaking - and knowing without speaking
The reassurance
of limitless solidarity
Bound to eachother's burdens
The sacred communion
of mother and daughter.

(C)2011 Tasha Chinnock

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Hermitage

Its quiet here
when they are gone.
Blank, white walls
Hold their breath
Stubborn as toddlers.
The lightbulbs sit and burn in silence
Like angry friends
Intent on not speaking first.
I don't even talk to myself.
It feels irreverent
To interrupt the wake,
Observing all the loud, messy laughter
That dies every other Sunday
when the sun goes down.
This extended moment of silence
Reminds me with its nothing pulse
That they are missing.

(c) 2011 Tasha Chinnock

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Jazz

A Grievance!
She cries out indignantly
at the swarth of the mercury.
It rises, it falls,
and all the while it is
a dark, untrustable thing.
Does it even believe in itself?
Like a tepid bath boasting steam
that delivers little more
than shivering wetness.

A lie! A lie!
And I knew not to listen.
I said I wouldn't
but plugging my ears turned out
to be pointless
with my uncanny talent
for lip-reading
I wish I could read your mind instead
I wish I could turn my back on you completely.

(c) 2011 Tasha Chinnock

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Naptime Adorations

Little cheeping chickies
With wide, watching eyes
Trying tricks
Banging sticks
Find the pecking order
Repeat all you hear
Believe it all
Beckon and call
Learn so much more
Than what is taught
Lick and feel
Find what's real
Exhaust yourselves
In half a sunny day
Nod your head
Sleep like the dead
Climb up high
And preach your innocence
When you cry
So will I
Words of wisdom
Blown like bubbles, free
Skip away
Back to play

(C) 2011 Tasha Chinnock

Consciousness

I was blind and empty
A vapid reflection
Deceived by my own titles
With a mere air of reality.

And then a crux
A solid, dense cross
Crashed on the shadow of my back
Creating a surface
And my life was formed
Of something heavier.
I took on mass
And grew opaque.
I was real, real, real
Vivid, almost garish.
Painful in existence
Shrill and stuffed with knowing.
I saw in three-dimensional contrast
The good and evil and fearful
In the world
And I longed to go back.

I sought out misty echoes
I shrunk into shaded caverns
Of half-life dreaming
I hummed a partial tune
I squinted and blurred my sight
Willing blindness to return me
Up that twilight path
Of intuited perception
To forget again the
Sharp, tangy peal and clang
That wakens slumber
And shakes us out of bed
Into the daylight.

(c) 2011 Tasha Chinnock

Rooms

We have themes for every room
Like three parties
All happening at once
Because this is a home
Whose promise we sense
But can't define
Its a scary proposition
Moving in to a place
With no idea of its future
Its purpose
So we have given it purpose

Wild flowers - untamed, ecclectic
Life based solely on whim
And personal preference
Not here to impress someone else
A place of my own

Light green with butterflies
The quiet place she goes to
In her heart and mind
In the counselor's office
The color under her eyelids
The soft little creatures
Almost mythical
Who flutter and light on her sorrow
And drink it away through curlicue tongues

The bottom of the deep blue sea
A new adventure
Where courage and bravery
Curiosity and momentum
Are rewarded with visual wonders
Mysteries revealed
Treasures collected
Making the frightening darkness of getting there
Worth it after all

(C) Tasha Chinnock 2011

No Room For You

I have a new house
One you've never seen
And there is no room for you here.
The owner called it little and rustic,
it is old and decrepit
with flaking paint
and clogged pipes
but it is free of any hint of you.
The children explore the overgrown yard
and I sweep the cobwebs off the ceilings
and never wonder if you will arrive.
You can not arrive.
I decorate my room in fans
and four mismatched bookcases
and I do not leave one shelf
empty in anticipation of your appearance.
The king sized bed is
made up on one side
and the other still holds laundry.
There is no place for your tools
Or your belt to hang in the closet.
There is no place for your razor
or your keys.
There is no room for you
in this house.
You are gone.
There is no room for you
in my life now.
It is full already,
with all that you abandoned.

(C) Tasha Chinnock 2011

Quiescence

I wait in stillness, a holy silence
I've been in this state of expectation
for so long now, it is home away from home.
A hundred times I have felt certain
a breakthrough was imminent
A change was coming.
I pray
I wait.
I consecrate myself.
My food is an offering
My heart on the altar,
I believe. My trusting heart
sits.
Like a dog awaiting permission to move.
Yes, you have trained me to wait.
I've forgotten how to
anxiously wonder
The hows and whys and whens
belong to the Master alone.
All that is left for me
Is Amen.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2011

Emergency Room

A heart condition.
So much implication in that.
A needy heart.
A greedy heart.
A broken heart.
Pierced through with its own sword?
Disappearing like grass?
What depths are in my own
too-human heart?
To wish someone's death
who I don't even know?
To calculate how this may be
my answer to prayer?
I despise the thought
and still entertain it.

She is a child;
a mother of children;
a weak, frail thing.
That I never was,
nomatter my submission.
I was never weak or frail or a child.
Does that give him power?
Does he feel big and strong?
As his pipes in his divey apartment crumble and
his ceiling caves in.
As his business falls apart
and disappears like sand through fingers.
As his children become strangers
hating all he stands for
because it is not them.
Does he derive power
from a child-lover
with a bad heart?

(C) Tasha Chinnock 2011

Frontiers

I don't want to plan your future.
I want you to be happy right now.
I want to hold you in my hands as you blossom.
I want to shower you with joyful moments,
seeded with promise.
If I can lay a foundation of wonder
and strength for you to grow on,
I can trust your future
to branch out in beauty.
I can believe you'll go
in directions I've never even imagined.
I can look in your face and believe
there is so much for you to thrive on.
Your future is too big for me.
But right now
I am here for you completely.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2010

A Frozen Moment

Standing on the watershed
of a century-old mine,
where thick ice paves
a surreal walkway
over tumbles of water.
The great, polished granite
that ushers this rindle
down the mountain crevices
is balanced
by skyfuls of evergreens
towering up the steeping slopes.
Winter birds - the juncos and flickers - survivors,
are hinting at things
with conspiratorial chirping.
And the wind
through winding tunnels in the earth
is moaning secrets
not meant for my naive ears.
The tissue-thin air
is hypnotic and dangerously freeing.
In this cold,
on this magical frozen stream,
at this altitude
a person could feel anything,
could think sacred thoughts
and soar into fairy tales
with eyes gently shut.

(c) Tashas Chinnock 2010

Regimen

Be thankful for fatness
It is contentment
You have all you need
More than enough
The love and security
To sleep at night
The passion to wake famished
Demanding a big breakfast
The leisure to cuddle on couches
You are fat and happy
Because you know your future
Waits for you like
A familiar friend
Who stands in an airport.

Don't admire my lean bones
Ribs and hips and angles
Of shame and sorrow
Do you envy prisoners of war?
Or concentration camps?
A diet of worry and grief
A workout of nausea
My aereola look bigger and bigger
As the rest of me shrinks
Like huge, bulging eyes
Staring in shock and fear
At the dark future
Without the comfort of food or couches
Or a strong embrace.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2010

Captive Thought

He stands startled
In a sequestered corridor
Slender and meandering
Like a swan neck, a champagne flute
He takes a step
Heavy with dread
Down this hall of thought
This stem of philosophy
A conduit, a pipe of dreams.

He didn’t want this
Never wanted to be here
Unrelated, quiet
Impervious to nearness
And cold as a death rattle.
Where is the sunshine?
How far is tomorrow from
All his yesterdays?

Yesterday is the sound
Of a rose blooming
Its red thundering like chariots
Into the dark of today
Dried and dusty
A crumble of neglect.
He can’t recall
Can’t pull it together
And the weave unravels
And falls in coils
Under concrete feet
Under a spell
Where lies are whispered
So very well
And darkness boils in
Like storm clouds.

Strip it bare
Release the echoing reverb
Into fresh air
Set him free
Let his thoughts spread out
Into everywhere
And the lies disappear
Let the truth line up
And speak order
Repair.

(C) 2010 Tasha Chinnock

Written in the Wake of Calamity 3/4/10

Walking in slow motion
Moving through icy tunnels
Silent and spooked
without you, without
You
Who am I and what
do I do?
How do you explain
one half of a whole
but empty like nothing?


When the moon is shining
through the window
when the dawn is creeping
to my lids of glass
How can I roll over
and make you be here
smiling at me
comfortably
like a love letter?


When both of us
are stunned to silence
and pain is written
on the backs of our hands
to remind us
to warn Do Not Return
But our hearts return
we regress so easily
to simple forgiveness
that costs everything

(c) 2010 Tasha Chinnock

Keeping Awake

It seems a shame to sleep;
to waste all this lovely silence.
Hours and hours I have
all to myself,
while the blessings
and burdens of daylight
are tucked sweetly away
and the naked night,
Precious and peculiar,
stretches out like a sea of onyx.

It is not insomnia
but stubborn indulgence
that keeps my lamp ablaze.
I will have this time,
Though my eyes burn
and my shoulders ache.
By rights it is mine
And it will serve me
And I will use it up,
Filling it with silence of my own.

Hush, pillow, I'll get to you
when I'm ready.
Leave off, dreaming, wait your turn.
The quiet isn't finished yet.

(C) 2010 Tasha Chinnock

Lessen

Make me less of a woman

Less soft and more firm

Not so smothered in feeling

A rock undisturbed.

Free me from being a woman

Slave to moon and tide

Undo mood and desire

And all their lies.

Make me less female, girly

Needing a man’s caress

Thriving on word and gesture

Make me less.

Call me andric, ascetic

Eusocial as an arthropod

Wanting no affection

Pure as a god.

Take away curves and cravings

And love songs played in my head

Stop up my teary eyes

To be stoic instead.

Make me less of a woman

I hate to care so much

To want his arms to hold me

And feel his touch.

Make me less of a woman

And if you can’t then please

Give me someone man enough

For all my needs.

(c) 2010 Tasha Chinnock

Phantom

He is here
stalking around like a dark ghost
haunting my house
hovering my heart
I am bedeviled by his nondescript nearness.
I can just make him out
but there's no denying he's here.

In times past
a priest would come and rattle off prayers
as the dead rattle their bones
and exorcise the specters
that tormented women like me
Or some gaudy, draped clairvoyant
would roll back her eyes and try
to communicate with him.

Ha. Communicate
This ghost will have none of that
he is merely here, possessing
not at rest, but wanting nothing more
just to keep being here forever
appearing and dissipating
howling then surly
Driving off the living.

He walks by with a chill
his voice - an eerie sound
his touch - lifeless
his eyes - hollow.
We are spooked by his empty presence.

Hope

I'm waiting like a blind man,
a prophet
Expecting what no one sees.
I'm trusting against
my senses
I'm waiting because I believe.

I believe because I know you.
With your true eye
that sees deep and far.
I know the pure heart within you
I know
this is not who you are.

I know you're the man
who loved me
And asked me to follow along
on a road we knew
wouldn't be easy
But the One who you followed
is strong.

He was strong
when we walked in a war zone
He provided us
raiment and bread
He healed you
when you were broken
And for every transgression
he bled.

A transgression
cannot condemn you
or snatch you out of his hand.
And I'm trusting in Him
to reclaim you
and to give me back my man.

My man, your heart
can trust me.
I've been here and
always will be.
I believe in, not just God,
but in YOU
to be a husband to me.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2010

Epinican

We’re singing the song

That can’t be learned.

Its built into us

In darkness, in fire.

It’s the aching moan,

The lonely sigh,

But the chorus is a glorious

Battle-cry.

Stone by stone

Without mortar or tools

An altar is set up

That carries the tune.

It’s a song of grief

That has made us wise

And of trusting in unseen

Victories.

A chorus of hearts

Once broken, now bound

Will soar to the heights

Lifted up on wings

With strength we don’t have,

Like this world’s never seen.

For the song that we know

Tells of conquering.

(c) 2010 Tasha Chinnock

Speaking Up

Will you sense
My pure desire
For the right words
This moral unction
To a wise response

Do I dare
Utter this oracle
Clear and low
Humble and trembling
Serving up truth on fine crystal

Defenseless
With this insight my burden
Vulnerable as the young doe
Fierce in my fragile fairness
I stand a cipher, a martyr.

Reach out your hand
Take hold of my message
To crush or to embrace
Only vanquish the fear
Of standing before you.

(c) 2009 Tasha Chinnock

Elevation

Without method we light on
A cranny of creation
Delicate as a breeze
Over marshy puddle land
Where crisp, dry grasses hide
Snake skins and beetle wings
And a tarantula with two legs gone
Dangles from a broken branch
Over the inlet.

My expeditious tramps
Are here and there
In twelve places at once.
Like multi-colored katydids
Under the tree –
Over the boulder –
Behind the thicket –
And cautiously creeping
At water’s quivering edge.
Near and far
And near again
In a matter of moments, for
Running is the only gait
Appropriate for our excursions.

Now stop and wave,
Shading eyes from the mild sun.
Now hide from cohorts,
Hair wild in the childlike gusts.
This is the warmest of winter afternoons
Where drowsy garters and lizards
Venture from rocks
And smell our breath
Before small voices reach them.
Reach for them,
And their half-awake tails
Unhinge in reptilian fright.

But we count all this gain –
Each incident fills the vacuum,
And builds a hunger
For days to come
Like this – or something else entirely.

© Tasha Chinnock 2009

Sprawled on a grassy bank, drifting in and out of waking, quiet summer day.

Playground

Theirs is a flashing sort of ecstasy.
It melts into grief
and returns in moments.
It takes my own heart for a ride.

Public Awkwardness

He was suckered by a noise in the bathroom -
A boy and girl laughing.
Which one was displaced?
Only he, himself.

Flipped

ʇsɐʃ ɯɐ ı ʍou puɐ
ʇuǝɯuopuɐqɐ ɟo uʍoɹɔ ɐ ɹoɟ
ssɐʃƃ ʇno pǝɹnod ɐ ɹoɟ
ʎʇnɐǝq ɯoɹɟ ʎɐʍɐ pǝʞʃɐʍ ı
sʃɐoƃ ʎɯ ʇoƃɹoɟ ı
ssǝuısnq pǝıɟıɹɹoɥ ɥƃnoɹɥʇ
ʎʇıʌıʇɔɐ ʃnɟǝɹɐɔ ɥƃnoɹɥʇ
sǝƃunʃ ʎʃıɯɐǝɹp ʇɐɥʇ
ǝɯ ǝɥʇ ǝǝs ʎʃuo uɐɔ ı
ʎʃpɹɐʍʇno ʇou ʇnq ǝɯ ɯɐ ı
pǝddıʃɟ uǝǝq sɐɥ ǝɟıʃ ʎɯ

Welcome to the World

I awake with a feverish pull
And my guts tell me what I must do.
I pace and I breathe, slow and full -
Working to open the world to you.

I swell and I shrink through and through
As your father massages the dull
Ache in my back till it feels black and blue

Now harder and closer together they cull
The midwife assures me that it’s almost through.
I focus and charge like a bull,
Working to open the world to you.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2008

Found

Crook of limbs unhinged
worm-eaten and skinless
a club, a weapon, a tool.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2008

Yearning for Freedom

Were it merely adding a few concubines to the harem
Or joining several willing hearts
To a connubial orgy
Were it only the pluralism,
The multiple partners,
Accompanied by the sad plight of necessity
All this, I could consider
Religion
…………………… Legalism
…………………………………………………… Folly

If never a little girl
was wounded
Forced to conjoin
Bred to likewise breed
Robbed of value or purpose
Caged and beaten like a dumb beast.

Sacred defiling

If never a little boy
Was marinated
In hate and lies
In suspicion, and savage misogyny
Stewed in corruption
Until competitive fear seals his exile

Sacrilege sanctified

If never a mother
Was manipulated
Pummeled to submission
By husbands, or wives with seniority
Doling out intimacy like a duty
Between laundry day and Sunday service

Sacrosanct perversion

If never a family
Was made inferior
Not worth supporting, indentured by their betters
Held under the fear of stolen children
Granted to a more worthy mother
Spirited away without a warning

Sanctimonious maleficence

If no innocent one ever kept the horror
of a secret ceremony,
a sordid night,
in the dark bedchambers
of her nightmares,
I could tolerate
So much that I don’t agree with.
I could uphold freedoms
I could shake a fist at judges,
If no victim ever
Fled
…………… called
……………………………………… cried out.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2008

The Waiting

I’ve born a thousand careful words
I’ve held in hand your dogged chin
And listened for a risk
And hurried through the endless fits
Through slits of eyes
And gapes of lips
It came in choppy bits.

As time has written down our words
Your figments barely peeking in
That fought for yesterdays
And calmly pushed us through the dim
With slabs of palm
And steady hips
Bridged with writing over them.

When under plaster skies a lamp
Was burning blaring yellow white
It all became so final
We reached to pull the curtain down
It stuck half-way
And light blazed out
Leaving you staring at the ground.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2008

Microscope Families

Beautiful protist
Invisible life
In your puddle home
Do you have a wife?
With a flagella
long and wavy
Does she cook up
puddle gravy?

Paramesium
in the slime
Bean shaped
since the start of time
Do baby amoebas
climb on your lap
and snuggle up
to take a nap?

Hypnosis

Take all this thickness of thought
These foggy recollections
My clouded version
And pull from it
The hard-handed facts.
Dissect my soul mumbling
And tell my story back
Like a lesson, like a lecture
I saw something coming
And I shut my eyes
For years
And I shut my eyes, I shut
My wincing eyes
Tight so as not to see
And so I was not there
It may not have even been me.
I will fish it out and tell it
I will sketch it out in greys
And you tell me what it says
Tell me, tell me
Who I was and why this fog
Obscures the words
And fills the skies
And calls to me
Open your eyes!

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2008

Financial Stress

I say hello
To that old crimp in your voice
I’m familiar with the drum skin pulled
- taut over your throat
I hear it and my forehead reacts
Pulling up into tight pleats – ironed in place
By years of these calls

Circumstance is a fickle companion
Left wild, it will always turn on you
And you and I have never quite
Gotten the knack of training
:Shush our rowdy children to hear you speak
:Grab a cigarette and pace the walk
How do you train circumstances?
The whip flails in a useless Q
Over our heads without a crack
Never accomplishing anything
Nothing is subdued or controlled

So I hold numbly to the phone
And sink dully into quiet
No point really in listening
I know the words already
We’re screwed.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2008

The Landscape

Months passed without a stroke, but
Does the artist dry up with the paint,
Or fade like old, abandoned pigment?

The wood box creaks open on tired hinges.
The smell is there -
Ancient oils, mineral spirits.
And here are the brushes
Of ox, camel and sable
Laid out, anticipating…
And there the vast, white canvas
taunting.

Slow, wide strokes begin.
Hues spread out gradually,
Picking up speed
Like an old steam engine.

Then smaller brushes,
Tender lines emerge by the
Hands of a musician,
A chef, a gardener,
A father.

Hours go by, muscles ache
But the colors are singing
On submissive canvas.
Vision is clear,
Rhythm is set.
Life, texture, dimension, emotion
Dance unbridled.

Don’t pause or hesitate!
Paint unwavering,
Confident of victory
Over blankness.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Haiku

Bubble floats on a
puddle in the rain until
drip drip drop it pops.

Accustomed

There was an incredible sound
In the bright light of
last night's moon.

And I hung on a long time
waiting to hear it again
listening to ordinary stillness

You weren't here to consult
I was sitting in our spot
smoking a lonely cigarette

But I went ahead and pretended
"What the hell was that?"
I asked the empty spot beside me.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

The Gamblers

These generations of men
that we cannot do without:
Infectious deviants
whose winning smiles
incur our wrath
and our devotion.
One by one
they tempt
and they taunt
and they goad one another
into utter folly.
In the end, adding one
more bawdry story
to our repertoire.
Saving up memories
like a treasure trove -
or maybe an arsenal -
for the day they are too old
to do more than
tell their tales. Yes,
They will have some to tell.

We sideline observers
vie for their dedication
like jealous cats
and curse the last dregs
of their spontaneity
as if we were surprised.
Somewhere within us
it is their predictable
unpredictability
that lets us welcome them
home again warmly on
yet another early morning.

(C) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Turning Thirty

And so it has been
three full decades.
The first one marked out
in a neat row on the chalkboard,
rhymed and colorful.
The next, glommed together
In a reckless, vibrant heap of late teens
and early twenties.
Followed by this last set
of full, budding years -
a crucible of human experience,
of realizing and forsaking dreams.

At thirty, coming into my own.
Full-grown
but young and open and fertile.
Stronger because of failures,
not yet overwhelmed by grief.
Walking more securely through life,
with a healthy tiredness
attesting to so much hard work.

Jesus was thirty
when he went out to preach.
Old enough to really know
the world he cried out to
and young enough to love it
in spite of what it was.

My own mother was thirty
when she bore me,
her fourth darling –
and most like her.

There is a pride comes with thirty
we look forward to it
we advertise it
and hesitate to move beyond it.

There is an introspection comes at thirty
Tallying up what we amount to,
setting our sites a bit higher,
striving for the mark with fervor.
At thirty we have permission
to fine tune things
or completely restructure
before it is too late.

Because forty will be set in its ways
and growing old will then be
imminent.

(C) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Look At This!

You say your don't believe
in luck, with a pitying smile
at my simpleness
I know exactly what
you mean, but act intrigued
urging you - tell on
Tell of Careful Design
the watch in the junkyard
Texas knee-deep in quarters
Quote chapter and verse of
the end from the beginning
your practiced apologetics.

And never take one look
At the wondrous four leaf clover
I was trying to show you.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Parade Day

As usual, I’m ill-prepared.
We rush off
Without breakfast
Hoping to find parking
Within a mile.
Detour around the route -
A-flutter with feathery marchers.
Wind up at the garage
Where a smiling old man
Forgives our lack of cash.
We park for free
On the fifth floor.

Find our friends, and settle in.
We are all young and old.
As the first flag passes
We are awestruck, reverent,
Cheering, remembering
We are free
To parade our colors.
Bagpipes whine right in
To my heart
Pushing goose bumps
Like champagne bubbles
to the surface.

We clap and wave for
Magnificent Clydesdales;
For rodeo queens with
Cascading curls
Under their hats;
For the governor in
A shiny red convertible –
Even though she isn’t from our party.

The real fun begins
With the firemen. One we
Know is uniformed
And stiff, but smiles
Covertly when we call his name
We never seem to be ready
For the cavalry and their
Real gunpowder muskets;
The whooping, hollering of
Mountain men and shady saloon girls;
Or leathered bikers,
Their vrooming hogs
Always leave one baby crying in terror.

Local businesses display
Decorated floats to honor
“Unspoken Heroes”
They toss candy, souvenirs
And we wave our little flags at them.
Cheerleaders march between floats
Carrying banners and we
Have fun requesting
The turn-around they must learn
In parade class. They do it
Faithfully, aiming to please.
Enter the pooper-scoopers
In cunning disguises
Competing with rodeo clowns
For our laughs, easy today.

We’re so worn out by the end –
Sugar high is fading –
The final floats are a blur
Unremembered.
Who can stick around for a boot race?
The winner will get ice cream.
Anyway, we ought to have
Ice creams all around
And drive home in sleepy,
Sunburned silence.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

A Day of Sickness

I barely slept
Awakened all night
By my own snoring
I ached all morning
to the vibrant shrieks
and squabbles of children
resounding through my deaf head
conducted by swollen glands
into the throbbing
echo chamber

I winced all day
with rolling over
lifting an arm
walking to the toilet
my skin hurts
I'm dying slowly, I'm sure of it

Still not sleeping
fitful at best during
naptime, my toddler
nearby with angel lids
still as a stone
he coughs and coughs
and smiles in his sleep
Phone ringers are turned off
but still the muffled trill
of the fax machine
stirs me again

Afternoon was chaos
so unfair
no one to tend me
no chamber maiden
the children seek out
mischief, trail in rubbish
a toad in a bucket
very special sand
and God knows
what is going out with them

I bravely rise
to get them ready to leave
but horror strikes my senses
its worse than I thought
I buckle...really lose it
name calling
swinging my angry spoon
shooing them off like dirty flies

Alone, I collapse
try to read
I hurt, though -
like Joyce, too aware
of my iniquities
I must bathe apologetically
wash it all away
down the drain
trade it for a fever
precious burning
purging heat
in my joints, my eyes
my wet, dark mouth

I simmer and ache
through the evening
peel an orange
hardly tasting the juice
for all the mucus in my
throat my nose my ears

what cruel neighbor
would pound on the door
at the bottom of
all those stairs?
I carefully descend
hunting his quarry
in confusion
utterly displaced
trying to seem normal
am I dressed?
Oh, good at least there is that

Once alone I phone you
bleary-voiced
I can't laugh at your jokes
I just need some soup
not from a can
even a packet would be better
yes, yes I have taken
my vitamins
yes, hurry home and
rub my back
It will be ten
when you get here
and I won't get a moment's rest
without you.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

A lark sang to my want of words.
A bird, a lark, a silly whim.
I heard the song as in a dream,
and sighed o`er whispy thoughts of him.

Storm at Sea

Storm at Sea by Pieter Brueghel the Elder

Storm at Sea
by Tasha Chinnock

Why throw off balast?
Its too late for precautions
Swells bounce
Every which way
Birds circle
in black of sky
Wreckage of ships and
of nature herself
A gutted whale
Headless, ship
without a sail
Here in this aqua eye
a beacon from below
exposes the ruin
But the far off shore city
enjoys sunlight and seagulls
the latter perhaps a little
fatter for the storm fishing
Tiny pillows of overturned vessels
sideways sails
dot their horizon
looking restful at such a safe distance
No muffled screams
reach their ears
above the roar of wind and wave
and screeching scavengers
You are alone, desolate.
Nought but deep stillness awaits you.

The Misanthrope

The Misanthrope by Pieter Brueghel the Elder

The Misanthrope
by Tasha Chinnock

There is a little
of the misanthrope
in all of us

and who can blame you
to have reached
your winter years

and still have all
the filthy, smiling beggars
pilfering your heart.

Oh, to fold my own
tired hands
and turn a dark shoulder

to the sheep
and their stooping shepherd
and the miller beyond

to become a part of
the greying expanse
of sky

and blend with
the shadows
of a nearby wood.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Two Monkeys

" Two Little Monkeys" by Brueghel the Elder



Two Monkeys

It looks like a lovely imprisonment
Situated high on the wall
A view of the sea
boats in the harbor
salt air tousling fur

But imprisonment itself
goes against their nature
their ape eyes are wild
not docile and tame
what torture to see it all from afar

Theirs is a sad, powerless state
nut shells litter the little cell
seagulls laugh at their captivity
some vain owner calls
the painter for their portrait.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Big Fish

To see where the inspiration for these poems came from, go to my other blog

Pictures From Brueghel

The Big Fish Eat the Small Fish
pen and ink by Pieter Brueghel the Elder 1557


Big Fish
by Tasha Chinnock

I nearly nose the stench
swamp-foul and spilling
out like a hard-learned
lesson. Listen
to your father, son
let him
warn you, urge you
beware the powerful;
ascertain your own guts

The truth of the big fish
is boundless
no species is safe
snake, crustacean, mollusk
even bird falls prey
to that predatory pisces
He won’t stop with his
own watery country
Taking wing
making tracks
to gorge himself on paltry
to conquer
because he can
he must cloy with his
wide open mouth
never sated until he
outgrows his pond.

The one aberration to the proverb being
man: the biggest, hungriest
most consumptive fish in the sea.
Yes, Father, I see.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Conversion

Regrettably, I interrupted
a carnivorous frenzy
a ravishing of corpses
meat stuck in the teeth
What were there, ten,
twelve on your plate
the last time I found you?
It is savage
the heart’s blood still pumping
sharing a common rhythmic drive
It is dead blood,
smelly and coagulated
but you have a taste for it.
What makes you crave
that death feast
stacks of steaks
looking at you alluringly
tough not tender
a whole side of gristle

I want to avoid that corruption
Give me the clean water-blood
I will eat plants
the fresh, chlorophyll taste
that grows in the garden
Purify me with such roughage
In bright, lively colors
sweet and fresh
it tastes so chaste
it is right, this diet of purity
this Eden meal
without hair or bones
without fat or a name
the seeds and pits that remain
will continue to feed me
life after life
while your orgy of carnage
can only breed death.



(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Lamenting for the Children

For me, it was a returning to my past
It was waving the dead cat
above my head
Its mortified flecks
Falling in my teacup
spattering on the bed sheets
smudging my children.

For you, it is something new, now
Never put to death or buried
Dangerous and cunning
hot with fervor
slicing with a switchblade
at me, at us and
our defenseless children

These are only two things out of
the hundreds that threaten
monogamy, purity
true fidelity
openness with a spouse
marriages all around us
hang by a thin cord,
thoughtless of the children.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Failure

Lord, bless this egg house
This poor, debauched room
It has suffered enough

This is your punishment
for faulty carrying of
that fragile package marked
Handle with Care
(Never mind that I slipped it
into your box unawares)

This torrent of sorrow
that crimps you
pushing blurbs of cooing
to the surface

In your defense,
it was not you
but a bad batch of jelly –
no tenacity
that dropped my parcel
(Butterfingers, you maladroit)

Did someone say punishment?
But that debt is pre-paid
This must not be put to your charge
you are acquitted.
Now, hold on tight,
this one will be true.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Alex on the last day of school

Sonny, you are right at the edge.
This summer is given to you,

hung around your tan neck
like an Olympian’s medal.

For all the afternoons that you sat,
quiet with your books -

a word worm,
young philosopher -

remembering four years of lessons,
combining them to make

a volume of riddles,
delivered with clever expectancy

and perhaps an excess of sobriety -
a need to be taken seriously, even in jest.

So, outside is dusty sunshine,
promise of an endless respite

and here in my nap house
your clean, white socks rest

on the cushions of my Swedish couch.
You are bored, but optimistic.

You brandish your neat row of early letters -
A’s and B’s that announce your realized potential:

You can rise above the turmoil
of a fragmented picture frame.

You are worth over a million words,
more than a mere merit;

augmented by the extra letter of reference
tucked sweetly by –

the unofficial with the certified,
both of solid value.

So, this is the content of your pack -
a year’s hard work summed up

in seven bent papers and a book
of head shots whose names will ever be

embedded in the synapses of your mental corridors,
though you may capriciously scratch them off the page.

Not just work – experience. Social forays,
physical testing, the ultimate feat of overcoming.

I am trying to see you as a peer,
to remember who has ever been like you -

Handsome and awkwardly funny,
sugar cane brown and a smile like an epiphany.

I am tempted to find your strata, your niche,
but you are worthy of so much more.

Juvenilia should get its sticky fingers off you.
Even your vices are pure

in the light of the future
and the inevitability of growth.

(c) 2007 Tasha Chinnock

What is the moral?

It was a day of over-emoting
my children swam through
bleary pools of compassion

Early morning was ushered in
with vindictive back-slapping
met with my barked reprimand
Broke loose a floodgate
of self-pitying sobs
utter despondence in the eyes
that swept through me
exposing my despotism
impeaching my love

Detour to the garden
as micro-examination closes in
on a tree, a leaf, a web
a massacre of miniscule
proportions. The horrified
shriek that conveys
torture, blood, painful
suffering and death
rings through the
neighboring yards. Panicked
pleas for aide answered
by futility – a spider has
caught and poisoned
a fat, green caterpillar
no winged glorious future
only writhing, spewing
malevolence. My soothing
assurances that all is right
smack of disinformation.
Her cries of compassion
are real – not affected

We stay inside, huddling
on our cozy sofa with the TV
relaxing in musical utopia
Even here, fear
and sympathy invade
the smallest mind
bring momma running
to calm a pounding pulse
rock away alarm
wait for the next melody
to chase off this latest
affront to a child’s
tender awareness.

I am teaching them to
accept injustice and misery
I am pointing them
toward pleasant apathy
and the bliss of ignorance
Because I am their mother
Shouldn’t I lead them around
all the painful rocks of
hardship they are powerless
to maneuver?

(c) 2007 Tasha Chinnock

Spoiled Serenity

I sought out a public refuge from
the corners of my mouth
clamped around gall
I chose my idyllic grassy plot
to forget the whole sour chronicle
I floated there, quite apart
suspended from listening
exempt from watching
immune to doing
only in such busy pavilions
can I momentarily be set free.

Until one shirtless invader
compromised my immaculate sanctuary
with wall-eyed vulgarity
with blaspheming spittle
and confused laughter
I was accosted with
unsanctioned familiarity
and repelled back to my piss-bog
unraveled further
rent and shaking like a victim.

It only confirmed to me that either
infirmity does not speak to infirmity
or I am not as touched as I once surmised.

(c) 2007 Tasha Chinnock

Magnetic Poetry #3

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Magnetic Poetry #2

A collaboration with Ardara



(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Magnetic Poetry #1

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

For Sara

My enemies have always been Sarahs
They are following me
haunting me through life
Baning me with their name.
At seven she was
the prig who unctioned me
told teacher on me
laid bare my secret
At twelve she was
the ugly, weird object
of my derision
I kicked her hooded head
on long bored bus rides
Of course, those days
the stigma wasn’t set.
I hadn’t realized that Saras –
with or without the sneaky, silent H –
were my nemesis
their evil didn’t signify just yet.
And so adolescence and its
high-low shame had something
to teach me of that
princess name.
That royal Sara of my lover’s covet
whose perfume I was taught to wear
whose hair
was straighter than mine
Taught me to hate
in spite of virtue,
to despise my betters.
I was the exploited Hagar
dark and bitter
the more faithful, and second-loved.
And moving on through closets of men
I saw Sarah pursuing
each of them.
Enchanting, stealing
harrowing them.
Sara mocked me
and pilfered my joy
Sarah - accented, busty
talented, smart
well-traveled, well-versed
well-endowed -
sent me into hiding,
sealed my Ishmaelic curse
to roam the land unloved, wild
the rejected mother,
wasted child.
To all my Abrahams,
I still can’t forgive your precious Saras.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Leaders and Followers

You favor one foot over the other
So I can always hear you
shadowing me
sneaking up behind
ta-tump, ta-tump
you come
I refuse to be frightened by it
your handicap, not mine
I could wait in shade
and quietly point a toe
trip you up
send you sprawling
If I had to outrun you
I’m sure I could
Fly away, fleet of foot
With your ta-tumping
growing quicker and quieter
behind me
I could escape
I could overcome
I am not worried
over you
Gimp limp
sneaking shrimp
I hear you
You’re a sloppy spy
amateur stalker
your stockings slid down
quitters
shaken loose by your
uneven reverb step
why not pull it over face
become shadow
no, you are too keen
on being known, heard, seen
I could take you
but I’m not sure I want to.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

The Disfiguring

Looking is all its good for
This smooth, flat kitten foot
Rabbit’s paw good luck charm
You look and don’t touch
No, please, don’t touch

It is childish but seasoned
Dappled and coarse
Its good enough
It will do for you
Don’t feign shame
You wear it well

Do you have to feel
To go against my grain
Your vigorous shoving hands
Sanding and sawing
Don’t feign consideration
This is all of you

I wish it was of me too
I drive myself to that end
But I confess I am elsewhere
Mine is a different softness
Not the smooth of satin,
but cushion of tenderness
The gentle softness of giving

What have I done for you
Today or ever in life
This is one thing
But it wouldn’t satisfy me
If I were keeping score
Which I’m not.

The Liberty of Love

I drank wine with my lunch today
because you were gone.
I had cioppino full of clams and mussels
the fishy taste that you despise.
I sat in silence without leaving my chair
and ate every drop
I didn’t have to share
because you were gone.

I heard a song that I used to love
so I cranked it up and danced
a silly dance with no one to watch me
because you were gone,
and I didn’t care if the neighbors heard.
I watched that show that drives you crazy
and I laughed and laughed
at every obnoxious word.

I got a note from a friend
that his lover’s gone for good,
he was crying and upset
and a part of me sort of understood,
and I told him I’d be praying for him
and he knows I really am
because you were gone
so in silence, I really can.

And now I know that when you come home
and do the things you’ve always done,
I may wish to dance
or eat dinner alone
but I don’t really wish you forever gone.
I don’t want to find myself broken like that.
When you are gone,
I thank God you’ll come back.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Haiku

They fight like bandits
wrestling over trinkets
and who reigns supreme.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

What a Flame it Makes

Where is the gall
that lets you execute your
disdain on me
like a guillotine
a judge’s mallet
looking at me through your ivory glass
telling the world that I am brass
and all the while
You kiss me like your meat
You coddle me with notions

I have no delusions
I know who greets my morning
I know what I behold
in slow motion odium
I see the sagging double you
hiding loosely in folds of fabric
and the hips agreeing with
the stretched out elastic
that strains to cover them
make them fit
perceptions and corduroys alike

No, maman, it is not flaunting
that your refined taste abhors
it is apathy
for you,
for the men -
your constant suspects
accused of staring,
and for myself -
I am finished caring

I had a day in the sun
when your contempt would have been just
I have been the sparkle-lust
This is altogether different
I am older
My passions molder
in a sess of empty eyes
and why try’s

Suspect yourself
discover what you’re hiding
covet someone else’s privacy
invade the rights of number two
you.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Don't force it

Maybe I could just sleep
While the words wash over me
Internal poetry
The feelings just get swallowed
sucked back down
sponged up
maybe I don’t need a pen
to set it all in order
line it up
put it in its place
for once and finally
I told you I was too tired
too somnolent to speak
exhausted by silence
drained into quiet
Perhaps I don’t need to write it
it is there and obvious
apparent to me
and easier to feel
than to say, to repeat
in words and their limits
Come closer and I’ll whisper it
sing it to you in a minor key
Or stick it like a shiv
under your rib
so you can feel it
deeply
and see what words come to you
Beautiful and poetic
or seeping and weeping
I chuckle seedily
in my unfit sheets
I am sleeping
I don’t need to write it
I only need to sleep
through the sensations
and the lack of
orations
I am a drowsy silent poet
and you are an unworthy audience

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

The Listener

How useless for me to understand.
For all my cries of “understand me”
what good will commiserating do?
I won’t change the way you feel.
You will still seek blankness
albeit knowing that I do too.
I wanted to knell with you
Express that I too, my dear clay one,
conclude us to be the balanced, authentic few
while those who don’t grasp it
are liars, dirty cowards.

You do know.
Have felt this!

But why does it hunt us so heavily –
others shrug it off
resuming their smiling lives –
Is it there, but unrecognized?
Too scared to acknowledge it
in all its renoun
In any form, it comes as
a welcome relief
the ecstatic release
A period to passion.
If only some merciful quietus
would find us and spare us
the difficulty
that captivates us in stasis.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Adoption

Your moue whispers in my ear
the bald, cold figments
that signify your voice.
You inspire the derelict mouths of
weary, insipid moppets,
Expose the blood of your spirit
like a milky moon
or a yearning organ,
Leave shaking a faint heart.
It is thievery,
a sly trick of the tongue
and my keys have ears for you.
I can hardly hear my own
small heart through your
pounding loth shrine,
and as they coincide I am prone
to listen to either
the louder
the stronger -
when one faints the other burgeons
like a blood red poppy
flapping perilous
waving a wand of contrition
a rueful garden.
I grow my blossom
from your own opiate pod.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Second Guessing

They should not be laid to my charge
I can’t be trusted with these -
I’ve always lost earrings,
spilled guarded secrets,
and broken small porcelain things.
Anger and selfishness constitute me.
No one ever gave me a test
or ascertained what would suit me the best
Am I my own keeper
All a-buzz with bees
Should I offer nets
and balm for the stings
How did I become a keeper of things
of such precious plum gems?

You mustn’t walk away yet
expecting me to oblige.
I live in a lurch of compunction
where Heaven’s awash with the tide.
Consider the dark purple flower
wretching a savory rush
while I in my phlegmy heart
wish I could sleep
through the gurgle and moan
of primal abdominal push.
Through the crying for peace
I am vying
Thinking as a sole fish.
I am careless, vicarious,
Wanting and wrong.
Your desire requires
the spurning of lassitude
shifting to staid aches -
sincerity,
cherishing -
while I offer reticence
Unworthy of thanks.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Contusion

Chain ganger, Thor,
take your mallet and pound.
Bring it down.
Crush out a banger.
Bone crusher
Spike right through
Without a warning
Chink. Chunk. Chink.
Hammer and nail
Usher in silence
Fall on the rock
Crack without echo
Heave, ho. Heave, ho.
A dusty crunch
under iron cudgel
Pegging a pin
With a knuckle down whomp.
To bludgeon the grit
you must clobber it.
A rhythm is set
in my bloody veins
ba bump ba bump
throw it hard
ba bump
I don’t want to see it coming.
Another swing,
another inch deeper
the stake is driven.
Blow upon blow
pound hard
move slow
The redundance of labor
a sweaty endeavor
Steady monotonous
plea for my liberty.
Quash an urge
To fade weakly
I prefer obliteration
With no hope of reformation
Just drub a wedge
Into the socket
Knick knock
Knock it.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Bulk Mail Is Poetry

Is this enough, or isn’t it
your austere mantra
lets go check it out
get-together or concede
I think i can help you out
with an empire kiss
this soap wardrobe
so stinking
annihilates the urn
in sag monotony
disheartened by the therapeutic
I wanna go commando
A lane of creation and collaboration
important for tomorrow
maybe before then
is this possible
bedspread invader
The westerners’ concurrent eruption
they’re traitors and foes
or so I’m guessing
Your prima donna suicide
with a convoy of grill tractor-trailors
so fascinated that I’m afraid to use it.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

The Brush-Off

Horridly it strikes me
Right between the eyes:
You did my dream,
yet still denied me.
I am rejected again
by your apparition.
You came so close
but gave me nothing,
not a pittance.
At a casual call
I might have silently begged.
On your appearing,
engulfing me in heavenly shock,
you know I would have
rolled right over,
Lapped up your gorgeous arrogance
like mothers milk.
I am tortured to see
your unaccompanied ubiety.
I think you must relish
the shameless guilt
of creating a jealous illusion
without even the grace
to involve my worshipful heart.
But this bold promulgation -
a flinty jab -
Made public, but oh so personal
is worse than your maiden offing
more painful and ribald,
And still I would suck up
All you have to give.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Cycles of Something

See how we fracture time
With our little worries?
Hammer and pick.
We struggle upstream.
We chase the old scent
With coalescent uncertainty.
It is a strenuous loathing,
A dark choking madness.
It comes on in a sneaking ambush of despair.
What creeping flame ignites
The soul to deviate from right?
The spark of Hell
Leaves, breathless and troubled,
A belt-bound heart.
You ring me and I come up short.
I can’t find in me the change
To buy some time;
Cheaper than truth
And decidedly prettier,
But out of my range, nonetheless.
You can’t see that?
The loathsome shudder -
Hell seeping through the cracks
in the floorboards.
I gather my stuffy ears
And, hunkering onward,
Forget I was there
In the Old Country,
Senses invigorated
By laughter and breath.
Breath.
I almost remember
Breathing in and out,
A leisurely indulgence.
I complain through my teeth
That my precious sorrow left me;
And somehow I am rushing
Back again to the darkness
Where I breathe easy
The fresh air of sadness.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Found Within

I guess I wasn’t ready
For your attitude.
Not smug, but satisfied.
There was a face of hate
in my dream.
So blank and calm
but hating as a mongrel
For two nights
it sat in the dream corner
soundless and still
not frightening
I was not frightened
I knew it was you.
Your harmless contempt
Has become my familiar.
And I don’t run from it
I just turn away.
Back to my dreaming.
I must not satisfy
Your silent desire
to bring me to nightmares.
Go on dreaming
dreaming, dreaming
Don’t look
don’t shudder
don’t fear or submit
to the hate
the placid menacing
of that dream face
gargoyle you.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Purchased

She flutters helplessly
leafy limbs and
feet of floss
Tell her, tell her
what she missed
what crinkled her papery
thoughts
what crusty pinching
sold her out
Her dreams are more real
than today, than home
yet roughly they cram her
full of truth
But heaven heard the shackles clink
and tramp her swimming bunch
of petal parts
Deeming it all
injustice and falling
she was blown dry
and dusted for soul remnants
and dropped from the highest peak
to start again.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

The Struggle

Held down by an unseen fist
suffocated and oppressed
I chose to make an effort
a defense, however lame
I dragged myself out,
hair clipped and lip-sticked,
willing joy to come.
When it doesn’t I scream -
my throat so scratched
that swallowing lends to retching.
These screams are real
not silent, not inner.
But they only empower my oppressor.
No, I must quietly conquer.
I must try again.
To my feet and forward -
force a smile, join in.
I gain figurative ground
until a literal boot
connects with my nose,
pain shooting up my brain
to my spirit cell.
So at last, I am still prisoner
to the unseen push.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2007

Poetic Punishment

The mind is a trap, you told me,
We can’t escape it.
We will rot here in this dungeon
Our Alcatraz.
We are held to a high standard -
The expectation
of those who want their thoughts
put into words.
Slaves,
Like Hebrews in Egypt.
Find your own straw,
scrape the ground for clay.
I’m getting out of here soon.
If the Sea won’t open up
I’ll have to walk right in
and get my skirts wet.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2006

Comparisons

All we do is different.
We change.
Our fantasy and ambitions
Off-ramp to Otherwhere.
How to return
Escapes.
Looking cross-eyed and churlish,
We sit still and stubborn.

Quality, quality
I look for it repeatedly
Seeking plump or sturdy,
Genuine.
But I can’t tell
The wax from the marble.
I’m a fool in this gallery.
I’ve turned you over
Until I hate what I see.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2006

The Ridicule

Jester.
Unkind heckler,
Cruel mimic
Callous buffoon.

Mondays come and go
Winter is creeping in
I’m sickly and slow
Crying, catching my breath
While you spook me.

Hoarse and hairy
Your groggy voice
Is hurtful, hushed
A caustic joke
It is not, not
Funny.

I can’t laugh
Or cry or scream
I am plain as yogurt
Terrible, cold viscous
Unsweetened.

You are between me
Like a squatter.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2006

Mystery Man

Tarzan, Superman
Squishy-eyed priest of our clan
I’ll never walk a mile in your skin
The vaults I have collected
Are grown-up, closed off
separation
Blank of pain and shame
Your soft white garmented heart
pale dough of skin
hair too thin
knobby knees that I clung to
giant fingers, big as hands
Images of a man disconnected
from affliction, guilt and grief
secrets you must keep
hurts tucked away

I have traced your origin
Wanting to meet you in
wormy bald seclusion
To comprehend
the disgust of whorey kin -
that “dirty slut” you hurled at me
when I was sixteen
was saved up over the years,
withheld from its intended
To observe the dark
fear of being found out
with beer in the fridge
or real filth on your lips
or in your hands
or your secret hideout
along with the bird guts
but salt-aired suburbia
held stunted trees
and powdery, clicking artifacts
nothing real
none of you there

I return repeatedly to a day
spent with three old hags
Wrinkled witch faces
and growling voices
breathing fire over their cards
They told me nothing
I don’t think they ever knew you
and what you knew of them
was slightly askew
their spells were cast before you
their love was taken and given to you -
the last hope; chosen one
Has to be one in every dozen

Beneath the antics
did you watch like a boy
in the dark theater
as your story rewound
and started anew
a new cast of goofs
but the old, tattered script
a noir so surreal, but
cleaned up as a show,
sweeping it under
the same old rug.
Your complacent horror
at passing on this birthright,
Doesn’t compare with
the relieving surprise
of discovering its emptiness.
Your strings are unraveled
You just go along
in your bleak repetitions,
a man I don’t fully know
Who I achingly love
in spite of the mystery
because history can remain,
the known will suffice.
Perhaps you really did
keep us safer, happier
than you ever were
We can thank you
for that, at least.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2006

Relaxing 5/6/06

I watch day in and day out
you hard at work
somber, aching muscles
grim brow
and strained voice
working, providing
dredging up a living
because you love us
too much to enjoy us

This holiday I watched you
all the long, muggy days
hard at play
exhausting strong muscles
careless grin
and hearty laugh
hiking, playing
teaching about living
because you love us
allow yourself to enjoy us.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2006

Quiet 5/5/06

No breeze
sleeping trees
whisper of bugs
chirping frogs and birds
are heard in a separate dimension
their background noise only serves
to enhance the pervasive quiet here.

Over still
serene water
sunshine melts like
butter sliding down the hillsides
and forgotten roads wind soundlessly
past glancing deer and into the hushed distance.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2006

Oak Grove 5/4/06

The fingered leaves are
cheering on a twittering parade.
Covered in thick, crackled skin,
they stand clumped together;
As if each acorn fell from
the same Grandfather Oak,
may he rest in peace.
Straight, black lines -
a platoon of footmen
saluting the sky,
with skinny roots scratching at the hillside.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2006

I Arise Early 5/3/06

Light emerges on Stoneman Lake.
I sit in quiet,
Waiting for life to occur.
Here comes Raven,
something large grasped in his beak,
Flying low - old show off.
The hummingbirds are
green and purple darts;
sugar-seeking missiles
launching an attack.
A long-legged heron,
siren draped in sleek blue velvet,
woos the water.
Nowhere are seen the lurking
animals whose tracks are sprinkled
on the muddy bank.
Hidden elk and deer
hunt me from tree shadows.
Raccoons fold their tiny hands
under pine needle pillows
and settle down to rest.
I hear a squirrel
laugh at my clumsy peeping -
unskilled, too noisy,
I don’t even know where to look.
But I am here,
on the morning lake -
awake and trying.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2006

The Crazy Girl

She was a young somber thing
She pressed her ear to the clockworks
Stared at her mother, the goat-girl
She cherished the holiness of marbles
The sad sanctity of a broken crayon
She rolled the street, bottom-down
On a skateboard, slowly
Her hair tickled her chin and her eyes
She trusted mice about everything
Her feet were once mistaken for oysters
In their half-shelled elegance
Delicate curvature and pearled toes
Her heart was devoted to a story
Where a princess fell from a tower
Turned to a white dove and flew
Cooing off to the horizon
She told it, she sang it, she cried
Her mother bleated and shrugged
And pedestrians all looked away
Goodbye, crazy girl, you are young
You are older than me, goodbye.

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2006

A Lament for Anne

I am thirty-two
and still wanting to be you.
You aren’t the same you
I desired at twenty
or twelve,
but you. The point is,
not me; not she.
To thine own idols be true.
I crawl to the comfort
of your stylish shoe
and savor its leathery
essence of you.
I run to the mirror
that depicts us as blue
and I never see you.
Give me a hand
from your far-off ferry
that faithfully carried
you there. I swear.
We talked in the pub
and I out-joked your smile,
but you were still you
by a mile.
And what’s a woman to do?

(c) Tasha Chinnock 2006