camera obscura.

driving down hampshire street

passing quiet and empty pubs

strangers opening doorways

near the starlight lounge

I remember the book with a red cover

left in the hands of a beautiful stranger

he is soon to marry

and I am still driving 

down hampshire street 

I see now, more than ever

you are the same as you ever were

and couldn't be more distant

stripped-down, your light gives to lies

and where do I go, where do I go 

when I feel everything 

and know nothing

this man, lost soul hovering above me

I would rearrange my books

this cup of coffee, rye in a glass with a square ice cube

I realize now that searching takes me nowhere

everything I need will find me

the skeleton key is no longer trapped 

inside the kingdom

and I gave you a damn good reason to stay

© 5.2.2016 heather brager

still untitled.

as luck would have it
a cobblestone city
hundreds of lost souls
heading westward
dark street tipping point
home, or breathless
nothing, or north
that which you fear
will always find you
hidden within your mouth
falling from your tongue
fingertips on a scar
at 3:00 a.m.
if only held hostage
in a poem


© 4.18.2016 heather brager

April.

early before daybreak I wander through our house, the
floorboards creak to remind me that you died

I look for your silhouette, hear ice in your glass
and feel your hands sliding across my bare back and thighs

I may never feel that I was enough
our discord longed for the hours and days of
perfectly timed harmony
the line of your jaw and depth of your need
left me reeling every time, you shook your head and told
me there was no one quite like me

in the night I still wait for you, quietly
pushing away your last photograph

I try not to remember the way your voice sounded, and
regret that I couldn't tell you about Jim Harrison


© 4.11.2016 heather brager

For A.g. Synclair.

This is the fundraising campaign for the A.g. Synclair Memorial Fund: 

https://de.gofund.me/emw73gk4&rcid=7724958ef61211e596edbc764e05901c

2:54 a.m. reconciliation

all of these years
we smoldered and blazed
the well constructed fires
west and east, poetry
for food and misery,
liquor for blankets
in truckstop hotels
sleeping closer than skin
I was just in the other room
baking you a cake

you forced your way
through my bones,
my bending soul
dangling keys and truth
while we reconciled the
many layers of our lives,
walked the cemeteries and
drove the empty highways
always finding our way back
to the same sad song

when I am scared that
you won't recognize me
I curl you deep within
the cocoon of my ribcage
sensing a subtle writhing, I
comfort you with my breath,
you are a found child and
storm on the horizon
I breathe you back to sleep


© 3.29.2016 heather brager

halfeti rose.

nowhere near providence, she has found him again 

slumped forward, a deconstructed flower

in his closed fists, invisible treasures

an eternity of skies written on his arm

silent bewilderment in his eyes, almost

like the afternoon they met

the broken mantle clock 

futures of observant children
the gift of a self portrait

lying on a kitchen table, now framed in the dark

how his hands 

once felt on her skin

she watches her own fingers trace his spine

witnesses a foreign voice recite 

a prayer in a whisper

it must have kept her alive when he left

something kept her alive 

years compressed into a hand tracing a spine

clarity drowns and resurfaces

love is not an emotion, but meager sustenance 

she turns her face to the ocean, pulling steadily on

the horizon, wave upon wave crashing down

an eternity of skies

an eternity of skies

© 3.13.2016 heather brager

the persistence of memory.

she refuses to end sentences with terror

though images of vacant desert landscapes

force the last breath of air from her lungs

seconds are melting incomprehensible

a soft voice answering and consoling

though she is holding hostage a velvet rage

she watches a woman dousing wreckage with the sea

a bare branch and timepiece on a bedside table

drown by rebirth and the flocks are coming

© 3.3.2016 heather brager