of wolves and fury.

I am wary of contentment.

a cloaked black wolf from the dream

her feet tough and dirty

from miles and miles of running

through swamps to arrogant mountain tops

back again, through the fire

that she started

I am wary of confinement.

speak softly and choose your words

before you touch my head,

prove me wrong

give me your air and open the door

stroke the tender vestiges of unfurling

hidden behind my teeth

I am suspicious, but not afraid.

© 7.31.2015 heather brager

high water mark.

would he recognize her

passing by

on the street

a blurred apparition in

his peripheral vision

a negative of the quiet

remaining memories

she is no longer captive

beneath his ribcage

remnants of her hair

her poetry

and her smell

washed away

by another trip

to the sea

© 7.29.2015 heather brager

tone deaf.

the rays of light are phantoms, repeating through the trees

she is followed home again

lost in captivity, defeat and dust in the ephemeral carnage 

a pulse from within a splintered masterpiece

the song wants out

she is the song, deafening and temporary

© 5.29.2015 heather brager 

paradox.

sitting alone in my office

on the second floor

forty three miles from home

I still make believe that

I know what I am doing

success is inevitable,

loyalty is possible,

and my aging

body will once again fit

into those jeans

I have tucked away

on the top shelf

no one knows that I am  

a masterful actress,

an introverted mind reader, that

I balance plates heaped

with stereotypes, and

the drawings on the wall

are mine

© 4.24.2015 heather brager 

redemption.

a neon morning cradling the skyline

offers temporary blindness

coasting again, I stare it down

like you with the thunderstorm

when your words were the wind

in the beginning of this

a song about loving a girl

for a moment I search for who I was

and your voice is every voice

expectation kept me alive

and made me who I am

time trudges onward, the

bones scattered, gleaming white

across the high plans

where I sifted through vast emptiness

for all of those years

temporary blindness with

her voice calling me in

I am puissant and complete

her black wings silhouetted by

the purest sapphire sky

© 4.2.2015 heather brager 

she is a poem.

the vulnerable

muscles that force them

to remain intact

a leaf, clutching

the branch of early spring

his palms on her skin, the indelible

rumors of time

just sleeping children, buried

under their covers

exposed to the world, they are

more than they know

these things, the quiet and

elusive commodities

but she is the giant, roots

delving deep into the earth

red vines climbing the stucco

in the mid-western autumn

west and to the eastern shore

she mimics and sways

missing only a beat

© 3.27.2015 heather brager