1. Heart Shaped Blossoms Rabbit lays out in the backseat of the Galaxy snared in the rush of auto lights flashing wave after wave across the interior ceiling. All of his muscles, even his teeth, begin to relax in The Light from Behind. He suddenly knows. He's lifted out of his hide and into The Lights. "We are already where we've been going!" • hungry ghosts grip the wheel unable to feast at the table • O, mother held homes together she lost her other O, father I fear, the absent years in mansions of manic depression O, sister sweet, desire I hid your own room O, brother, my brothers, living and dead all the love we wish we said • words go out I hear my heart a red crown in a dark sea pages of morning white fingers cup the wind all night • the whole dream the instant I wake an ancient and confounding skull with enormous teeth • years of myself there another day outside my grasp • where diamonds slope the sea my goddess sings to me • our bodies the sun mornings dressed for church leave me drum my songs the heart shaped blossoms when I'm not there to see plum leaf butterfly wings the breeze 2. Wild With Spring A lettuce field a deep ravine holes caves shacks pieces of wood scraps the edge of a hole an old man's hair My own father asking his questions, making me shake. His life in a box. • through street light pine- needles O moon bruised clouds blue streets up and down Spaghetti Hill sea lions bark from the Coast Guard pier below • words go out I hear my heart a red crown in a dark sea pages of morning white fingers cup the wind all night • years of myself there another day outside my grasp • a flute the moon a tiny heart sleepless music on the water all there is everywhere at once and anywhere you point points back to you at the speed of light name this thing a separate being in a crisis of perception who is whose reflection • the nightingale's quiet the sunrise a riot high and low tide the moon's second sight a star to me • the world begins in my mouth the fierce clear light between a caterpillar and a cloud 3. A Convertible Galaxy that's what I want shake rattle and roll my own hair in all directions • blue lupine green mountain white water songs • the sea hag's hair blown back on the coast cars small as bottle caps sea lions roar updrafts vultures circle • The truth is Frank, a song and dance man wrote. All day, turning leaves 4. Frank's Home a gray cat on the edge of a birdbath in the desert Signal Hill • a family photo turned into wallpaper "the longer human history petroglyphs suggest" • between a caterpillar and a cloud the heart attacks • red sky in morning blue afternoon face to face by evening with a white full moon • 77°F 4:15am the wild flowers I guess somewhere 75°F 4:42 am inchoate 80°F 4:30 am over drawn 104°F 2:36 pm adobe yellow wall cats walk up and down Palo Verde limbs skinny bird song everyday air • wash the glass panes in the front door clean off the coffee table and sweep the livingroom floor wash the brown splatters off the black phone where rain leaks thru the roof during monsoon wash the dishes and wipe down the counters take out the trash and put a new bag in the bucket under the sink sit at the computer near my neatly made bed feel better about scrubbing the IRS another day • not a musician no degree in the field Jimmie Vaughan Do You Get The Blues Saturday • red blooms on yellow bikini, holding my gut in, first day of Spring • "breasts are luminous" I grab them exaggerate their orbs loaves of heaven nutmeg-flecked, exuding light 5. Tombstone My daughter enters the room and finds me on the edge of my bed What can be funnier than this, she said I’m not ready for school • when I slide into the blue car bleeding wires where Sachdev’s flute used to sing • the edge of a hole an old man's hair my father asking questions making me shake his life in a box • prison walls the wind exits all covered in time • the tide sunrise in our eyes we lean out and look upon shiny black roads bordering the sand • There are hills trees roads and townships gossip is time loving the visit, thinking - all • someone coughs bring the hoe inside door locks 4:30 in the morning • charlie parker rides with a farmhand ...voxxi David tells me about song I read Paul Blackburn “hands move earth feeling earth” moment to moment to monument in time blue and polished stone • The Morning Sun I’ve been a mean son of a bitch and I’m sorry Copyright © 2007 Frank Parker BACK 
. . . combined his crafts of printing and writing to publish his book, Heart Shaped Blossoms, and has since become active in electronic publishing, i.e., Frank’s Home. His poem “Wild with Spring” won a prize in Quarry West 35/36: Poets and Writers of the Monterey Bay, edited by Ken Weisner, judged by Francisco X. Alarcón, in the Spring of 2000.
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