The past nights words were feathered hermits that passed before your quill could grasp them and tonight is no different; you have not forgotten the taste of salt on fresh cuts the sound of secretive moans of a maiden still naked in her childhood sweater you only stopped documenting the miseries that remain faithful to their vow to build you a monastery. ~ I haven't held a secret in so long, but oh God, I can still feel the ghosts on my shoulders as I pick my way up to our pretend Olympus to give my testimo st.

I wish to write beautiful melodies of you
Performed with voices so ambrosial, angels will watch the show
These words never before heard
It's underlying passion never witnessed
The only beauty compared to your song, is only you

I want to create great orchestras dedicated to you
The symphony performed would even cause God to applaud
The thunderous drums to the sweet violin
Every note will echo among the earth
The performance will be boisterous
And the band will play until there are no more notes
They will player for eternity in admiration of your beauty

Beyond All Earthly Words


My activist lesbian novelist sister
Posted on Facebook
just post Election Day.

"Woke up
with a song in my head
and realized it's the Kaddish."


It did feel like a death.
An assassination of our ideals
The burial of our complacence.

Our Timelines were filled
with vitriol and fear
in unequal measure.

We gorged on talk
Of tiny hands
on huge sh!tholes.

Variations on Orange
bloated Twitter memes
Filled Facebook.

Scary pumpkin head man,
Complexion like a Cheeto.

Scrofula

After the old man found it, the solitary
upright marker bearing his mother's
mother's name, we worked for several days
clearing the small hill of its hundred summers'
growth and then marched with pitchforks,
side by side, shoving their fingers into the ground,
feeling for what had been slowly bowed
and buried by the dull weight of time
that had lain so heavy upon these obstacles
in its path of desired flatness. 
And when we felt the grip, the pull,
we would slice the earth and slide
our fingers below, force the cool slabs

Untamed Fury

In arteries wedged with a clot
Countries rumble, feeling a slight
Passions bottled throughout the night

It bundles into great big knots
Collectively there is a roar
Threats must be answered, time for war

Burning tissues no matter what
The armies mass, the soldiers train
The country bleeds red drops of rain

Till it breaks through the weakest spot
A tinder box, waiting for fire
A deadline ticks down to the wire

Anger rises, so quick and hot
The first shot sounds, cracks like a whip

......I'm latched onto a spike Through majestic yet convulsing, A collapsing entrance; The clew expands. Being dragged about Am I liberated or snared even more? Engraved sides, queer and curved Pacifying anyway. Fragile, so weak, This con of existence, A mere disillusion of reality. A gaff to lure. Amidst such chaos, a fruiting hope To return where I belong, Or rather did. To have what is mine. Or rather was. When did I cease to be? The walls; now converging Do I escape or merely succumb? Invisible waves quaking Am I drowning or being buoyed? The answer is staring at me.......

Flexible arms fixed to brackets
swing heatless light into place; flower-heads droop and fall.
A suite of metal and plastic.

Her face expressionless as a plastic
doll, a woman braced from a sturdier bracket;
floodlit, her limp limbs fall

in quietus by her side. The body falls
into warm arms; a heavy-duty plastic
cord slips from round her neck. Open bracket

close bracket. Rise and fall of a pulse; plastic surgery.

(Unpublished. Copyright © Lee Nash 2017.)

Staring Eyes that want to communicate;
wispy hair pulled back, seeking.
A wrinkled face that depicts a past,
well-formed lips longing to speak.

A ghost of a gal,
a woman in a shell,
she'll never break out
of her living hell! 

Polite people look and turn away,
some shake their heads and wonder
what's on her mind or if something's wrong
They have no time to ponder. 

A ghost of a gal,
a woman in a shell,
will she ever break out
of her living hell? 

But this woman has been deaf since youth

He sits down wishing for serenity
Hoping for escape from the melancholy
Coming from a land run down and decrepit
A land lost, scarce, and neglected
But there’s a place that truly shines brightly
Producing hopes and dreams vibrantly
It’s rich with zest…and the good life
Though amongst it is an area filled with strife
Filled with hopelessness and despair
And of people who wonder if there is any real care
A care for a land so rugged and gritty
A land evoking suffering and pity

He’s gazing at the stars up in the air