kathryn lyster

friends colony of ants in my apartment crawling over plants busy at the edges of rugs   meeting at rings left by teacups to decide what happens next.   kathryn lyster

rockstar now i have one tiny photo left of you buried in a pile of books i’ll find it on a rainy day when i least expect it and smile. kathryn lyster

other side now we are civil now that love is done kathryn lyster

R.I.P (an) ending. Storm ripped through your heart morning light debris   hail-smashed sunflowers + fallen oak limbs   puddles drowning grass baby bird thrown from nest Devastation   destruction what a wreck   gardenias trampled by rain   feet dreams beaten   iridescent turquoise-winged butterfly feelings   stopped dead don’t fret    Breathe clear the carnage   plant new basil and  ruby roses. Bees will return (gardens are resilient like that) kathryn lyster

gone he left a bright blue    bucket on the sand towel shirt spectacles jangle of keys inside i saw him swimming in the crashing winter swell rolling over great whale waves he never came back we read about him in the paper the man who swam beyond the breakers to touch the weeping moon. kathryn lyster

autumn  Where did all the sugar go? Sweet honey syrup plum juice? Where is my ripe fruit?    It’s cracked seeds &    dry skulls around here Husks of brighter summer     sun on skin     Long gone. Bare knuckles grinding quiet    songs on fading wind.  Pebbles rocks    stones underfoot Thick roots pushing to bone. kathryn lyster

no strings people are balloons they hold you up when your life is falling down. kathryn lyster

Your place Running late to meet You    imagine your head Between    ah   slow smiling Eyes  tickle    up my spine Heart hammers   as I get Close   Pause   outside your Door.  Breathing  hard    jasmine Fills everything.    Steady myself Let the flush fall off my cheeks Be fashionably late   make you Wait   walk around the block Once     twice Then knock. kathryn lyster

current small fleeting moment sound softens    You realise the smallness of  Yourself   You came    You'll     go it was never   really about You. kathryn lyster 

bush track late night drive back road no moon windows down wind whistle my favourite time to think of you. kathryn lyster

when it comes we're all very brave little humans  of this i am absolutely sure kathryn lyster

Desire Watching   jungle  plants grow in my apartment in giant round pots & tiny glass bowls,   relative to their distance to the windows, how they snake up / stretch down, they are always reaching     like us    trying to reach   the light. kathryn lyster

eyes So what do you   eat? do you know  where it comes from? do you care who   died or how? kathryn lyster  

sleepless yellow bloodwood resin    climbing pumpkin vines +   buttermilk  bell flowers    sprawled  in soft white sheets pink mouths devouring hot tongues    molten hands on sticky   thighs     fingers open to the sun. kathryn lyster

falling do you know that you are brilliant    brighter more    dazzling than fresh fallen   snow? kathryn lyster

W woo me with your culinary prowess & i’ll wow you with my word wizardry while the wild wistful world watches on. kathryn lyster   

intimacy how she went from being completely unknown to  deeply Known.   kathryn lyster

gold papaya tree full of green one small timid        yellow leaf turning suspended in spider thread danced by unruly breezes don’t we all know that feeling? kathryn lyster 

journey home ferry    ride across Sydney harbour  Glass city painted against cerulean sky    Peacock blue water plummets White sailboats sliding through   Grey gulls pivet dive dip infinite currents     my tired mind     cannot see. kathryn lyster

Monday slow sky turning nebulous cosmos birthing fire clouds bursting space + time reversing god’s house burning in the background behind your phosphorescent eyes. I could not look away

curl curl A woman slips serenely into the wave pool, 80-something & smiling like she knows something we don’t. A beige bathing suit sheer in all places, Orange tassels constellation of freckles vivid under flooding light. A scowling man complains loudly to his wife, ‘Just look at her!’ I want to applaud the mermaid, not man+wife. kathryn lyster

done wish i could take back the    champagne catalogue     magazine collage    of hurtful things. NOT so i      could do it       ALL again differently,   just so i could   NOT do any of it     at ALL. kathryn lyster

for rosa if words are golden then you are some sort of astonishingly brilliant sun   kathryn lyster

garden wet earth after rain   high river clambers over stones scent of damp undergrowth    leaf litter rotting fungi spores in old wood burrowing     bugs beetles   worms rabbit foot & bird’s nest ferns      elkhorns soaked through  delicious monsters            catching  waterfalls with      wide            green hands     history      caught burying secrets      in the ground. kathryn lyster

just when i said Found. one red     velvet scrunchie strange      magic is afoot. kathryn lyster

instagram in recent photographs i saw online you look like no one i know, like a person i have never met. these pictures confirm it, the you i knew’s all Gone, & i have mourned you as if there had been a death. kathryn lyster