All by Maggie Alvarez

Last updated October 05, 2006

When I love
winner of the first Poet's Forum contest

There will be

no sticky white icing

no weeping hordes of strangers

no cold flashing lights

no impassioned organ playing

no heavily-laced dress

But I'll have

us

twirling and dancing

under a graceful moon

and amongst silently beaming saplings

and the stars will serenade

to windsung poems

of a girl flower pretty

as we hum home

in our own twinkling silence

built of dreams and hopes and castles

Where

Away to a land
Where the way's forgotten
Where kings are made
and queens begotten.
Where kingdoms thrive
and kingdoms fall,
where one man can win it all.
Where princes will learn how to play
and ministers feal how to pray.
Where fairies learn to flit and fly
and bent old women learn to pry.
Where children learn to wonder and awe
and the carpenter learns to use his saw.
Where lives are saved, and loves are won
where battles are fought, and wars begun.
A land where witches learn their spells
and mermaids gather their combs and shell.
Gnarly old trols guard the bridges
and six-course dinners are called just smidges.
Where a kiss can hae a magic touch
and people never knew they could love so much.
Where hurts are healed, and wounds are soothed
where mothers rock, and babies are toothed.
Where is this place that I speak about?
It's anywhere... without a doubt.

Our World

What kind of slum is this
This filth that we live upon
Where the people clamor
for skinny legs that walk
down to bars
And drown their fears in oblivion
And the occasional drop of kindness
is in itself questioned for its motives
You help to receive
Give to get back
You donate nothing
and take away everything
Digging and prying
until the only thing left
is that cheap compressed sawdust
Underneath that alluring veneer of paint
And the occasional bubbly laugh
amidst the bitter caws
Makes us all turn upon it
vultures wanting to tear apart
what we ourselves can not have
We like sunny days if they're not too warm
Rainy days if they're not too wet
And we stop every leak in our harsh dam
Because a drop can begin a flood
And when it rains
it pours
Because we don't know how to swim.

I Used to . .  but

I used to laugh
to make myself feel good
and people would gaze at me strangely, wondering
But now I cry
because people will always, always look
and you might as well make them
feel good while they're at it
I used try and wave
at the man in the moon
and sometimes he would wave back
sometimes he wouldn't
But now I'm a passenger
on a freight-liner cloud (first class, of course)
too busy waving at myself
to bother with him
I used to ask a lot of questions
eager to see and be seen
But now I'm silent
because silence is bliss.
But ignorance is also bliss.
Does that mean a silent shoulder is also an ignorant one?
I can believe that.
I used to write poetry
full of music and beauty and emotion
But now I realize that those notes
are being drowned out by the
incessant beeps of my alarm clock.
I used to have monsters under my bed
and an alien in my closet
who ate all my socks and made them singles
But now I have only singles
so they match up again
and the alien, hungry, left.
I used to sit on top of redwoods
and have the world at my feet
But now I know
that the world isn't something to be stepped on
or watched afar from tree tops.

Words from the Pulpit

and the second hand slowly unwinds
as the mountains crumble back on themselves
and i'm waiting here
where the rain doesn't fall
in a cloud so deep
the butterflies lose themselves
cause there's no kind of preachin'
that can turn this into a miracle
there's no where to hide
where i can't catch your stealth planes
and those scissors keep snipping away
my envelopes're sealed
and my thought're a crime
cause there's no kind of preachin'
that can turn this into a miracle
my dictionary leers at what i can't do
as the slopes beckon my hurt
there's no translation for language
and no explanation for reality
cause there's no kind of preachin'
that can turn this into a miracle

Untitled

they whisper in crowded melodies of singing and gleeful shouts drenched in color and good health as they carelessly skip through chapped archways of creaking trees with the wind laced in their hair, fluttering like luminescent streams of ribbons, and they whirl and whirl in orbitals of church steeples and full moons with shimmering faerie wings wafting gentle guiding breezes dancing through the hanging creepers tumbling over crumbling stone walls hand in hand as they monotonously chant that good fences make good neighbors laughing all the while at the absurdity of it all and at the same time shrinking shamefully at the truth of it, the truth which rings with cold clarity like a cathedral bell in the dead of winter when somber crows sweep over a drafty sky and the whole earth moans of aches and pains and searing boredom dreaming of when they can whisper in crowded melodies of singing and gleeful shouts....

~Just Breath~

Such a life, set your life
On a comet in your autumn sleep
It's just like waiting for the consolation that comes
in soundbytes on the radio
I get so I've got no pride at all
So I'm gonna take a breath
And take my time and then let it out again
fifty thousand times.
And I just want to tell you
how I get my ends and beginnings mixed up
too
I'm changing and I
Think it's funny how no one notices
Do you notice how I line my sky with all the silver I can use?
Just like you always told me to
I just want to stay, just for a little while
And there's a dying light just falling down on me
I'm feeling like a change.
So I'm gonna take a breath
And take my time and then let it out again
forty thousand times.
But you see the sun and the summer aren't enough to make the flowers bloom
You've got to have the rain
And now that I'm alone, Lost in my last winter dreams
I haven't got any to spare
So I'm gonna take a breath
And take my time and let it out again
thirty thousand times.
Would you mind if I was gone from here tomorrow?
I've got some things I can't tell anybody
And I've got some things I just can't say
The bottom line is that
you never knew how much I felt
Twenty thousand left
That's the bottom line

Constant Longing

I want to remember when we drank time together
And how I forgot to breathe
when you came near
But I know
and I chide myself for believing in fantasies
So now I resign myself
To the fact that all I can do is dream
And my sighs overflow
This cup of hopes I hold out for you
Where ever you are in this universe
that holds so many hearts like my own
When is love going to come? I dream,
I dream, I dream
of the kiss, the glance, the slight curve of a smile
That will change my whole world
So put this down as craziness
put it down as the superficial longings of a teenage girl
and put it down as whatever you want it to be
But remember
Remember
that when it happens
I always knew it would