Red: Lust is a Monster

By James Sawers

The poems in this book reflect the deepest longings of the human heart. They celebrate and explore love and loss, life and lust, expressing the ecstasies and mysteries of love and grief and longings of all kinds, from the erotic to the seemingly divine to love of country, to the love of true friendship.

From the ethereal to the everyday, from the simple to the complex, these poems encompass what it is to be truly human; especially in the relationship to and with the lover – that one person that can capture a heart or destroy it.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Sep 6, 2014
• ISBN: 9781595948786

Book preview

Red

The email was short

Red, was all it said

Code word for

When we were tired:

Look, there’s a beautiful red

sunset on the horizon

Red, it stood for something

We thought worth noticing

But were too tired to explain

The whole thing in detail

Or, when we just wanted to connect

Red and we would smile

Knowing we were connected

With our special code

And special, shared life

So, the email said a lot

Beyond one simple, small word

Since words had helped destroy us

Perhaps one, small word

Can save us…

A Flash of Legs

A flash of legs

Pale in the headlights

Of the jeep

As she runs across

The broken road

Long skirt hiked up

To avoid the mud

Then she was gone

Into the dark

Seeking sanctuary

In ruined, blasted buildings

The memory comes forth

Sometimes, when I am tired

I wonder what happened to her

If she ever found safety

Or, just more loss?

A Night with a View

From the Signature Room

Atop the John Hancock building

The night-view to the west

Is a Rorschach vision of sparkling lights

To the east, the vertiginous blackness

Of Lake Michigan

Sucking you to black depths

Sometimes a lone, twinkling light

Blinks out of the blackness

A lost boat, or lost soul, perhaps

Looking for a safe harbor?

Holding hands, whispering

Heads leaning in close

We enjoy the moment

And each other

Oblivious to others

And the approaching storm

Abide With Me

Come abide with me for awhile

Let the grass grow beneath our