COTTON MAGIC.

 Ketchum, Idaho
(Frenchman's Bend)

I waited for the sun to rise a bit higher before waking her. 

matching her breathing to mine & the rustle of the wind against the pine. 

there is a song one should appreciate more,  

it is the song of morning, before the world wakes up.

The smoke from last night's fire danced, waltzing & fox trotting to the sky and past my nose, along with smell of smoked salmon.

I remember looking up for what seemed like hours, 

at the crowds of cotton passing by.
time froze in cotton magic. 

light prisms,

freeing us of mind prisons.

SAGE.

 We have one rule on the road: 

"If your eyes at any moment spot a place, feeling, or light worthy of the lens, slam the brakes."

To capture time is more appealing then to race it I believe.

 It was a blistering heat,  

So we tossed our slips on a Juniper rooted along the creek, the one  our sunburnt, clay braised bodies thirsted for.  

Tessa's hands doubled as pans as I watched her sift stones through her fingertips.

Water Striders danced across the surface & around my calves, clumsily bumping into one another for my entertainment.

Sagebrush lined the base of Pinion pines as cracks lined My lip skin, splitting like the desert ground I stood upon. We bundled Sage and tied it together with sweetgrass, knowing one day evil spirits would find us, ones we would soon smudge away. 

LAKE OF FIRE.

Azores, Sao Miguel, Portugal

the queens and I soaked our pale bodies for hours in hot sulfur springs at the base of three active volcanoes.

--

 The archaic village of Furnas, possesed a history of algerian pirate attacks, notorious for stealing rams before returning to the Barbary coast they came from..

Identifying as a Ram myself,

I felt oddly at peace surrounded by fire & the idea of past mutiny. 

As dusk drew near, 

we took the only road leading home along Lagoa Das Furnas 

"LAKE OF FIRE" 

The five of us attempted to scale the wall to the chapel, My own personal attempt leading to bleeding palms n' broken nails. 

The structure was built on a promise to God. A wealthy man that lived on the island oathed that if God would heal his ill wife, he would build a treasure to thank him by the name of "Nossa Senhora dos Victorias" ...meaning Lady of Victories. 

However, death without regret will soon take us.

leaving the corpse of the man & his wife asleep forever inside the gothic walls.

ANXIETY.

anxiety

noun  anx·i·ety \aŋ-ˈzī-ə-tē\

Never invited, 

always shows up.

wreaks havoc, 

 leaves. 

Nicotine & Jack prescribed by the local 

gas-station clerk. 

I wonder how he's doing?

such a well-versed, educated man. 

scaling stainless steel carriages,

only because we couldn't get the fuc*in car to start. 

NATURE'S PENDLETON.

The cliffs were quiet, 

Common Gulls at eye level.

The afternoon light contrasted the primary colors, 

Colors only meant to be captured in great paintings or film. 

Our cameras ate rolls of film, 

like the irish guzzled stew and rolls.

Every 30 minutes, one of us a took a knee to pocket a canisters containing clips of colors, we would only hope to later posses photographs of.  

  
Tall beds of soft, moss-like grass covered the 
eroded shale & sandstone with colors, dubbed as Nature's Pendleton.  
--
I watched their bodies lean just far enough over the edge to make any passer-by gasp in fear..imaginations wandering to premontions of sudden death. 

Enduringly observing the women I walked alongside, 
carelessly doze off in scurvy grass while picking the petals off Sheeps Bit. 

The sun eventually decided to nod off with each of them on the cliffside, but their eyes had now seen a light too great to ever let leave... 

They ran as fast as they could to the very end, as if they would never see the sun again, as if it would never awake & the moon would hold the colors captive forever.   

 Cliffs Of Moher, Ireland 

POISON GARDENS.

IRELAND
County Cork

I'm not sure if it was my obsession with Norman Reedus' skill at kill in Boondock Saints, my fascination for anything abandon, or my deep rooted relationship with irish whiskey that lead my red reeboks to the island...

I followed the three of them everywhere...

we wandered in and out of castle backyards for days as if they were our own in Riverwest.

"the ravens followed us."

Betsy & I found ourselves lost at golden hour in "magic gardens", where apparently a bunch of witch's use to casually cast spells; to enter the gardens you had to close your eyes n' wish your way down the "witch's staircase." 

I'm still banking on that wish to come true.

I can still taste the foreign air, feel the leftover rain drops make their home on my forehead, hear my own thoughts walking backwards up the stone steps.

I would be lying to you if I told you I wasn't posing in "fairy trees." I was. We all were. We were all just posing in "fairy trees." 

--

I stopped often to take photographs of flowers decorating the castle's exterior. I let the girls know I was taking them for grandma. 

I lied.

they were for me... 
they reminded me of perfect hardcover insides I flipped through as a little girl; A place I now existed in.

Every rose has its thorn, 

but the Wolf's Bane at our feet, 

had its own death rate.

-- 

Killing Greek Gods & dripping its poison down arrow tips since BC. 

secretly tempted to steal a leaf or two...

I left the Wolf's Bane, but only cause because the rain came.