Colleen Machut is a teacher and a writer from Sheboygan, WI. She lives there with her husband, Trent and her son, Desmond. Colleen and Trent write and perform songs in the lakeshore area of Wisconsin. Colleen has poems published or forthcoming in Open Skies Quarterly, Jalmurra, Creation and the Cosmos Anthology, Anxious Times Magazine, and CORE: Dance Poems Volume III.

The Long Way

 Flame-licked eye-mirrors
 Leak bloodfire.
  
 Viscosity spins a scarlet spiral,
 Dripping clotted beads
 On a white gown.
  
 Pale arm sweeps chest.
  
 Steaming staircase shrouded
 By moist forest breath
 Of mossy oak.
  
 Echo.
  
 Dark billow-clouds gawk.
  
 Pointed toe shatters iridescence.
 Spine bristles with tingle-fear.
  
 Totter turns to tumult
 And she sinks into watery caverns -
  
 Final decrescendo. 

Paralysis

 Lights blare.
  
 Kaleidoscopes
 Decapitate you
 In the rocking chair.
  
 Ossified limbs,
 Neck acutely bent,
 Chest-dancing devils laugh.
  
 Stare into pinholes
 Until you fit through.
 Melt into liquid,
 Pinholes swallow you.
  
 Wolf awaits
 In highest room -
 Offer your arm
 To chew.
  
 Not even God
 Can wake you. 

Butterfly from Ashes

 We complain
 To numb the pain
 Of starless hourglass-eyes,
 Memorized minute-minds,
 And scheduled, “have to” hearts.
  
 We must embrace our own sadness,
 Forsake burdened antics,
 Remit our permission
 And admit our commitment
  
 To extract the metastasized plastic
 Of minds,
  
 Re-wish their hearts
 And re-star their eyes,
  
 Snap our red pens
 And unplan our ends,
  
 Emerge from the ash
 Of smoldering pretense,
 Chrysalis deaf,
 Awaiting our first tiger swallowtail breath.