Barbara

I live as if.

People keep telling me that poetry reflects life, but I don't believe it. I can't tell the difference myself. My life reflects my art as often as it happens the other way, and really, it's more of a braid or a weave or a confluence of sacred rivers...

It's all a sacred dance.

Mostly, I write. I love really, really well. I smile in a way that reminds you baby stars are still being born somewhere, and I dance for no reason at all in the aisle at the grocery store.

You won't forget me easily.

My voice comes from the place where both sorrow and joy get stuck, which seems like it's in the center of your chest, but is really the center of creation. I can make hope out of almost nothing and I can sustain it all the way there and back again. I am a hand in the dark and I never let go.

Ink Slinger
© 2006 Barbara L.M. Handley All Rights Reserved

If I could be
anything
I would be the North Wind's
cloak. I would be photographic

paper developing
in the bath. I would be
the feeling in your feet
after you remove your shoes.
I would be the reflection
of your eye sometimes caught

in the lens of your glasses, and
if I could be
anyone,

I would be me.

I'm enthralled with my own mystique, which I don't really think qualifies as a mystique since I conceal nothing and reveal everything.

One of the cats died and I moved out of the vinca cottage after discarding most of my furniture, but somehow retaining the excess stacks of paper.

My penchant for sensationalism and exhibitionism ought to get me into trouble, but it seems to attract money and great sex which hasn't exactly encouraged me to tone it down.

I always tell the truth, but I like to make it stand in different lights to see how the shadows change the shape of things. I'm likely to take it and slap you upside the head with it to get you to connect with me. I'm all about connection. I'll hold your hand and look you straight in the eye while we stand someplace real.