A rock & roll terza rima sonnet from my poetry collection Dragonfly . . .


      "Are You Experienced?"

In the Church of Saint Jimi, purples and blues
played in the gold haze of the spotlight.
A glass butterfly slicing through

Spanish forests on ebony nights.
At Monterey, Jimi's hips
had thrust vermillion into white

hot flames. Strumming with lips,
fingers, tongue — Hendrix had spiraled
into our brains, fired the wicks

of our secret candles. We fed on his crystal
bones like vampires at some vile feast.
How could we have known how brittle

he really was? That the prince was just
a mirror? His flesh, only flesh?



First appeared in the
magazine ART/LIFE.