november is an exercise in trust
we sit inside and through the windows
we watch things die
never quite sure if this time too
they will return

Her soul is bleeding,
her colors are fading;
instead of becoming nothing,
she chose to give away her everything.

And so...

The world around her
suddenly turned brighter,
and there she was
slowly becoming duller.

The pain was unbearable
yet she silently endured it all,
she held the brush in her hand
and painted until the end.

You demanded me to rip a bandaid off an open wound while it was still bleeding. Blood soaked and dried, stuck to my body, staining my curtains, clothes, pillows. Not even being able to lay my head down without being reminded of blood spilt without a shield to save myself from the pestilence the world holds. Rotten, stiff air infecting us all slowly.

i am learning to love myself
like he never could
and darling
i can feel flowers
growing from my scars
reaching for the sunshine
of my new found smile

s.s

My death will be liberating.

And I do not say that in the sense
that I am going to find a cliff
and take a good jump off.

No.

I am just trying to find a
clever way to tell you

that I do not know what is going
to happen next.

You see,

there is a
fine line
between
dreaming and
mortality

and

I am finding out for myself
that being in love
does not always
involve

being awake.

And for my sake
I fall in love with daydreams,
nightmares,
hazy realities
and

the hung-over idea

of not being enough.

It is all out of my hands.
                 It is all out of time.

And the only thing I have left to do,
now,


is decide.

Two boys and a dog walk to the river
on the cusp of manhood,
each finishing the last half of a cigarette.
Schooling and lovers
and familial diagnoses left behind them
where they parked their car.
Above them,
the colorless and colorful expanse
of uncertain futures and Colorado sky.
The dog will die in six years
and what then?
How many years will they spend
walking away
and how many times will they return?
Dirt will collect beneath their heals
and there will be other dogs.
A child strapped to ones’s back
and another running along beside
with scraped knees
and an open heart.
The same brand of tobacco
burning between their fingers
and miles of river to be re-explored.