I don't want to run
I don't want to shoot
I don't want to run from the police
I don't want to loot
I don't want a gangster's life
I don't want to have to look over my shoulder at night

Growing up in the big city
Born of a family in the dirt
Never much money to anybody
But it seems none of my cousins really learned
But I'm not like them, I'm not about that
I never was keen of violence
Always hated hate and loved love
Never got how they all missed this
Never understood how they could want that kind of life

Because I'd be a bum on the street
Begging for a penny or two
Before I was to go out and hurt someone who didn't deserve it
Or trick someone into thinking something false
I don't like to deceive, I hate it
But do many people think it's right
Crime doesn't pay, you can't win
There's nothing to a life of sin
At the end if the day you're left with shit
Your hearts turned to an empty black pit

Written as a wedding gift for two dear friends, Gregg and Lisa.

This is a love poem.

This is a clashing skylines over mountain tops love poem.

This is a desert wind kicking dust clouds off of the earthen floor like time love poem.

It's a phoenix rising from the ashes again and again, smoothing every rough edge to make them beautiful, burning faults like paper lanterns love poem.
It's giant monument cascading down in a rainstorm of embers as the lone giant tumbles to the earth in a offering of solidarity.

This is a love poem.

It's wind and water and trees bowing limbs in genuflect out of respect for the hearts combined.
It's wild and fierce, like great beasts and flashing storms that match the primal song of the passion of two souls aligning.
It's hanging by a single chord from the tallest of ancient brothers. It's laughter echoing off of canyon walls and echoed back like majesty.

This is a love poem.

This is an urban jungle alive with life and color love poem.
This is a chain link fence and beat pounding to vibrate two heart strings into a single rhythm, striking a beautiful chord love poem.
This poem is spinning lights and a body of hundreds. Legion, moving as one, rich with the scent of joy and effort.
It's late nights and early mornings, adorned in affection and whispers. It's music and dance and holding tight and holding on.

This is a love poem.
This is a timeless love moving at the speed of thought, pushing clocks to keep pace in futility love poem.
This is a hand touching skin, like ink touching paper to record the poems of your past, present, and future, to only be recited with a kiss love poem.
It's a forever has too few letters for how long this love has been destined and how long it will continue on love poem.

This poem is learning the other like morning prayer. It's tasting each goodnight kiss like Eucharist.
This poem is sound and fury and steadfast through every storm and letting the wind of your whirling dance fill the sails of the wooden ship you build together.

This poem is aging. Building monoliths of your past. Tearing them down and using the stones to build the cobbled path of your future. It's a new laugh. An innocent laugh. Fresh eyes glimpsing a future made from the hearts of two that will carry the love forward so that it can remain forever a wave giving back to the shore. Rich. Tidal. Steady.

This is a love poem.

This is a wrinkles and cracks forming like cuneiform. Making the sculpture more beautiful with time love poem. A lines spreading out across the cover of the book, wrinkled to resemble a road map of the winding path of the journey of two, circling one and other like a binary star. Bright and radiant.

It's a patina heart. Showing through with red and blue. Lines lit by fire that warms aching bones on even the coldest nights of our minds.

This is a love poem.
This is a celebration.

This is a gathering of witnesses who checked their wings at the door, that we may stand below and watch the dance above. Quaking parishioners glimpsing the face of God and beauty. Jaws agape eyes shining with tears like morning dew.

This is a love poem trying in vain to describe the beauty of soul mates finding their way back home. For sometimes home is not a destination, but a person.

This is a love poem.
This is a poem about love.

The twinkle in your eyes when I profess my love for you the feel of your curves cascading down your long body and the shape of your honey lips how could I forget the pleasure of ever loving you of ever knowing such a delicate flower? My sweet angel my diamond in the rough of life my warrior and my hero a comrade in this war of love my goddess of Atlantis Athena the great my loving queen how could I have ever been so mean! Love of a lifetime in this soulless world my never ending dream my true beauty queen live long, love forever, miss me never, stay true, be you.

You're my secret garden in my sleep
Planting kisses on my hands,
Digging into my memories
And your face is covered in a sun hat
So I am blind and you can see
If only love was, or love weren't;
If only I believed;
If you could let it be.

You and only you know who I am.
When you touch me with your muddy hands.

I am a piece of flesh, with a blossoming heart.
We lie in the forest beneath the starry dark.

Challenge my mind but do not get lost in arrogance.
Do not engage without caution, but love with patience.

Be mine so long as I can feel the spark in your touch.
Love me hard and deep, but not too much.

I lose myself and escape to your eyes.
I wander amongst the streets of your fears and lies.

But I do not run or flee or scramble away.
For those moments I am lost, yet unable to stray.

Allow your heart to be my home, and I will do the same too.
I will bury my body in your muddy hands, and I will leave them clean for you.

We are such opposites, you and I
Yet somehow we've woven ourselves into this web
You are a tsunami
Yet I am simply the ebb

Differences so evident, it's almost insulting
Your ink-stained arms push up against my bare, ivory chest
You are so clearly you
While I am only somewhat me, at best

So many places you've been
While I've been sitting here all the while
Circumstances should have told us both "No!"
But that word disappears completely as you smile

So much knowledge I've gained
While you don't bother with reading
You are always content with the simplest things
But I yearn immensely for things I'm not really needing

Your smoke-filled room meets my untouched lungs
Your devilish ways engulf my virgin essence
We can only meet briefly, and so rarely it feels
Your absence is like Christmas without presents

I snicker when you sigh, laugh when you cry
I'm through with rest, yet you sit as I stand
I lay myself down just as you rise
My ghostly form next to your harsh skin, perfectly tanned

Your breast was hollow once
Long before me and you, we, became us
But mine was overflowing with love
That the Heavens knew was meant for you, I undoubtedly trust

They, all of them out there, may not understand
Your roughness and ruggedness holding my soft and clean hands
But I do not care about their worries or remarks
Because we are separate people, but one in our hearts