The stream
twists, slithers, binds
two banks to each other,
slinking ‘cross the dry gaunt gulley,
unpaired.

Under
the faded trees’
blinds, I sit on stone from
where riparian-paradise
explodes;
California’s stolen soil, air,
are logorrhea in
the toilets of
my ears.

I sit
stream-like, apart, meditative –
echoes of Kumeyaay
swirl inside
my head.

I am down
To my last stick,
But I am still not
Over the thoughts  of you...

Of your gentle voice,
Of your tender lips,
Of your warm embrace,
Of the tiny c r e a s e s you make on the bed sheet,
Of the fragrant musk,
Of the window dust you used to wipe off,
Of the unpaired slippers,
Of the now cobwebbed toothbrush,
Of the hair strands left on my towel,
Of the socks,
And of the smell of your mocassin.

There's just so much of you I am helpless about
Now that you're gone
As I blow this last packet of smoke
Into the darkness of this spirit room.

I weep.

The day we roared with infinite jest the
larder packed tight with provisions burst.
So much canned meats, tinned, pemmican
hardtack we had stored knowing our
journey north would be sufficiently trying
that sustenance would prove difficult.

The slog.  The slacking day when you rolled
off the sled, creviced.  Your voice booming blue
crystalline as we see, no escape.  Trapped and
the cans I hurl into the hole.

Hours I read to you lipped, curled into a
snail, a shell, a crocus of yellow
a dread of
finishing the story and saying to you there is
no
more.  So you cannot tell, when the pages have ended
I make up confabulate truth and fiction
embellish.  
Pretend the story line marches
forward decades and we are in the Amazon;
You’ve discovered
that the water
that seemed
guileless is crocodile filled.
They bite hard and
you can imagine.

All primary colors on the
floes, all glacial movement, slow to melt, fast to burn through
the colors of our arctic rainbow.
I had primed the lamp the last night, before that dawn, before
the ride in which you fell.  
The wick trimmed and each
consequential action of the day I placed
hanks of hair
neatly side by side into banks of snow.  
Under my cracked tongue is
a bump that rolls
mole like cyst.  

Partner of my travels to this cold realm, your self shelved.
Below:  Did you hear me whisper?  Asking why today
have I become.  
The whispered promise of holding
upright against the dark.  I thought.
It would be magnificent.  

Not even fanfare.  Or aurora borealis.  Or flight.
Yes dreams of flying.  
Yes dreams of ahah so it is after all.
I thought I would recognize the moment of unleashing.  
What makes the special now?
If I whisper Abandon I might hear you echo in the ice.  I might see your
boot, attached to.  A glove alone, unpaired.

The story they lived, the story they tell is one of each husky,
one by one, no longer.  Starvation and then there are none.
But we are in the Amazon, and it is a scorching hot day and there is
much to be explored until you fall into the river and get bit.

I take it all back.  
You laugh because I add flying monkeys which is
us pretending that we’ve explored
this terrain which looks like a bed
in a room and a chart.  
They cannot
stop your bleed, and so we begin again.

Think of the lonely hearts at the zoo
Kept captive for reasons they haven’t a clue
Souls kept unpaired on the ground
Not a mate for them could be found!

Should have thought of it when trapped from the forest
Or acquired them from another zoo
Showcased them those unwilling guests
Forgetting they need mates too!

Mightiest animal decides these creatures’ fate
Dictates how they should live and be grown
The right time to love and have a mate
Or spend life in their enclosures alone!

In the name of care you make their lives messy
Consign them to the doom of loneliness
You ruin their home invade their privacy
No wonder the zoo doesn’t have a happy face!

To touch base, I've mixed with bass,
treble; or tremble at the highest volume,
audiotapes left in the closet, those love
confessions in secret; titled into a mixtape,
Or was it a mistake to place myself in the
music I tried to write?

The lyrics are just me ranting away,
in the thinking of finding a way.
I feel a little blue today; in a jazz of a saxophone,
ordering snacks on my phone. It feels too easy to
rhyme. To play with my words. CD discs,
I was scratched by love; in the ignorance of bliss.

Sad playlists saved in good question,
earphones stuck in my ears while I'm still asleep.
Good reason for me to seem so restless,
bluetooth speaker; hoping to successfully connect.
Still pairing to an unpaired match I could bet.

But music is always emotion, just in beat,
catchy hooks, melodies, and shuffling your feet.
To get you off your feet, get you to think, and as
my dad would say, "your favourite songs gets your *** lit"

I can't function without my music.

The poetry of longing
is but the bright side of despair.
The expression of a yearning
for a love no longer there.
The embodiment of our parting
that cold dark Winter’s night,
brutal in its finality
beneath the stars unblinking light.
We turned there from each other
as two halves, now unpaired,
Each knowing in our hearts
the bitter tasting fare.

keep plodding
Keep plodding the great
unpaired line up
basking in the illumination that
streams
from those opposite
of them
some sick trick
of light
or dark
that sends those caught
in the crossfire on a wild goose
chase into the night
some version of this that works our
limitations
Breed
Stagnation daily

I feel like "orange",
Nobody rhymes with me,
I am bright and bold and delicious
And I am loved...

But I am alone.
I am unpaired.

It seems to me
just as it seems to be-
My Life will not entertain Harmony.
...not by choice...
I'm  oblivious to quarrels.
I'm  incompetent to debate.
Bound in Fate.
...my Unheard Voice...

Fated to be Alone.
Not Lonely.
Only Aware that I am the one and only One that will pick myself up, after Your Day in My Sun.

This Life of mine keeps struggling, I must once again lose,
Because I've  refused to accept,
this Life that I choose.
I Choose to be partnered, but I Am Not.
Again.Alas.
I'm  Abandoned as I.  Have abandoned this Love that you ******* Crushed.
I will stand where I Am, until I wander away...
...not finding the voice for what i must say.
I will regret not the partig.
...the Parting Out of my Life...
...like an old truckto be dismantled and sold as a salvage.
Lost.

I am unpaired in this Bond,
Bound in Fate

I have multitudes
spread throughout me asymmetrically
eyes of 3 shades
leveled as if portrayed vertically
sunshine captured in them deep
oceanic blue sky lit by lightnings cloudless open airy & free
lonely writer
wired to a chosen scheme
reinvented blissfully
Morning calm another day of resting under apple trees

troublesome ways awoken by no cost
transits rule the world - including all those created by me
scene of april
By the fortress nowhere lying near to a brand new land formed
-down my Ravine
where the meandering valley stops-
(and starts running later on)
Lonely writer in shallow love
eyes deep
trust in the transit

Although so frantic no place is vile to sit
rethink
or overthink...

Anyway - I have strong faith in my destiny
I obey
all the glitter wisdom and great glory
of it - and all its closest surroundings.

u ought to know
In times when the dull winter sun descends behind the skyline
and it darkens progressively
crazy fast as if sped up
I try to find a brighter light in those green eyes of yours
find calm amidst thunderclouds miniature thunderstorms
and inhale the magic orbiting you like a handmade universe so perfect
so quintessential
that I don’t mind being in love
with your eyes
your auburn hair
and extraterrestrial reputation.

But as I said:
I don’t mind being blue nor rosy
next to u
The reason for this staged adventure across galaxies is true
I love u
for the fun of it
I don’t need u
but keep u close to my shoulder as if I was orbiting u
As a planet - in your handmade universe - in your emerald eyes - in my sober mind.

I am the poet in big need and
captivated
by ur olive green vividly glistening eyes
which fit my fractured consistency unattached from everyone
ur hair gold like fallen leaves in fall
a celestial archer from Orion
areas of thinking I have for an armor
against unwanted corruption-
u have things i wanna gain
in the future
distant but plain

Evenings come
it darkens now
I see summer in your sweet eyes
I feel bliss empowerment magic midnight lit by fire
you create
Masterfully

And the things you do to me
make no sense
why I stay?
Simple answer:
you are the perfect bartender to align with to become something what’s larger
to move forward with u
or without u
doesn’t matter.

Epic story to be written past boring beginnings later
after everything has happened
nonchalant and happy after.
Lonely lover
favorite poet
writing with ur hands narrative
To acknowledge my true thoughts
roaming through my unpaired visually eyes
To remember that I love you
for forever
when u leave i’ll live in peace
somewhere in the deep of my
sweet overpoetic mind.

You are two things distinct,
  that exist yet unfurled

You as yourself,
  and as part of the world

Fundamentally the same,
  but functionally unpaired

Your story twice told
  —as you’re here and then there

(Villanova Pennsylvania: April, 2019)

everything is reconciled
memories, body, weight of stone on back, superfluous adjunct thoughts, miscellaneous socks still unpaired
all is looked at and then accepted

The clock radio predates my birth by at
Least five years
It must .
Looking like that.
On Sunday morning
The alarm is still set :
And goes off before the sun . Before time
Deserves to exist

Smothered in heaps of (hopefully )clean
Laundry on top of the bureau

The Sunday morning art program slurs
Words between the tangles of sweatpant
Legs
And
Unpaired socks

(Socks I am not responsible for)

/

My mother used to have an old radio in
The bathroom that must have been of a
Similar vintage.
It was a beach radio:black with a brown
Grill - thin red line across the white strip of
The station numbers,

Pushing around the little plastic wheels on the
Side,the red line never lined up quite right .

It hung from a long black drywall *****
From its
Squared off handle on the wallpaper behind the toilet

I think it may have belonged to my
Grandfather
We never took it to the beach,
I’m not sure what he did with it.

He may of just sat out with it on the back fire escape in August.
By the spindly dogwood tree that I remember my nana picking white blossoms from in spring.

The blossoms still come each year , I’m
Sure.
(I don’t know who lives there now)

My radio wakes me up on Sunday
Mornings .
My mother’s radio would play softly at night around the corner from my room.
Sometimes she would shut it off in the early hours of the morning -
When she went to bed.
Other times it would just play



///

Everything are paired
In this universe
Sometimes,
True hearts are unpaired
Like a orphanage...