blessings/resentments
My body is a blessing
best seen in the sun
when shadows fall like lace
across limbs
best felt under light fingers
that tug a sock to rest
in the curve of my ankle
best understood
from a distance
A body is a blessing
to the man in the bar
the flashing of his hands, his teeth
on thighs, on necks
his hot breath worshipping
his bloodshot, heavy-lidded revering
shadows fall like cages
and a body
is not a blessing.
Sep 28, 2016
Sep 28, 2016 at 7:58 PM UTC
I read somewhere
that you could bite off your own pinky finger,
as easily as biting a baby carrot in half.
We think that we’re resilient,
miracles incarnate,
but we are just bones waiting to be crushed between each other’s teeth.
We are waiting to be
plucked peeled battered baked fried mashed
into something unrecognizable,
something that someone
will look at and say,
“that’s too beautiful to eat.”
Sep 28, 2016
Sep 28, 2016 at 7:56 PM UTC
she is the kind of girl
to stare up at the stars for too long
to let her feet
stray from their path
because her mind has sailed up
and away
into the galaxy
with
utter disregard
for gravity
the kind of girl to abandon her body
in order to expand her mind
to get a little lost
because she’s too busy
finding something new
the kind of girl to get lost anywhere
because the stars are not the only place
for the mind
to wander to
drawn to more than
celestial features
she is that kind of girl
Oct 21, 2014
Oct 21, 2014 at 3:33 PM UTC
As I walked out one evening,
Walking down Bristol Street,
The crowds upon the pavement
Were fields of harvest wheat.
And down by the brimming river
I heard a lover sing
Under an arch of the railway:
"Love has no ending.
"I'll love you, dear, I'll love you
Till China and Africa meet,
And the river jumps over the mountain
And the salmon sing in the street,
"I'll love you till the ocean
Is folded and hung up to dry
And the seven stars go squawking
Like geese about the sky.
"The years shall run like rabbits,
For in my arms I hold
The Flower of the Ages,
And the first love of the world."
But all the clocks in the city
Began to whirr and chime:
"O let not Time deceive you,
You cannot conquer Time.
"In the burrows of the Nightmare
Where Justice naked is,
Time watches from the shadow
And coughs when you would kiss.
"In headaches and in worry
Vaguely life leaks away,
And Time will have his fancy
To-morrow or to-day.
"Into many a green valley
Drifts the appalling snow;
Time breaks the threaded dances
And the diver's brilliant bow.
"O plunge your hands in water,
Plunge them in up to the wrist;
Stare, stare in the basin
And wonder what you've missed.
"The glacier knocks in the cupboard,
The desert sighs in the bed,
And the crack in the tea-cup opens
A lane to the land of the dead.
"Where the beggars raffle the banknotes
And the Giant is enchanting to Jack,
And the Lily-white Boy is a Roarer,
And Jill goes down on her back.
"O look, look in the mirror?
O look in your distress:
Life remains a blessing
Although you cannot bless.
"O stand, stand at the window
As the tears scald and start;
You shall love your crooked neighbour
With your crooked heart."
It was late, late in the evening,
The lovers they were gone;
The clocks had ceased their chiming,
And the deep river ran on.
Oct 20, 2014
Oct 20, 2014 at 3:38 AM UTC
I remember asking my dad,
“How many stars are in the sky,”
and he said something like,
“Way too many to count.”
But I’ve counted.
And after recounting
and recounting
and scribbling in my notebook
under my fathers flashlight
I can tell you that there is
indeed a number.
And to this day I prefer
reading the stars over anything.
They’re the oldest book ever written.
Space: the oldest canvas to be sewn
and the cosmos the paint of Picasso.
Each spec is its own character
each pair a set of eyes
where I can lose myself in their gaze.
A celestial connect the dots
where I collect the pictures
and pick out my favorite spots.
But when my son
is old enough to ask,
“How many stars are in the sky?”
I’ll just hand him a notebook
and tell him to read what he sees.
Jul 20, 2014
Jul 20, 2014 at 7:49 PM UTC
I wrote a poem
today
I traced curling letters
in invisible ink
tentatively
across his chest
a tattoo
only I can see
I watched the vowels fall
down
his
spine
only to pool
in the small of his back
I sent the consonants to snake along his arms
the prettiest of my words encircling his wrists
my lips trail behind
erasing as they go
I turned him into a book
that only I can read
Mar 19, 2014
Mar 19, 2014 at 11:05 PM UTC
Draw a map of the world.
Draw it straight onto the walls
of your bedroom
(or your cell, whichever you prefer)
into your favourite notebook
(so you always have it with you)
onto the palms of your hands
(so you never forget it's there)
Press a pushpin
into the capital cities.
The ones with names like
Most Beautiful View
Him
That Song
A Few Tears
and remember to translate their titles
to the local tongue.
Maybe
they'll read
You
Love
Feel
Him
or maybe not.
Trace the lines
of the coast on which
you faced your first ocean
or your second
or your twenty-ninth.
Doodle a hollow star
onto the hilltop where the two of you
made the same wish
on that strange streak of light burned into the sky.
Draw a map of your world.
Fill it with all of the beautiful things
that you have ever and never seen.
Jan 26, 2014
Jan 26, 2014 at 11:14 PM UTC
Us, just you and I.
This is our world.
But these aren’t tears.
Maybe they are, maybe they are our own.
But what does this matter? We have seen each other’s tears.
We’re washed, cleansed, and no longer you and I.
We are young.
We are free.
We are innocent.
We are happy. Happy.
Can you imagine?
Thunder rolls. But not thunder.
Music that used to be our sobs, washed clean by this rain that isn't rain at all.
We play, play like the children we never ceased to be.
We run, not racing like we usually do,
neither one of us wanting to win because to win means to leave the other behind.
We love each other, but we’re not in love.
How beautiful is that? How simple and perfect.
How sublime this thundering, rainy day can be.
It’s a wonder. Greater than the sun.
Sunlight doesn’t bring us together, darkness does.
We grow from the darkness.
We flourish in the sun.
But every so often, we retreat. Just to stay honest, you see?
Dec 5, 2013
Dec 5, 2013 at 2:14 AM UTC
loneliness preys
on those you would least expect
to fall prey
to loneliness.
he curls up
next to the people surrounded by people.
he sits down beside me
on the bus
the park bench
my kitchen table.
he murmurs soft reassurances
that are not at all
reassuring.
Don't Worry he says
No One Can Hurt You he says
As Long As You
Let No One In.
and
weak as I am
I listen.
guilt though
takes a different approach
I can feel him
when I'm alone.
At night,
face down on my pillows
he creeps.
soft fingers play piano
on my spine
the notes
reverberating through my ribcage
the metallic thud as they pound
my heart
You Did This
rings out
over and over
its rhythm
adhering itself
to the
unsteady
tattoo of my heart
until the guilt
is inseparable
from me.
Sep 9, 2013
Sep 9, 2013 at 11:58 PM UTC
The oppression of sadness
The absorption of madness
The stark contrast
of the black on white.
Few things are more defined
than the clear separation
the cutting edge of the "t"s
the loose curl of the "c"s
individually,
so clear
but page after page
the letterswordsstanzas
run together
to create a map
of the labyrinthine establishment
that just may be
my mind.
Sep 9, 2013
Sep 9, 2013 at 11:48 PM UTC