I scuff my sneakers on the sidewalks glancing sideways
at commuters and their habits
stock-still from rusted bench to the same speckled train seat to the same stained coffee cup
settled gently on tired laps
same crosswords to turn the gears then – look! the tired frayed split ends & split
jeans of the “wild crowd” – 3 of them huddled in the corner,
the remains of the dawn’s crack
and boom of mics and plastic beer pushed hastily into
cups and glowsticks into
back pockets, the poetry of the worker clashing with the night rave.
We are awash in threadbare floors
that thousands of footsteps caught and dragged the morning out into the ever-
repetitive path
we crave this
it is so old and tired and we crave it
even our glowticks are
fading
changing from neon green and pink
to traffic cone orange
gray pigeoned collars
and scuffed sneakers
seamless changes of building to street speed by
drinking it in blindly, getting our
fix of the day
from stop to seat to the same stained coffee cup

As if I haven’t written enough about anxiety, but here
it is, reminding you.
I’ve been entirely too nervous for
most of my life. I overthink
ways I could ***** up way more
than succeed. I obsess over and over
my appearance; my body is too much in a
world of overwhelming plenty plenty, I want
to be empty empty. I find peace in
water, I can feel the flow of
waves, and calm within the movement. My
body itself never stops its movement, I’m
fidgeting and my heart tells me to
stressrespond:panic and now my
fingertips are red and tingly, they
press on every object with hesitation
asking again and again if they’re real real,
my brain removes me from reality
and even pressing a thing is too cold so
it catches and breaks my skin, I
feel suddenly freezing and guilty, I
want as much space as possible to be alone, I’m
repeating thoughts and
shrink into nothing nothing I say and agree
I am nothing nothing my breaths and my
heartbeat and my blood disagrees. And
the cycle repeats.

we have direct associations of
things long past and no
way to connect random
words. I wonder, then, why I always  think of peanut
butter when someone says winter
or I taste eggs when someone
mentions Christmas. I don't
even celebrate Christmas and
I taste caramel popcorn
and crisp wintermint and
what a cloud would taste
like. why is that? where do
our words go? others would taste fish when they hear
the word tooth
paste, or crave oranges when their feet first
hit pavement. if you're trying to fit the
words together, and see
why the bitter taste of chicory
is reminisced with coppery blood and
love, and you are sure your own word associations are
completely logical, one day you'll come across
the skeletons in closets, the snake slithering in the
greenest grass, things that mean
so little to you yet are bright points
of deep connection. you try to
fit the words together and
suddenly, you'll know. then.

So, I’m late, as usual.
He smells weird; a mixture
of sweat and cologne.
I ask softly if he wants to meet
my bunny and he turns away.
I am too quiet.
We go to a restaurant and
he asked what I’d like to order
I am too unsure.
I start playing with the sugar packets
build a house, a garden, a roof. It falls.
I am appalled at his lack of appreciation,
lack of poise, he is joking but not smiling
and I feel uncomfortable.
I am too lonely.
And that’s why I keep hoping the
next date will be better
Why don’t you date someone else,
he asks. Twice.
I am too confused.
I leave with a sigh of relief
I am too good
for him.

simple swing sunlight
glinting off tiny sparkling feet
the pure joy of wind and speed
rushed and slipping by through the hot summer
days. streams of shadows play and splash
around the busy feet, the small bodies
jump and swoop up and around the
flat cushion ground.

memories are made here, with mom
just an arm’s length away - and then -
woosh! soaring again, mouth with
six new teeth shouting in pure
moment and monuments of love and
fun cement themselves in this
flashbulb second:

imagine it with me, I’ve taken
you there: a girl in a pink
dress, the fluffs of her curls just
emerging from her soft head and wide
brown eyes, her smile suspended in
the air as she floats slowly forward

her mom, her source of love, arms
tan and strong that have held her and
kissed her tears away, outstreched
to meet the red plastic swing to push
again, to push again, and her daughter

enjoys this almost-flight. she never
wants it to end.

***** uncertain words escape my raccoon eyes,
I speak to you, my friend. Did you know
I saw a boy
who used to throw chalk at me in class
who used to be the quickest in soccer
who used to be best friends with your older brother
who used to have a home –
I saw him
broken down by hatred.
Today that little boy
who was Team Blue in Color War
Now smokes two packs a day
now his eye are
Times the danger,
Minus the mischief,
Add the stress. Add the red caked on his memory. Add the bonewhite weariness
that comes with duty.
today a county is wiped clean –
minus the purity, the holiness,
add the tension –
see it as it breaks its teeth on this boy.
See it jump and grab his ankles –
only his ***** gray fingernails are holding him back
until he discovers
how much addition his country needs.

Remember feeling safe?
Remember feeling, perhaps as a child,
carefree. You walk outside,
and keep walking. Green grass. Tall trees to
climb, clouds to imagine into
beings and shapes. Look
now, do you feel the same? Maybe
age has blunted me, but I see darkness
in shadows and I am aware now, always,
of a drink left alone at a bar, at going
to the bathroom alone,
at walking. Home.  
My heart is with you, people of Pittsburgh. I walk
with you, home, I walk with you,
as your steps are
ever more careful. Feeling
fear in your once well-known home.
I walk with you, I hold your hands. I know. I am there, too.
I am also afraid.
I hope you can retrace your steps, make shapes
with the clouds, feel strength within my
presence, and walk with
me. And keep walking.

When I say "I miss you"
it's not just an automatic response
like when people say
How are you I'mfine
or
It wasn't my fault
or
You have the right to remain silent!
These are just normal, day-to-day conversations
and I forget we need them sometimes
But
I do not have the right to remain silent
when after I write ten times how much I miss you,
and that I think about you every time I check the mail,
or make a peanutbutter sandwich,
and all you write is a lousy "Lol. K."
I do NOT have the right to remain silent
when how much I miss you is as big as the rain,
the rainbow, and the *** of gold at the end of it,
when how much I miss you hurts so much
that it makes me wonder what it feels like to not feel like this,
I will not remain silent when you just say,
'miss u 2'
because I miss you in that stalker-ish way
that the waiter misses serving you your morning coffee
because he thinks you're kinda cute
or the way that girl always finds a way to walk by you
even though you rejected her other other night
and she clearly isn't over you...
When I'm sick of how "I miss you"
doesn't make the universe
implode
and it's disappointing when you don't hear everyone in the world screaming "Yes" at
the same time
I want you to hear the silence
when you see me off at the airport, train station, wherever,
I want "I miss you" backwards to spell "Because, that's why"
instead of having a reason why I called you.
I want to not run out of things to say when I finally
call you
I want "I miss you" to mean
everything again, including, I love you, you're so awesome,
what does your new haircut look like, and unfortunately
our own lives are so messy
that distance no longer makes sense
But,
hey,
I guess our memories were worth it.

the day Erin died, I
was struck with the selfish horror of
impermanence. It was
unbelievable to
me that
an unjust world would hand me this
sorrow. I was wracked with the inability to act, save,
think or
do, and I was devoid of the confrontation of my
limits and weaknesses. I could not
save her.
Now it’s been two years and the
sorrow I’ve
held has
loosened like
a tight balloon, it’s draped across my
ribcage like
an ever-present reality.
I still maintain the
ambitious goal to
make a difference, my
knowledge is now awakened that
I am bound by
limits. I could not
save her yet I
am trying to save
myself, from my limitations
I grow into a
compassionate weight
of my own, the circle
of grief listening, widening
as others cry their own
heaviness. I hold
them like I would hold
an umbrella: carefully,
fully knowing the
rain is falling off the thin
nylon surface. We feel
the rain but
do not
let it soak
in.

I’ve had this long distance relationship for
a while, now
since sleep-
overs were a thing, literally, sleep – overs, when
I was just 8,
the flicker of my friend’s basement
TV taunting me to dare it to come
back, seeing
daylight hours I never
knew existed before,
and it intensified in
college, as you could
imagine, I’ve missed it
so much since it’s been gone
I know when I had it,
when it wasn’t hours away,
I let it
kiss my eyelashes
right before the moon rose
and hold me tighter than
any secret I’ve
kept (on purpose). without it now,
I’ve never
felt so abandoned-helpless.
In college,
especially in college, it
was a constant that
everyone in a relationship
couldn’t relate to, they’d go
out late at night, and I’d
go, too, missing it
missing sleep.
Sleep.
How I’ve missed you
Wished to
embrace you
every night that
everyone who didn’t bother
took for granted, greedily stuffing
themselves with it,
but insomnia
pushes sleep out
onto an ocean voyage to nowhere,
reminding me of my first sleepover, when
everyone but me lay silently on the floor,
while my exhaustion crept around the corners, drowning in the
moonlight,
and it’s like I can only hear
the ocean waves long enough
to taunt me back awake

new year isn't really
new it's a new cycle of all the
old in the world
old rotations of earth-sun-moon-stars-
old fruits to sprout & die at the breath of hope
old places trodden over by
new feet, worn by the curious who are conquering their fears.
old sounds permeate my senses & I wonder at a
time when they meant something
old year is a crouching beast, he is standing tip-toed in a liminal space between
new & new; old new and freshly
new, ink on parchment,
signs & names sealed and permanently set
the world cycles & returns.
people walk the earth & hold their hearts out for me to inspect
nothing is new here
just gone.

I’ve been having the dreams again. The ones
which have been
interpreted; not by a fortune-teller, or an old
witch, or a seer-mage, but a practical
woman with earnest eyes and an easy smile. My dreams involve
abandonment and loss. Sometimes even
death. I dream of helpless creatures starved to death, wasting
away of hunger and thirst. Perhaps
an old soul I share remembers
locking a helpless animal with trust in its
eyes in a dark cage, and I
am here to repent;
my dreams dwelling on this horrible secret of
a previous life. But recently, my
dreams have
changed. I find the critters, soft bellies, and helpless
eyes, and I wipe off the dust and gravel
caked into their fur. I nourish
them back to health. I’m overcoming
the helplessness of time passing and
I am able to hold it, like a wish. I’m waking up
to a reality
that is finally reflected in
my dreams.

my tears aren’t forced
they flow in that
dark tunnel that she
dreamed so long ago
she wasn’t ready
to take her first steps
I wasn’t ready to
take mine without her.
Little things bring her back
like empty bowls or the tower
of books she’s never going to read.
People have been calling this a
trauma, but they’ve forgotten the
loneliness of life’s journey. She dreamed
a tunnel and added bright lights
and dusted the floor with powdery snow
she traveled far yet I can
only see the trails of
milk puddling around the lost key that she
dropped under blankets
of memory and phrases of
I-promise and tomorrow. I’m growing up as
she falls down. She wasn’t
perfect but that’s why it
was so easy to love her.
My journey’s ongoing, and the
deep undercurrents of pain and
grief are pulling me through
that tunnel.
I’m rowing softly by,
quietly, quietly,
as she is laid to rest.
her memories swallow the emptiness
she is kneeling at the throne.
I follow slowly and leave my
tears for her to know that life’s
path isn’t paved in water but
with sorrow, with endings, and with lost
boats on turbid seas.

when my goals are thicker, my hopes
are fuller, I
know it's starting to go well again. I've
been at the bottom of
the well, but I've been dragged out and I'm
blinking in fear of the new sky, in
case it'll suddenly collapse. But I don't walk
stoop-shouldered because I have drawn a fragile
bubble of happiness around me, that I can bounce within it.
I compare to the times when I have seen
the lonely end of the universe, when
my goals were to slip out of bed and then
breathe the air, and now,
my bubble becomes a shield. I
am a warrior and a conqueror and I am
making great strides. To have seen
the well, to have been centered within it,
struggled to pull off the heavy rock
over my head, it is something of a wonder to now walk with my shield. My
hopes are a buoy to guide me. It's
going well again and my warrior
pose is standing strong.

four years and I still miss her. I wonder about
her so often. I read for her, yet I
do not breathe for her. I’ve
accepted that she’s gone. I
believe she’s in a
glorious place. I’m whispering
why and why
and why and sometimes
I’m okay without knowing. The only
certainty is how much I’ll never know. I’m afraid
of not doing enough.
It’s a crushing realization to
be so aware
of my own flaws. The more
loss I unfortunately
feel as
time falls
faster and faster. Her face is
fading within my memory. What did her
laugh sound like? Did I know her
enough? The worst
part is the emptiness.
This scene comes clearly to mind,
if you’ve read “Holes,” when Stanley was
at Camp Green Lake. (Camp Green Lake was
a desert). He attempts to drive, and much like my
dreams when I am driving heedlessly and I cannot stop, he speeds and
speeds a truck full of water in the dry desert. He drives
the truck into a hole. He runs. and each time he
takes a step, his feet bringing up puffs of dry dirt,
his canteen reminds him, banging against him, empty,
empty, empty. This is life. We’re
in the desert and each step reminds us.
empty. empty. empty.

gray. dust and plaster litter the floor scraped off
hastily from the name are
stickers, an open/closed sign. I  can’t
remember the name and the
sign hanging perhaps above the door is gone. The shop
looks strangely tiny now, even though its chairs and tables are gone. I wonder
the last click of the lock that the ownder heard
if it was a tragic goodbye of an empty memory, or a
relieved echo off somewhere that was
too cramped
or old, or the wiring sparked and caused
blackouts. Either way, I’m glad
that shop is closed. It contains the memory of an awful date and even more
awful tea. And now that it’s gone,
so is my memory. Almost.

I tried to strike this
sad, single, match, it was the one remaining in the box, and it
splintered and sputtered and I muttered and moved
to throw it away, but you said no; carefully placed it tenderly back in
the box, and this is how you treat every single thing, with
love and care, seeing its potential, you tenderly hold it and give it
worth and now, months later, I opened the matchbox and saw the single
match. I threw it away, I must tell you,
I don’t’ treat all things as precious and to me, it is just a match
but I thought of you in that fleeting moment,
as I opened a new box, and struck a new match –
you were there, glimmering in the light.

but I’m playing my favorite song for you I know
you can’t hear it cuz you’re
too far away I sink into
the beats and my arms are
solid blocks Moving hurts from
missing
you
it’s my turn to stay now, and gently flip
my heart over, a warm toasted
color like the burnt amber
taste aspen leaves get at the end of spring
missing you is the white hot color
of fire yet the bubbles
of yesterday pop
their ice on my eyes You’re chuckling softly
I’m the words and melodies of our simple
bytimes, when you were here, once
singing and burning and becoming

In memory of Sara Galit, my friend.

Things the dead miss
sleep, but so do I
good food, rich, creamy, *****,
a breeze
the glint of winter
the burst of speed and elation coursing through as you near the end of your lap
laughter
comfort
softness
love

Things the dead do not miss
Guilt. Guilt that keeps me up at night. Telling myself repeatedly,
failure. loser. worthless.
Mistakes. they are frozen. I constantly make new ones.
Loss. They have no concept of gone.
Taking breaths of burden.
Release, even that of pain.

Let’s say the human experience the yin
and the yang of beauty and
pain, is a blessing of growth.
miracles ever producing through
the new. even at rock bottom, you’re
still moving. I compare
myself to the dead. my past a culmination
of deed and choice. and I ask, if I were
in their place, would my life be worth it?
These are things the dead miss,
but I’d like a break, too. Even
from the sun. It’s burning through the
clarity of all my flaws.

this summer was like
lucid dreaming an exorcism,
watching the little skeleton rise and scream and shatter
I bit into a mouthful of summer, expecting
sugar, and buttery love, but instead got a mouthful of
blood and broken teeth and shattered souls

Time is a hungry beast
it devours and consumes
hours, minutes, seconds,
life but a small dry snack
it crushes and smacks its
jaws and smiles smugly
when it finishes its meal.
and when the wafer-thin life
promises terrible and boring
classes and summers and rainy days
Time crawls along slowly and lazily
hotter than fire to make one's eyes
sleepy and drooping and realize
that it will take forever to end
but time is never stagnant, no
matter how slow it crawls
time warps, destroys, spreads wrinkles and
empty promises.
making plans spreads chills
along its spine
puts it in order
but it fights its box
it yawns at the future
Time bites its tail
and encircles conception, growth
and even graves.
Touching everything,
Time's claws grasp
the tumultuous heavens
and sandy barren ground
it swallows oceans and
grinds bones to dust
but without it,
life would dissolve into
empty eternity.

I’m never sure. it’s sad. I know.
I want to be honest.
sometimes I’m too honest, honestly,
and in the wrong way. the worst way.
I want to be good. good at something
anything, really. I don’t know what.
maybe I’d be a good barista
or a good waitress. I don’t know.
sushi chef maybe? is that even
something that I’d want to do?
I hate when people say they do
“computers”. That’s not even DOING
something. That’s just a noun.
Can I say I do “books”??
Is your job too complicated to
explain to simple old me?
I need to work on being logical
with my heart. I need to start
believing in chances. I have a
poet’s eye, so why can’t I have
her ever-breaking heart? her
softasskin soul? her longing for
cold winters and sunbright lemonaid
her love of love?
I have a bitter feel of love. it’s
twisted into a harsh hatred. It’s
eaten by doubt. It doesn’t smile,
it blushes, it hides. I need to
re-coax love into existence.
so that when it opens up, it
recreates the boundaries
of safety that I so crave.
I want to be the fearless poet
that Frost examines in his woods
I want the flawed ***-ful poet
that Bukowski loves to paint
I want the darkest raven-breasted poet
that Poe tearfully wrote
or I want to be my own poet,
lost in thick dusty second-hand
bookstores, full of soggy stories
too heavy sometimes
to re-tell.