When i was young, my skin was smooth and soft and un-ravaged.
Then, I grew up, and my top and bottom cheeks sagged, and my laughter
became a tangible memory around the corners of my eyes.
Now, when I smile, there are dimples and there are lines,
like the life-line and the love-line which are supposed to spell out my story
on the palm of my hand.
When I opened my eyes as a child, I saw brown water and blue skies and popsicles.
I saw floats on a lake and boats and friends splashing in from a water-trampoline,
yellow life jackets bobbing and children shouting.
Now, I still see blue skies, but sometimes there are white clouds and sometimes grey.  
I see my mother with her own memories of laughter around her eyes and I see the crevices
at the edges of my father’s mouth from smiling and frowning.
I smell flowers now, and little boys inform me they're fuschia, and when I breathe
at night my pillow smells like London and my room like lavender so I am home and
abroad at once.
Once, when I was sad, I would think mommy and daddy mommy and daddy.  
Now, when I am afraid, I think mommy mommy daddy I miss you.  
I sleep in a twin bed and I tickle myself and it is like I am in kindergarten but now
my fantasies are slicker and harsher but they still paint pictures of a school girl.
I lay in shivasna when I was young yet not old, and I saw a peach pit uncovered,
and it transcended back in time to a baby, just born in the world, and I realized
how it is we can die before our bodies do, how our minds can leave even though
we physically stay.

Perhaps if I lay him on his side
he will become something.

He will blink his plastic eyes and
stretch his padless paws out and upward.

If a knead his hide just right
the blind eyes will see
and the black string mouth
will turn red and wet.

A scratch on the belly
and his stuffing will turn to organs.
A kiss on the nose
and he will listen to his head
not my hands.

His floppy, fraying tail will wag
and his shaggy white hair will be fur.

But its 10 year old ears do not hear
and it’s worn out old tail does not shake.

Forever asleep,
for old toys never wake.

We all think success is where you go,
Or, perhaps, success is who you know.
Success is who you yearn to be?
No, success is the green stuff that,
(unfortunately), doesn't grow on trees.
Success is what you get when you
plug that magical formula in.
Success is maybe what you've done
and where you've been?
Success could be all of the above,
But I think
          Success
                      Is counted in who we love.

I found myself upon the water,
waves and breakers crashing.
My fear locked up inside the boat,
my desperate heartbeat catching.
The mounting waves and ceaseless sea
did fill my mind with fear.
But the sun broke through--
as the son will always do--
and in awe I cried:
My God! He is here!

This is what happens everyday:
I sit, not knowing what to do with myself.
Immobile in my grey chair, as storm clouds
swirl and rain splatters and thunder shatters
the silence. My nails keep curling out of my
fingertips while the hair sprouts from my head—
longer and longer like ropes being pulled from
the mass of a ship; golden; heavy and endless.
Trees swaying and rocking, so clear against
the white shimmer of unseeing eyes, as
the thousands of unborn spiders crawl within
the milky white swinging precariously across
the black abyss which stares out through my lashes.
A heart beat a million times.
My body is stiff, molded to the curve of my
forever-restless squat.

Sometimes I feel my heart is swollen with love.
Other times I feel it is chipper but narrow as a bird:
singing out praise while breathing so little air.

A long time ago, in this land, before people forgot my name.
I do not understand why they forgot, or what was forgotten.
It is only a thousand miles separating us
and the unity of space travels through the jolts of electric currents.
I am not alone—
neither are you, we are both buried deep inside ourselves
hidden behind the masks of personalities we have
taped over around our faces
two deep beings, burrowed beneath the thumping
jumbles of our thoughts, meditating in the core
and whispering quietly like wheat upon the land.