A beginning is simple, or say it's been said.
I differ in thinking, my heart one of dread.
That first step is cosmic, in breadth and in weight.
It harries both shoulders, Atlas made lame.

To face fear and fight folly, to bear shame and know loss.
Failure without trying seems the easier lot.
To drown without burning, wings shapen wax;
this, my instincts gather - thus, my spoke snaps.

For allowed or barred, followed or infamed,
immortalized, idolized, beloved or lame;
Man is Man, too mortal by half;
ad astra, I think - perfection, I gasp.

A goal, I breathe; a sin, most certain.
A thing I need, marrow and bourbon;
for the soul and mind, for my body and heart.
It stops and pushes, my dread, my art.

upon reflection, the universe is a suicidal *******
wrought
torn, painfully borne
a sea of flame named Love.

Loving the idealized version of another person.
What a terrible disservice to yourself and them.

We are not gods, we fleshly humans,
Ichorous and unfailing-

-our blood runs thin:
Hands on a clock.
See them-
-their truth,

and love.

It starts with a look-

Temptation teasing the tongue,
Sly grins soaring on sordid winds.

-and it ends with a sigh,

Empty wallets and too much powder;
Regret giving way to cowardice.

The world moves on.

These illusions we have built;
castles in the sky where riches gild our every motion - they are so:
Falsities. Lies that comfort and steal;
binding chains by which we are made slaves of another's will.

Collectively,
obsessively,
let us melt them down and build for ourselves a tower;
an edifice of resplendent brick mortared by truth and conviction,
etched by the implacable-
-love
(and)
-derision
sat within our *******; a furnace for smelting.

I am the wound - bitterness given a tongue and ten fingers.
Each bone made for breaking - I am bloodless regret.
Sour breath like scorched sunshine - I have never known the gentle touch;
bruises litter my tapestry.

I am-
-the boy three streets down.
-the sister upstairs.
-the father in his dreams, the mother's living nightmare.

The bone cracks; it's a chicken wing-
-a wishbone. A girl whispers beneath her breath:
"Let me find love."

She dies of cancer, fourteen months later.
Sammy was seven.
Her parents still love her.

You are not deserving of the hatred you hold;
this self-inflicted thing of barbarous intent.

Not because of some inherent goodness,
and never for what you were.
Such notions are silly. Instead,
you are, each day-
-and every hour hence,
stochastic potential:
whatever that may be.

Feel despite oppression;
Aim high, and hold God's gaze.
Treat kindness as your course,
Home like warmest maize.
Endure the call of justice,
Run far for such a sake.

I do swear this vow:

Loath all that loathes love's sake:
Odes bitter and false,
Valiance burnt, a lie like hate.
Earned comfort is your joy,

Yarn sewn from woolen craze.
Our hearts are twice apart,
Umbral moons a sunlit blaze.

Thus:

The night is quiet, unmarred by your brilliance.
You are no more than a phantom,
Haunting.

I should be thankful,
But I refuse as much.
You were a supernova of salience-

-and I am still blind.

Her name is Grace - I never did find out the last.
She stands a little over six foot - has skin like teak and a smile that laughs.
I said, "I think I'm falling in love with you," on the seventh date.
She smiled. Punched my arm, too.
Whispered, "Don't go hitting the ground, lover boy."

We hadn't even started to soar.

When snow fell, it caught in her hair like a sea of crystal, stars soaking night.
I loved the scent each strand carried, floral oils a bright nasal bite.
She thinks the world of honey and judo, and names her sister the best.
Last Monday, she stole my phone charger.
Now we can't reconnect.

All that said - and a whole lot more left private - I wish her the best.

I wish her the kindest.

Romance is no thing of flame or wax;
it is the spark and starter,
and sometimes falls splat.

You need for fuel for endurance,
patience for warmth;
understanding of limits, and humour for more.

There is worth in choice, in holding firm,
in bending to whims,
in affection deserved.

By grace of Man,
by imagined God,
love is this and more unsought.

Beyond Love, there is nothing.
So, let us look at that which lies before.

There is a skier on the Rockies.
She is fraught with fear and worry.
Her muscles are fatigued. Below her feet, the oxygen of a stranger runs low.

She is trying.

Sweltering summer heat beats down one billion souls.
Of them, in a small corner of Churu, a man of little faith sits beside a dog.
She is wild and angry. Thirst grates her tongue.

He is giving.

Chicago is alive with nightly clamour.
Friends crawl between bars, *** and slumber on their minds.
The alleyways are familiar. The screaming is not.

They are fighting.

Speak to me of hatred, and all the evils committed in the name of 'love'.
Profess to me your ignorance.
I will gift unto thee a thousand stories as above.

All of them beautiful.

For we are more than diatribe and division or tribalistic cannibalism:
we are firelight intentions, freedom's way and righteous truth:
we are as ever:

All too human.

Forever
for never
always, last May
she'd felt the air was acidic
scorching past bruised lips to fuel the wrong kind of engine
that water was a balm just out of reach, forbidden.

Today, with her boot turned to lead, Jessie raced alongside relief
a king's ransom in her contacts
she a queen-to-be.​

-spoke:
"You are king. That means something."

"Does it?" I asked aloud, wondering if:
"It must," my sister asserted. I-
-disagreed with a flattering hum,
rejoining, "So you say-"
-for:
"So I do. So did Mother and Father. So did your children."
"So did your wife and citizens, too."

I knew, "I know," and she laughed bellsome tears,
sounding of rain and lilies o'er my favourite bridge.
They splattered the Eos, overlooking our city, run red by the dawn.

"Hah!"

My sister's favourite was Nyx, a shadowed thing-
-brick and mortar, and rarely touched;
it sat far below, and stretched half as much;
a bridge of ill repute.

"Do you think it true?"
"Your honesty is real?"
"Always and forever," my sister replied,
half in and out my ear.

I let loose a lax breath, streaks ran down my face,
dawning red, featherlight lace.

Nyx was known for dying, darkened by the river,
furiously cleansing itself,
flooding tearful currents towards our city dear.
Dead bodies were common sights from those swept off its thick;
our people, dead bodies, gone like morning mist.

'How terribly morose on such a blessed day.'

I thought of other things, roughly hewn.
I sighed, and my sister sighed too.
Together we looked upon our city,
feeling old, far from youth.

I loved our people, like I did my bridge.
The world went quiet, the world went dim…

"If king I must be, then rule I shall," and my sister-
-ever clever
said:
"Very well,"
"What is your first-"
"Edict?" I asked, and wonder oh wonder,
for I spoke first and fast,
she was rent speechless, wordless phantom of the…

"Hah," I laughed,
"My sister is dead!"

Like Mother and Father, my wife,
and them:
My children many.

Down I looked, upon my ruin.

Further down sat Nyx, and below my feet Eos,
Both of them strong, unlike I,
king of a broken people,
leaping without fear.
Red and splattered bone,
I-

Slay the dragon;
The unkindness of the heart,
That whispers in the late of night
Of all your dreams gone dark.

Your broken breath, half a sob - regret coiled, skin fevered.

Swallow
               it
                  down,
or don't

think on it:
Shame.

A most beautiful gift-
-to rise above.
-to rally against.
-to learn from.

There is comfort to be found in our dearth of unique experiences.

This broken heart has been reforged by softer souls.
This lesson has been learned by crueler minds.
This victory has been shared by worthier hands.
This shame has been loved by greater kinds.

It has been done before.
It can be done again.

We will not die.

This-
-a subject in need of dire discussion:

It has been argued the People are ever the aggressor;
unwieldy, illogical children.

Rioting without cause;
martyrs to treason.

A lie-
-the Lie.

Police brutality, senatorial banality,
the sting of verbalized hatred?

These too are political;
a violence driven by reigning powers:

Microcostic displays of decay,
condoned and arrayed:

Neat lines, neat numbers;
statistics, not People.

In the end, faced with such imposition-
-that a fist is made:

The cornered rat bites;
fights to survive, no matter the cost.

Aye,
cruelty.

I am,
Or so I thought,
Until you walked and talked,
Bearing an old hat that smelled of forest pine.
All the nasty things I thought,
From then on,
I was.

Do not believe yourself in love,
Know it. Remember the taste of such truth,
Wet against your tongue, sweetest fire through your veins,
Breathing whispered passions.
Hands grasping hips, teeth grazing skin;
The consumption of another soul, body and mind:

Let it envelop you, but-
-please, be kind about your recollections;

Public ****** is illegal.

the curtains have closed, a red ragged rose
no blue shall blossom 'neath tripartite cloves
yet:
breathe defiance, you lovers fine
drink of lions, gold become wine

courage your teeth, spite your bright bite
I say to thee: "Fight loathsome blights."
say no to the ills, to the negative thrills
become a dragon, a summit beyond hills
embody the action, the will to do
become better than good, a much better you

spark hope in your heart, spark humour in theirs
coax warmth from the coals of the once debonair
and throughout it all, never doubt what can be
a world evergreen, a finally clean sea

defeat is not death, for love lives beyond
in the eyes of the mother, the sister, the sun.

You'll never be white enough.
You'll never be right enough.

You'll never know the route they're taking.

Because your mother was Irish.
Because your father was mixed.

Because your grandma was Polish, to them so much ****.

This world is too kind.
This world is too cold.

This world is tinder, burnt before old.

We'll breathe poison together.
We'll breathe lies till we're cured.

We'll breathe drink like oxygen, dumber for sure.

The flowers are dead, cursed rotten in bed.
The flowers are plastic, and taste of ill lead.

The flowers are children, petals wrought poor.

This flower is tired, far from du jour.

I: your kin: the sinew sin.

My breath,
                          this spark,
your life,  
                          my flame,
ennobled strife,
                          divine ordained.

I love the rain.
Each drop is a promise made and kept,
Whispered into the air for all to hear:

F
  A
L
   L

I could rhyme each word, every one absurd,
Licking and kicking and assiduously drinking myself down
nonsensically.

But that is not I, who loves the dis-
-jointed feeling of reading people;
those broken souls,
poetic blows,
heralds of laughter and pain.

The dark is not afraid of light-
-how could it be, of the brilliant bright?
That simmering softness and lilting sun,
Which brims with fun, and fulsome love.

Revolution and sleep, the dark welcomes both,
The light is its break,
Its innermost hope.

We are as Athens and Athena,
mortal and divine,
entwined/inspiration:
libations made for love's drugged mind.

Let freedom ring from the highest mountaintops,
but first know:
You are a slave to the machine, stuck:

Consent was never given.
Capitalism conquered our vision
of right,
of wrong,
of things well beyond,
and all the air we breathe.

It shapes our thoughts,
acceptance the lot
given to US, you and me.

The children that mine,
the beggars that crawl,
the infants that starve,
a price for us all.

In this we are bound,
from this we might flee,
otherwise fight
with fury and glee.

Fires we'll set,
smoke we'll inhale,
chains will sunder,
freedom exhaled.

Or perhaps it best,
that we stay slaves of rest
ignorantly sipping our tea.

I do not yet know your name,
though I imagine it pretty or plain:
Elizabeth or Ruth, Amara or Yue,
Claire or Bethany who lives by the zoo.

You'll be seven foot tall, and four foot three,
Stand with bowed legs, and sing in your sleep.
You'll know mathematics, like seven times one;
Add us together, and make for the sun.

Less would be shameful, this we'll both know;
So we'll zip from the ground, fired from bows.
The stars our audience, we'll burn to a crisp,
We, a miracle, sealed with a kiss.

Love like wine
red against your tongue
bitter/sweet, intoxicating
and
less godly than you might have hoped for.

For why would I be aught but myself?

Dost the eagle swim?
Dost the whale totter?

Forsooth, I am Man.
Forsooth, I am-

-bickering teeth and a tongue too glib.
-fond, warm eyes, ready to jig.
-gentle songs on a summer's day.
-a hearty breakup just before May.
-the roar of ice, crackled by heat.
-a fiery shout, far from replete.
-passion stopped by unsought sound.
-my own demise, far from profound.

Indeed I am, all this and more,
I swear to me, I swear quite sure.

Ability becomes superb, becomes aplomb,
becomes metaphysical bombs dropped,
public consciousness shot;
the crowd shakes and writhes,
the crowd beats ten thousand drums,
echoing, echoing,
"The Greatest of All Time!"

Their god is flesh, is bone,
is stone becoming a wheel,
becoming a tower: royal-
-tied, educating the masses on excellence;
lacks references,
tiger dropped in the Arctic,
king of the jungle.

Does she not dance?
Does he not skip?
Do we not each,
run, laugh, and sip,

Of the deepest drum,
of the foreign choir,
of the winter breeze,
of the Chinese lyre?

We lords of dance,
we merry gods,
we royal queens,
kings and odds.

To us I raise,
to thee I sing.
For thus I praise,
for this I bring,

Facts of life:
unchartered course;
this music many,
this music Norse.

Replete, yet not.
Unbound and sought.
A reason known.
A rhythm hot.

Beneath burdened skies,
over boiled earth,
breathing of toxic mystique;
we or I,
all the same die-
-the world won't end, regardless.

Information suppression and oppression go hand in hand,
The tools of tyrants and bullies the world over.

They've no care for your triumphs, your ennui, or your rage-
Die and weep, laugh and smile, we're all the same;
just another cog in Their machine of conflict and capitalism.
-there are always more children.

A vicious cycle repeated throughout history:
"We the People!" given life anew.

The answer is obvious; the right and wrong plain:
Black Lives Matter, among other equally clear issues.
Yet, people have chosen a side bereft of love;
a misaligned mob, uninformed and angry.

It's a migraine - a growing pain and self-surgery more so, this division
where sons and daughters and those undefined rail against 'tradition'.

Mayhaps that's the due,
The price of our condition...
Or so I might have said, once upon a time.
I've since learned to live, and better learned to rhyme.

The fight is continuous, and the price always paid.
I'd rather it us, a generation razed.

Let us be as Zeus.
Not as he became, but as he was-

-a hero,
To his brothers and sisters.

-an end,
To tyranny.