Rubies glistening
'neath light of the moon
as rabbits feast
and children sleep
'midst dreams
of a strawberry morning.

r ~ 6/13/14

i awake to the thundering of the sky,
flashes of light that shimmer in the sky,
and the sound of rain pouring down.

on rainy days it's hard to see and feel
that the sun shines above the skies,
behind the dreary darkness.
It's hard to remember that the rain feeds the earth
and helps things grow.

Most of my life I avoided the sadness that
I feel on stormy days, but today underneath
the sadness I can also feel a sense of excitement
for the storm to wash away the wreckage of my life
to help my heart's soil be renewed.

Peering through a wasp's wing
at shadows on the wall
Hear the whispered whimper
echo down the hall
Glass thump of bone and feathers
against the bedroom window
Motes of darkness floating
to air a moldy winnow
Creak of standing knees
rise in opioid haze
To wander past the shadows
and sniff of death's bouquets.

r ~ 6/11/14

One: Sleepy
When your spine takes cat-like curves into the recesses of blankets
And crickets and thunder and howling wind all sound like peace
And puzzle pieces fitting splendidly against each other
You’re sleepy when your eyelashes are weakly magnetized
And pull gently towards one another in soft but stuttered motions
When white noise and static fill your ears the way that water can sometimes fill a glass a little bit past the top without spilling
And you look forward to the lure of dreams or of dreamless nights
Because you know you’re sleepy when the only reason to be awake in the moment
Is so that you can appreciate the split second of falling
When you finally lose consciousness

Two: Bored
When you switch from counting ceiling tiles to counting the colors that you can find when you close your eyes with varying degrees of tension
And you’ve become so bored with distracting yourself that sleep seems like the only genuine option
Even if you’ve only just woken up
Even if you’re not feeling comforted by darkness and silence yet
Even if distractions are abundant
Because they just aren’t distracting enough
Sometimes boredom summons misery just to occupy your mind
And you’re bored when you remember you were supposed to be in bed an hour before
And you actually listen to yourself and go

Three: Drowsy
When you wish you had longer limbs just so you could properly drape them from the edges of your mattress and stretch at better angles
Suspecting that maybe the odd crooks in your bedframe are the crooks that have been thieving in bits of the night and stealing the ends of dreams and the beginnings of alarms
You’re drowsy when you can feel the burn of smoke sloping against the walls of your lungs
Even when you’ve been breathing clean air all day
And the dizzy spin of the room is more of a waltz that’s moving just a little bit slower than expected
Until you turn the music off

Four: Fed Up
When stress is snapping at your synapses and igniting fizzling fireworks at the back of your throat
But the forward corners of your eyes pull together to shut out the world
Because ignoring is a temporary retreat into forgetting
And permanence isn’t something you’re in the mood to believe in any way
You’re fed up with the world, and with existing
Or maybe just being awake
When you know there are better things that you could and should be doing
But shutting down is all you can manage right now

Five:  Faint
When the world appears not only blurry, but verging on translucent
And there’s a steady hum lacing the edges of reality
With sporadic jolts of memory forcing twitching sensations down your back
You’re feeling faint when you’re hopelessly holding onto consciousness
Because you’re a little bit afraid of falling
But you would never admit it
Because there are too many blank spaces in your vision to allow for any vagueness in your thoughts
But sometimes the body can’t keep up with the mind
And you collapse all the same

Six: Weary
When time seems to thicken and stick to your skin
Weighing down your movements like steel beads of sweat
And pressing palms to your eyes almost seems to drown out sound as well
You’re weary when the grass feels a few inches too long and the ground seems a few inches too close
And the ends of your limbs feel as though they have been reaching for something a little bit too far away
And you have only just given up
So you grab handfuls of the clothes you have on and pull them tighter against yourself
Forming an artificial blanket
And imitation slumber

Seven: Exhausted
When you can feel static buzzing through your veins
Stretching capillaries into threads to keep yourself sewn together
Knowing that consciousness could spill from the cracks in your skin all too easily if given the chance
And your eyelids hold together like the grand doors of a cathedral
Opening only with a struggle that everyone tries to make seem effortless
You’re exhausted when you’ve been writing this poem for days trying to find the words
To properly describe different degrees of fatigue
And you’re sure that you’ve probably recycled a metaphor or two but you don’t bother to double check
So you keep trudging along
Until nothing makes sense anymore
And the seams that encase your consciousness begin to strain
And snap

Eight: Hyperactive
When despite all reason dictating that you should be experiencing the drag of being awake for too long
You see clearly and think in double time
With energy flickering behind your irises
Foreshadowing the dread of sunrise
You’re hyperactive when you’re knitting your voice with your friends’ voices in a collage of laughs
Each indistinguishable from the last
And you start counting the stars with flashlights until
Like sugar and smiles
And fast cars on icy roads
You inevitably
Crash

Nine: Emotionally Drained
When you’re worn to the point that mental distress manifests itself physically
And you can feel the chains of your own thoughts around your wrists
Almost wishing they were tighter so there would at least be proof of their damage
You’re emotionally drained when you can scream without making any sound
And you've perfected the syncopated rhythm of a nervous twitch
You realize that you've been grinding your teeth for the last two hours
So you switch to biting your tongue
And you don’t rest
You don’t rest until there are tears mimicking a Jackson ******* on your pillowcase
You don’t rest until the clock is judging you for testing it
You don’t rest until you feel empty
You cannot rest when you feel empty
No matter how desperately you wish you could just fade
And drift away
You do not
Rest

Ten: Tired
Just…tired

It drips along my hairline
Dragging my eyelashes down.
The urge to open my eyes wanes
As the moonlight brightens.
I should stay up, stay vivid
As the constellations dance
Waltzing along the horizon,
As the last hint of rosy pink fades.
Listen to the birds sleep, their
Faint fluttering of feathers.
Let the sound of slumber calm me,
But not fool me into sleep.
The fatigue is so welcoming,
I shouldn't give in to its promise
Of sweet dreams like I'm still awake.
Just wait, watch them be lovelier than I thought
Watch me wake up and feel the instant disappointment
As the harsh sunlight permeates my eyelids,
Snapping at me to get up, carpe diem.
It's so much easier to stay standing
Never feel the empty oath sleep brings
And never know what better things there are
Without the dreams of impossible things

She looked at me with colorless eyes
And café-au-lait face.
Beads and thread spun into her hair,
Descending to her waist.
The scent of rosemary and answers drifted off her skin.

She fed me no lies, assessing the situation
With critical efficiency.
"I think I have something for that."
I waited in a red velvet, upholstered chair,
Twiddling my thumbs as she shuffled through the shelves
Lining the walls, crammed with books and trinkets and vials.

She selected one, careful not to drop it on the knitted rug
And handed it to me with a promise.
"Drink this. It will do what needs to be done."
I gave her thanks and payment,
And stepped out of her residence, happy.
As I returned home, the grape-juice colored potion
Was opened and sipped out of a wineglass.

And nothing changed.

I peered around the room.
Inhaled.
It still reminded me of him.
The walls were still his favorite color,
The fridge still held the pictures he took,
All I could see or smell or touch reminded me of
Him.

But he wasn't there.

He still wasn't, and he would never come back
Because I kicked him out in a fit of madness
And I never realized how much I would miss him
And some stupid potion will never get me to stop-
knock knock
Hello?

Lying here rewinding us
while you sleep
Reflecting on where we've been
and where we are
Pausing here and there
feeling for effect
I look at you and wonder
just how much more
I could  ever hope to have-
to hope to live-
that's more than this.

Fast-forward to last night
and there we were
loving like there'll be
no tomorrow
Loving away all of those angry  
yesterdays
Now it's 2 a.m. and my heart
is wide awake
hoping you'll dream us
back again
Rewind us back to where
our love began.

r ~ 6/8/14