Our map seems stained
with the ink of Shakespeare's pen
dripping into our future,
Time plays with the plot
And we all must journey apart,
until we are together.

We wrestle time,
knocking out the days with patience
and mighty yawning.
Between us the fields of grass spread out
wider than fifty days on a calendar.

But at dusk, you are the star of my silver screen,
We unpack our minds like suitcases and
Move into the future together,
While apart.
Vanishing with a click,
Your goodnights soak the wind

In November
Time holds us apart,
Weary, but for the fullness of
December’s side-by-side mornings,
with toast crumbs and coffee breath
and kisses, anyway.

With hands full of promise,
you hold onto me and
we grow deeper and deeper
together despite a dreary
part of November.

Quick sweep of the steeple's steep
staircase winding
forever reminding
of a chasm in the maze and the mess;
A House of Mirrors.
A ***** trail, left to confess.

Three hail marys and a change of tack;
A quick sin shower
gets the devil off the back.
Perpetually pious of the priest
to keep the gun beneath the sheets.
Christ is hanging on the walls
a quick look up
the burden falls.

Shattered into tiny pieces
peace re-pieced upon the altar,
by Holy ghost and ****** Mary
Be this not the day he falter.

There was a Mortician I used to know
With a chin of whiskers and sallow teeth
He didn’t comb his graying tresses
“Moonlight commence your drip” muttered he
But his hair grew stringier and his ligature looser
A man ever dingy with mourning

Shrouded with death was his visage
A man of fifty, shriveled like a rose
If you spend lifetimes watching milk curdle
And leaves stiffen
Traces of mortality will wrinkle you the same

Acrid appealed to the Undertaker’s senses
Drank black coffee to match his hue
Used to cloud lucid skies, he’d wipe out the blue

None spoke to him but the drawing room mirror
Listen he didn’t to its clamor of tongues  
For a reflection’s to blame for receding flesh

Thirty years conducting funerals
Built a morose man
Quietly he wept
Though a furrowed rose cannot
Thus his quietus was born

If you are uncomfortable when you look in the mirror,
keep in mind:
We spent thousands of years
trying to convince the earth
she was flat.

We wrote her maps as evidence of the things we saw;
and she believed them.
She cried tsunamis, and had earthquake breakdowns.

Keep in mind: the Sun never gave up hope.
The earth will keep spinning and breathing
the star-dusty space void of encouragement.

Next time you look in the mirror
and second-guess your potential divinity,
remember you will keep shining and living.

Because the Sun is out there
believing in you,
compensating for lack of the human capacity
to treat each other empathically.

You don’t need proof or approval
to be exactly what you are;
Eventually everyone will see
your infinite beauty.

The puppet strings
That light
Your banana yellow
Face strikes
A hollow pang.

Your roommate
Speaks with the gloomy
Eloquence
Of a Greek tragedy,
Or an American vision
Of a corrupted Greek tragedy,
Or maybe a lonely English
Counterpart well you get the
Point—

Two lovers
Wrought in silk and wool
Sweaters
Forever unaware
Of the fact that no matter
How devoted
They are to each other’s
Well-being,

Their eyebrows will forever
Never touch.

At this point I know it's over
They've told us where the plane is heading
I've always thought I'd know what to think if something like this happened
But I'm lost here
I'm not thinking about my beautiful wife
Or my daughter
My parents who will outlive me
Or my friends who are off living their lives

I keep thinking about the mailman
No really I do
How he'll have to go around tomorrow
Passing this tale of tragedy
Gracing my family with statistics
Thousands dead thousands hurt
I feel bad for that mailman
For he will never truly understand the pain he will bring

This mailman does not know my name
He does not know my wife, my daughter,
The man next to me,
My first grade teacher, my first girlfriend
He does not know my dog
He does not know my true dreams or my hopes
My ambitions, my musings, my innermost thoughts
No this mailman only knows he is passing out the paper

Delivering news to millions who do not want it