My body somehow knows
The grief tomorrow holds.
I ache and throb
But I cannot sob;
The urge to cry
Stings my eyes.
My feet drag heavily
In the depths of this valley.
Every year without fail
I remind myself I am too frail.
"You're strong without the numbers,"
Yet I was too weak to pull you from your slumber.
Each March 22nd
Feels just like the 1st end,
When your heart stopped beating
And mine started bleeding.
I'd skip this whole day
But I'd miss the chance to say:
I miss you, lovely little hurricane.
It's all I can do to keep sane.
The smell of mint
Hurts just a hint.
The skinny jeans and hair bows
I could never disown.
I wear your effect  
On my forearm *****.
The pain of loss is akin
To etching you into my skin.
My hands shake with cold,
Though not as cold as a headstone.
Oh, how my body knows
The grief tomorrow holds.

Every morning I jump through the brush.
A thicket of knots and thorns that’s on top of my head.
Every day I pick rose petals from my garden, and I place them on each apple of my face.
Every night I take off my camouflage, and glow with a fluorescent blue light that keeps the neighbors up at night.

I am an apple on the branch of a tree that branches through canopies and canopies of leaves and leaves to find an inch of light, to get out of the darkness. An apple that blooms off the twists and turns of sticks over sticks that grow and meet through out the years, I am an apple.

I am a wonder of the world, I am a miracle that pops through the wilderness.
I am nature.

About now she is having her first cup
in her java ritual of waking up
starting the day by feeding the birds
who swoop too eat and hear her words.

St. Francis is smiling up there
seeing her quiet presence and care
presence to what is real
in the moment and what it reveals.

The creator is in his or her creatures
in shape, contour and natural features.
I don’t need TV, *****, caffeine
or any other fix to intervene.

And it is good to have friends who are kind
who help the helpless and the blind
who feed birds and spirits of the down
not looking for applause or renown.

Knowing and loving and being there
for others, taking time to care.
Having friends like this - a treasure
impossible to repay or measure.

So when I’m tempted to medicate
in any fashion, let me meditate
or be present to friends or birds in flight,
let me abide in their darkness and their light.

Written 07/08/2018

He calls me perfect tonight
and I have not shown him
how much dried blood
stains soft hands, and maybe
he is blind to the ugly of me
or maybe, I should borrow his eyes
and see what is so beautiful.

I’d rather be lost in him.
Sometimes
despite all the thickle and thorn,
you will find a rose
with no *****
of the skin
when touched.

breathing the turquoise like lavender,
and sipping the blue summer.
bitter cold clouds glide and morph lava lather,
floating whispers cut by sweet pineapple sunshine.

soon, a moment, now
rhythms ripple the sky like skipping stones
we jump the music like puddles
splashing in the frequencies.

cobalt bass rumbles the earth hungry,
pumps the air with springing spirals
pushing and pulling the senses,
reverberating through cells.

heavy mud humming, stomping
echoes through our atoms dizzy;
balancing tuned body to innate electricity
the fizz of circulating lemonade energy.

we jump the music like puddles
splashing in the frequencies.

strawberry melodies spilling ribbons,
dolphin leaps of the spaces inbetween beats,
lines of colours overlapping,
colliding, mixing, merging, blending
in with the forest.

washing over souls the life fire sparkles
like a clear water cleansing harmonies,
sound waves crashing against inertia.
phosphorescent glow of re-charged love
for the world, for being, animation

flowing through burnt smoky ashes
of sapphire charcoal skies;
dimmed radiation of chlorophyll emerald days.
the smell of salt, dry bark, fluffy carbon mists,
trembling lights softening the eyes'
grip on outlines, loosening lies.

watching the cycles of patterns
tumbling colours through a mill rotating,
and the silence of listening
when the music comes to an end.

.
One day at a time
swings the pendulum;
only love awakens senses
too ephemeral to be restrained,
like the magic of a phonograph stylus
in a vintage vinyl groove
and the sensual touch
      of skin so new

It's not easy to watch
a flock flying away
      in the distance,
seeing the expanse beyond
reach of a wandering mind;

      heed distracted
      by the slow sway
of the treetops hypnotic careen

Doves dive on feathered canter,
      silent as the winged wind,
broke free from the gravity
      befallen the weight
            of the world
                                                
      Look­ing up wondering
            beyond the sky,
         the passing clouds
            crawl across
palliating the dusk hazed horizon

Synchronicity transcends across
an immeasurably deep river chasm,
      into a wordless abyss
      ensconced unthought
              between
        here and there

Silent silhouettes
            glide across
      the valley void below,
            wings to the sky

and, if you listen to a moment breathe,
            you can hear
                  the silent peace .............

you can feel the prevailing wind's direction
            blowing through your soul


             Jesse Stillwater
            December 2017