There is no such thing as
Bringing a relationship
Back from the dead
Attempts at resuscitation
Will only result
In more frustration
Holding on
Hoping for change
According to Einstein
Makes you deranged
And he was pretty smart

Dear sir
Yippie!!!  
We write to inform
You are a member of
The most exclusive club
Membership of a few
Only you
Can be
In this imaginary
Club with me
Myself, and I
We three and you
In this club of almost two
Until, the day
Yourself shows up
I hope he’s on his way

I tell my truth to deaf ears
And this I knowingly do
Often
It’s true
Dear ears and deaf ears
Both need to hear
Truth
It’s always of some use
Truth is still truth
Even if it’s mute

You want to focus on minutiae
Who said what
And in what way
Each word picked apart
And thrown
In the middle
Overblown
You want to continue down this road
Bickering all the way
Sorry buddy, It's not my thing
Imma leave, and you can stay

Peace is the greatest commodity
A soul can have
Individually
Or globally
And if it’s done properly
It is also free

It is my job to like myself
I am not gonna sell out
And be the typa person
I cannot like.
Things that are only my own business
But this is only how I feel about me
Whether you like you
Is your business, too

I see you dangling there
At the end of your rope
Holding on for easier times
Holding on for hope
They will come
As they tend to do
I wish I could make it easy for you
But if you put the work in

I promise it's worth it

All the things you never said
Sit inside my head
Unspoken almost token
Of what should have been
Yet never was
Could it be the voices
In my head
Are broken?
Or is it the voice you speak with
That is choking?
Maybe both of us are the cause
Ain’t either one of us lacking flaws
But everyone with common sense and eyes to see
Can ascertain quite easily
The problem surely rests in me
With eyes that think they can hear,
And ears that think they can see

It will be the easy way
Or the hard way
So simple
Yet so complicated

I am at a magic “show”
Predictable and boring
With the audience somehow transfixed
I cannot leave
I becomes a we
Stuck in the magic show
So many still believe

Rock me Amadeus
Is now on our playlist
That is your song
Today
This is me
Running a tab

Blame doesn’t have to be claimed or assigned
It lies in every adult
You or me
Blame is there
Surely for this or for that
Some carry more
Or less  
Some pretend they carry none
Some really believe it
But no body
Is blameless

Is it fear
Of the fuzzy person
Trying to make herself clear?
Or perhaps disdain
Of the persistent poet
Putting worms in your brain
Or maybe complete disinterest
Like a forced exercise
When you want to rest
Or maybe it’s really funny to you
Watching some dummy play the fool
Because you are just that cool
To reach on in to your woman pool
And draw out something better
Than anything I could do
Are you waiting for me to disappear
Or somehow be more clear
I couldn’t have tried any harder
I’ve got only words
With which I can barter
But what good will it do
To speak lovingly to you
Through the internet
Far and near
When I’m trying to talk
To deaf ears

Thank you for piquing my interest
And thank you for tingling my toes
It really made me bloom
My heart getting almost too big for this room
And even though it didn’t last
It’s a bright point of my past
Got me spinning like a the perfect ride
In the tilt a whirl
In an otherwise boring slump
But as much as you get my heart racing
I cannot be a chump

I am the old lady
Stumbling down a dark, hard path
Telling myself there’s sunlight
And I’m frolicking in the grass
Gassed up grassed up
Ready to go
Fast or slow
Waiting to know
Which direction to go

He wants us to believe
He lost his poetry
When that cannot be
He has it so naturally

I want to shake your spirit
I want to rattle your demons
I want to get you caught out in the rain
I want to pinch your scars
So you can feel how numb they are
I want to bring your growing pains
And massage them out again
I want to be the storm before the calm
I want to set off every alarm
I want to make you want to run away
I want to be what makes you choose to stay
I want you anyway
Any **** way

I want to entice you
Into complicit
When we fit it
Where it should be
As seen from afar by me

This is my gift
Suckle on my supple lines
Make my hair stand on end
Get my goosebumps
All a rile
On my form
Let me dine on your attention
While it’s warm
It is my gift to you
But I get something from it too

You’re supposed to be cooler than this
Either turn it on
Or dismiss
It doesn’t have to end in a kiss
But it should be more, or less,  than this

((I say these things in vain
I’ll surely be back here
Begging again)

If God really liked humans best
We would be able to fly
Yeah, we’ve got these incredible brains
But God clearly loves birds more than you or I

You gonna have to
Maybe
Come right out and say
Some day
When you feel a foundation laid
Almost sorta
Depending upon how much attention you paid
And how much you are afraid
I know you ain’t worried about getting played
The risky bet wants to know
Which way you gonna go?

Better than who she was willing to see
She might have been you
She might have been me

Swag
That thing
That THING
Not necessarily seen
By anyone but me
But that’s unlikely
I ain’t the first with the eyes to see
The swag you bringing
So beautifully
Your authentic self
So **** swaggy
To me

So many things without which
Would be a big deal
Assumed
Reliably
What could anyone hope for
More than necessity?

I would pray for you
But God has better things to do
I’m gonna have to pull this one off myself
But what else is new?
Thus far
Not me and you
My dream come true
If I add an “amen”
At the end
Will this “prayer” do?
Amen
Then
Praying might work
And I’ll try anything

My neighbor is growing ***
Right in the back yard
She goes to work all day
The sun baking those little trees
I’ve been dutifully watering them
I’m sure hoping she sees
Maybe she’ll be inspired
To share some of it with me

Some kinda something is there
Between us otherwise strangers
Small interactions
Now and then
Mysterious energy
I can’t explain
Between you and me
Over airwaves
Almost anonymously
But some way
Somehow
It means something to me

It is a win
When I ignore them
You know the type
The reaction they seek
Will be how they perceive it to be
They declare themselves a win
No matter how it really goes down
There’s really more consequence
Than reward
In trying to trip up a clown
The act gets old quick
And can somebody bring
A trapeze artist around?

I must remind myself
Lack of resistance
Is not encouragement
In fact
Lack of encouragement
Is resistance

She leaves a part of who she is
Everywhere she goes
Her true face she shows
To everyone she knows

Her apologies are really thinly veiled guilt trips
Aimed at you
How can someone say sorry
While still blaming you?
Denying the truth
That’s what you do
You call it
“Keeping the peace”

I want to smack the back of your head
To knock into it some sense that’s common
But you’ve got yourself in so deep
Common sense is something you no longer keep

What can I say?
You grew on me
Like moss
I suppose
******* off
The tree

I cannot imagine a ten year old American
Today
Excited to watch a 1970s episode of
“The Price is Right”
But the average American
From 7 to old age
Found that show riveting in the 1970s
It’s only fault was it priced average items
Way too high
People had to guess the price of a jar of
Peanut butter (or whatever)
And the “manufacturer suggested retail”
Was always way higher than what it
Actually cost at the store
It’d be a trip to watch those shows now
And see how cheap things used to be
In the seventies
Even when they were pricing it as high
As they could

Am I taking pieces of you
For my own use
When I write you in my poetry?
And if I do
Do I at least
Leave a piece of me?
I feel like the lucky one
To have such a spectacular muse
But I ain’t no slouch
When  it comes to poetry
You got lucky
To be the muse
Of a pretty good poet
Like me
The spectacular muse
With the pretty good poet
There’s no telling what that could be
But it will be written
And thus
A part of our history

She takes it on the chin
When he brings it in
More and more these days
He blames her
For his old ways
And still
She remains
The victim(s) often take the blame

A history of subjugation
Via impossible circumstance
Is not a negative
It is pride
To have survived intolerable
Circumstances
Brought about
Against your control
Having slaves for ancestors
Only means
You had some badass ancestors
Who thrived in intolerable
Conditions
Pride.

Is it easy to ignore
Or do you almost
Forget
It’s something you don’t want to know
Yet?
Or maybe never
Whatever, whether
I couldn’t have tried any better
Though it was unsuccessful
It was my pleasure

Each poem
Stands on it’s own
For what it’s worth
Beginning to end
It remains
What it’s worth
Changing
Perhaps
Through time
Some tarnish
Others shine

Your reaction to fear is silence
And you’re almost always so
And when you ever do speak
You make sure to say lots of nothing
Though
You want to pretend you’re cool
And for us to believe you’re strong
And lots may be fooled forever
I stayed that way for too long
But now that I’ve seen through the charade
I pass by the fool who is too **** afraid
But that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t stop in to get laid

It is a mission
Just to get there
Acknowledgment

There is no pill
For
Draining will
After using every bit of skill
Still
Uphill
To some distant peak
I may or may not ever reach
And that’s me thinking optimistically
The logical part of me
Can clearly see
I am looking foolishly
Begging for attention from somebody
Who clearly isn’t interested in me
And this I need to force myself to see
So I can search for something I can achieve

Maybe I’m intimidating
With all that brazen speculating
On what I see in he and me
And what I think we could be
Maybe I am just annoying
And altogether too adoring
Who knows what the reason be
That he is so thoroughly
Uninterested in me

There’s a saying about being on the wrong train
Get off at the first station
It says
But sometimes it’s best to
Just to see where the train goes
One never knows

I want to take you there
Trees and bee hives
Lakes and frogs
And even one ******
Circle in the woods
Campfire in the ground
Thin streets of colonial towns
Five inch panes of glass
Mosaic for windows
Creaky pewed churches
Groaning under the weight of
Thousands of prayers
Streams
The peeking rock
Just above the water line
Bubbles past
Rock remains
Birds land
Thankful for a spot
In the middle of the action
Tiny fish collect in the shadow
Hiding from the sun
And everything
Lowest on the food chain
Beneath the rock
Safe remain
Highest on the chain
Above the rock
Sit on top
Eating picnic lunch
Jumping off
The rock is the make out spot
Plenty in town will confess
The rock was the spot of their first kiss

Some days it’s more
When it’s little things
Sometimes same
Sometimes new
Sometimes new within the same
Teeny moments added
In
To become
Everything

You missed an exciting year
Grampa
You did get to see
The first black president
So much you got to see
When you had an entire childhood
Without even knowing about tv
Yet, you saw the world
Through war and peaceful means
Inventions of things
That once seemed like fantasies
You saw smartphones
In almost every pocket
When you once celebrated
The rotary, and then
The touch tone
Such technology that must have seemed!
Maybe when you were a kid
You dreamed of flying cars
But the miraculous inventions
You witnessed
Have them beat by far
We don't have robot maids
And we haven't yet cured baldness
And as far as politics
The nation is a mess
I think you'd be *******
About that
I suppose, if there was ever a time to
Exit Earth
Stage left
You got a good cue
But that don't stop me
From sorely missing you

The hinges upon which a maybe swings
Potential for any things
Sometimes, if one is really
Desperately
Holding onto  what they want to see  
An unsaid no
Can almost be
A maybe
To someone who refuses to agree  
What obviously
Never will be

Just when I was starting to get bored
Here you come
Spark and fire
And juices
Too
Fire and liquid
The breadth of you
Breathing Art from
Deflated old tires
It’s not a job
Yet it’s required
The homage of the re-inspired
I know you know it’s for you

Every life leads to
Something bigger than
The sum of the parts
Tissues, fluids
Meat, bones
Kids
Creations
Art
What is left
Is rarely nothing
We live on
Somehow
The lucky ones