These days I let the cold in. I creak at the joints because of it. It's a constant reminder that they can hear me passing through the house. I wear sweaters for comfort and these days are more important for the whole and less for the moment. I have a future to reminisce about. Birds speak of procedures and pecking orders via airmail. And we will work, endlessly, until our bones peak through our fingertips. This is the life we are meant for. Ahhh to live and die in HNL.
My journal is filled with constant memos and notes. It is filled with my life and it's the overflow valve that worries me. It is at these times, I withdraw and observe. There's usually nothing going on. But sometimes....

He keeps a flute in his boot.
Plays it for strangers, listens for little crashes of loot.
Sleeps on a stone bench near the ocean.
Sometimes he gets drunk , hollers, causes commotion.
Some days he ***** about
in his loose oversized castoff suit
looking as if he might fly
or cry when the sun shines blindness
across his two *** eyes.
Passersby know not
that once he brought the house down
with Ellington in a jazzy joint in Harlem town.

when she was sick,
or sometimes when
she got her period,
she would lay in the
bathtub.

she would ask me
to come and talk
with her while
she did this,
and I would.

we would talk about
everything and nothing,

all the while
I would look at her and
marvel.

her skin is the color of milk,
mottled with freckles
like droplets of honey.

and, there were places that were pink,
of course
but I was always fascinated,
at these moments,
with her toes, flushed with blood
from the warmth of the water.

with those toes she can flip the drain,
letting out water,
work the faucet,
adding just a little more hot,
they would crinkle and pop
as she flexed them,

working the drain a final time,
she stands, closes the curtain,
starts the shower.

that’s my cue.

I stand, stretch and yawn,
feeling more sated somehow
now than when we have ***,
I make my way to
the linen closet,
and return faithfully
to my porcelain perch

with a towel.

*
-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications; 2016

i am the canary
in the binary
singing bars hard

distal phalanges
tap the app
till these trills mean something

the oolong tea leaves
in the bottom of the witch's teacup
told me doom and bloom

was nigh
as ****.

her words quavered
like dead grass clippings falling up
into the discerning violet scry

Sapling that tendered the
same earth where once apart.
Roots did mingle in proximity,
to moments that yearned
that they were to be entangled
in creations delicate weaving.

To cultivate this bonding as
moments past elegantly they
were entwined within each
others intimacy. Devotion  
of binding bodies did whisper
apparitions of form above.

In this lusting of selves did
form emulate above, as wisps
of emotion were rendered in
form. They were bonded in
admiration, a creation of
closeness and seeded love.




*"A seed only needs to be watered for love to grow,

Under bruised skies
in late July
she hoarded electric life
in blue Ball jars

Dandelion dust
twitched across her face
as time
inevitably would