The sweet kiss of the young sun
And a bitter embrace
Begin another day.
Do people still die in the cold?
Trains and warm cars keep it at bay.
Could one bewitched by this light
Receive its kisses
While losing his life?
The universe giveth and taketh away.

Sipping the air of a city night
So heady in the cold
On the move under static lights
Little worlds about
To collide

Gravity frivolity
Draw broken hearts like earth bound stars
As the pull of every
Small storied point holds others back
From abysses beneath
Dark waters

Lone souls each and all
Compose this metropolis
Joy is to be
Discovered in insignificance
Where together
We belong

Every now and then,
Someone lights up your world
Like breaking weather,
Scattering the clouds
And baptizing your soul
In a deluge of colors.

Every now and then,
Someone captures emotions
Like bluebottle flies
In a jar, only to release,
Too delighted ever
To pin them with names.

Every now and then,
Someone dares you to dance
With words or muscle memory,
And laughs with you
When flailing efforts prove
That you almost can.

Every now and then,
Someone glows like traffic lights
And points you to new roads
They've traveled on before:
Ways that part and meet again,
Every now and then.

Some impossible goodbyes
Like a farewell embrace
For a wisp of tobacco smoke
Or a parting kiss
From the vapors dancing at the rim
Of that favorite chipped teacup
You carry with you wherever you go

The highway changes when you travel it
At different times,
In different seasons,
Weathers, road conditions, or decades.
The places you pass and your final destination
Will change entirely from year to year
Or day to night.
The highway will tell you totally different things,
The signs change from year to year
And day to night.

The sky goes dark, the lights come on,
Some letters are lost, and new meaning found.
A roadside motel becomes simply a mote,
There is vacancy where before
There was nothing at all,
Just an abandoned fruit stand, which by twilight
Becomes a small house—
The siding might be yellow or brown—
With dark curtains and neon signs
Proffering readings, psychic insights, an open palm.

The other night, I came to the end of the highway.
I would have crashed right through the barrier
But God or my survival instinct intervened,
And my journey continued
On a different highway altogether.

Let the dead carry the weight of you
when the road is long,
the climb too steep

—worn treads, bare threads—

out of time,
in place.

A bereaved mother's touch to guide you,
an empty hand to hold

when you're on the brink
of a faltering jump to the sidewalk
she is right there with you
to lift you
over the deep mud, the oily puddles.

In that dark mirror
let her show you the shattered faces
of the ones taken

but still here with you,

still here
in a world seen through her eyes
for what it was

and for all it can be.

I LIKE TO SAY YOUR NAME

I like to say
your name

when you're
not here

turn you
into sound

conjure you out of
thin air

so that you appear
before me

dressed in sound
only

memory sketching in
the rest of you

as if sound
was just an outline

and love
colours you in

adding the voice last
so I can hear you say.

"Hello you..!"
and there you are

as present
as present

can be.

I like to say
your name

when you're
not there.