when i am gone
plant me in your heart
go for a run when it rains

i will be the strange line on the ceiling
or the smallest dot on the bathroom wall
or the type of cologne you smell on a passerby

i will be the strange tune no one knows why you like

when i am gone
it's no one's fault
it's just default
some die now, some die later.

as ruthless as my words
is the truth
that takes more than it gives
and we are asked to live with
what we have
or specifically, what we don't have

and, truly, instead of thinking
i would just
water my plants

traffic backup,
    roadwork signs.
drive down road,
    little houses
treed yards.
    brown leaves,
first sign of fall.
    kids about to go back to
school\parents
    return to work. rolling
on the seconds go,
    ticking by faster
each year so it
    seems.

cars piled up,
     to slow, won't go.
tiny dancers in the
     wind blow on to car
windows,
     another sign of coming
Harvest Season.
     people resist the clear
trademarks
     enjoying the fall,
but resenting the
     winter.

I can't understand
     New England birds,
you're housed in
     cocoons like caterpillars
that guard against the
     elements,
not freezer coldness
     that animals call home.
I'm not sure the memo
     reached you,
but this isn't the
     South.

trees like snakes,
     shed their
rainbow skins, as
    "Old Man Winter"
kicks in. the sound of
      leaves crunching, cold
on the floor under foot.
     Autumn's death has
no memorial,
     birds flying South
a eulogy.

In my desperate search for true love;
I lost myself.

I’ve been drawing circles,
The same ones
Over
And over –
I’ve been feeling sleepless
Night after
Night,
Hoping that I can work the courage
To talk to someone
And not feel so lonely –
But like I said –
I’ve been drawing circles.