One day when I was a child
My favorite pear tree fell
I found it strange to know it’s fruit
When I’d only seen it bloom

Split in half by the weight of ice
Right down the middle
A crack of thunder as it went
It was killed by the rain and cold

I used to rest in it’s shadow
Infertile but gracious to me
As the blooms floated down
Like flurrying springtime snow

Strong seeming and lovely smelling
A father in spirit and in truth
Winter killed what spring made beautiful
It held no children but me

I used to write fearlessly
Prolific, almost profligate
Pertinacious and flagrant.
I was well and a well
And I never ran dry

I’ve run dry like a riverbed
I’m now lost like a wanderer
I can’t see the promised land
No pillar of cloud by day,
No pillar of fire by night.

I’ll be persistent, I’ll be obstinate
I’ll take a staff and strike a rock,
Let the living waters flow like a river
Flood the stream
Become a torrent

Become well

It is the wind that upsets pages
Spills them on the floor
Both personal and impersonal

It is the spark blown from the fireplace
That catches and spreads
Unwelcome destruction

It inks itself through typeface
And bleeds through paper
Wet with rain

Until the tears dry
The fire abates
Wind settles
Ceases

Still

And I remember the sound of your name

I feel like the sound of summer thunder,
The thrum and rumble and force.
Like the crash of waves on rock.

I feel like the heat from a fire,
Burning and writhing and roiling,
The sun on an August day.

I feel like a stray bolt of lightning.
Like copper, electrical and manic.
The smell of ozone as an aftermath.

I feel like no words can describe,
I feel empty, I feel full, I feel tired.
So, I feel like the sound of summer thunder.

If galaxies were a mood,
I’d probably be Andromeda,
On my way to collide with
The Milky Way traveling at
68 miles a second.
That’s 244,800 miles an hour.
I feel like I’m treading water,
Moving nowhere in an empty space.
Too fast, too slow, no, still too fast,
Moving, but not moving fast enough.
I am the world’s slowest collision course,
And it’ll still take 4 billion years,
To get where I'm going.

I want to feel the beat of your heart on mine
Watching shows about people we’ve never known
And though we never will, they make us laugh all the same
Hoping and laughing and feeling
Searching screens and sound waves trying to reach beyond here
That liminal space between being and nothing
We press in and press together
Warmth unbidden but welcome
I support your head with my shoulder
And you support my heart with your soul

You are stars in the evening sky,
Beautiful and radiant.
They make up your body,
The fabric of my universe,
Dipping and encompassing.
You do not alter,
But look on tempests,
Unshakeable.
You are all these things,
Fixed, constant, and true.
No man ever loved,
As I have - and will love you.