The slant of his shoulders,
The way they shifted under
His shirt, a bible verse shining
Against the yellow fabric, into
The eyes of others.

Even if the words faded with
One too many washes, you
Would still feel the gold, the
Sound of the Spirit’s footsteps
As they blended with his.
His ambassador, a wordless
Expression of God's love and
Peace in this twisted world.

If I walked through the door,
Lips silent, would anybody
Know I followed Jesus?
Or was my heart obscured--
Split between the world
And my Father?

I sat too long.
And now,
My life has pins
And needles.

Procrastination is simply the fear
Of living in a world where everything
You do becomes a regret.

Amidst my last-minute scrambling,
I find myself asking:
How am I living there anyway?
I procrastinate a feeling
That is omnipresent,
No matter how much I delay.

The man’s neck craned eerily
Over his shaking cup of coffee,
As if the bones in his neck
Were disjointed, hanging loosely
There was a distance to his eyes
As if they were thinking, thinking
But never quite seeing things
I kept my distance, like most others,
But he insisted on talking,
Mumbling ravaged thoughts,
As if he didnt see the frightened
Posture and body language
Of all those around him

Beer-soaked sweatshirt,
A rainbow of paw prints—
A gentle heart
Opened to the sky,
Vulnerable and beating—
The floors awash in gray,
Unfeeling in the waiting.
The wheel intangible
In my hands as I drive,
Rushing home to retrieve
The shoes I forgot
In red-lighted emergency—
Two ambulances amplified
The night turned cold,
In something unexpected.

You are an unspoken word--

              You are the glow behind
                 thin leaves at goldenhour.

You are the stillness of
the reeds before the tide
  begins to shift—

                  You are the truth
              that promotes gratitude
                     rather than tears.

You are the long breath,
the release of anxiety
    at dusk--

              You are First, the warmth
                   that melts all of my
                     coveted selfishness.

You are the burnt cinnamon
of cardigans from those
   who are lost--

                   You are the silence
                      of crashing waves
                       and white noise.

You are all that I have come
     to love.

Calm yourself down, child.
They spoke in gentle tones
Words suppressed, mild
Their reassurances
Sank uselessly like stones.
My fingers flicked away
Everything they claimed
To own--
Broken bones, a shriveled soul;
Who is a child
If not a fully inflated balloon,
Full to the bursting
Before scandalous wild
And shaking sorrow
Maliciously chipped away
Their countenance,
Puncturing the elastic
Until the vibrance
Lay in a thousand
Stretched pieces

I hope I have not been unkind,
Or muddled the world
With swine-like words.
Put my life on rewind;
Moonwalk my shoes
Back to the first time
I saw your eyes---
Uncertain, but kind
Did genuine disgust
Scare you away?
What can I say
To convince you
It was all a lie,
A scathing mask
Plastered on my face,
Always trying to dissuade
Unwelcome emotions
From broadcasting
Through the way
I say your name?

The foam forms rings
In the tide—
Like blown glass
In the light.


The space between the leaves
Shows the words
We never said.


How lonely it must be
To be the missing piece
Of a set.

I let the anxiety crash over me,
Like a barreling wave—
The whitewash dragging me under,
My body a helpless doll
FIlled with the question of “up.”
My eyes stung from the salt
And my hair lassoed my throat,
Until I had no choice
But to succomb to the ravaging
And hope that I would, someday,
   come up for air.

His mouth was a perfect ‘O’
Like the opening of a guitar,
But out of tune, dumbstruck.
There was nothing he could
Say, no words that his face
Hadn’t already expressed.
Where had he been all this
Time? To not notice the lies
Furnishing his own mouth?

Father, You say I will find rest
If I am burdened and weary—
But what if my burdens
Are imagined?
I am surrounded by Your grace,
Held tight by glowing circumstances,
Yet I search for the strands
Of doubt, of anxiety, and
Torment myself with the thought
That if I rest, I will fail You.

Even as I feel tangible things,
Connection beyond imagined,
The reality of a life I do not deserve
Fades away, touching the horizon, only
A rosy haze of broken seashells,
Thoughts and blessings becoming one.
Deep reds and shadowed burgundies,
Faces of daises and laughs of green,
The colors coincide as the sky expands,
And I only feel my Father’s hand on me.

Distraction from truth—
I waited in bird calls,
Hoarding sensitivity.
Did I respond,
Or only become glass,
Fragile and hidden,
Afraid to step outside
For fear of breaking?

Rightness travels in a bus,
Holding a yellow pole,
Waiting for its stop.
The scenery speeds by,
My interiority bleeding open,
  yet never slowing,
      forever lost.
On the rail tracks of my God,
I blink, zoom out my gaze,
And see all of the souls,
Provided and beautiful,
Sitting patiently beside me—
A gift to grow in Spirit
Before I’m ready for the station
   impatiently awaited,
        sitting in dusk.

Circles of grandma’s nails,
Round and round along my back--
“Cumbaya, my Lord,’
A melody on rewind.
The blinds flashed with lightning,
Shedding light on the quaint room,
Childhood in the textile details—
“I love you.”
My response quenched by salt,
The thoughts I was trying to shut off,
“I’ll see you soon.”
Wet pillowcase and itchy hair,
Forced breathing lifted to prayer—
All is well.
Slanted outlets, a bursting suitcase,
The smell of eucalyptus,
Crisp on a two dollar coin—
“Did you forget anything?”
Yes, only you.
A bundle of memories my mind
Decided to discard without consent,
Forever scrambling to grip
The dregs of what maybe was—
“I love you to the moon
and back”
I finally said, asleep in pieces,
A little girl, crying again.

Dresses pushing prams,
The evidence of life
And its rotation.
Girls showing their insecurity
On exposed skin,
Walking the path
Towards the world’s

Low-hanging validation.

Outside of the motion,
Eyes an X-ray to the soul,
I watched the hearts
On the left side of their bodies
Move up and down,
With every breath, every step,
And I thought aloud.
Where would my words go
If no one ever heard them?

Clouds coming in,
Soft and pink,
Like the curtains in a nursery
For a baby who never came.
Did she still hear the lies
In her head,
Even as an infant?

There was a part of me
That did not want to know.
There was another that
Imagined the mother,
Full of rocks at a shoreline,
Her body a mesh enclosure,
Weighed down as the waves
Of grief washed over her,
Again and again,
Until she was only the sand
People collected on vacations.

I’ve gotten carried away,
But I know, somewhere,
A girl looks at these clouds,
And sees her sorrow
Held in God’s hands of sunset,
Coddling the child in softness,
Before, through, and after the rain.