What a storm cloud
Making a mess of my land
Flooding my gardens
Drowning my fields
You and all your life
You with all this love
I would construct continents
Raise all your cities
Claim the unknown in your name
Just to hold your light
One ray at a time

Blonde beauty
Green eyed thief
Stole me away
Upon twilight hours
You’re lungs sing
Songs of forgiveness
You’re mind speaks
Lessons of longing
Blonde beauty
Green eyed thief
Steal my heart
Leave me to be

Cut me open
Only to find salt water
Drank an ocean
Swallowed the seas
Stole from it’s depths
These washed away dreams

Most days I find myself daydreaming
of my skull painting the walls of the room

Mr. Gooding tells me about the past,
Back before the levees gave way,
and the water swallowed his city,
Mr. Gooding says she was a proud place,
One full of passion and sound,
He says New Orleans had a life of its own,
Everyone there just loved to hear it sing,
I tell him that Baltimore sings too,
Sometimes out of tune,
But still she sings,
And we came here to listen

Things fall apart,
Flowers grow between the cracks,
The sea will hurl itself into a fit,
The inside of our bodies
will do the same.

To be brave enough
traversing this hurricane,
Is a paradise at sea

When Baltimore was burning
My body began to shake
When Baltimore was burning
The roots of my father were unearthed,
Unsure looks from classmates
I promise I didn’t want it to turn out like this
I promise my children will be raised proper like,
I promised myself that my voice will be one to sing
the most caring of hymns.
When baltimore was burning
Parts of myself were charred and forgotten
The white of my skin was a question of a lightbulb,
I still haven’t gotten the answers
to all the problems I’ve thought out in my head

You who speak the words of mountains
The kind that leave a chill in the room
with your snow covered peaks,
You who know the song the morning sings,
How this orchestra of a world plays
symphonies with the movement of the sun,
I've wondered for years now
How you were chosen to microscope this life
The way you analyze the details we are blind to,
You with those feathers in your mouth
How your words take flight as you read,
I hope your journey is a quick one.
Thank you for everything.

Weeping at the strings
Plucking away these fears
Ive climbed the steps
Knocked on the door of forgiveness
Broken windows,
****** floors,
****** me on the stoop of god
Someone needs to know
That we have bled too much
If we are all his children
Than why haven’t these deaths counted
for some salvation of sin
I watch as more bodies show up on the news,
Boys laid out on the sidewalk
Arms spread and bleeding
Crucified to this concrete
Hoping for some kind of remembrance
Who’s side are you on lord

These storms have come
They hang heavy over my roof
The night is spent dreaming
My days spent in static
I wish to be the man I once was
Back when these legs could
Carry the weight
I am tired now
So tired I no longer have the
Energy to hate myself
So tired now I sometimes
Forget what it is to feel

On the porch,
Our star hung high above us,
The flowers bloomed,
Trees wiped away sleep from their branches
I remembered the frost on my bones,
Floating candles of fireflies,
Laughter in the breeze,
And the rain dripping from the shingles

I know sometimes I do not meet expectations
I know sometimes my voice quivers when I speak
I know sometimes these words can not fix all the broken things I have made,
I just want to patch the holes in the ceiling
I want to keep the storms away just a little while longer,
So you can dream of all the good you have left to give
And I can watch as you share your joy without a worry.
The song we sing is one that reinvents itself as time goes on
As long as the instruments stay tuned, than this song
will be the only music that I will listen to

golden sliver, Fistfuls of skin
Such a scenic sight
Clenched sheets like prayers,
Hailed gospel to the ceiling
All was holy in the twilight,
I spoke aloud my wantings
You replied with your own,
I've fallen for eden,
Knowing the consequences
Lord have mercy
On our sinning souls

If you've never seen a cherry blossom bloom
Spring must be difficult to understand,
Transforming in a night to blotches of pink
Painting the blue of the sky in a stretch of wonder,
The pedals will fall, dancing through the air
As their journey comes to an end on the soft earth,
The roots, they grow wide,
Grasping to the edges of the soil,
All the windows are opened up wide,
Dreaming with the scent of the world on my sheets,
Spring be the most beautiful of seasons

Oh how simple of a love this was
Curiosity from such a young age
You with your age and experience
Years of captivating hearts and minds
I fell victim to your narcotic charm
Your empty frame a reminder of the nights
You came and went like lightning
Only leaving long enough
For me to convince myself of just how much
I needed you to put laughter back into my life

I want to write something honest
Want to make something of these words
How I crave for you to notice me
How I know that my morals are so tainted
I know that my decisions are the wrong ones
I know that I am handcuffed to the most dangerous of vices
And I choose to push those things so far in my head that it’s like they were never there to begin with.

All those who fought with silence,
Used their words instead of violence,
Tattooed scriptures upon their thighs
Battled the lows with ballpoint highs,
Burn away the fracture pieces,
Iron on the tainted creases,
This purging was our way of survival,
Poet's own parables a secondhand bible,
This was love, this was hate, this was rage,
This was anything we could confess in midnight haze,
Dream out loud all you silent eyed fiends,
For this was nothing but the fuel of the machine

Back over seas
What a nightmare of a memory
Making mountains of men
What dust I have become
Such a parasite of a man
I've come to this land
Sold it my innocence
There is not enough person
Left in this body,
To make it back home

You got your drinking whiskey
The kind that you sip to remember
You drink to laugh and cry
Scrap books liquified and bottled
With a cork and a price tag
Than you got your warming whiskey
The kind you drink to feel summer  inside your ribcage
The kind that melts the winter in your thoughts
and leaves you on the floor in a spring embrace
Lately I've been drinking whiskey
Strolling through the aisles seeing all the bottles
Debating on which is one or the other
And deciding on what kind I need most

Lying through my teeth
slick silver tongued
weaving the words
into intricate lies
I am cardboard insides
Paper thin skin
feel the dust in my palms
anything to be who I am not

These finish lines lining my gut,
Scars of past encounters
Ive ran far too fast and far too long
to still be standing up straight,
My shoulders ripped from corner to corner,
A snake of a lesion lies between them,
hissing and curling itself into some knot,
For years now it has slept,
Cracked and shed it’s skin; strewn in ribbons across the floor,
Leaving nothing but that vice grip reminder
that it is only thing I have left of myself

The whole room got up to dance,
all head shakes and hip swings
this music got me all filled up
each note a cry out for someone
they done made the leaves change
autumn jazz be the most beautiful of colors

My voice echoes with longing
Lost, searching for protection
I wear my raincoat most days
just incase the sky decides to open
and I am left below, out in the rain
searching for shelter in all the
wrong doorways

What’s in a man?
This engine of a heart,
Works in machine like rhythm,
Monochrome innards,
Stashing my colors far too deep,
Someday I wish to see them,
Let their tones creep into place,
What’s in a man?
The longing for someone,
Silence worn as an outfit,
Attempts at concrete and structure,
At times we will shift,
Loosing sight of the times,
Apologies there after,
What’s in a man?
A title I am still trying to fit into.

There are times,
Where I want to sing,
Your name and mine,
Tangled in the same tune,
Dancing with the syllables,
All the notes and nothings,
Around and around,
Into the evening hours,
There are times,
Where I have cried,
Familiar faces on morning news,
Funerals for the friends lost,
Childhood ends far too early,
So many nights forgotten,
Sunday morning service,
Prayers for the wrongs I committed,
In the hours prior,
There are times*,
Where I reflected on the memories,
August took a piece of me,
Everything was full of life,
We never even wondered,
About what would become of us,
In the sunrise that followed.

You give a whole new meaning to sheet music.

In nature
Reptiles shed their skin
This signifies growth
Ridding their bodies of all the parts
no longer suitable enough for use
In some occasions gorging
themselves on the remains
Feeding the body with these parts
no longer suitable enough for use
Some days I call myself a reptile
I recognize my shortcomings
I've outlined each and every one
So i've begun feasting on this body
Gorging myself on the parts of me
no longer suitable enough for use
Because in order for the soul to grow
I must rid myself of these left overs of demons
And begin tomorrow anew

I am mending this heart of mine,
Sewing together the parts torn away,
The distance I've put between
us was intentional,
I can not move forward
with you on my horizon,
You've made your decision,
Your own path to take,
I am headed for the south,
Somewhere for solace,
Somewhere to rest