I remember as a child
how desperately I would fight away the needles,
no matter that they were to make me better.
To this day, nothing has changed.

Your body moved like ocean waves
                beneath me,
    the wet taste of salt shared between our lips,
        moonlight reflecting off metallic jewelry
like little lighthouse beacons gleaming in the darkness.
And in that fleeting moment
      of equal parts fear and fulfillment,
  when there is no moon or movement
             and all is quiet and still,
                 I felt myself sink into you
             and I have yet to hit bottom.

Eclipse me.
Keep me from view.
The whole world wants to see you.

God created man.
I create poems.
Just like poems,
some men are good,
     some bad.
The poems that are good,
I save those.
The bad ones? I save those, too -
that I may rework them
until they are good.
     I do not burn my creations,
for they are only ever bad
because I lacked a vision or patience.

San Francisco, 1977
I sat by my window and listened
to the crying of Carlos Santana and the wind
His guitar told stories
of home in México and how he yearned for it
and the wind kept howling along
as if it tried to bring him back
and I wished for Carlos to be home
and I wished for the wind to carry him there
and I wished for myself to be somewhere else
where the city isn't as big
and the people aren't as greedy
and the love comes naturally, not for fifty bucks a night

So I sat by my window
and listened to the sound of Santana's guitar
and the wind crying
and I understood
as I wept along.

Like ships in the night
we pass - side by side - not breaking our stride,
not looking left, not gazing right,
barely glimpsing each other, like light-
houses, signals blinking brightly.

For the longest time we were alone
still are, no change tonight, we won't;
I've felt your presence long ago,
it was a silent gift.

How did we not recognize each other
after screaming for so many hours?
Listening to your soft cries  (your blue eyes),
Norwegian wood between us guards your lies -
you pretend to be rich and pretty;
I know you're just the janitor of the ferry.
The first mate, the captain, all remotely
far away and you're all that's left -
you are the second best.

Thankfully I'm not picky,
I don't care if you're not pretty,
I only need to see your hands and heart -
the rough patches are a part - of you, of me, of all the world,
and you're so out of reach, of sight,
and I know that it won't feel right; despite that
we shouldn't feel alone tonight.
And you have a wife-

and I know but I don't care.
You won't hesitate to stare,
and I can feel your bitter look upon my back,
the fingers that won't touch my neck
no matter how much I beg and plead for you to take me
and love me, unconditionally,
before I fall into the sea,
the water claiming me fully,
the waves brutally forcing me
under themselves, generously,
drowning in my bed.

God punishes us forever
because we merely sought knowledge
in The Garden,
long before things were written down.

Did not the masters of the slave trade
demonstrate the same authority -
denying their subjects knowledge,
or simply the hope of betterment -
as they toiled in their gardens?

And are the descendants of those subjects
not still punished by self-proclaimed masters
who are little more than masters of none
but ignorance and inequality?

And yet, we pray that God may show us the way.