Sometimes
out of purpose,
Sometimes
out of love,
Sometimes
out of necessity,
Sometimes
for a reason,
Sometimes
accidentally,
We make
someone happy.
And in those
quiet moments,
we feel
most human.

When I force frozen
meat apart before
it’s had time to thaw
it injures and tears
where the ice clings
too tightly.
  The meat no longer
whole, scatters into
broken bones and
bleeding fragments.
  Your absence undoes
me like this not all at
once, but with a quiet
rip, where we once
held each other too
close to separate
  without breaking.

I was sitting
deliberately
cross-legged
on the carpet,
listening to a
divine lecture,
each word felt
like light
falling in
my heart.
As I gazed
down,
my attention
drifted towards
the movement
around me
so many feet,
each searching
for space in
the crowd.
There’s something
special about feet.
They perform
classical
conditioning
on the pilgrims.
Each step a
response and
stimulus to
the next,
saying “Come.”
In mosques,
temples, and
churches,
people take
small, reverent
steps toward God.
Each foot quietly
follows the
imprint of another,
as if reinforcing
belief,
creating a path
of shared faith.
The ground
becomes sacred
not because
of what’s built
upon it,
but because
of all the feet
that have
stepped on
it with devotion
each one distinct
in size, pace,
weight, and
locomotive
ability, yet
move toward
the same purpose
carrying people
through rituals,
toward altars,
toward prayer.
They become
silent guides.
Perhaps this is
why sacred spaces
are always crowded
not just with bodies,
but with the energy
of countless footsteps,
layered one
over the other.
In divinity,
one foot invites
another,
and by these holy
increments,
faith multiplies.

Altruism
has
become
an old
film reel,
where grief
looked noble
and death
had meaning.
Now people
water
relationships
for their
own springs.

My body
only
gives three.
I’m either
sad,
happy,
or
empathetic.
That’s a
strange
kind of
survival,
a triangle
of
emotion
holding
me up.

Perhaps
moon
had been
hiding
something.
she loved
once
it hollowed
her, she
poured
herself out
into the
dark
left her
body bare,
and we
call it light.

I used to be
a difficult kid
when it came
to eating.
I didn’t
raid fridges
in quest
of food.
To ensure
my good
health,
my mother
fed me
spoonfuls
of bone pulp
on bunk beds.
She’d scoop
it out,
blowing air
to cool its fire,
then press it
into my
mouth
with the
quiet panic
only a mother
knows
fearful I’d turn
my head,
or spit
what she
believed
might
save me.