It’s a choreographed dance  
To the melody of car horns  
And jackhammers,  
The white noise of phone calls  
And conversations  
Where only money talks.

It’s called the big city shuffle.  
Your partner sits across you  
On subways, or in back alleys,  
In the opulence of a penthouse—  
Even the pigeons do it,  
If you let 'em.

We all dance different
Some limp, some shuffle so fast  
Their calves cramp—  
All lock step to the time of progress.

We shuffle in courthouses, cathedrals,  
In tenement halls and overcrowded  
Coffee shops,  
Over the trash heaps  
And broken dreams of capitalism.

Take me to the countryside—  
I don’t wanna dance.

The moon adjacent the setting sun,
Celestial standoff.
Two gods fighting for dominance
Of their open air domain.  

A legion of stars,
Greys and blues encroaching
On the suns last stand.
Hues of orange and streaks of pink,
Gold covered clouds,
A fiery fortress on the horizon
The last defences.

The battle commences,
A gladiatorial display.
A collision of light and dark,
Carnage painting
The heavenly battlefield.  

The sun in full retreat,
As the moon ascends into
His new position
As ruler of the sky.

The morning was serene
The type of morning
You wish for on a special day
for it could make death feel sweet

grass glisten like dew covered emeralds
Song birds singing hallelujah
The sun rising from slumber, hues of gold
A pulsing breeze; breath from the mother

Stupefied in want, something amiss
In perfect creation; glory on display
once fulfilling me; invigorating the soul
pleasure dulled by longing
**** you I thought

My joy, commanded by you  
Each stroke of the brush, lost on me
Without the artist

In every pretty thing I see your spirit
A world more exquisite, you created
All it’s beauty; yours to dole
Bestowed through your presence, love

I lounge in the garden of Eden,
And gorge on her fruit.
Fill my cup with the finest wines,
Smell fields of honeysuckle and lilac.  
Feast my eyes on divine landscapes;
It’s all frivolous, frivolous!

I assault my senses with exquisite things,
In your absence,
To fill the void left by you.  
It’s all in frivolity!
The void so great, more of me is absent
Than is truly living.

Should you leave me in this life, my beloved.  
I shall enjoy no good thing again,
Destined for solitary confinement,
Reduce me to the likeness of a worm
Devoid of all pleasure,
For none should be had, without you.

Jealous of your heart,
The crimson coursing through it
Flows with life more precious
Than the earth whence it came.  

Under your skin; I yearn to be,
Beating with no respite.  
Let me do its labour,
These hands bathed in your life,
Stained with your love.

My neck hurts  
looking for the stars again—  
Timeless divinity lost  
to man’s paltry convenience.

Streetlights, the new  
celestial roadmap  
for nighttime travelers  
with a destination  
of nowhere.

Gather 'round the light  
the stars view  
from space—  
how ironic.

When I lay with you
My body sings
To your tune
Every beat hitting its mark

I sit on the edge of desire
Tension rising
like the crescendo

You, the perfect falsetto
Harmony to my song
Passion is our conductor
And love is the sheet music
On which its written

It’s you, my dear,  
The phantom of my heart,  
The nameless figure  
That haunted my mind,  
The one I’ve loved  
All this time.

Hidden deep within,  
My perfect secret.  
My soul called out,  
Searching for you  
In the space  
That does not exist.

For you were an ideal,  
My antidote to heartache.  
The one I met  
In ghostly hours  
Of the night.

I know you like an old lover,  
Though I knew not  
Who you were.  
Heart attuned to mine,  
For that was your dwelling.

It’s you, my dear,  
The phantom of my heart,  
The nameless figure  
That haunted my mind,  
The one I’ve loved  
All this time.

Purple and white flowers dot the landscape
And the roadways
Delicate flowers, the bunches of them
Give the allusion of pink
Everywhere I travel they grace me
I’ve never seen them before
But maybe they’ve always been there
And I’ve just never noticed

This heart was held by another,
Pawned to the thrift store.  
There it reside,
In a chest at the back,
Lost amongst trinkets
In the stagnant smell of time.  

You crossed the threshold
with a mischievous grace  
And celestial step,  
Commanding attention
With a confidence so sharp,
Cleaving the antiquated air.  

Target marked
With the slyness of a fox,
You pocketed
This secondhand heart  
And stole away.  

No thief or collector
Shall gaze upon it again,
Locked In a double-keyed safe,
This secondhand heart
Is in your clutches.

We don’t hate sleep,
We just love each other.
Hours roll past,
One after another.

It’s 4am,
The time of songbirds and lovers.
We’re driving nowhere
on the empty streets.
Won’t let the day end,
Do anything to avoid the sheets.

Not afraid of the dark,
We just love one another.
Don’t put out the light,
Fear of missing the other.

Your name on my breath
In my restless slumber,
I’ll see you in my dreams,
My one true lover.

It’s a Tuesday,
This coffee shop is too busy for a Tuesday.  
Set out looking for a quiet place to write,
My lover beside me to read.

The monotone music
Drowned out by the conversation
Of an eclectic man,
In a floral shirt
Talking about pond algae,
And poaching the kings deer.  
It’s a Tuesday.

My lover beside me
Tucked into a Leo Tolstoy book
That’s as big as she is,
Daunting.
She snacks and sips, we share a glance,
So lovely to do this on a Tuesday.  

The grotesque egg salad sandwich
Across me keeps distracting me.  
Maybe that’s why the lady
Hasn’t touched it,
It’s a Tuesday.

I never wanted to write
about the grotesque egg salad,
Stream of Consciousness.

Take shelter my dandelion, stand proud.
You’ll find no persecution here,
Many look down upon you,
They have not the eye for your splendour.

Unhalted by the world, you bloom.
Astounding fortitude; delicate grace
Your grandeur displayed.
A beauty misplaced,
In the concrete fortress.

A wild flower,
Life ushered by the blowing wind.  
Only tender hands can hold you,
Or off you go to bless another.

My eyes remind you of sunflowers
I say you’re my sun
What truth lay in these words

For my eyes show a glimpse
Of times long forgotten
Indeed in a past life it was so  

Like a flower of the field; your warmth I seek
My sun I will follow
At night how I twist and turn
in anticipation of your dawns break

My sun I will follow, until I can no longer
Feeble, my last petal drops  
Back here I will meet you

In your eyes we will meet again
For they will show me a glimpse
of times long forgotten