She tells me it takes time,
but what is time?
The passing of moments
that turn into hours
that make up the days
that stretch into weeks
that fill up the months
that linger as years?

It takes time to heal.
I cut my arm once.
It was on purpose.
Deep enough to need stitches
but I didn’t see a doctor.
Instead I watched time pass.
Time was red blood flowing
Into slowly clotting drying blood
Into stiff inflexible scab
Into peeling, pusing dead skin
Into pink jagged itchy new skin
Into scar, also known as memory.

It takes time to forgive.
My fingers run over that scar
and time stands still
as it rushes through my brain:
Time is in my mind’s eye
Four-year old me slipping on glasses
for the first time,
Seven-year old me slipping on glasses
after they were slapped off and shattered, again,
Twelve-year old me slipping on glasses
after they were slapped off and shattered, again,
Sixteen-year old me slipping on glasses
after they were slapped off and shattered, again,
Twenty-one-year old me slipping on glasses
after they were shattered for the last time;
I blink at the clock
and see a life-time has passed in thirty seconds.

It takes time.
And some days it feels like
it was all such a very long time ago.
And some days my heart seizes
like it did at the moment it happened.
It takes time; but what is time?

Red hued water swirls round the drain.
Bloodied hands wash themselves of sin.
Vacant eyes glance briefly in the mirror.
As the once temporary mask grows permanent.

The charade will continue.
The show must go on.
The bright and magicked aural lies persist.
For this is the reality of life.

Every human is an actor.
Every life has its stage.
And there is none willing to consider
Taking a peek behind another's curtain.

Too many acts to follow.
Too many roles to play.
We're all grifters and cheats
Trying to make a way in our worlds

And get everyone else to believe
We belong here as much as the next.

For the broken don't belong.
The wounded and bloodied don't belong.
The scarred and marred don't belong.
Not in a world that prizes symmetry
And wholeness and uniformity.

What is uniform about the bags
That darken our eyes?
What is whole about the scars
That shade our arms?
What is symmetrical about the sad smirks
That crook our cracked lips?

What is prized about our brokenness?

So we play our roles
And we play them well
So no one knows
Our brokenness.

But we do.
For our reality is in the mirror.

The now shattered mirror
Streaked with blood
To match the cuts
New to our fists.

When you get a chance to apologize,
Don't say:

I'm sorry, but....

Just be the adult you say you are,
Then what you say will be enough:

*I'm sorry.

I wait with bated breath
For a depth
Of understanding
That never follows.

How can another ken
And lend
An empathetic hand
To my set of misery?

They know not being waken
By being shaken
To the core of their soul
With memories harrowing and haunting.

They know peace
Whilst all I know is destruction.

And yet here I stand
For a hand
To reach out and touch me
On my cheek, my shoulder, my heart.

I wait with impatience
In silence.
I wait.
But I do not make it known:

I crave the human touch.

Raise your glass.

This is for the man
Who taught me how to ride a bike
When I was five years old,
Who taught me how to lay a brick
Wall with my own two hands,
Who taught me how to love
My heritage and my roots
While embracing change and newness.

Raise your glass.

This is for the woman
Who carried me for nine months
Whilst giving me my love of steak,
Who read stories of imaginable fantasy
And sang crackling fireside songs
To lull me into slumber,
Who taught me to Love
Even when she herself had forgotten how.

Raise your glass.

This is for the women
Who know me better than anyone else
For they have grown with me
In ways only siblings can,
Who taught me to fight for myself
And simultaneously be merciful
For I am not a perfect person,
Who gave me all the love I need
And then some simply because
They wanted to.

Raise your glass.

This is for who we were.
This is for who we are.
This is for who we will be.

Raise your glass.

Some blood is thinner than water.
Some ties more easily severed.
Yet we live because they existed
If even but for a single moment
And for that,
We give tribute.

Drink.

They say I'll forget...with time.
But I don't think they ever met you,
For you were the most sublime
Of all the universe ever knew.

And it's true what I said,
It was always you.
It will always be you.
I'll never forget.

I can't forget.
Sláinte

Laying in bed
Thinking of what my favorite
Childhood memory is,

And I think of that time
Your head popped over the edge
Of the railing on my loft bed,
And you whispered,
"Permission to come aboard?"
Because out of everyone in the family
You respected my dream of joining the navy,
So when you wanted to spend time with me,
You always asked me that,
As if my space was a ship
And I had to give you permission to approach,
And even though now you and I aren't that close,
You've always known how to approach me,
And you don't know how much that means to me.

And I think of that time
You and I climbed out the window
Above our toilet in the bathroom
Onto the roof to eat dinner there
Because we were turning 16
And that's how we wanted to spend
Our shared birthday.
And we sat there watching our neighborhood
As the California sun set in a brilliant red-orange hue.
And then you said, "Happy birthday, Twainy,"--
That's what we've called each other
Since as long as I can remember--
And my heart stopped a beat
At the sudden realization that
I didn't know how to live without you
Because you had literally been there
For every moment of my life,
And even though our lives have diverged
You don't know how much that that means to me.

And I think of that time,
No, not just that time,
But all those times
You tucked us into bed,
Then sat down to read a chapter
From whatever book you were reading to us,
And I didn't know at that time
How much you reading to us before bed
Would mean to me,
But ****** all if I don't know it now,
Because, you see, stories are all I have left of you.
So I write stories, I read stories, I tell stories,
I live stories
Because when there's a story,
It's like you're still reading to me,
And I'm just not ready to let that version of you go.
But you'll never know how much you meant to me.

I am who I am today because of you.
All the bad but so much more all the good,
And you don't know how much
You will always mean to me.

He was born in 1924
And at 17 went to war.
Parachuted over Sicily,
Wounded, sent home to live in civility.

One day he met a Ryder,
Tall and elegant and regal.
Married her and made a home,
Though the front lawn lacked a gnome.

He died before I could really know him.
But what I remember is this:
His heart was good and full of love,
Tender, strong and not at all rough.

He pulled quarters from my ears
Whenever I saw him.
He and Shadow walked the beach
For miles before a swim.
He smoked cigars and drank beer
While playing cribbage.
And he was my favorite person
When I was four years old.

I will never understand
How rocket science works,
How caterpillars become butterflies,
How languages evolve linguistically,
How genetics determine everything,
How faith is determined,
How hope is enduring,
How love is prevailing,
How any relationship works,
How I fit into my own life...
Stuff like that.

I will never understand
A lot of things,
But I'll be ******
If I don't make you think
I already do
Understand.

A silent room's embrace,
Cast in neither darkness nor light,
The only thing of note
Is the bass drum thump
Of a heartbeat.

Two worlds collided and this its aftermath.
Numbly watching the swirling chaos
Through glazed dilated eyes.

The demons of the past haunt
Like parasites in the blood.
Can't live with them,
But no longer can we live without them.  
Every action and reaction made with this in view.
To guard and protect the innocent
From a hell they were never supposed to know.

Hate us for who we were,
For who we are,
For who we will always be.

But do not hate us for separating ourselves
So as to spare you, the innocent and naïve,
From the horrors and hell
That now call our souls home.

This was never meant for you.

I go back
To the place that molded me
Shaped me into who I am today.
The trees are so much taller
And I stand before them
That much straighter.
The paint that stuck in my memory
Of faded white and grey-blue trim
Is fresh and spotless and perfect,
Like the mask I painted
On my own face in the mirror that morning.
The grass I spent countless childhood days
Mowing and trimming and ****-whacking
Is manicured by professionals now.
And a different girl sits on the roof
Making her own memories.
We stare at each other in silence
Committing the other's features to memory.
Then with the slightest of nods in her direction,
I'm turn on my heel and gone.
You see I've been lost for awhile now
In this world we all must make our home.
And I thought that maybe by going back
I'd find myself.
And I suppose I did, but really I didn't.
I wasn't there--
In those memories.
No, I found myself--
I was in the walking away.

Walls of silence,
Of guarded wariness.

Walls of hesitation,
Of experienced caution.

Walls of distrust,
Of practiced isolation.

Walls I put up intentionally.
Walls you tore down unknowingly.

Walls I found crumbled,
The door of my heart opened.

Walls I found breached,
And you were just sitting there.

Walls I had never lived without,
Suddenly seemingly unneeded.

Walls I was glad to let down,
Until you shanked my heart.

Walls I should have fortified
With anger and hate and experience.

Walls of "I know better."
Of "There are NO exceptions to the pattern."

Walls of protection,
Of much needed security.

Walls of insulation,
Of broken-heart bandaging.

Walls I won't let down again.
Thanks to you, I've learned my lesson.

She held my hand
As I put the flowers on your grave.
And I didn't understand
How the wind kept whispering your name.

I stood up on that hill
Thinking of all the things we'd done.
Down my spine ran a chill,
Trying to face what I'd become.

No one ever said it'd be like a hurricane
Rushing through my veins.
I try to hold the tears back,
But they fall like rain
Washing my sins away.

*Washing our sins away.

"I would give anything
To see you smile again."
Said my reflection in the mirror.

So would i,
my friend,
*So would i.

A sea of voices murmuring
At the ballpark in the afternoon.
Shouts of "Hot dogs! Foot-long hot dogs!"
And chanted hometown cheers
Fill the sweltering summer air.
Men with wooden sticks and leather gloves
Play a nation's beloved pastime.
And I watch enraptured by the rhythm,
Sounds and smells of this place.
Sometimes you just need a slowdown of life,
A weekend dedicated to the melding
Of past, present, and future,
A getaway into the wonderful world of
*BASEBALL.

I still remember the feeling
Of how heavy my arms weighed
As I curled up to the risers of the stairs
I couldn't pick myself up from
After collapsing from the news.
I remember eyes staring at me,
Unsure of how to respond
To the usually stoic and strong me
Bawling uncontrollably
And heaving sobs wracking my body.
I remember cautious hands
Lifting my shoulders
And dragging me to bed
Where I stayed for three straight days.
I remember haziness setting in
And the following days and weeks
All blending into one.

I remember all that
But I don't remember your face.
Funny, isn't it?
What gets seared into our brains,
And what we lose because for so long
We took its presence for granted
Until it was too late
To remember.

It's a blank canvas
waiting for paint to be
splashed
stroked
swished
splattered
slung
slapped on it.
I've got the canvas;
I've got the paint.
I've got the page;
I've got the words.
But I don't got the muse.
Or maybe I've got too much muse.
Either way, I sit here with my chicken scratch instead of a Monet.

I don't get too many phone calls,
But I didn't think much of it
When the vaguely familiar bars
Of an old popular soundtrack
Began gently drawing my attention
To my hardly-used-except-to-Google-things-
Or-play-hours-upon-hours-of-­word-games-
Unless-I'm-on-a-Netflix-binge
Smartphone,
(Which I obviously don't use as a phone,)
Because someone was calling me.
I was flabbergasted in the next heartbeat
And didn't know what to think
Say
Do
Feel
So I just stared at the screen with your name.
Stared at the flashing lights
Until it all went dark.

It took me exactly 21 years
To begin to accept my given name.
It was unique and as a kid I was...not.
I wanted to fit in, to belong, to get along
With all the other kids,
But for years, the name you gave me
Haunted every time someone called out to me.
Things changed the year I was 21.
The weight and gravity of names
Became clear and more understandable to me,
For a name is not merely an appellation
By which others in society
Are able to gain your attention,
No, names are powerful things.
They direct the thoughts and consideration
Of those we interact with
Because our name is often
Their first impression of us.
And I began to consider my name,
It's meaning,
It's origin,
The reason you named me it.
And as the knowledge grew
So did my appreciation
Until I embraced it with eagerness.

But just as I began to realize
That my name influenced how others saw me,
I began to see that what I call others
Influences me.

Your name has gone through a few transformations
In these past few years,
Much like you yourself.

On the flashing screen of my mobile
Where it first read:

mama

mom

mother

Your Given Name

Now it reads

**Do Not Answer. Ever.

You know how your heart swells
When you finally find that piece
To the puzzle that is "you"
You've been looking for all your life?

You know how your eyes close slowly
As you absorb the feeling of knowing
These are your people, this is your place,
This is your world, your universe, your home?

What about how your fingertips numb
And your brain refuses to calm down
Enough to let you sleep and rest and heal
Because it has sunk in at last:

That piece to your puzzle is lost forever,
And there will never be a place for you to belong.

That hand that gently grips your shoulder
In a soft show of support
Will always be just a touch foreign.

That encouraging smile that stretches
Across a familiar face as you try again
Will always seem a little out of place.

These people are not your people,
This place is not your home,
This is not where you belong.

Your people are gone and
Your home was destroyed,
And those who knew you
Are far and long gone.

I don't want this to be my norm.
But I don't belong anymore.

I have a hole in my stomach
And you think it's because I worry
About money or material possessions.
You take pity on me
For my young age and inexperience
And naïveity and general paucity.
You think you're magnanimous,
Benevolent and chivalrous.
To stoop to where I stand
In the gutter, covered
With the sweat and tears
And shards of a broken heart
Left behind by life's disappointments,
Stand alone with no one
To pull me up when I get knocked down
By the chaos that swirls
In the muck by my feet,
Stand weary and weakened
In body and soul
At having to combat the demons
Your memories invoke,
Stand lowered in your opinion
Because of my pauper's condition--
To stoop--a great commendation to your name.
But I don't care about your money,
Your gifts or your charity.
I've never cared about what you can do for me.
All I want is for once in our lives,
Your hand would reach out empty
Of things, of gifts, of material monies,
But full of kindness and empathy.

It's not what you do,
But who you are.

The pleasant cacophony
Of mirthful feasting
Surround and invade my soul.
In the midst of the crowd
I stand
And yet alone.
Always has it been.
Ever it will be.
It longs for belonging,
For acceptance, for connection,
My soul.
But when every attempt
At conversation falls into
Short and stilted phrase,
When every try to be friendly
Is met with cold shoulders and icy glares,
I'm left to quietly sip at some iced beverage.
And it is harshly reaffirmed:
I know I will never find what I'm looking for.
And there is no consolation in that.
Just an unrest, a disquiet,
That slips through every fiber of my heart,
And without another's notice,
I slip away
Back to the dark confines of the solitude
I have come to call home.

Cicadas' chirp chirp
Buzzing fills the night; and I
Feel winter coming.

Dark moon rising; lone
Wolf cresting mountain tree lines
As the leaves fall down.

My hands are cold, numb;
Empty palms remind me of
Broken solitude--

Once they had been warm,
Once when yours held mine. But now
You are gone. It's cold.

Long nights and short days.
Winter has come; but winter
Was already here.

I asked the stars
If it was ok to make a wish
Even in the daylight
Because I hate facing
My demons in the night.

I asked the stars
If it was ok to make a wish
Even in the daylight
Because at night the tears come
Too quickly for words to form.

I asked the stars
What price I had to pay
For my daylight wishes
To come true.

I asked the stars,
But what can stars say?
They are but light from a distant past
With no bearing whatsoever on the present.

I wonder a lot.
Even in the middle
Of a busy day at work,
My pondering cogs start to turn.
What do I think about?
Honestly, mostly you.

I wonder if you would
Recognize me if you saw
Me on the street.

I wonder if you would
Be proud of the woman
I'm molding myself into.

I wonder if you're sad
About the fact that you'll
Most likely never meet
Your grandchildren.

I wonder if you even care.

And then in the midst
Of that train of thought
Pops this:
I wonder why I'm wondering.

I could be wondering
Why baby elephants
Like to push their heads
Into mudbanks.
Or why warm water
Freezes more quickly than cold.

I could be wondering
Why the sound of minor chords
Evokes a deeply
Haunting feeling.
Or why white is the absence of all color,
While black is the presence of all color.

I could be wondering
About politics, religion, myths,
Relationships, love, life,
Me.

Instead
I'm sitting here
Thinking about you.

Which is infinitely depressing
When I know
You don't even give a **** 'bout me.

I was just beginning to reconsider
Your current status in my life.
I've kept you at the edge, the periphery,
For quite a period of time now,
And I was starting to think
Maybe I had made a mistake.
Then you used me again
And it all came crashing back...

The way you'd ask me to dinner
Then show up three hours late. No apology.
The way you'd ask me to do you a favor,
Then never say, "Thank you." Not once.
The way you'd promise I was your family,
Then refused to talk to me. Not ever.

At first I thought it was me:
I wasn't good enough,
I have horrible personality inadequacies,
I'm not worth anyone's love,
And some days, I still think all that's true.
But some days, I realize
It's not just me.

You never thought about how I felt
Sitting alone at the restaurant
Waiting for hours for you to show up
Only to give up and order and eat alone.

You never thought about how I felt
Letting my guard down one more time
Because you felt lonely, needed a friend,
But no one else was around to support you
So you asked me to give you another chance,
And I would knowing that you wouldn't know
How big a risk I was willing to take
To open my heart to you again
Because, well, it was you.

You live your life according to the motto:
Some people were meant to come in
And go out of your life;
They weren't meant to stay.
But I don't think you know how lame
Of an excuse that is for you to just leave
People behind when you've finished using them.

You are not the kind of person
Who supports and loves and cares.
You use and leave and take for granted.

So the next time you call and ask a favor,
I'm going to say, "sorry, wrong number.
There's no one here who can help you."

10 years, 17 days, 5 hours, 29 minutes and 48 seconds.
But who's counting?
I mean isn't that a super cheesy thing to do?
To count how long it's been since I realized
That I was over heads and heels
In love with you.
I guess I'm a cheeseball. shrug

38.2 times an hour.
Sure it's just a guesstimate,  
But I don't think I could actually count
The number of times I think of you.
So I should really just say "infinity".

7 out of 10 "Thank you's"
I say a day is to you and for you.
To you: you saved my life that day.
To you: you save my life every day.
For you: you are so...AMAZING.
For you: you're the best man I know.

26 years of struggling with the human life.
20 years of a broken, beaten body and soul.
But...
6 hours of willing suffering.
3 days of death.
Then...
1 "yes."

To the Man who knows my heart
Better even than i do myself,
To the Man who loves to bind my wounds
When i can't bear to look at them,
To the Man who makes me laugh
When i least expect to even smile,
To the Man whose broad shoulders
Have been the hanky for my many tears,
To the Man who loved me
Before i ever knew He existed,
To Him I say,
Yes.

I wish you knew how you undo me.
I wish you knew how you unravel my senses.
I wish you knew how you untangle my thoughts.
I wish you knew how you still affect me
  When you are now but a mere memory.

I wish you knew my memory of you
  Changes with time, as memories are wont to do.
I wish you knew my recollection of you
  Fades with every recall, as clarity is apt to flee.
I wish you knew my impression of you
  Diminishes with the years, as life is accustomed to.

For you are but a shadowed face in the past,
A silhouetted figure encased in the bygone days,
A man I thought I knew and will never see again.

I saw this video
Of a T-Rex chasing a Jeep
Through a parking lot
And I laughed.
No. I threw my head back and guffawed.
Because it was so ******* funny.
And my first thought was
"She'd love to see this video!"
But before I could finish that thought,
I began to cry
Tears I didn't know still existed in my eyes;
Because I instantly remembered
You're not here anymore
To laugh with me about
T-Rexes chasing Jeeps
Through abandoned parking lots.
And that isn't ******* funny
To me.

I waited for you
By the bridge
We used to sneak under
To play with firecrackers
And tell ghost stories
Under the pale light
Of the full moon.

I waited until
June bugs and crickets
Filled the summer breeze
With their chirping buzz buzz buzz.

I waited until
Glow bugs twinkled
In a floating mirror image
To the starlight above.

I waited until
The scarlet hues of dawn
Began to saturate the sky,
And the glowing ball of light
Greeted gently the world below.

And when the sun was fully up,
So was my time to wait.
And though my footsteps dragged
As I meandered
Back through the quiet streets
We grew up racing our skateboards down,
I couldn't help but think

When I look to the sky
Something tells me you're here with me
*And you make everything alright.

I wake up and take a deep breath but most days it barely helps to ease the sharp stabbing pain in my heart.
I get up and stumble to the bathroom where I’ve written “Cheer up, Charlie” on the mirror to remind myself that all is not lost.
But when I get there, my head is hung too low to see the mirror and the words that are meant to support and encourage.
I get dressed slowly but not because I care about what I’m putting on.
Most days I grab something from the hamper and make sure it’s not too smelly.
By then my morning ritual is almost done.
I’m just missing one last piece.
I look up at the clock and take another deep breath.
Here goes nothing to start and get through another day.
With that breath, I slide the mask into place and walk out the door to go to work where no one will notice the pain, the sorrow, the brokenness.
The mask is my savior, my hiding place, my peace from all the chaos, for even though I know what it hides, I choose to be disillusioned by it.
I choose to see myself as whole, as untouched by you, as loved, as happy, as friendly, as…as me.
And for twelve carefree hours in my day, I can believe the lies I’m telling to the world:
That I’m ok even though you’re gone.
That I’m just fine even though the person who said they’d never go abandoned me too.
That I’m fit as a fiddle even though this ulcer is eating me from the inside out and I just don’t care because you don’t either.
That I’m happy living on my own even though I confessed to you all my fears of living alone, but that didn’t stop you from up and leaving.
That I’m strong enough to pick up the pieces of my broken heart and somehow put them back together even though I don’t even know where all the pieces are.
But then the end of the day comes and I find myself standing in the middle of my bedroom again.
I begin the evening ritual with dread filling every pore of my being.
I change into my pajamas, I brush my hair, I wash my face.
And then I take off my mask.
That last piece.
I fall on my bed exhausted from the pretense of the day.
I fall on my bed exhausted from holding back the tears all day.
I fall on my bed exhausted from missing you.
I fall on my bed exhausted from still loving you.
And then I cry.
I cry for the girl who never knew the life she dreamed for could be this painful.
I cry for the girl who thought she had finally found someone she could rely on only to find her judge of character was grossly wrong.
I cry for the girl who wanted many things from life but now would give all that up just to have you back.
I cry for me.
I cry for you.
I cry for us.
And then in the midst of my crying, I sleep.
I sleep with dreams of you and me.
I sleep with nothingness.
I sleep only for a short while as has become my habit.
And then I wake up and take a deep breath.
A deep breath and it begins again.
Did you know?
No?
Well…now you do.

I write for no one.
My cadence and rhyme,
My similes and metaphors,
My free verse and sonnets,
My poetry is not for you.

I write for no one.
My word painted masterpieces
Of lyrical brilliance
With balanced tone depth
And rich hues of experience
Are not on display for you.

I write for no one.
My sidewalk art is not for sale.
My music scores are private.
My dance moves are copyrighted.
And no one can make me share.

I write for no one.
But I reserve the right to be...
Contradictory.

I write for that little ******* the slide
Who is wearing denim overall shorts
Because it's 1991 and that's what people do.

I write because she had a dream
Once of being loud and obnoxious,
And I'd like to support her dream.

I write for that teenager
Riding her skateboard at midnight in A-town,
Because it's 2001 and she's got nothing better to do.

I write because she made a plea
Twice with me,
And I'd like to save her if I can.

I write for that college graduate
Who sits in the crowd, proud,
Because it's 2010 and people got some living to do.

I write because she lost a bet
And needed a way out of being muzzled,
So I agreed to be her voice.

I write for no one.
I write for me.