My lover asks me:
"What is the difference between me and the sky?"
The difference, my love,
Is that when you laugh,
I forget about the sky.

How Much Gets Me On A Bus?  to the City?
          (I live 30 minutes away)

more than this ever will - POETRY
I’ve been writing ‘poems’ ever since I remember
ever since 11 –
reciting these phenomenal words of wisdom
to any and all who would listen
forcing family-members & friends

that’s the thing about poetry,
it makes you feel like it’s important,
makes you think the words you sling together
aren’t really yours
it comes to you, through you, needs to come out of you,
and when its over you’re just as amazed
as they should be.

but they’re not, I mean
they like poetry, admire it,
even enjoy it sometimes,
but they could honestly
give it up in a heartbeat,
live without it.
You know what I mean?

I’m like you
like all the people who come here
I'm part poetry as poetry is me
A Dodge Poetry Attendee many years –
my arm once around Gwendolyn Brooks,
cried in a church with Lucille Clifton
talked Newark to Baraka –
know the honorable Slammer, Patricia Smith!

I’ve sat many years with the Lords of Literature - my professors
who all seemed to know “whose got it”
the intellectuals of American prose who seem to be searching for a rookie,
the next best troubadour college-student that will grace their faculty-doors…

The poetry I read here is incredible
Some of the best stuff on the net,
poignant, painful , honest, raw, sensual, serious – provokingly real

words I read here startle me, stun me at times
so clear in meaning, well-crafted, chosen words
unusually strong

They’re the kind of words the got-it people have,
the poet people (probably all people have)
poetry is just another way of finding an infallible song –

(I still say we should go sing it on the bus!)

Is it weird for me to say
That I really love your lips?
But I don't have to kiss them
I just want to trace them
With my eyes
With my finger tips,
And just admire them
And they way they form words
Or the way your cigarette smoke
Just slowly creeps between them.
Then they smile
That gorgeous smile..
That they create as you exhale.
But maybe if it's okay
Not too much to ask
I would really love if I could..
Can I trace them with my lips, too?

I've been told that it's not okay, and I've been told that it's a sin.
I've been told not to worry, that God looks for beauty within.
I've been told that it's a choice, some say wrong, others right.
I've been told I could be "Cured", if only I'd see the light.
Some people awkwardly avoid me, others rush to be my friend.
As I've been told, it doesn't matter. it's all the same in the end.
It seems that everyone around me has something about it to say,
but honestly, most of them wouldn't even know me,
if they didn't know that I was gay.

I live on misery street
With misery homes
And misery rooms
And misery men
Making misery memories
With their misery mistresses
To forget their misery lives
And their misery jobs
With their misery bosses
And misery coworkers
Working to get their misery pay
So they can feed their misery kids
So they can focus at misery school
And get misery grades
So they can have misery lives of their own.
I live on misery street
Where misery isn't misery at all.
Misery is routine.

People are never just people
Have you ever sat in a circle
With a group of acquaintances
You've known a few days --
You met at a camp, or a club, or a journey --
And stayed up all night?
Truth or dare, no holds barred, no limits
Besides the basic decency of humanity?

Have you ever
Done so many things you're ashamed of
And so many things you're proud of
In one night
That you have no idea what you feel?
Fear, the pounding thrill of breaking rules,
The sweet rebellion of being different,
The intoxication of belonging?
But mostly,
The love -- the broken
Brothers and sisters in your circle
Going from middle-school dares
To their family's secrets,
Their darkest fears,
And most poignant dreams
The sweet kiss of hello
Tinged with the bitter poison of goodbye.

I learned something tonight.
I learned that the "****" is funny and smart,
That the "goth" is brave and strong,
That I am beautiful.
Apparently.
I learned that people are afraid of being known
But they are even more afraid
Of being alone
And sooner or later, we have to trust someone.

You learn so much
When you break the rules.
I am sad. The night is almost over,
And morning tastes of farewell
To all the soulmates
I've only just met
The ten of us
Teenagers, in a dark room
With only a flashlight,
Defying the power of dawn
Defying fear and pain and regret
By refusing to say goodbye.
Not yet.
We have three hours left.
One. One-half.
Ten minutes. Five.
We will never say goodbye.