The random mysteries in the universe are unrelated.
Pure lies

I rarely edit my work
I prefer the fresh
green
words that sprout in the moment
There is something disingenuous to me
about letting someone
even a later self
uproot and replant my ideas

My mother wants me to
let the editors inside
she wants me to open my sanctuary
to the norms
the opinions
the pen
of the world

I'm afraid to touch my own words
because god loves ugly
because
I
love ugly
what would happen
if I let
them
touch my thoughts?

I think therefor I am
so if they help me think
am I still?

give me your downcast, your ugly, your broken
the grit and the grime of your teeming mind
I lift    my       pen, I peel back the wool
this is life, there is no golden door of escape

complacency is sickness
have I found it
of from it do I flee?

See the beauty within your core.
Speak nothing but the truth.
Listen, only to the same.
And feel nothing but the warmth of love unseen.

"hey *******, let's meet"
        i'm glad you've come to that premise
                the rain - its slick concrete
                     and so narrow
               staining the streets,
                  i would shelter you
        but here we are
                at coffee dropping hello's
          and following the pack
             to high ground
i would
keep
my
scarf
wrapped
'round
my
pretty
head
from melting in the rain turning to snow
        but little did i know
          i should have given it to you
to keep you from turning the snow red as strawberries
        these fall days you'll never know, here we go again
                to define a relationship whose particular lusters ferry
                        us together, i don't see an end, but if you bend i'll know when
to go.
i like the way you smile, here in this quiet coffeehouse
        despite you arguing with me, that is the cornucopia i offer

It’s a marvel—
how the human heart
can continue to want that same something
that so willingly smashed it to a thousand pieces.
It’s a wonder how it still beats
as it watches that something
meticulously plaster each of those
one thousand fragments onto its
mural of damaged conquests.

But the heart is in good company, I guess.
At least its own pieces have a commonality
with its surrounding neighborly shards.
Together they can be sharp and exude mystery—
no longer desired to be touched or examined
by the pairs of eyes that closely study their edges.

That something? He steps back.
With a grin ear to ear, he
enjoys the whole of his piecemeal creation.
With his beautiful hands,
he forces all of them to fit together,
Reminiscing as he watches them dry,
cementing them to memory,
telling his tales of pushes and pulls,
of warmth and chills.
Damage, his only true medium,
he finds much easier to manipulate than oils or pastels,
and that something, he is a master of his craft.

He contorts each of us into his own work of art,
fixed for the public eye with sticky regret
and dried by the countless nights of cold wonder.
And we wait, patiently, until his craftsmanship folds.
Until the plaster chips and crumbles.
Each of our pieces falling to the ground
in the hopes that someone will
pick us up, pocket us,
and appreciate the sullen beauty
in something that once was whole.