Hey Dixie.
You were pretty
Smart, weren't
You?

You packed up
And left your
Dead end town
Deadened life.

Hey Dixie.
You were pretty
Sad, weren't
You?

Girls like
You, girls like
Us are
Often sad.

Hey Dixie.
You were pretty
Scared, weren't
You?

Ran, you ran
And I never found
Out if you ever caught
Up with yourself.

Hey Dixie.
You were pretty
Strong, weren't
You?

Stronger than the
Coffee and whiskey
Stronger than your
Lipstick lullabies.

Hey Dixie.
You and I are
Not the same
Are we?

You had a heart
And I've got a soul
Yet you took the
Easy way out.

Hey Dixie.
I guess you were
Pretty smart
Huh?

I've been staring out of this
Hole in the wall
For about
936 weeks.

I say
Hole in the wall
Because they replaced
The window
About
Two years ago.

The frame is
Different, more
Energy and
Efficiency.

Same wires, trees
Night and day and seasonal
Intermittent poser runway.

Headlights, I counted the
Headlights once
Once.

Gray skies
Snow and sunshine
The frozen summer exile of
My focus.

I've been staring out of this
Hole in the wall
For about
937 weeks.

I'm just a girl
Lying on back road pavement
A girl with cold fingers
And pink hair.

Read my walls.

I stay up all night
Writing papers I hate and
I hold what hurts
Tight inside wooly blankets.

Read my walls.

I'm just a girl
A face in a shiny restaurant
An icon on your screen
A flannel-denim conversation.

Read my walls.

Read my walls, every crack around
The edge of the molding, the way the
Bumps cast their shadows, every chip in
The paint, every scratch, every letter.

Read my walls.

We all want love, we all
Want recognition and I'm not
Worth half of what anyone has
To give.

But please
Read my walls.

Fall break came at the perfect time. And it's a memory I'll cherish forever -- waterfalls and falling leaves and sunshine and cold waterbottles and plaid flannel shirts named Rufus and milk bottles and miles of blue sky. Monday. Rain on my umbrella, smile for the camera. Tuesday. And then like waking up from a magical dream, blue carpets and textbooks and shifty-eyed girls in Ugg boots and my anxiety. Wednesday. Back to studying for midterms and I'll throw in a pair of borrowed shoes.

I've got hours to wait, so I went outside and Ron said "it's people like me and you who give a **** that'll get A's." Then I went back in and found a side hallway. I wrote down what he said and listened to the janitorial staff. She opened the supply closet and told her friend "come into my office" with a laugh. Five minutes later they came back out talking about how Jamie was ******* about them at nights but it looked to me that they were more ******* about Jamie, and whoever she is, she's apparently worthless. And I wonder if this is how to make friends, by chilling with the cleaning ladies. Actually, that would be a family tradition. Is this how you find your niche?

Now they've moved from talking about Jamie to school shootings and all the good cleaning closets to hide in. And I wonder if this is why I spent 17 years "sheltered", because I'd rather be safe than normal. I'm writing all of this in the back of my science notebook because when I write my fingers don't feel the need to pull at my scalp. Rifle my hair, maybe, but no snapping. And I have 45 minutes before I get another hour to wait.

Sometimes I walk by the art department and I always want to go in, but what would someone like me be doing there? I'm not an artist by any sketch of the imagination. But it's always dark in there and I wonder what goes on in that back hallway. Like this back hallway where I'm sitting with these collegiate white cinderblock walls. How much misery from the cleaning crews have they heard?

Everyone says I'll find my niche, but it's looking to me like all I'll ever find is empty corners and solitary benches. People are okay, but the only person I really have to fall back on seems to be myself.

It's so
yellow
The walls are
all yellow
It's so
empty
And I can't
look up from the
Golden
table.

I guess I just
don't have
Anything
to say.

It's got some
yellow
Sticking my toes
between strands of
Scratchy acrylic
my mother's words
An unintentional reminder of
who I am not.

Sunlight
yellow
Containers
yellow
I DON'T HAVE
THE PATIENCE
to pick at the beaded
lint
MAKE IT ALL STOP
YELLOWING

I won't
yellow
I'll be
YELLING
screaming
IT'S ALL
yellow.

It's two a.m. and I'm suddenly thinking about how what we love most can make us the saddest. Out-of-state asphalt can't help me now. And I'm not upset about what I've lost, I'm upset about the things I can't lose, no matter how hard I try.

It hurts in the sense of being shot up with Novocaine and knowing you should feel pain but can't. It hurts like having fingernails that aren't short and playing my brother's guitar when he's not home -- uncomfortable and exciting. And I've been in bed for the last eight hours, but there's no way I can sleep now. Not when I'm consumed by all the petty facts of failure I define myself by.

I was crying this morning as I put on my makeup, and I'm still not sure if it was the eyeliner or the song playing. My face just deteriorated from there and I'm emotionally drained of all motivation to do anything but hide under an old afghan or shrink into a huge sweatshirt on my kitchen floor.

Good grief, it's just flannel, it didn't really matter. But it was her flannel, then it was my flannel, then it was my friend's flannel. Now it's just flannel, and who knows who should have it. I'm just doubting my own sanity. Every second is like reading my walls a hundred times and feeling it the same every minute.

I was expecting to write a lot of sad poetry but I wasn't expecting to be too sad to write poetry. And I don't want to move from this spot, but I guess I'll have to in the next two weeks, even though I might shake uncontrollably in the middle of the night when the lights are out. I'm not losing my mind, it's falling out, I swear.

I bought a paper
Bag of sunshine
Stood on dry pavement in
An early autumn rainstorm
And let the damp crush it
Crumpled brown paper bag.

I remember a car trip in
A vehicle similar to this one
And how I had notebook paper and
A purple pen with purple ink
I guess that old Barbie pen was
My first love.

Honestly, my nose is cold but
It's not raining
And my socks are keeping
Me and my massive sweatshirt warm.

Pink braid, pink shoes
I'd like to think I'm wiser
As wise as the owl on my keys
Too wise to write a letter like I did.

Part you, part her
Part him, part them
Part coffee breath but mostly
I wrote this brown paper poem.

I'm making a
Mental list.

It includes high-pitched noises
And dried up creek beds
A few gallons of orange juice
And an empty tube of toothpaste.

I'm bold enough to add some
Paper bags and that time in an
August rainstorm with you and
The moon when it's blood red.

Recently it's acquired a canister of
Powdered sugar, a slew of people I
Was too afraid to talk to and several
More who I wasn't.

The receptionist I smile at and
An empty bench where I sometimes sit
And the feeling of hands covered in
Acrylic paint.

I'm making a
Mental list.

But now I'm moving it
To paper, a list
Of things I never
Write poetry about.

There are moments I'll
Remember.

Like the bellyaching laughter on the
Living room floor when I said
Eisenhower, ****** and Giovanni Arnolfini and
His bride negotiated at Camp David.

Like sitting in an old Chevvy
Van with a half empty Starbucks
Cup, singing along to a song I'd
Never heard before.

Like dancing on the hot
Asphalt that has seen so much of
Us, and falling neatly enough to
Put me on crutches.

Like sitting in a bedroom that
Looked vaguely like mine when her
Boyfriend decided he would play
My guitar.

Like perfect
Complete and
Utter
Silence.

There are moments I'll
Remember.

I didn't ever write a
Journal entry about last Wednesday night.

It was strange, the dampness
In the air and the cough in
My throat, and the whole world felt
Empty and deadened.

She didn't really want to
Go, and I guess I didn't either, now
That I think about it, after
All I could have been writing a paper.

But I had my alterior
Motives, which fell through and
I wanted to get out of the
House, to clear my stuffy head.

So we walked, like two girls who
Can survive on their own mistakes
And then after awhile
We walked back.

But we walked to the little
Playground instead of home because I guess
For nine-thirty at night we were
Both a little unsettled.

And we talked about God and I
Looked at the leaves on the
Pavement and thought about how different the
Uniform Methodist windows were from ours.

The whole thing smells like chlorine, which is extremely unsettling because chlorine always tastes green and a lot like hereditary paranoia. These pants were only two washes  removed from brand new, and now there's a slit in the knee, a slit as precise as the shape my eyes make when I'm suspicious of wanderlusting newcomers who moonlight in my former prison cell.  And I'm unsure if I should call it like I'd like it to be and say the **** things were defective or if I should investigate further as to where I placed my legs while hacking bits of plastic.

I'm TIRED of hacking at bits of plastic. I daresay if things start looking up, I could get there. I'm desperate, while this pumpkin-leaf hole grows in my chest, I'm realizing I'll never get to Lancaster at this rate. Sure, sure, I'm obsessed. I also have a blonde tail hanging from a tack on my shelf and a lot of cards tacked to my wall. They either resemble a quilt, a window or a complete mess.

I'm relying on plastic cups and the Internet to continuously foster this false sense of belonging. And I don't want to shatter it, but I'm terrified by the threat of a midterm and I feel trapped by my own sky. I mean, have you SEEN the prices for quaint bed and breakfasts? But the sad truth is, I would be haunted by insurmountable guilt at leaving her behind. The cash flow isn't flowing, either. I'm thinking I'll have to forget about it and sit at my shiny laptop on an empty desk, staring at the cottage cheese ceiling and wondering if God is looking back.

There's a lot of mercy out there
For sinners like me
But a lot of things are going on
That I won't let you see
While I'm too afraid
To seize this day
Well, I swear I'm not
The girl in this glass box

Once there was a time
We were sons and daughters
But men, like lambs
Get led to the slaughter
I'm so afraid of falling
In this love I don't deserve
But I'm gonna die if I don't accept
This grace I didn't earn

There's a lot of forgiveness due
That I don't have the means to pay
It's hard to know that any blood but mine
Could take this pain away
But I can't sneak out
One more back door route
And though I don't lie
I've still got a lot to hide

Once there was a time
We were sons and daughters
But men, like lambs
Get led to the slaughter
I'm so afraid of falling
In this love I don't deserve
But I'm gonna die if I don't accept
This grace I didn't earn

Cause I can't live on front row chairs and pinned on prayers
My good deeds, historic creeds, Thursday night salvation
And I've gotta shake this fourth-floor faith
But I'm drowning in alternative translations

Words have always been an effective method of construction. In fact, if I ever wanted to build a wall, I would use nothing but my shoddy verbal and written constructs, and it would be stronger than my willpower and higher than the same wall you've built for yourself.

I keep saying I'm just tired, but you're disputing that fact and I'm sleeping at nights as if nothing were wrong, but when I sleep like that, I know it's all wrong. I don't miss the way things used to be, I miss the way I used to be.

I've got this ridiculous theory that you can love someone without being in love. Call me crazy, right? There's got to be some kind of distinction, but with you, the lines don't make sense. And I can't imagine a world of mine without you in it.

I'd like an out, a kind of escape from the harsh truth that you're a boy, and I'm a girl and our skies don't line up. I've got a long driveway with a lot of trees and stars above them, and you've got a life trajectory that doesn't include me and never will. The second you realize there's a hole in your pocket is the second you know that you lost your hope.

Mowers that bump and buses that jolt are two things that cause anxiety. Sometimes the only way to reach me is through my poetry, my cracks and chips. Hand me a sledgehammer, we're all crumbling anyway.

The sky was tilting and dipping downward and if it hadn't been so beautiful, I would have assumed it to be a tornado. The way the clouds clustered and swirled into a hole directly above Pennsylvania reminded me of when you shut the bathtub drain and rinse the soapsuds out of your hair, then open it back up and watch it vortex away.

Like I said, I've never seen Lancaster at night, but I'm assuming it's lovely. At least, it must feel lovely. How lovely can anything really be in the dark? But if you think about it, even little old ladies have a nightlife, they play bingo and then go to bed. What more could I ask for? A pencil that doesn't attempt ****** on a sheet of drawing paper? Because every pencil I have keeps trying to **** something inside me that's trying very hard to stay alive.

It's strange to be in someone else's shoes, and even stranger when they fit. If you ever want to trade teddy bears for the weekend, I'm down.

I haven't cried since April 24th, but lately every time I start thinking about life, my eyes get damp and my expensive eyeliner starts running onto my cheeks. And speaking of eyes, my lids are always feeling sleepy and puffy and my lashes frequently weigh down my entire body. I'm trying to see the bright side, but all I've got over here is a cup of mistemperatured coffee and a dimming world that I already extracted all the poetry from. Somebody get me to Lancaster this fall, I'm thinking a slew of unfamiliar parking lots might lift this insufferable fog, and maybe you'll become my Seattle.

this one is for every poem
lost in the digital age by
a mere slip of the finger, a
faulty web browser, your notorious
lapse of wifi, the convenience of
an anti-analog world, and now
a moment of silence.

It was a strange thing to throw a house party for birds, especially since no one showed up. I was left sipping honeycomb champagne and gawking at the colored glass bubbles descending from the sky. And I thought it odd that a car dealer would care enough about my obsession with old VHS tapes to throw a few onto the cruise ship. Never mind the fact that with all I had paid on fixing my transmission of thought, I was dead broke and looking for a summertime getaway closer to downtown and nearer to autumn.

The things I'd like to do if I could paint. I would construe a white front porch in repurposed chair caning and glue it to a canvas, mottled in shapes and light. Or maybe it would take multiple canvasses to hold what I consider to be the best image of a future. Perhaps a patio with an overgrown garden would do the trick, and I would be just another loner.

Will anyone remember when we were children and we dug a canal by putting the dirt into paper cups and leaving it in the forest? You can't deny that life was easier before I ingested that Matisse print hanging on the graying wall. All these skewed angles and les possions sont rouge make for a bit of a stomachache.

I have a question for you to ponder as it gets dark. If I were to fill a swimming pool with blotchy pastel hues and sit in it as if it were a motel jacuzzi, would I receive some kind of tye-dyed epiphany or would I just catch a chill?

I'm not a fan of spatulas, not when the pancakes burn and their gilt edges look pretentious. Perhaps ostentatious is a better word when mahogany is used in the kitchen. I feel a lot of guilt, mostly over silly things I can't change, so sew me a quilt of pockets in which to store my regrets.

I won't say I got especially drunk, but a few nights later there was a skunk, and I'm thinking that if you had stopped to ask his name, he would have introduced himself as Alfred. However, all this talk of individuality has got me thinking of the polyester comforter in beige she sewed and how there was once that mix-up with my former Sunday school teacher and a national holiday that didn't exist. Does a bigger beard make a man a better prophet?

When a person stops to contemplate a grass blade, the whole world opens up in wonder. What good does greenery do? I'm telling you, it's not so much the greenery and more the change of scenery that's what makes a person whole. Thankfulness won't come in pieces, and God's grace is one of those intricate jigsaw puzzles spread out on a table in your heart as it gets glued with love and matted and framed with goodness.

It's not that I'm in love with my billing office, it's just that I'm thinking of someone else when I put the stamp on. And I've tried to keep my thoughts quiet, but forget wearing my heart on my sleeve, I'm a bank window with paper cutout promises. But if you ever think of me, I'm thinking you might have a deficit on your account.

Just because there's no way I left the oven on when I left the house doesn't mean I don't have the right to check.

There's spotlights
And track lights
And ambient
Wall lights.

And my feet always feel
Closer to the ground in here.

Chairs and floors and
I am not getting anywhere.

Throbbing, my head, make
It stop, plug my
Ears and hide my face
In darkness.

Drumbeats, reverberating
Through the furniture, make it
Stop, just
TURN OFF THE NOISE.

I swear, I will keep
My back against this wall
Until something happens, and I
Swear, something will happen.

There's spotlights
And track lights
And ambivalent
Wall lights.

On sunshiny mornings I'll
Perch myself on the edge of
The sink and look past the
Basil and cyclamen
Past the stained glass birds
And rainbow crystals
And I will look at the trees
As I feel the poetry and taste cold pizza.

When it starts to rain I
Will brew myself a blue mug of expensive
Imported tea and sit upon the
Unswept linoleum as I listen to the
Refrigerator rumble behind my head
And the rain echo in sheets on the skylight.

And once in awhile a
Stray drop comes through the window.

If I ever find myself lonely
I'll take the six minutes back to the
Place that never sleeps and
Drape myself on the humming stairs with my other half
To remind myself that
Solitude is a gift.

People change but
Houses stay the same.

There is much to be found
When you stop sitting in chairs
And realize that the place you call
Home is a place to feel safe.

Loathing upon the
Object of awaking in the
Summertime can be quite
Tenacious.

Dreamy eyes of browns
Opaque ceramic coffee cups in
Grassy fields by
Tired blackberry bushes
And, most of all, a
Gaping sensation of finality and
Sunshine.

Now I'm wondering if I will
Ever find as
Vibrant a friend as you and your
Reasonable explanations, for lack of a better word.

Flying, close your eyes and
On you'll go, far over the skyscrapers, you'll find
Utopia, and I'll find our conversations of
November through June, and drink a thousand cups of your
Dark roast.

Maybe it's strange, but I'll miss your 10 a.m.
Eyelashes and all our lovely times.

Of all the things I am
I am not insane.

The reservoir is rising
And I'm sweating in my
Dress and white sneakers
And the sky is turning gray.

At least there are breezes
By the lake, although
I had a breakdown in the car
When Henry wasn't real.

Lele left me for Larry
And I'm struggling to write
Your prose as my own
Poem thoughts.

If it rains on the
Water I will never
Forgive the person who built
The glass cafe.

All the plastic communion cups in my purse
Cracked.

Prop my feet up on the dash
Make another societal
Faux pas and take one last sip of
Chandelier staircase filmstrips.

This kayak of mine
Has tipped.

I know how to question
Authority
Now someone teach me to question
Reasonably
Why everyone settles for
Mediocrity.

I'm not
Passive
But I get
Aggressive
When society becomes
Dismissive.

Art is not a
Perforation
On an
Illustration
Of paper-doll cutouts of
Creation.

But somewhere we lost
Authenticity
With our former
Intricacies
And were stripped of all
Legitimacy.

I sat in the silence of a
Room eight times larger than I know
And I absorbed the six hundred
Empty chairs.

And I wrapped myself in
Miles of white fabric
And learned the feeling of
Sitting on an escalator.

The clean lines and plate-glass sunshine
Of Hermes's aqueduct
A secret passage everyone knows
You cannot fade into floral carpet.

It is a jaunty expression
To consume a length of sub sandwich
While strolling down an ally
Aware you may get mugged.

And over the years I have begun
To believe that teenage girls
Should not have camera phones
With their sneaky minds.

Somewhere along the line I learned
How to think, that silence
Is a virtue and precisely the best
Way to be alone.

I will never forget
The chandeliers of
Trapped Christmas lights
Painted in a warm glow.

Hook your arm in mine to
Stroll upon this concrete
And we will share this half
Gallon of lukewarm milk.

I would greatly enjoy
Drinking a full bottle
Of blue sky, with
Cloud cubes.

And as a youngest
Quasi-only child
I have no basis
Upon which to babysit.

I keep a pocket-sized
Terrace with me
At all times
Purely for the flowers.

And it would be a
Jolly thing to have
An eight-year old
Dream come true.

On rare occasions
I wear dresses
And walk sedately
Through fields.

And once in awhile
The bird on my leg
Is a massive swallowtail
And tries to fly a feathery airplane.

I've a cache of four youth leaders
In the back of my mind
But it's best to keep
Them in the dark.

My fascination with
Binder clips
Just won't leave
My desk.

I swear, I do not
Remember last summer.

I also don't remember
The last four sermons in my psyche.

I will wear this
Nose ring like a princess
But I'm afraid
Of panic attacks and frosted doughnuts.

The water vaporizer and
The narwhals
Frequently run off together
And go to Somalia for Christmas.

I'm begging you not
To remind me of the Chevy t-shirt
Because I cannot get the
Ketchup and pasta off my reasons.

Gold glitter
Only stays on the ceiling
When the upholstery is gray.

Church gyms are suddenly
Piggy banks to play
Basketball upon.

I will draw a city on
The bulletin board
And owl pushpins will inhabit it.

My mind is no longer in a
Casing of gray rick-rack
And suppositions I do not feel.

It is a precarious thing to
Play a solar piano
Under the midday sky.

Have you ever heard
A pumpkin-flavored
Volkswagen van?

It happened suddenly
That everything I could possibly
See became a photography contest.

Once in awhile
I feel inclined
To stay up all night
Writing stanzas like this.

And having drunk three
Shimmering tumblerfulls of
Self-doubting coffee
The prospect seems alive.

The longer I stay
Awake
The sooner I can
Reinvent myself.

My body is
Changing
And so is my
Soul.

And I'm beginning to see
Where I went wrong
In this world where I
Raised myself to be right.

However, if I stay awake
One cannot forget the issue of
Filled notebooks, attractive men
And tomorrow's frosted gaze.

Perhaps I will shower in
Whole-grain mustard at three a.m.

Tempted
I was tempted to
Walk away, to
Sit in this empty
Car, with rain on the windows
Forever.

But then the shocking
Confession was made for me
That I still sleep with a
Naked teddy bear and these
Archaic sheets of
Translucent obsessions.

I am not myself
Or a number on a scale
Or the lonely midnights
Drinking milkshakes in empty
Diners, alone but for
Those neon lights.

Those lonely midnights
That do not yet exist
And the vacant burns
Of vanity
Inscribed upon my
Favorite caveman.

I spent awhile
In a honey-barbeque
Chicken salad of
Cynicism.

And then one day
Instead of Frank
I was no longer Bryan
But a better version of my Mondays.

Or was it the
Lesser form a
Thursday takes
When you're alone?

I have a desire
Shaded in the glow
Of a stained glass
Display an hour away.

A wish, shrouded in
These filmy layers
Of forgotten words
And remembered sayings.

To be half of one
And twice of me
So I stopped seeing stars
And dropped the peace-sign for a dash.

Reinvented myself
To break all molds
And here I stand, slightly
More intact, I'm back.

Give me approximately
Seven seconds
To sit on
The universe.

It may take
A lifetime of walks
In green gardens.

Or perhaps ten years
Of white front
Porches.

But I will stand
Upon the red
Roof of this
Convertible.

Against the blue sky
And yellow tulips
These primary colors
Will be etched.

Etched
Not upon
May
But purely upon
The defeated
Twilight sky.

Lukewarm mugs of
Mocha
On papery thin
Napkins.

Warm cubes of
Sunshine
On honey wooden
Tables.

I swear my coffee
Never goes cold.

But this morning I found
You gone.

And there was a
Gray sky on the
Honey wooden table.

Only one cup of
Black coffee on a
Single stained napkin.

Because not just the coffee
No, the whole
Scene
Had gone cold.

Line up the
Bottles on your dresser
Ordered
And measured
Have the water
Lines gone down?

So much perfume
So little time
So much bodyspray, our
Well-scented crimes.

Can I smell
Better than the
Next girl?
Should today be
"Fruited Almond Flower Quell"
Or "Coconut Island Sugar Swirl"?

What does it matter?
Just bathe in it
There's always tomorrow for
"French Hibiscus Pomegranate".

Because we're all just
Femme fatales
Or maybe our nostrils
Can no longer smell.

"He's a pushover," you grumbled
As you swung starboard
"I've never seen anyone so
Slippery in magic."

"Beastly," I agreed, "simply beastly
Like a competition with those
Seven unenchantments."

"He broke the boundaries!"
You swore, took a long
Swig from your jar and
Ambled to the prow.

I said nothing more but simply
Thought to myself as I looked to
The afternoon of leather and ropes.

Empty church chairs
Keep the light on upstairs
You said You had a plan
But here's the moving van
And I wonder why I ever cried
To leave these halls and whitewashed walls
And learn to be.

Woodgrain runs through the patterns of my youth
And I keep running from the truth
Those hundred and eighty eyes were blind
To what they put me through
The truth, the truth
I just keep running from You.

Dewy morning haze
Lazy pajama days
We just need perspective
To find our real objective
And I wonder why I ever tried
To fit myself into that shell
They made of me.

Woodgrain runs through the patterns of my youth
And I keep running from the truth
Those hundred and eighty eyes were blind
To what they put me through
The truth, the truth
I just keep running from You.

I can play the victim well
Walking on the line between Heaven and Hell
We're living in this great divide
Of time and space and sin and pride
To take a stand you will need nerve
So choose today who you will serve.

Woodgrain runs through the patterns of my youth
And I keep running from the truth
Those hundred and eighty eyes were blind
To what they put me through
The truth, the truth
The truth
The truth is that
I can't stop running from You.

Sunday morning monologues
Front row fixtures
Dreamy papercup dialogues
And cracked tile constellations.

It's safe inside these walls
Safe, they scream, safe
And behind my smiles and uplifted hands is
My never ending unease.

Sunday morning monologues
Front row fakes
Sunshine maple tree jogs
And stained tile motivations.

I could stand up
Leave those lyrics running
Walk out
And never come back.

Or take to the mic
And scream every last
One of my insecurities
To the whole dang world.

But I'll never
Do either.

Sunday morning monologues
And front row blanks.

Clocks tick
Seconds slip
By.

Leaves fall
Babies crawl
Kisses end
Branches bend
And break as
Hearts ache.

We'll forget, forgive
Move on
But stay in once place and
Hurt to fill empty space.

And still the
Ceaseless passage continues
Of the monolith called
Time.

Clocks tick
Years slip
By
Don't live your life
In regret
Don't be afraid
To forget.

In the delicious dusk
We danced
Let the starless fantasies
Soak into our blighted fight.

The moonlight, delectable
Moonlight flitted in the trees
A filigree pattern reminiscent
Of the wrapping papers with which
I once covered the long days
And sad afternoons I spent alone.

You removed a thermos of
Lukewarm coffee from your heart, and in
That singularly solemn week
I fell in love.
Deliciously in
The sweetest love.

But it melted with
Sugar crystals
In the first bitter
Rains of October.

And the Halloween candy
Stashed behind my door
Was forgotten in the
Loneliness
A sense of isolation I couldn't shake
Not since I'd used
Every last inch of wallpaper
On you.

Stained glass chandeliers
And shattered bedroom mirrors
Tapestries of fine brocade
Mixed with town-house charades.

Leaky faucet fallacies
An upper-middle class disease
Pop radio leaves them apathetic
Try alt-indie for aesthetics.

They will call the wallpaper charming
For well-furnished rooms are quite disarming
Smile and nod in a well-meaning act
But once they leave, feel free to attack.

You can hang Chuhuli in the kitchen
Da Vincis in bathrooms are quite bewitching
But give me a house that knows how to be
How to sleep and to sing and to sigh and to scream.

Something lovely about carpet freshly vacuumed
But who cares about designer living rooms?
A house isn't a home until it's been broken in
We call them hassocks, so long ottomans.

The Big Dipper
Dripped starlight
Into the silent
Dark pines.

Orion shot his
Arrow right on
Target into my
Cracked heart.

The Milky Way
Ceased to run its course
And instead
Spilled your name into the sky.

And still, the North Star
Kept on sparkling
Reminding me of
A stability like yours.

It was cloudless and
Moonless and the
Meteor showers were over
But not the hole in my chest.

The only hope I
Had left was that
Somewhere in the world
You saw the same stars.

Once in a rare while
The stars align.

And next time the clouds
Part I'll remember to
Appreciate
The moment.

Once in a rare while
A star falls from the sky.

I once caught one
Wasted it on a frivolous wish
When all along I
Should have used it on you.

When you cracked
The sky cracked, too.

And all the feelings
I had tried so hard to
Get past
Fell through the shattered atmosphere.

And in the chapel
Bathed in fragile glass light
The coffee was well-disguised
But bitter, like you.

And the hard bench and off
White wall
Reminded me well of
A home no longer mine
Reminded me well
We all have demons.

When you cracked
The sky cracked, too.

She burst into our lives one summer
In an explosion of glitter and cat ears
And into the darkness of our young lives
She became a light.

She demanded my friendship
Commanded my respect
Reprimanded my bad choices
And expanded my views.

She's the one who got me writing poetry
She taught me how to worship
And how to question authority
She told me to speak up
To be myself
And I learned from her fearless example.

We shared some scars
And she was never afraid of telling me the straight-up truth.

She wasn't perfect
Sometimes she destroyed feelings
And shoplifted our hearts
But I learned from that, too.

And then one day with a toss
Of those red curls, one of those
Hugs that made everything better
And a swing of the metal heart hanging on her chest
She was gone, just like that
But I'll never forget she changed my life
And I'm still changing it through
Rachel, this one's for you.

Do you ever get
The feeling
Not of deja vu
But of the curious
Sensation that at some
Point in your recent
Past you already
Lived this day?

Oh wait
I think they
Call that
Deja vu
Now
Don't they?

Cracked sidewalks
Hopeful puddles
And the downtown umbrellas
Racing with the cars
In the rain of
Toasty libraries
You sat on the floor like always.

Downtown coffee shops
Roasted from the finest and most
Impertinent beans
Never forget the
Kind of damp days we
Spent together.

Sweeter now the cherries
Taste than before you
And somehow they'll always
Remind me of you
But life, our
Unforgotten years
Can always remember to
Keep you and yours alive, in our hearts, don't
Say goodbye.

It was so hot
The dogs stretched out flat
In yards and flopped on
Front porches were
All running like Boeing 737s.

It was so hot
At the end of the
Church service all the
Church ladies scattered
Just like that.

It was so hot
That even the
Atmosphere groaned
And the forests wished
For air-conditioning.

It was so hot
The letters threatened to
Melt as fast as I
Could possibly apply
Them to a page.

It was so hot
I simply forgot
To breathe and instead
Wondered why
The stifled world still turned.

The shadows flick
Faster and faster of
The fan until it
Turns into a UFO and
Detaches from the
Ceiling to fly away.

I'm drunk on
Exhaustion
High on
Poetry.

The invisible pattern
On the wall begins
To dance, the curlicues
Tangoing with fleur-d'les
To the silent drumbeat
Of my heart in my ears.

I'm intoxicated from
My thoughts
Completely smashed on
Shards of mirrors and the
Dregs of any
Innocence I had left.

I'll watch the numbers
Flash backwards, just
Let time turn around
Clocks will melt
Even in air-conditioning
I've got a
Pounding headache and
Tomorrow I'll be
Hungover
On my soul.

Rumble strips and road trips
Drive until I catch the night
Right shoulder tears for all my fears
Thruways admit I lost the fight.

An eye for an eye
Left turn for left turn
GPSs always lie
A truth for a truth
Reroute our directions but we'll
Never regain our wasted youth.

Now again I'm drifting off
The road signs mean I'm never lost
But the rumble strip will always grind
Until I forget what I drove to find.

Highway markers flashing by
In tired hate I wonder why
Until the sun must also rise
This painful day will be reprised.

Hands off the wheel, forget to blink
This desolate night is not what you think
A split second glance in my rearview
Confirms what I already knew
For though my stance to run was wrong
There's no denying you were in the back seat all along.

We told citronella secrets
Under the summer stars
When the Christmas lights burned
Out of the airy tent
The tiki torch tradition
Was newly begun.

We told laughing love stories
As we walked the phantom dog
Down the silent, midnight road
Occasionally lit up by giggling headlights.

We drank soda from crinkling cans
Sipping down our suppositions
Rehashing the year and all
Our misconceptions by the
Light of the tropical
Tribal flames.

We told citronella secrets
And shared our autumnal fantasies.

There are
Cities
In me.

A small town girl full of
Cities.

The only time I am ever
Alone
Is when the oceans of
People
Surround me
Concrete walls and window tiles
Every face dissolves
Into every other, just
Blur the skylines
A little more.

I always feel the restless
Energy, but only when
The ceaseless floods of
Mankind wash me over.

There are
Cities
In me.

Every block, every brick
Every beam and every balcony
Every inch of this
World in me.

There are
Cities
In me.

But I saw once face
In all the seas of shifting life
And suddenly the smoke-rimmed sky
Parted ways for you.

On the escalator mountaintop
Friday evening at seven
One face, one name
Made its way through
The tiled maze, and then
Astoundingly
I woke up from my
Metropolis dreams.

In one split
Second, the thousands of
Souls, all shoved
Together, swayed
To reveal
Just two souls, spotlighted
You
And me.

There are cities
In me
But never
Can anyone
But you
Light up the roving night.

Every morning as a
New day
But that doesn't mean the consequences
Of our actions are taken away.

Every night I'm
One day older
But that doesn't mean I have less of these
Burdens to shoulder.

Every afternoon is
One more chunk of trickling time
But wasted hours add up fast
Like millions are made of nickles and dimes.

Every single late
Night I spent awake
Could have been used
For society's sake.

Now and then and
Here and there
Are the seconds I surveyed
The ones of love to share.