Before earth leaves me
someday under the sun
the moon will explode
My humble abode no more

And no bullet will outrun
No gun won
One last cry for life
But I'm done
I'm done

Rebellious in nature, I made friends
with crumbled leaves
on the last day of fall
Before my nose froze
and I dipped my toes in
a dry lake to catch my tears

My nature is dead, gone
Beating a dead dog
Looking for a reason to
pick up the phone
and call for a break
But there isn't one

Spare me the grief
for your own handkerchief
I don't need your tears
I have my own
Saved in a moldy jar
when I need the change.

I wish we could
catch a raindrop
with our hands
Hydrate a 3 a.m.
conversation about how
the First Agreement
either does
or doesn't
keep us honest
about the way
we look at
each other.

At 3:13 a.m. I tell a
story about my
favorite agate
I found when
I was 13.

By now it's
pouring outside
and a bolt
of thunder
snaps me out
of my haze.

Laying on my pillow
I remember
I need
the clouds because
I live
in a storm,
and right now
you're the calm
before, during, and after.

Your voice is the one
I hear over the
whirl of the wind,
the one I feel
after waking up
in a pool of
my own sweat,
the one I see
even through the
distance of feeling
alone.

So talk to me
before, during,
and after
the storms
of our lifetime,
and we can share
what we find
together
in the aftermath.

I'm fighting two pails --
One filled with feeling of
a homeless future and
one with a far cry crow
swooping in on every worm
living in the cracks of my life.

Give me a rifle with a
cross-haired scope, locked and loaded
two painted metal pails
with the eyes of a bull
so I can shoot one
and let the other
rust with my soul.

Concrete beneath seats
of listeners
Chalk artists
creating frames for the
next rainfall

Wash away
sun burnt big toes
beads of sweat
on sunglasses
Spoken word next to
handrails

The river below
huffs the wind
Spits it
to the current
of artistry
waving back from shore

Cancel the 12:50
replace the interruption
with impromptu colors
of the rainbow
Let children wander
under bridges
and pop balloons
filled with water
Color paint

Let the world
around us drink
water of guitar strings
and gaze at
ambient light
with star-struck eyes

Let the world
revolve around
lightning bolt revolt
Protect sacred
performing stages
Say yes to
Art-spired revolution

Don't have a clue.
Don't have a clue?

They live in dive bars
and take shots of
Karkov, eyes glued
to the radio
hanging in the corner
laughing with the cracked
peanut shells on the floor

They will slaughter you
with analogies likening
Moby **** to the bruised banana
they ate prior to
their last reading

They sleep in dumpster fires
and digest the
nature of rotten cheese

Under some circumstances
they play fetch with bones
thrown by big government
just to see how many
splinters get stuck in
the roof of their mouth

Proceed to shout
"don't ask about my thoughts
on politics and government
don't ask about my thoughts
on politics and government
don't ask about my thoughts
on politics and government"

They hate politics and
would rather
cry into a red wheelbarrow
glazed with gasoline
on top of Lady Liberty's torch

and let their tears
set the world ablaze.

Today I watched a log near the shore
wait for the Mississippi's current to
push it past the lone rock in its way.
Two and a half hours later it
caught the current, and gained
enough momentum to float ahead.

The log was forced from its comfort zone,
but wanted the change,
and embraced its own currency.
It got stuck along the way
(probably more than once)
but trusted the process
like flowers trust honeybees.

Today
the log is as much a part of me
as I
       am a part of it
Ready to ride the wave
Ready to converse with the current
Ready
Ready.

Moving forward, I'll think about
that log from time to time
when I'm stuck in captivity,
holding on to hope that I can
find a current to carry me away.

A broken guitar tells me to shut it
on every rest note.
And I tell myself to
ditch old baggage
on the side of the road
to clean my tattered knapsack
of cobwebs and broken light bulbs.

So I divest,

Decompress in present
because right now, I'm at peace.
You speak over church bells
at the top of the hour
and I listen like
nothing else matters.
But I only hear the future
My future, your future, our future
                    the world's future.

It's not often,
but every once in a while
midnight slaps me with a sound
I can't explain.
Even if I explain myself
I ramble around the point
like an arrow with no tip.

The weird thing about time
is it's a lot like music,
or a galaxy,
but right in the palm
of soft hands and ambitious souls
It only makes sense with experience,
and getting lost in a pavilion
of nervous butterflies
only seen in lucid dreams.

The world is old. We're young.
We're lost. And so is everyone else.
Tell me about your favorite constellation,
your favorite letter of the alphabet,
what makes you tick,
and why.

One day, after learning about your spectrum,
and where it intersects with mine
we'll dance in space.
I'll come to my senses
and question nothing

Not even the silence between our lips.

Sitting alone in a whirlwind
Black center and hail pellets
Scattered platters of food
Drowned out conversations,
mumbled spit up

Can't calm the angered nature
of broken class in a sheepish world
Twelve days until the broken
symphony sings in front of a
          tidal wave

Twenty four hours until yesterday
Spin cycle repeats deceit
What more is there than then?
When everything stops spinning
and the wind eats karma
for breakfast with Mother Nature
on Sunday morning.

When you make a garlic chicken
special guests are also essential
Cross sections and interior views
forged all manner of ancient

The name may evoke evening
Experiment with cucumber, watermelon
Do not imply the expression of any opinion
increase in normal and immunosuppressed

Make an irony-free living
but never in such proliferation
Prepare to be bowled over by porridge
or other library materials

covered with a blanket of clouds
The dead began to speak.

The streetlight on the corner of
8th and Harriet talks in Morse code
every Sunday night at half past eight.

Maybe it’s asking to be saved
from the blistering cold. Maybe
it has feelings for the moon

and is only trying to be noticed.
It must get lonely working
the same corner for years

and nobody bothers to return thanks.
My guess is it’s trying to communicate
with fellow streetlights

and plan an attack like the Ents
did before they went to
war on Isengard.

But then again, only in my mind
I make perfect sense. After all,
it is just a malfunctioning street light.

When Friday buried Thursday
at the cemetery
I was eating eggs and
bacon in my bathrobe.
The other days wore black
attire to the burial
and brought white geraniums.
I stood in silence for three minutes
after I finished my breakfast
then wrote a note for the weekend:

“My time will come,
don’t wait for me,”

and left.

Staying afloat on a low note
a lost man crosses crippled bridges
carrying a turtle’s shell and flour
Singing off pitch, making leaves shrivel
Off abound, forbidden from sight,
glass air pierces his stale soul.

Wonder yonder he thinks to fire
of foreseen history pocketed in a square
while passing a brown polar bear
He hears nothing but bats communicating
when he saunters the woods at night
In the middle of his sleep      
his big toe squeaks and the bed shrieks
and the frigid air nips his shriveled lips.

He once made friends with
a single blade of grass in the desert
               but it died the day after they met
In the grand scheme of irony
he doesn’t see the reason for pancakes
They make his taste buds scream for quiet.

Whether or not he sees straight
is an entirely different question
If he comes to a fork in the road
he tends to keep walking forward
As if he thinks there’s not much difference
between right and wrong in present tense.

There’s too much for him to understand
in an overwhelming world; an abandoned creature
under starlight in a red sky reverie
he seeks rhythm from deflated composition
but fears that tapping his foot
will crumble his hypnagogic melody.

It's not illegal to sprinkle lemon juice
in a healing wound, but it's not recommended.

The clatter of silverware rattles the piercings
of a tattooed barista battling a vexatious morning.

Iced caramel lattes, incarcerated by
serrated coffee beans, sleep alone at night.

A half-empty cup of 2% screams at a
of glass skim milk for acting obnoxiously drunk.

One squirrel scorns another for
stealing its spiked acorns last fall.

A lonely poem twists and turns
through disappointing images of life.

At the end of the road there's a mirror
reflecting an absent feeling of satisfaction.

I.

The night sky cantillates a tune
only sobbing icicles can hear
A redeye flight soars
with a defunctive plot aboard
Supposedly Pluto planned it
News reports the next morning
said responders found a suicide note
along with residue from a melted
block of ice in the wreckage.

II.

Some millions of miles away
pocketing silence in his palm
Neptune’s tears freeze
on the green tips of pine trees
Frozen leaves sleep beneath
glaring Great Horned Owls
Black eyes bend in the back,
ground stiff as their spine.

III.

There is nothing scary about
a sad bedtime story
without crows or ghosts
or a cat’s empty cradle
When the pages turn
the night sky descends into
its deepest sleep before dawn
and closed eyelids fantasize
about tomorrow’s morning.

Winding roads and one-way traffic
Heading to a poetry reading,
rounding every turn
like a metaphor
emerges from a idea.
Passing  headlights
squinted eyelids,
Ditchweed on the roadsides
lay flat and brown
on icelandic mudbeds.
Driving through a bare, tree-lit tunnel,
a library smiles off in the distance.
                            ---
Standing behind a podium
ready to send my words off
to sneak into a listener's mind
like a Trojan Horse,
let them deploy an army of sword-less warriors
ready for action.
A perpendicular sequence of events
reveal new paths on an old map.
On the road again,
back home,
the sunrise in my rearview mirror
reaches my imagination.

The rebirth of our nation
rests in motion.
In a country mounted
on revolutionary (Freedom of) Speech
fear of falling off the balance beam
permeates our culture's streets
Rock bottom is visible.

The next step in a row of stones
might require more than a skip
but the heavy heart of resiliency
                         must persist,
preserve the embers that
burn in the enduring hand
of our Statue (of Liberty).

Cope with the wilted white flowers
Look to the rising sun
every morning it emerges with
tired eyes, sleeping flames,
garden beds greeted with mist.

Listen to the music of mighty mitochondria
Let the DNA of "bend don't break"
and swords of endorphins thrive
'til their final breath.

Fight unmerited power
with a rigid, rebellious fist
and a voice armed to the teeth
from the mouth it speaks.
Fight 'til the white of bone
and then some.

This is the long anticipated
wake-up call from Mother Gaia;
it comes in the form of tears.
Don't let them drown us,
create new
streams, rivers, lakes, and oceans
so they wave with every
spun cycle
of Earth's journey
around the sun
of a

Walking on pebbles
turning them to
grains of sand
An angelic finger
points to me
from the sky
pinching my skin
with dull nails
I point back
and close my eyes
feel the shoreline
and get goosebumps.

I remember cuddling
in your arms
the whole night
my ninth birthday
my ear infected
with painful fluid
I watched the clock
with your eyes
wincing in pain
But your words,
colored with comfort,
turned my focus
"I want to stay
up past midnight
with you mommy."
"It's your birthday,
stay by me
and don't worry."

Today, I remember
that night with
flowers of vivid silence
and a diamond bouquet,
filled with nine geraniums
to be exact,
for all the birthdays
that I've spent
without an ear infection
or an angelic voice
to comfort me
But I still
feel your arms
and their warmth
around my chest
like a kangaroo
pouch in the desert.

This is your day
Pour a margarita
Let's have a toast
for your wings
of holy wisdom
that help keep
my feet afloat.

Shine, like the sunrise
greeting the mountainside.
A diamond ring, long lost
beneath beds of snowflakes,
suffocates.
Cold feet abandoned it.

I'm plagued by nimble,
yet fragile, greed;
insatiable.

I traverse and stumble
and stumble and stumble
through a dense mist.
Frozen portraits, precise, turned corpses
litter my focals.
Blurred vision excites
the hibernating nerves
in my numb fingertips.

I blow
into them.
Coarse skin grasps
my cracked pale lips.

I clear my lenses,
steal my senses
and ask for the moon
to cradle me in
its dusty gray craters
while I look for
a fool's broken vows.

Standing on a rusted
sidewalk plate, contemplating.
Let me bleed
like a slaughtered sunflower.

Let me walk away
from this wilted bar stool.
Death waits for the weary,
Knock kneed.
I trample through rotten hops.

Scotch on the rocks,
aged like the
half-lit bar sign
with three Xs
and a poisoned skull.

Chasing fear, exhausted.
Legless horsepower, monstrous.
Grinding my fingers on Grainbelts
before the crack of fall.
Stained oak pillars,
star mangled manors

Let me bleed.

The cold sun beats
on gold pinstripe pants.
Between the same fingers
that grip a pen
a physical form of smoke;
cancerous, like divisive rhetoric
dictating dialogue between
red and blue threads; white
in the middle turned
a depressed gray.

Stand, stare at
a  stale banner;
salute 50 blank stars,
the right choice
follows like a thief
with forlorn hands for feet.
Dead in the water,
Freedom drowning, shouting
in a salty blue tune.

The sun watches from
its godly golden throne.
Out, uttering among  
waves of stars,
speaking with nothing to say.
Freedom sinks to the
depths of Hell
as if but smoke
trying to make waves.

Rumbling thunder clashes
with ambient lightning
The cigarette smoke
gets in an argument about
who owns the sky tonight.

"Don't **** with me
I'll give you cancer!"
"Yeah? Well I'll light
your world up and
strike you to the ground,"
The storm replies.

And that was the
end of the argument.
The smoke conceded
and its soaked cigarette ****
followed the clouded stream
down the storm drain.

The last piece of straw
from the horses mouth
said its final words
The sky's batteries died
and there was no real winner.

No, not even Mother Nature
could hammer justice
into the broken gavel
She just sat and
chewed her fingernails
as the stars waved

goodbye to the Earth.

Setting up a studio
vaulted ceilings with
scented linguistics
Glued to a group
Glass Stains on grained wood
tell me to ground my soul,
let go and propel waves
in the mountains
Glue the wind to trees
by any means necessary.

Anything is cool if it
interrupts the mind
of so called intellects
reacting with concrete questions
It's just as easy to
tug heart strings
with well crafted narrative
as it is to spread hate
with carefully constructed conspiracy
Word is bond
only broken by
water over blown bridges.

Keep strings tied to wounded rocks
Don't skip
Rippled vision
round squares and indecision
A sight to see
Don't quit
when there's always now
Find how
and walk the plank.

Night #1
Around the dinner table crickets directed a noiseless choir
It's all full of emotion
But I don't know how to
Define a face full of
earthquake expressions
When the stars play guitar
with three broken strings
it sounds like musical genius,
and the grass is waving to it.

"Dude, the moon's coming out now,"
I hear from the crowd.
The autumn brown leaf outside the window
turns green in amazement
And then it swallows the sky whole.

Night #2
I don't even feel my drunkness, I just feel the
highness and euphoria.
I wonder who sees Orion with me tonight.
The triple XXXs behind the drummer and
ringing tambourines scream with
guitar picks and microphones
and I think I know this euphoria is more
powerful than the whisky in my right hand.
I'm the king of upside down guitars that read
"DEATHBOT," and the "B" is backwards
and I don't give a ****.

Night #3
Arnold Palmer and coconut juice
A pair of glasses and a sight that's obtuse
I don't need to see straight
like a wave in the ocean that capsizes at night
And I roll up a joint that is beyond precise.

I went outside for a cigarette
Sat on the step and
I see myself down the street
forty years from now;

Burnt like an ember in an ash pile
Ground into a particle by
the street sweeper to be eaten
by the atmosphere's tangled black tongue.

Walking up and down the
battered stairs tires my weary legs
with every trip I make
Lungs crying for air like a newborn.

A tool for procrastination
A tobacco fascination can lead to
a disastrous situation. Kurt
Vonnegut once said, "Cigarettes

are a classy way to commit suicide"
He must have been stupefied making that statement.

Like taking a blade serrated 1000 times
and nudging one more notch through
his flesh with every caramel covered kiss.
But he was too scared to take it out.

Exhale and apologize to Earth
for his suffocated statement. Breathing in
snakes and rusted copper.

The man down the street probably wishes
to be my age back in his day again.
My eyes frozen in space like Walt Disney's
severed head.

He catches a  a cloud of smoke
and his lungs scream through stalagmites
that drip with unwashed tears
that never fell from Vonnegut's stone face.

You spent endless time
at your desk in the sun porch.
After your diagnosis we
turned the porch into
your own personal scrapbook room.
I could tell you didn’t
think about your disease
when you were in there crafting
because of how focused
you always looked when at work;

lips puckered out, oblivious
to the commotion of our backyard.
You were granted God’s greatest gift
to see the end of your
days as you wished.
You did just that.
The memory of you lives on
in all those whose lives you touched.

When you left we didn’t
know what to do with
the overwhelming heap
of scrapbook materials
you accumulated over the years.

They took up too much space
that could be used for other things
like furniture and storage.
Plus, they were hard to
look at without being
swarmed with empty
thoughts and sadness. But,
we didn’t want all these
valuable accessories to go to
waste, forever forgotten.  

When it came to deciding
what to do with your
leftover supplies, we knew
we couldn’t toss them out.
We wanted them to carry out
their intended purpose
just as you would have
had time permitted.

The Ronald McDonald House
in Minneapolis had an unused room
they were looking to fill—
we knew that was it.
We donated nearly all your supplies
there and now that empty room
is a scrapbook room bearing your name;
carrying on an important piece of you
so other families can
craft memories into treasures—
just as I carry a treasured
piece of you wherever I go.

I wander through the world
                to make my own math.
Maybe a kid with
ice cream will stumble
across my path one day
and venture the scene.

Brown grass and an
abundance of wheat,
mangled trees and
ice cube sun rays--maybe
something in between.

As a wayward
Purple Pincher Hermit Crab, I
float through ocean currents.
As a North coast coyote
sometimes I can't tell what I am.

Just wandering through
ice cold smoke, smoldering ash,
apple orchards, joyful torture,
dead rose gardens,       a thornyard,
a sunflower sanctuary. Serenity,

I wear no crown, no ermine cape,
I eat beetles and grasshoppers
off of a rusted plastic plate.

This court found me…

Guilty

of remaining reticent
to express my desire for her
on the counts of:

Past experiences,

Fear of what
vulnerability
would lead to,

Lack of confidence

and,

An inability to
pick up signals.

I was sentenced to life in solitude.

On a frigid night I am
the lone resident in my house.
Not a whisper sounds from
the mouth of the biting air outside.

Alone in my house I am at ease
for there is nothing around
to interrupt this time left to me.
I can see things differently,
like the face of a Picasso painting.

With a lessened tension I
have a deeper sense of recollection.
My thoughts are a ceiling fan,
constantly spinning and circulating
the sentences of these lines
like the air throughout the house.

As I listen to the warm air
rattle from the vent in the wall
I am reminded of the days
spent with my dad working
in the basement workshop.

My purple, gold and white
Pinewood Derby car for Boy Scouts
was a piece of work to be proud of.
It may not have placed, but
it had a special place on my dresser
for several years to come.

It’s memories like these I
know I’ll never forget because
even after thirteen years
I can recall it like it was yesterday.

The smell of freshly sanded wood
and sore fingers after long hours
of hard work perfecting the shape
was worth more than all the
money a rich couple could
spoil their children with.

I kiss the spliff as the neighbor
across the street stares out his porch windows.
He clasps his upper lip
with his left hand—
thumb and pointer finger
split like a horseshoe.
The difference in temperature
from outside and my porch
is hardly measurable.
The feathers in my jacket
fight to keep my body heat
captive beneath my MAS*H sweatshirt.
His porch must be a four-season
because he hovers over his desk
in a t-shirt with a cigarette
in his mouth.
Maybe he’s writing, or reading,
        doing homework or work work.
Whatever it may be,
it stirs a bit of jealousy in me.
I wish to be home, sitting
in the warmth of my four-season porch,
where many stories are saved.
Scrapbooks full of memories.

The streetlight on the corner of
8th and Harriet talks in Morse code
every Sunday night at half past eight.

Maybe it’s asking to be saved
from the blistering cold. Maybe
it has feelings for the moon

and only wants to be noticed.
It must get lonely working
the same corner for years

and nobody bothers to return thanks.
My guess is it’s trying to communicate
with fellow streetlights

and plan an attack like the Ents
did before they went to
war on Isengard.

But then again, only in my mind
I make perfect sense. After all,
it is just a malfunctioning street light.

Looking over my mom’s shoulder
while she sat in her chair
with her Toshiba laptop, and
a hummingbird’s beak
was nestled in sugar water
outside the living room window.

Engaged in her game of “Buck Euchre”
while I massaged her stiff neck
with my tired fingers, she
messaged her opponents
“You guys will be lucky to
take one ‘trick’ this round
with the hand I got.”

Her brisk tapping of the keyboard
seemed nearly in sync
with the fierce flickering of
the hummingbird’s wings.

I wondered what it’d be like
if my mom had energy
like a hummingbird everyday—
upbeat and alert,
But I knew that wish was
out of reach. Chemo kept her
house-ridden;
either in her bed or a seat.

“Yes! Ha! Ha! suckers,” my
mom shouted,
“Ben, there’s no way they will beat me.”
I smiled and said,
“You show ‘em, Mom.”

Sitting on a bench just off the
Liberty Trail in Boston, waiting as
the rest of my family made a restroom stop.
An old man with a thick, greyish
beard and heavy eyelids
took a seat next to me.
His ***** white hair caught
a cotton seed sailing through the air.

The bag of tobacco in his hand
was wide open, and he
pulled a roll of Zig-Zags
out of his pocket—he tore
the paper about six inches long
and proceeded to
roll a cigarette. His fingers,
bent and forlorn,
worked tediously as a
diamond cutter’s.

He lit the cigarette, let out a ring of smoke,
and introduced himself as
Lenny. I told him my name
and we talked for a few minutes.
"What brings you to Boston
young fella?" he said
in his aged Boston accent.
"Family vacation--personally, I'm
interested in all the history of the town."

By now his cigarette is
half-burnt, and my family is
ready to continue on the trail.
Lenny turned to me with
a low look in his eyes,
but he cracked a smile.
He had a couple teeth missing

Before I got up he said to me,
“When I want to sit and think,
a cigarette isn’t long enough
to burn through my thoughts,
but a conversation with a
stranger every day
is what keeps my mind
from running away in smoke.”

My CD player starts
spinning,
songs singing,
eyes seeing.
In that moment I recede from
reality and into the page.

Elevated to new heights;
a symmetrical splash
into a new world.
A solid shore serenated
by a storm of new music.

No two beats the same—
Each with its own aura that
sings of fallen life
worth a memory
as it disappeared in smoke
to weave a story like a river.

They all glisten with
unparalleled perfection
as their story is penned
during a 45 minute decent,
freefalling to their own rhythm.

My wasted memory
is messing with me.
A memory where
I was left
hanging threaded
through a needle
I found in a haystack.

My past showed up and
she sent my thoughts into
a vortex of uneasiness.

I tried to reconcile
with that memory,
but it wasn’t as
rectifying as I had hoped.

Chaos surrounds the calm realm
I store the memory—waiting for
its chance to erupt and
resurrect what I wished would stay
dead.

It’s a wasted memory
for a reason—
I want it to stay that way.

She comes off as rude
and makes it obvious—
the only time she ever
makes her intentions known.

She took advantage of
my vulnerability
and left me sunk
as lost treasure.

I need to learn
to see some things
for what they are sometimes,
and that sometimes
a memory is just a memory.

I’m wasted, it’s wasted;
give me a double shot
of Jack Daniels
and let’s keep things that way.

when we should stick.
The rigid cliffs
spiraling down our spines
grind every time
we’re held together
as one.

I don’t know about
you, but we should
probably find
a way to smooth
things out.

Maybe glue ourselves
together so our
problems don’t appear
so transparent
to others.

I woke up and went outside
to bathe in the winter weather.
Sitting in a wooden chair, hidden behind
some firewood I see a bird appear
The bird was startled to see me there.


My heart skipped like a rock across water.
We made eye contact and the bird flipped
and retreated to the pine trees.
It was a blue jay--
I could see the speckled array of blue patterned
on its elegant down coat.

It started digging through
the blanket of dead needles
and my curiosity led me to question
the blue jay’s curiosity;
because curiosity killed the cat,
or in this case, startled the blue jay.
Does the blue jay
have a family to feed?
A flock to fly with? Or is the
blue jay on its own?

I feel human because
the blue jay and I are not the same—
just pieces of natures puzzle.
The blue jay thrives on nature,
I thrive on the
evolution of humanity.
The blue jay spends a lifetime
in the sky--
I spend mine trying to find my wings.

An Old Oaken Bucket full of *****
Swindling me from a spindle of rope,
Sloshing with every cup I fill
to the brim, topped with a savory foam.

I dip into the treasure on most
weekend nights with a blurry sight,
the least bit of fright, and a cup
that screams “Let’s have some fun, alright?”

I carry that cup with a sense of pride
every trip I make to fill it with *****.
Too many round trips have lead to
a massive amount of mistakes made.

Being out too late, because nothing
good ever happens after midnight,
Locking lips with random women
and not re-calling any of them.

Convoluted conversations about
the string theory or religion, trying
to sound smart while I slur my words,
I successfully fail to make sense.

I’ve learned the circle of life revolves
around learning, so, how can I learn if
I never make mistakes and play it safe?
Safe to say, I’ll never make that mistake.

Eyes slit like a stoner,
hearing things that
never made a sound.

Dust white as sugar
looks like residue
from an eight-ball line
recently snorted off
of the Old Testament.

Alluring at the top
and somewhat appealing but,
pointed at the bottom—
which penetrates the grain
cementing self-control together.

Buzzed and bleeding through
rusted nostrils eroding
from illicit use and
spiraling out of control.

Keeping it together
strictly because a
corrosive adhesive has been
stuck to an addicted membrane.

Eventually, the adhesive
will wear off and
everything will fall apart.

I told my mother I found out
love is not what people say it is
in the leather-bound books
or the virtual screens today.

They say we should fall in love
with the idea of love and
"happily ever after"
will be until the end of our days.

My mother replied to me,
“Tell me son, what is love
in your eyes then?
What is love to your heart?”

My muttered answer to my mother
was, “What makes my heart race,
and what makes my heart sink,”
as if it should make sense to her.

Surprisingly, her reply to me
was this, “Don’t define love, son,
It is too powerful to define.
Let love define you—

That is where the true power lies.”

They are a reminder,
A reminder
that the future is full of surprises.
A raging mystery unmatched.
Every drop of water
that splashes upon the reflection
has the opportunity
to create a wave.

Not all the same.

Some will rage
                            and some will ripple,
but either way
                            the water’s face
will be forever changed.

Don’t think too hard;
                            the beauty of it all
will never be lost.
                            We are surrounded by it.
It looks up at us,
and we watch it capture eyes.
Unending, ceasing to amaze,
can’t be stopped.

A ripple or a wave
                            whatever it may be
will always--always
                            affect its surrounding.

And, drops of water are
always splashing somewhere.

Throw a rock
In river

and the rip-
ple will fade.

The river,
it moves on.

Yes, time stops
for no one

But it does
not forget

about the rock
that was thrown.

It's still there
sitting at

the bottom;
out of sight

out of mind.
As time moves

on, and more
ripples made.

Clouds flat as pancakes line the sky
hovering over rivers and lakes,
roaming across prairies and bluffs
Seasoned with a bitter sweetness.

Some trees less lively than others,
Some blaze with a unique aura.
Wild reeds and wild weeds ride the wind--
Brown and rusted like train track bolts.

Signs for a woodshop boutique lead
down a road prancing deer wander.
Sun rays hint shades of light through cracks
Revealing a scene to be seen.

The red, the orange, the yellow-green.
Brown, sleeping stalks of corn in rows
And the scare crow standing tall in
The middle, still in nights silence.

Lifeless leaves falling to the ground
Leave colored murals on footpaths
Soon to be covered with sheets of
Snow as nature prepares to sleep.

When I wake in the morning
and rub the sunshine off my eyelids,
I think of ways--of ways
I’m going to make you smile.

Yet, everything seems—backwards,
back burners, back of the bus.
I don’t know, really, how
                     to describe it.

But It entices me, whatever
It is; It entices me.
It’s like your presence became—omnipresent
ever since I made myself
present to you.

I never thought much of it
until this year, until I took a
pleasant slap to the face,
and we haven’t even had
physical contact yet, just
brief conversations to hold me over
until then.

Everyone in this world
is beautiful in one way or another;
a beauty someone out there
will see as particularly striking.
Yours happened to strike me.
It’s a beauty I just cant ignore
yet, its all I’ve been doing
since I informed you it can’t be ignored.

To make up for it, I wake up
pretending there’s a smile waiting to happen
Because there always is, sometimes
you just have to dig deep,
and be patient, to find it.

I haven’t yet felt what
your hand feels like intertwined with mine.
but I certainly hope
I’ll at least get the chance to.

When the time is right,
when that opportune moment comes along,
maybe that chance will make
a fool of my pretending ways
and I’ll no longer need
the rising of the sun
as a reason to make you smile.

For when I find my lonely soul
with head and shoulders hanging low
wandering through the streets at night
I'll walk on by that scary sight.

My life is full of empty space
that I will not let go to waste.
And if I start to lost my way,
I'll find a way to fill the blanks.

With empty space there's room to grow
Don't be spooked by your own shadow.
When times are dark and things seem grim
just tell yourself "I won't give in."

More moisture helps
the ******* of dirt
become a purification element.
The hydro-logic behind that
is completely fluid
and misunderstood.

Water is much like a brain—
it makes these connections
between polarizing elements
that will take eons
to arrive at a universal understanding
of how or why they were made.

As poets we work with the earth
to try and make sense of things—
like why exactly the purest form
of water is shed from the soil
that springs with infinite life.

The single most important aspect
of connections that contribute
to the everlasting growth of meaning
is that it's right beneath our feet,
which is probably why we
continually walk right over it.

What springs from the soils surface
is a constant cycle
of unearthing meaning.
Which is why there will never be
a shortage in the supply
of what provides us with life.

Your beauty is contagious
and I’m allergic to it.
Your presence makes my eyes water
and heart race faster.
Almost as fast as
the wind racing
in the eye of a hurricane.
My throat swells up
to a point where
I can barely speak.
My head starts spinning
clockwise and counterclockwise.
Simultaneously.
I’m barely aware
of my surroundings.
The sound of your voice
splits the tiny hairs
of my earlobe.
Accented with a sexiness
I could listen to
all day long,
intently and uninterrupted.
Even after I wipe the water
from the bottom lids
of my eyes
I still find your beauty
difficult to look at for too long.
Like it can only be taken
in small dosages,
otherwise the effect is too strong.
Allergies are unpleasant
to deal with,
but the reaction I draw
from your contagion
is worth the side effects.

Holy ba-jeebus, Beavis and Butthead
am I ever in the right place.
Astonishing.
I’m grounded with the roots of
stories ready to sprout
like leafs during springtime.

Green as the fields
and grassy hills
of the Midwest.
Blooming with beauty
that can’t be forgotten.

It’s an enriching feeling
that can’t be contained
by a company of one.
It has to be shared with everyone.

Just because you’re rooted
in one spot
doesn’t mean you can’t
spread seeds with
the whisper of the wind.

The grounds of the place we call home
live with us forever.
Stay, or leave, you’re left
with something to live with
as a result of
choice.

Even the bolt of a metal *****
will eventually erode.
Is it ironic to say that
a blowfish can implode, too?

The notion of wearing a mask
is an interesting one
Because nothing in this world
is meant to stand the test of time
And if you try to hide
you will fail.
Then, when you wake,
and try to see past your mask
you'll find yourself staring
at the wall behind you.

Even on a bright, sunny day
you can wake up feeling gray.
Making you feel out of place,
so wearing a mask compensates
Disguising blind eyes from reality
with a false sense of security.

The calm before the storm
is a deceptive moment in time
But it just goes to show
how quickly things can go
from good to bad
And it happens everyone.

Everyone has a shadow
no matter how you choose too see things.
It will never leave your side
Big or small, day or night
Your shadow is cast as a mask,
how you wear it is up to you.

Becoming comfortable in your mask
can be an uncomfortable task
As uncomfortable as a gullible mime
that is stuck on the outside
of his invisible box,
just trying to find a way in.

It's a queasy experience
that makes your stomach churn.
Trying to find the face behind
the mask
When you can't see past the facade
that acts as a mirage.

It's might sound easier to keep
the mask on,
put up a front and never look back
But that doesnt mean
things will be any easier,
just harder to hide behind.

Only when you choose to see
the reflection in the mirror
for its face value,
and not as a misleading mask,
will you begin to feel
how awesome it is to see clearly

The top
is not what you think

Each step
is led by your heart

I was
told to travel light

It leaves
more room to pick up

It's not
a straight shot up, though

But more
up, down, in and out

Don't run
or you might fall down

Don't stop
or you might miss out

Get stuck
look for a new path

Patience
and you will stay on course

Shortcuts
don't have real outcomes

Long paths
will help pace your growth

The top
is not out of reach

It can
be seen when you start

We all
wish to stand atop

The top
and swim in success

But fear
the journey ahead

Don't fear
what  you don't know yet

It will
all be known one day

The top
Has a special spot

Waiting
for you to fill it.

Guns are everywhere in sight
Muzzles, fire and fright.
Blood running through sewers
like flooded rivers in mid-May,
when it should be running through veins.
Slain bodies once filled with life
are now filled with undeserved death.
Pain seeps through the eyes
of brutalized victims as they weep.

A mother pleads to God
with hopes He will breath life
back into her daughter's lungs
as a child stands over the rotting
bodies of bystanders,
and waves at the flies
Unrest fills the air
while fire's are burning under water
Tragedy burns the face down to a tear,
Could Hell get any hotter?

Mirages mirror terror,
Silence in broken mirrors.
It may seem that voices don't exist
in places like this,
And that a difference lies off
in the distance;
out of reach, unattainable.
But they do.
A blind man's eyes become
his hands and his ears
when he needs to see,
While the mute lack a voice,
they still find a way to say,
"Hope is never all lost."

They need to know they are not alone.
Battles are being fought all over this world.
War, famine, sexism, racism.
A fight between mother and father.
Grief for the loss a lover.
We can all relate,
in one way or another.
Ignore ignorance, become informed.
Silence does not defeat violence,
nor is strength needed to beat it.
Courage and a heart
are needed to defeat it,
along with the will to believe
it can be defeated.

Throwing punches with fingerless fists
and broken spirits can seem useless,
but more has been done
with less.

Remember, a voice with something to say
is harder to forget
than a voice
that is
silent.