one hand
driven up sunken
inhaled midsection
resting at wet sternum
pausing to spread
five fingers
i can feel the beat quicken

digging them in
i inch up toward her

body angular  
waves of her churn
i eat dishes beastly
her entire plate clean

It was a national day
I pieced myself together
From remains of melancholia  
You asked about the weather
I said it looked like a tornado
I'm spinning into a dreary dream
You laughed the way roses wilt away
And took another sip from a broken glass of wine

I watched the garden untangle itself
In the breeze of an April's December
Hanging holiday lights with whiskey breath
Your hair tangled in knots
Like bows on unopened presents
I remember the shade of Crimson
That you left across the white picket fence
When the rain poured and tried to wash it all away

blackbird eyes me up from its wire
sez im aright
sez i can fly higher
sez there's no period at the end
only a halfhearted comma

but i dunno what for

blackbird hops over
makes room for another
makes the saddest caw you ever did hear
then dashes off to lick the sky clear
till eleven shades of bluewhite appear

but i dunno im not sure anymore

this is the part where i carve
one little hole in my thoughts
watch the me breathe its last breath
watch the i beady turn tor

Friends, strangers, empty-men. Lend me your fears...
People ask us why we keep these pages. Why we cling to these words. Why we hold on to the pain that we felt in these snapshot moments of time.
The answer may not be simple, but the real truths seldom are; we are holding on to the hopes that kept us going in the darkness.
We all pen our words to express our deepest selves and to expose our darkest corners in the hopes that one day they will help someone. And secretly, we hope they will save us.
The following poems were written for my daughter. Today, she turns six, and, while I am still trying to live my life in her absence, I hold strong to the hope that one day she will read the words on these obscure pages and know that I have loved her more than life itself from the first time that I held her tiny frame in my arms. And that the same tiny frame has continued to make my world spin round and kept the garden of my eyes damp through the droughts of longing.
Maybe, one day, she will stumble upon these verses and know that I was thinking about her. Know that my heart has been with her, always. These words were not written to make me feel better, except they might make her feel better. Maybe one day, these words will keep her.
Happy Birthday, my sweet angel. These simple words are only for you. Blow out your candles and may all of your dreams come true in time...

Why do I insist on looking for solace at the bottom of all of these bottles?
I know full well that nothing in this world, nor in Heaven nor Hell, can fill the small, Gavyn-sized void in my heart and in my soul, yet still, in vain, I try to drown my misery in the suds and decanters of inebriation…
I have dreampt of you twice in the last week. That is more than my dreams have been graced by your countenance in the last year. Each time, upon waking, I have been found with a smile, painful in its hope, for waking brings the end of the dream. I spend my time chasing dreams, for dreams are so much more hopeful than the reality that my sleeping brain awakens unto.
In these dreams, I have seen your face, heard you laugh and cry and call for me. Seen you run and play and question, seen you witness the sun and the World. I have held you in my arms and felt you wrap yours around me.
This alcohol numbs the sting of this unreality, for when I awake, it is in the sobering arms of loneliness and longing and emptiness. My heart beats for you, and in your absence, continues to beat, labored and heavily.
Every fiber of my being cries out for you, every second of every day. I see my failure in the smiles of children, in the hands of Fathers and Mothers and Children entwined, for mine clasp only the pen or the pillow, the bottle or themselves.
I want to heal the pain of this world, yet I cannot find inside myself the focus to care for anyone other than you or myself, nor the capacity to heal your world, or my own.
My hope continues, beaten down and suffocating, yet alive; the hope of the ******.
Whilst ****** I may not be, the excommunication from you is damning…
Am I dying, my Angel?
…Maybe.
Or am I just not living?
Try as I might, I cannot find the answer to this question. Perhaps, it is both. Dying while refusing to live.
For there is much to live for and much to die from.
Yet, my heart beats and my hope, my hope screams in whispers. Because of you.
I love you, Sweet Angel. With more than I ever knew that I possessed. These unshed tears are nothing more than unsung songs and unpenned verses in your name.
Sleep sweet, my love. Don’t forget to say your prayers. Daddy will be here when you wake up.

I have intentionally tried to fill the hole inside myself that your smile holds, my sweetest Angel. For that, I am ashamed. But there has been only the feeling of emptiness residing in that cavern since last I looked upon your smiling face and held you close to my heart.
The sun has risen and set, the seas have ebbed and flowed, the winds have blown, hither and yon. Yet, still I stand, unmoving through all of it, for the pain of not having your tiny hand in mine has left me cold, battered by the waves and fossilized by the sands carried upon the winds.
My eyes have withered from too many unhappy tears and nowhere near enough tears of joy, made all the more optically diuretic by my inability to look upon your face as you run and play and sleep and dream.
I am sorry, my truest of Loves, my Only, that I have chosen to ignore these feelings of longingness for so long. I could touch the pen to paper a million times, writing odes to your face and sonnets to your smile, but the distance that I feel has forced me to lull my heart into a coma. I have intentionally medicated my heart in an attempt to stop feeling (to stop all feeling), yet I cannot.
I feel the sunshine on my face and I pine to see the sun’s rays dwarfed by the radiance of your dwarven smile.
I feel my heart hang so low and wish against hope that I could pick you up while you raise me.
My soul cries out to replace you, yet my heart is merely attempting to survive. My soul screams for only you and the chance (nay, privilege) to shield you from the fears that cause you to scream in the middle of the night.
Why have I chosen to harden my heart, my Love? Why have I allowed myself to stifle my screams, when in all truthfulness, I only dream of easing your own?

He ripped it open
He pulled it tight
Softness eluding
Absorbing light
He escaped in mourning
He swiftly returned
Partially healed
Mortally burned