A blue flame flickers
Enchanting in deepest blue
Amidst a dark night

Beneath the sky
chalk-speckled

ink as though spilt
to bruise the night

dark scab blemish
a smoker’s abrasive cough

then muddy worms
wonky highway migraine

and forked tongue limbs
sprout from funnel of pine

I braced for the sound, the inevitable blast that would deafen my ears and jolt my nerves
they came streaming out in my words
every syllable sounded like rounds from the chamber
as i released my anger
I hate who I become
when you spit your venom and load my gun
the magazine full of thoughts of discontent
shells of spite and resent
your words push your fingers to pull my trigger
itching dangerously close to setting off my uncontrollable rage
I try putting my mouth on safe
holding the rounds at bay
yet they pour out one after another
we're poison for each other
I'm sick, weak in the knees as these words continue to  release each time your words pull that trigger and squeeze
the blowback nearly knocks me off my feet
I hear the distinct buzz of being too close to the boom
in the center of the room
my fingers pointing at you to blame, you're the reason I explode
I'm too weak, these words too heavy to reload
I hate who I've become
when you fill my thoughts with this ammo and turn me into this gun

When the halls of solitude give way to arching gardens it will all be but half-remembered when I’m blinded by your kiss, as bright as a Sunday morning sun all bundled in a fuzzy blanket when you smile like this, gentle and sweet.
You’re as steady as the tides, as consistent as night and day and I know you can already see the lines being traced for the blueprint of our home, I see our future children playing in your line of sight, just a stone’s throw down streams of time.
I know you aim to see heaven on earth, to see Jesus turn water into wine again, to see the downtrodden lifted with an upward spiraling bannister towards eternal bliss and I think that’s why your focus so rarely drifts, you’re a woman who knows the joy of excellence.
So tell me all your days, I’ll mix my love into your morning coffee and into every evening deliberation, into every small yet meaningful consideration.
There’s a drama written in our God-given oxygen, a theology in the curve of your cheek, in the movements of your soul from life to death, movements like a bow drawn along a cello purring with voices low, voices quiet with a vow. And so I make my vows.

30 days ago, I set a challenge for myself:
       No ***, for 6 months.

I am on day 31.
        That means there are 149 days to go.

This is
the single  
most idiotic
decision I have made in a long time.

I keep thinking the next thing will be it.

Maybe the next job, the next project, the next person in my life.

But I don’t know what it is I’m searching for.

All I know is something is missing.

She cannot grasp her shifting landscape,
With its muted morning lyrics
from both Robin and Cardinal.

What has dimmed today’s sunrise?
Her steps are shorter, her walk slower,
both signs she disregards
of her approaching twilight age.

She rests on her favorite bench
by the garden gate.
She finds no handle on the rusted bolt.

No entrance for her inspiring plod
among her realm of light and sound.

Sitting, she gathers courage,
new strength to
climb over the weathered fence.
Undaunted, she reaches
her limit. Her muscles feel lacking.

Accompanied by her mystic shadow self,
her playful muse mirrors what she feels: incapability.

I sit in a trance as the morning sun sifts through the porch window.  Music from a Carolina wren taunts the world with a glorious tweet.

My wife invades my trance, “Look what Amazon brought me.”

My reply, “That’s nice, honey."

My eyes fixed on a headline, “Colleges are cautious about graduation speakers who might provoke the government!”

Freedom of speech, where have you gone?
Are you hiding in the canyons of the Appalachian Hills?
Concealed in the wheat fields of Kansas?

Will ICE deport the songbirds to Latin America
because they sound like freedom?