is this the silent ache
they talk about?
that turns into something
much better?
am I growing without
really knowing?
put down your suitcase,
what a weapon it's been

all the things you thought
you had to be, and what
you needed to change,
maybe you didn't have to be wild
but needed a good shake
a good earthquake for that
rebel in you to learn who
you really weren't


all the times you've been stirred from
sleep, well it's okay to dream now,
go ahead and laugh if it loosens up
the dust,
even those that took you far away
fell in line with something greater
a conquest in their direction
doesn't mean you looked the
other way,
lonely barely begins
to describe the storm
but everyone has seen
the smooth stones at
the bottom of the river,
at one point
rough and withstanding,
day to day relenting,
but i've never stopped
to judge a pocked thing,
and it's certainly not
the worst to lose a way or two
or be knocked from a hiding
place,

so it's okay
that you're
all alone,
the road is mighty long
good lord that suitcase, you wield it
like a sword,
it's okay little girl,
we've never had this
in the bag, and if no one's
here to walk you back
then

sometimes you gotta walk yourself home.


sometimes you gotta walk yourself home.

it's coming.
it's coming.
my mom always
says it's coming,
a revelation, an
epiphany, on a
fast moving train
a note on the end
of a bullet, I'm
waiting, I'm
outside waiting
for a prophecy
to be dropped
into my hands
with a how-to
where-to, when-to
i'm here, I'm outside
I'm outside, I'm here
I'm here.
is it coming
is it coming



is it coming?

can medleys
be self-aware
could i recognize
myself in all the
people i've met?

it's still very strange
to silence a place as
you walk past
or to hear that you
are a ***** from drunks
i once thought that
love carried over
into rough circumstances
but I can see that people
will gather on sides
proclaiming their support
and hurling rocks--
i just never thought
he'd be the one to
listlessly watch
it happen.

i'm not sure--
you once said
i touched you
like i was seein'
a  l  l  o  f   i  t
you'd prolly
say I didn't, now
the way things are--
i was tracin' my freckles
the other day wonderin'
the same thing 'bout myself
'cause it sounds silly but I
remember the texture of
his cuticles and the whiskers
around his lips
but will anyone have seen
me
that
way before gettin',
before losing, before
goin, before

before

drive miles out
open up, find a
spot you never were
you owe no one an
explanation for
screaming or crying
admit to all the things
you did and go,
show up and expect
nothing, you don't need
roots, that is why you have
hands, nimble and ever busy
always searching, you don't
need roots, your fingers
have always done a fine
job of digging in so
drive miles out
open up, find a
spot you never were
the newest things are
always scary and
you are infinitely
cautious but despite
the ticks in your surface
are so worthy of good
things.

he jokes about tuscaloosa
and being buried in dixie
shot in his truck near the border
or set on fire for a better purpose
had gone down in a tomato fight
somewhere in texas,

and when he's mad he dredges up
all the things he secretly hates about me
but'll ne'er admit, 'cause sometimes he doesn't
even know what he's feeling, has got all his
spirit out in ten arms searching for the best
way to put down one sentence--

he's pretty scary when he's angry
looks like might just lash out or
shoot through my redwood patio
'specially with the threat of his truck
runnin' in the background, rumbling
in the driveway ready to take him away--

he used all my favorite things to get inside
but starts to take them away one by one
I tell my mom same, same cause it's
the same story, different page, different chapter
same book, same shelf, same dust

he once said I was what he was tryin' to get back to
told me he was takin' his mom to church
once brought up the Lord in a dim light
but now he don't see the point
I'll tell you what,


I'll tell you *what

I want to bloom--

is that the word for it? I want to unfurl,

billow, love unconditionally, fearless

no excuses, there would be no excuses

to be pure in an impure vessel

a spirit hasn't chosen its home

beautiful in my wretchedness,  

salt will still burn like all the others

but i'll be soothed by words of milk

is that strange of me to say, I want

to know the woman I'll be someday

oh
man
the
smile,
though.

Little things
my dad does,
today he put
a new tooth
brush by my
sink after I
carelessly
mentioned
wanting new
things

I still ask
myself why
you do the
things you
do, still wonder
if you hide behind
a paintbrush or
smoke blunts on
cliff edges with
pretty girls, wrapped
in bandanas, dust
and Albuquerque
sweat, I still romanticize
you in the back of my
head along with everything
else, and that song by Tori
Kelly winds back up over
the speakers.

is it really like that?
I wonder, him not
sayin' a thing and
ignoring you after
he gets off,  i still
hurt about that
about bein' looked
through and through
like I wasn't even there
but lord if that's the
last thing on his mind
anymore, a silly girl
silly, silly
girl.

early morning grey Greeley
Violet's cats woke me up
and I left her roommate
taking a hit upstairs, just
wanted to leave, just wanted
to leave, didn't want to think
that this was the same kind
of life you were living. i'm
still not used to this you
that I don't even know
still not used to this
you that was there
all
along.

somewhere we're at the dinner table together



and the scene pans in on your arm stretched
across the dishes, the noise fades in but you are
not lost in the chatter, the camera assumes position
of an all-seeing eye, except it is both you and me and
everyone, the drifting lens lands on my fingers, my shoulder
the bottom of my chin, I'm all a blurred face in the dim party
lights, hair awash with the leaves and the plastic clatter of plates
but you focus in and so do I, because it's me and you and everyone



somewhere we sit together at a dinner table.

I want to
taste that
kind of
happiness

am i to think
i am the only
one who finds
sharing bodies
to be sacred or
was that lost
am I just

dreaming.

i am chasing you down
an alley way, the slap of
my shoes echoing up the
shoots,

standing in front of your bike
your head tilted back, a toothpick
wobbling up and down between
your teeth, hold a blank
stare, jaw slowly working
i think i should slip between
your handlebars like a siren on a ship

speedwalking backwards-- stop, stop
in front of your door, head tucked
the railing catching a fall
and then wanting to
fold myself into
an origami butterfly
when you launched
off the couch and used
a voice no one has ever

I don't fully cry
until you mutter
jesus ******' christ
slip off the recliner
and hold me.

More than less I
am sick. Of writing.
things about love.
when I know nothing about it.

You were a mandarin experience
jets of white ribbon, the things you
said were quarters, flat and chucked
sometimes you reached all the way
into me with your ideas, with your
with your, with your, with your



did you even ask?

will i steam like
naked earth beneath
the tepid rain
raw?

How do
things
become
well with
your soul?