there’s a piece of you inside of me
I put it there for safe keeping
close to the beating pulse of my body
so I can still feel you when you’re not around

your presence envelopes me
your voice soothes me
your touch stimulates me

this piece I carry tightly kept
inside my breath
where no one can see

Sacred, where the she or him
Cannot take it from me
Solid, where the lack or not enough
Cannot waiver me

Protected in this quiet place
that may not actually exist
perhaps only in this prose

where letter meets paper
paper holds truth
truth is what I say
and I say this..

There will always be a piece of you inside of me
Forever.
From now
until the next life we meet.

I see my naked reflection painted on the glass as I look out upon the night sky
the delicate sparkles make me smile like a little girl, lost in a daydream

The pungent smell of farmland gone bad disrupts the serenity of my scene
But no bother
I will not let the grandeur be tainted

As I gaze out at the romantic splendor
The song in the background transports me to a time when I danced with reckless abandonment

when my main priority was a game of kickball or maybe a long bike ride where I got lost in myself til the fading light of day guided me home.

Youth is never lost on the young if you pay attention

“Up above my head
I hear music in the air
I really do believe
I really do believe
there's a Heaven somewhere”
--Rhiannon Giddens

“Is that all there is?”
--Peggy Lee*

An old philosopher told me this:

“About heaven.
Let’s say there’s more than one.
There’s the one where souls
are lurid with perfection,
piled into bliss,
dreaming of change.

“There’s the one people search for
to fit the story they tell themselves.
I looked for it.  I watched the sky.
I found only words.  Blue sky is
a blank page.  Clouds are garish metaphors.

“Then there’s one that follows you.
Don’t look for it. You can’t find it.
It’s not a place or a path.
It dances at the edge of things
like old photos or a young face
that lives remembered in its older one,
an eternal moment always at hand
trailing like a thought balloon,
a shadow cast by nothing,
forever unfolding, never now.”

The story began one night in the dark
when most curious minds were asleep.
Sitting silently, only fingers tapping the keys,

“You tempted me like an empty page,” he wrote,
longing for a response of immediacy
that would fill his mind with more words,
the only thing he took comfort in.

She stepped aside from the voices
at her gathering to read his message.
“Emptiness,” she wrote back, “lives in the mind,
the habit of looking for what’s lost.

There is no zero in nature.
Let me tempt you with fullness instead.
Come and see what I see, and share what is there.”

As she sent the message, she swallowed deeply
knowing that what she offered was not quite a lie
but more of an unfulfilled desire.

“I can give you what I never had,” she thought.
Her mind wandered, filling
with all the ways that only emptiness can.

He wasn’t sure what she was offering him.
Whatever it was, he longed for it.
Her words flooded him with a feeling he couldn’t name.
Love? Desire?  Intoxication? Yes.

As the sun rose, he took no notice of fatigue, thirst, hunger.
He forgot the empty days,
the time spent looking in the mirror,
counting the lost years.
He began again to write.

"Only kids play hide and seek", I tell myself,
as I ponder all the dimly lit, hidden places to squeeze my body into

I've never really been afraid of the dark until I try to hide
These empty cold spaces
that hold nothing but vacant memories of the last spider's web where weaving stopped

What's so scary about the dark?
If I carry my flashlight in my back pocket would I be less ashamed?

It's only a game
There's nothing to be afraid of
Yet it's the only thing I actually fear.
Things that go bump in the night always seem to control all the candles

being brazenly bold in the daylight
is easy
all eyes on me and the fleshed persona
that seems invincible
How can you be invisible when you are nothing but seen?

Center of attention
Applause from the stage
Seems as though there is nothing left to seek
It's what I hide from myself in dark
That makes me the most afraid

Maybe the reasons are multitudes of many
Maybe the purpose of this path connecting is far too grand for just one thing
Maybe the worlds apart come close
Wrap in rhyme and swallowed in rhythm
To show this little girl that there is more then this

Maybe

Maybe this intertwined time is to guide the blind and haphazard to really see that which has been right in front of her eyes

Maybe that is what this is all for
You see me in my broken disconnect
Fighting to hide the hurt that lies deep behind my eyes
Passionate disconnect is still disconnected

Piecing back the pieces, with jagged edges and not enough glue
Maybe that's you
The sticky, free-flowing magic that's quickly filling in all the in betweens

The little light leaks that let the great seap
To all the wrong places
What does it feel like to be filled up?
Teach me to top off my overflowing cup

Feed me and my starving mind
Show me that true love is real
Help me explore the rest of this divine
I've waited so long to truly feel
This

My mind is ignited in a new creative flow
Doors blown open to let me
wander, or maybe I'll follow
Where ever you may go

A true love story grander then my imagination could create on my own

Maybe this is what I've been waiting for

I remember that day when I made a declaration to someone's mom who didn't really care
That day, when I stood proudly and said I'm moving to gold country
where dreams never sleep

with rolling hills, covered in golden grass as far as the eye can see
Where passion runs freely through the valleys, up the mountains and leaping off into the foggy sunsets

I'm moving to gold country where the weather is always perfect and life just seems easier somehow

Perfect

Such a strange word really, as I believe perfect doesn't actually exist

I moved to gold country where it never rains just sunshine and daydreams

Sometimes I miss the rain

The showers of perfection that seem to wash off all the things that hold me back
The pools of raindrops that house the wildest of childhood fantasies

I remember the times,  in the mostly forgotten past
Sitting on the front porch, rocking in chairs that only squeaked when we sang

That childhood of long ago that's only lost in the longing of playing in the puddles
too big for one little girl

I remember the times
where we sat quietly listening to the thunder in the distance just far enough to connect the dots and lead us through the clouds on the backs of dragons to where the magic is hidden deep within the greatness of the sky

Watching quietly
as the majestic clouds burst open with these tiny droplets of rain that seemed to form sheets of blue, grey and what true perfection really is

I remember the times
sitting on that porch, watching the storms and nothing else mattered

Lost in the sea of rain that seemed to open the sky to everything I've ever hoped for

Sometimes I miss the rain