Her name is Autumn.
She can write, write so beautifully.
Her name is Autumn.
Her written word makes my soul dance quickly.
Her name is Autumn.
She ponders things I never think of
A dreamer of dreams,
A schemer of schemes,
And a wonderful lady at that.
A lady named Autumn.

You exist
As a means of action
And your job
Is well done.

You yourself
Make the world stand still
While I struggle
To learn my lesson.

I find
Every moment without your presence
Feels like a
Waste of an opportunity...

To learn,
To live,
To love,
To exist,
Like you do.

You can teach me something.
Show me anything, help me learn
Make the wheels in my mind turn.
It could be the most trivial thing,
Something you discovered on Google, or Bing
You could know the whole song, or a few pieces
Anything you teach me is more than decent.
What has the most value in the big blue earth?
For me, your knowledge beings the most mirth.
My friends, my allies, they know so much
About people, places, life and such.

How I adore your nerve
when you kissed me in your closet upon sheets made of legos
and all of your childhood dreams.
How easy I am for you to draw when you play on stage the song that you wrote me,
The one that feels like rock climbing by the river,
Like naps in the summer when I drool on your chest and you don't mind,
Like kissing you until the very last minute of my curfew,
only to break it for the miracle that is your lips.
How alluring is your breath on my neck,
Your voice in my ear when you told me that you loved me
and you didn't stop smiling,
even as the years went by and I did.
How I craved, longed, begged for time to be still
the time you took me to the highest hill you could drive to,
You called it my mountain.
"At first, you look at it and it's so small,
but once you notice it, it's all you can see," you said.
How my stomach floods with waves of nostalgia and a taste
of everything I've ever had to live without,
With complete and utter spell-binded devotion at the simple familiarity
of your smell.
How addicted I am to your laugh when you're happy and
the mastered impression you do of your mom.
How weak I am to your intellect and your appreciation of literature
and real music,
Your enthusiasm for art and the "name that note" game you force upon me
as you stumble onto the classical radio station.
How in love I am with your romance that is as childish as my attachment
to my baby blankie and my mother's childhood walrus that you never ceased to insult.
Our pajama day that we decided over our prom,
When we turned on John Mayer and slow danced in your room.
Your idea of a date consisted of fake wine and me.
How incredibly warm are the coldest of nights,
On the side of your dirt road as we lie in the snow that is too cold for comfort,
yet holds us there with the fear that one day will not look the same as this one
and I would bear any amount of cold winter to keep one more moment of yours.
How I cherish the way you latch my pinky with yours when we walk
And the face you don't know you make when you play guitar.
The rooftop where you kissed me for the very first time and the string rings
we wore to remind each other we were still there.
How incredibly and unfortunately devout I am to all that I remember of you.

we're all standing on the edge of reality,
millimeters from the precarious cliff of horrible,
beautiful truth.
the glow of our iPhones, tablets, flat screen TVs, etc
illuminating our placid faces.
ignorance is bliss, they say.
wake up!
wake up,
and turn off your alarm,
and flip on the news;
start your coffee brewer.
we depend on the technology.
we live in the the technology.
we live in a computer.
you are not real
and neither am i
but we aren't dead either.
if we can think,
we can exist,
right?

My love is ethereal, unknown.
Magical, but true.
Genderless and fathomless;
my one and only you.
Androgynous because
It doesn't matter what's outside.
Love lies between the spirit and the mind.
Oh may your heart be blessed to feel the waters of starlight;
or live among a quality of crows, a lonesome night.

I walk the broken path-
the sidewalk of life.
I walk and sleep,
and sometimes weep.

Though I feel that I'm alone,
from the path I dare not go.
At times my path will cross another,
then I'll even start to wonder
Was that greeting even real?
do they know how I feel?

Everyone's path is their own.
What's upon it no one knows
when I reach my journeys end,
I'll feel the power of the paths great bend.

Sometimes the poem
doesn't want to come;
it hides from the poet
like a playful cat
who has run
under the house
& lurks among slugs,
roots, spiders' eyes,
ledge so long out of the sun
that it is dank
with the breath of the Troll King.

Sometimes the poem
darts away
like a coy lover
who is afraid of being possessed,
of feeling too much,
of losing his essential
loneliness-which he calls
freedom.

Sometimes the poem
can't requite
the poet's passion.

The poem is a dance
between poet & poem,
but sometimes the poem
just won't dance
and lurks on the sidelines
tapping its feet-
iambs, trochees-
out of step with the music
of your mariachi band.

If the poem won't come,
I say: sneak up on it.
Pretend you don't care.
Sit in your chair
reading Shakespeare, Neruda,
immortal Emily
and let yourself flow
into their music.

Go to the kitchen
and start peeling onions
for homemade sugo.

Before you know it,
the poem will be crying
as your ripe tomatoes
bubble away
with inspiration.

When the whole house is filled
with the tender tomato aroma,
start kneading the pasta.

As you rock
over the damp sensuous dough,
making it bend to your will,
as you make love to this manna
of flour and water,
the poem will get hungry
and come
just like a cat
coming home
when you least
expect her.