I drew your heart on a piece of paper
and painted it with pastel colors
It's sad,
because,
you wanted it to be vivid
But darling I held my brush,
again,
against the palette

Our poems are fabrics

knit with the dreams inside
laid out in the open
so may a passing eye
grant a glance

a pausing mind
decides for a fleeting moment
to wear

thinking them their own.

Nothing ventured
nothing gained

We'll feign the perfection
we never attained

Only memories ever can last
we'll postpone the future
to worship the past

Love me strong
in candle light

Pretend you do
stay tonight

The feeling I'll save
locked in my mind

Embrace me again
for the last time

There is breath here
Still
Full of silent
Mornings silent nights
Looking
Glass half-full half-empty
Handed
A Love beyond wild edges
Made
Too sharp to catch my fall

Yet I stand these tests of strength
Weathered the devastation
Share stories of our struggle
Never really losing the acidic taste of failure
The burn of letting go
How do I not feel guilty?
Even knowing I gave my all
It wasn't enough
Played out in such a way that nothing could have been

*I still had more to give

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?

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...