Desire a man who walks a straight path
Keen as the cutting edge
Straight as an arrow and deep to sink
That way in him you may always be found
Like the mountain pass
Taken higher than the clouds  
And never disgraced, degraded or sunk down

This sunrise is very beautiful
With a hue of pink and a rareness which
Befits the weariness of red eyes

As slowly over the Catskills she
Rises and resides
Until she can be seen within the sky

Pure as almond and ivory  
Backed by the dawn and the day alike

Who am I to stand here in her way?
Who am I to say that she shouldn’t try?

I can only trust and occasionally wish
That she would honor me with a simple kiss
Of morning dew, and a smile wide

For that, in this, my morning eyes  
Would bring great joy to me in my life

Perhaps I am mistaken
Perhaps you are not as you seem in the light of day
Glimmering like the Pyrite on the infinite cliff
On the edges of which you keep me, ever at bay
Because after all of the crystal
And shale has been stripped away
And the quartz, the granite, the limestone pale
Have fallen to the earth beneath
To be crushed underneath the walking waves
Perhaps then I will see you shine on a barren day
And my eyes will be better for the sight
Even if your worth is not in gold
But as I fear it might be, in clay

Either I know everything, or I know nothing
I'm never close to the in between
Which is why you seem so far away
At least in time, within this space
Because I cannot see your face
I can only hope most ardently
That for once in my life
Somebody like you
Knows everything there is to know
About someone like me

The smell of skin
Alabaster
Mixed with deep breaths in the dark

As quiet minds
Slowly unwind
And let go of the thoughts inside
Like shooting stars
We fall in line
Most quietly here side by side

Within this bed
All that could've been said
Has faded like the setting sun
At least until the morning comes
Until you smell the coffee
And hear the distant purring hum
Of the ceiling fan
Let your heart beat slow until we speak again

Because there is no safer place
No secluded cabin or basin by a mountain face

There is only you
And there is only me
And the edges of what cannot be seen

Like the trust we keep in each other
So completed
Which results in an expert exclusivity

So you know that when I say I can
I mean thay I will indefinitely
As you know that you could for me

Because no other eyes can see
The certain way the palmtrees sway
Longingly beside the sea

So if you ever desire to sleep
While lying right here next to me

I wouldn't mind such a memory
In fact I'd cherish it, hold onto it
And try my best to forever keep
The essence of your tiny feet
As they passed by my awkward knees

Provided you don't mind my skin
Or the smell of my cologne which I always keep
For as surly as the sun will peak
Near by my side is where you'd be

And slowly as you succumb to sleep
And drift into a pleasant dream
I'd close my eyes and be at peace
Just knowing you were next to me

There in the dark
Where our deep breaths meet
Is where I hope you'd fall asleep

I am weary
My eyes are wandering aimlessly
My forethought having long since lost its ability to see
Anything beyond the warm bed in front of me

O' my old friend
How I long and wish to return to you again
To pass the day slowly away
Until I am refreshed again and eager to live
Outside of this abnormality

Because I miss the normal visions I have
And this, whatever you want to call it existence
Is a much sleepier, far less enjoyable version of me

For I am weary
And yet I want to be
Rested without having to waste my time
Investing in the folds of sleep

This I know to be selfish of me
And yet no matter how hard I try
I cannot seem to close my eyes and rest my head
At either the foot nor head of my bed

Perhaps, if you'd see me, you could understand
That I am not angry, foolish, or sad
I'm just a slightly tired man

When I see this
When I hear that
And when I am most hallowed out
The arrogant side of me saunters in
And quietly says, something boisterous and aloud
“Let me show you just how I can be“
It says most confidently
And yet I wonder those words
And if my arrogance also says such things to me

I don't say this much, but that's stupid
To waste your life creating things for someone else
When really all that I create is to learn about myself
To understand the other half, of the other side, of the other me
And to create something so foolishly
And to think that it represents most perfectly
Whatever it is that I did see
That perhaps was stupid of me

If I could box up all of the words
The most beautiful ones that I've found
And send them to you in the mail
I would do it without hesitance
Because beautiful words don't belong in my world
And I'd much rather see them alive and well
In the hands of a fluid reflective girl
Who might just meld them into song
In a world where such words actually belong

No woman's hand will warm my own
And I need no other voice to tell me I can

I'll find no confort in the confusion of another person's soul
I have enough problems within my own

I feel no obligation to try and break this human mold
For this is simply how I am

I just wish that I could stop expecting others
To somehow create the value in me
Which would permit me to grow old without regrets

This most definitely it's a terrible venture in which to invest

Remember when a woman’s walk
Her poise and chance
And most importantly, her ability to dance
Is what drew her outline and intrigued
Every able bodied man
Single or not
To look at her
To wish to offer her a hand
And yet as I am
An able bodied modern man
I hate who I am
Not because I can, but because I cannot dance
Half so well as I like to think I can
But perhaps…
Under the right circumstances
If I could see the shooting star before it descends
And ultimately lands
I would possibly
Almost definitely
Try and practice dancing again

The moment you are most comfortable
The moment you are free
Is a lie... Or so I think

Because the next wave is on it's way
And soon you will be crashing down
Just like the wave...

Because life and love I view like this
Though most around you do not know
That they are tossing in the sea

There will always be another wave
Moving towards our solemn shores
Crashing into you and me

Nothing makes me smile like a dark day
Like the heavy rain
Which openly berates the crowd
But smiles at me on its way down

As I run from my car
But not to hide
No I run from my car to get inside
Because I'm late as late can be
And if I had no responsibilities
I would let the time slip and slide away
Within such rain

I would trod the squishy flooded ground
And turn my head up to the sky
To declare my love for such a day
And to kiss the open honest clouds

I’m struck by this
Isn't it funny how?
No matter how hard the rain may fall
Your thirst is never quenched at all
By the rain drops tumbling down
How silly are the people who frown
At such rain

Darker than the shade beneath the heavy trees on a moonless night
So my heart has been when my companion is thee
For we are more different than the sun and the stars
Than the earth and mars
Never to be crossed but ever cross at the universe
For placing us this far apart
You throw me underneath the evergreens
Like the very shade of which you sing
Dark as the midnight hour and cold as the dawn of each new morn
Where not a glimmer of hope has a chance to stay
This is why we both must find another way
To tear ourselves apart from the sky
And to rotate the distance and turn away
Hence why the sunlight and the shade are not the same
For they are the inverse and the opposite
As you and I are night and day

From the last scribble
To the last scrawl

The last storm which lasts
Beyond the last hope in all

Like a lasting song
Or the last lengthy drawl

Let the artist draw last
What is meant to be drawn

Mistress of the cliffs
With eyes like lighting
And the rolling thunderous waves crashing down
Just beneath her fingertips

She is Demelza
The Goddess of solidarity and steadfastness

The epitome of emphasis
And the truth behind every last belmaidens wish

Which is of course…
To return to the fields of idleness
Of former youth

To thresh the wheat and kick the chaff
And to walk the surface of the earth
With a joy forgetting the hardships
And the toils of the fast

And so each day
She trudges her way
Though the dark and dull abyss
Until she reaches her new task
And sets herself to another height
For she was born to be mistress of the cliffs

A beautiful notion isn't it?
Ironic even
The thought of waiting here like this
As if the act is somehow blessed with ease
When all around you is in motion
And you are as unstirring as the trees
Rooted deep within the mind
Looking at the other side
And seeing the blissful, beautiful ignorance
How often I wish it could be mine
That I had no such standards as this
And that I could swallow such a feeble line
Just like a fish
Nibbling on a willow wisp
In an ocean seemingly full of fish

Believe me…

I respect such idealism as this
Because I live with it
But to “just wait” and stay like this
At present holds little hope for me
Both to and from this someone else
There is no transfer, or passage of peace

Because these few years feel like an eternity

And so the term…
“The right one?”
Makes want to say...
“Oh please.”

I've drained every wishing well
Dried-up every puddle of water
And drank down every lake, pond, and looming ocean
Not a venue is left to quench my thirst
Or to quell the viscous expression in me
Which burns like the saline fires of the red sea
So I of course... Being of sound mind
Tilt my head back to the sky to catch the rain
For the sky provides the purity of mind
To wash the taste of salt away
And to remind me what it is like to drink
Anew from the stream of each new day

I am the jackrabbit on two legs
The half moon hanging overhead
The eerie branches in the dead of night
And the midnight snack
On which you wish you might just be able to bite

It's the little things in life
Which can slowly crush the soul
The will to fight, the old desires
Ever changing and growing older

Be it in the misunderstanding
Or the mistreatment of others
Or the values to which you so preciously hold

I find its better to take the time
To reshape the clay
Rather than to let yourself be bothered
By the deconstruction of your most beloved mold

When I focus, I can pull the walls
And create the shadows that only the artist sees

Like the distant corners of the dreary hall
Nobody knows internally what is happening to me

Whenever I focus inward, and throw the ball
Precariously, towards another

Because when I am focused I am me
And I am never afraid to fall

That is the secret within me
That when I try, I pull the walls

Inward at a unparalleled speed
Until the path is known to me

And it narrows out like the distant hall
Because when I focus, I can pull the walls

If you mind
Their small mindedness
Their mindlessness
Will become the beast which kills the creative genius

He is the sky beyond the clouds
The heaven and the highest host
The gentle breath in the wandering fields
And the coolest drink of water in the wellspring of my soul
He breathes life into me
Acknowledges me
And makes my scattered pieces whole
My God with steady outstretched arms
Who offers me a hand to hold

I wish you could see these reflections of mine
In my eyes
Like when the snow falls freely down
Careening now
Onto the ground
Past the autumn remnants of my life

I'm waiting in a dark room
When it would be brighter just outside
I speak and sing, but sound nothing like a tune
And I hope that my ears, and especially my eyes
Never fully adjust to this life of mine

Because I am waiting on the receiving end
Of an empty and uncertain line
Like a phone cord wrapped around my wrist
I tell myself that it’s no crime
To wait for what I hope would be mine

Red lights in the night sky
Twelve eyes
Blinking at me curiously
On top of towers which fail to pierce the sky
They wink at me
Almost knowingly
For I am tall and lean like these
Blinking often into the night
Clearly in sight
But rarely ever truly seen
For more than an instant
Or more than a two eyes
Just for a moment
Like the red eye passing by
I blink
Because I'm still alive

I am drawn apart
Cut in half
Separated
Like the sea
Both the color
And the overcast
Reside in me
But do not think
For a second
That they are
The same in me
For they are separate
And aside
On the other side
O*f the other me

No shining star in the distant sky
Nor headlight glaring in your eye
Or a firework after it learns to fly
Can compare to the light in a man's heart
When he kisses his girl for the first time

I am the last hand on the earth
To compound and push down
To press the headache as it sounds
And fade it out

Away into the nothingness which awaits its new master
I am standing upside-down
Twisted inside until out
Living in the unlivable town

For I am the last hand on the earth
And as it stands I'm falling down

I feel the cold inside my fingers
Trying to turn them into Steel
Like notches on an arrowhead
My joints will not yield
To the bending ways of the steering wheel

Metal and plastic, ice and ore
Barrel beneath my soaking shoes
And I the driver of this Ford
Try desperately to warm
Be it not to you

Regarding the snow
I hope we get hammered
I hope we get hit

I hope that the wind just blows and blows
Yet cannot decide which way to go
When carrying for us the blessing of snow

How I hope to get home
And get off these roads
Be it into a ditch
That way for a moment
That way for a bit
I would be left alone
Be it just for a minute

And if you're smiling now
Then you can relate to this
So get going dear related
Before the roads turn to slick

How I hope and hope with an honest heart
That we would see storms
Of magnificent art
Capable of incapacitating the means to work
At least in part

If I up and died today
Would anyone know?
About the archives stored away?
About the words which I've locked away?
And if I died on such a day
Would anyone ever find a way
To link me back to those former days?
To hear the words I once did say?
If I were to die this present day
Would you find me here along your way?

She tasted like the atmosphere
Deep, dark, and blue as the moon
Distant as the fading star in the northern most hemisphere
And yet each time I tasted her
I was reminded that there was no oxygen to be had in her

To be alone is no crime
To be strong like oak
Or to spin like the baler and his twine
Because to be molded is to wait to be broken
Apart by the falling folds of time
To be falling out beside yourself
That is a shame but not a crime

I see your doppelganger here
I’m always most polite to her
Because I know
Because I see
Just who she it
Just who you were

Alluring eyes like waterfalls flow right on by
See not the graffiti on the rocks
But the beauty which resides
Deep inside her watery eyes

Cold caffeine
Warm room
Rain outside my windowsill

Quite chill
Somber tune
Waterfall which turns to snow

Hissing heat
Radiates
Truth until it’s known to me

That underneath
Every tire
Grinds the morning words to speak

Don't pretend to be something you're not to impress
Don't be like that
When in fact it's the claim that you understand
Which unfailing
Undoubtedly
Makes me laugh

I'll find no rest in this old home
Another house beneath my feet
Like sands which shift on a foreign shole
I am the comber of this beach

With every night alive I wake
To wind which howls
And a bed which aches

Though guilty as my leave may be
I can no longer sleep within this place

I close my eyes above my salad
Nobody here can see
Praying that God would keep her well
And take care of her
Be it well away from me

If each wave on the sea
Was but a single life
We would all come crashing down
Around the knees of our children's lives

Wherever they are
Would you let these thoughts and dreams profound
Settle to the base of your stomach

Like that stray grains of coffee grounds
Not filtered through the thinness of society
But strained through the fibers of the heart

Ever flowing from the the mind
Until the truth is boiled down
And at the bottom of the cup found

Press my chest like the pillow
Breath your love back into me
Until I can see your hair swaying with ease
Softly like the whims of the summer willows
Would you resuscitate the lover in me?

From brews, to baseball, to the Caesar salads we both like to eat

You were the potential just out of reach
The distant hope, the fear internalized
The not knowing when, or how, or if, we would ever meet

For once, for real, instead of on screens
Like the reflections in my galleries
I see you now in photos with him
Seeing both what is and could’ve been

Yet there you are by your father's side
Striding down the aisle inside, of another man’s church
Another man’s mind    

I just hope that he loves baseball like me
And that he can paint the corners outside
Almost perfectly, just like a Rembrandt

Though I missed you this time by a single stride
I never felt like the game began
Because we both looked down that distant road
And you, glanced back, at a map inscribed

On that, with this, I bid you goodbye, and wish you well until the 9th

Dear Hush,
What is a movie which I must,
See and such?
Something idealistic,
And not so hush hush.
If you'd tell me in a minute,
I'd appreciate it much,
I appreciate your time,
O' Misses o' Hush.

The more I look
The more I see
But do not necessarily understand
Why is such a simple thing
So much of a surprise to me?

Sometimes I wish I were like them
That I could see such alluring sights
And that in likeness shared with them
I knew the fear of such trembling heights

But then I’m reminded in my mind
Of my own mountains which arise
With every dawn until the dusk
It’s my own Everest I must climb

A true leader is a selfless soul,
One who thinks not for himself,
But for the others, for the many
For the halves and for the whole, of humanity

Regardless of age or importance to man,
It’s not in the memory of their great names,
In with which we stand.
But in the willingness to mold
One’s self into a servant,

To humbly hold the troubled hand,
And to become the kind of person who doesn’t abuse,
The right to demand

But instead, looks to enable others,
So that they might just begin, and begin again

Because all of the power in the world,
Can be abused, and removed if misused

For this, my dear leaders, I ask of you,
To not lose yourself in the arrogance
Of discovering that you are indeed you

Because true leadership is not about you
And leadership, will never be about you
So before you lead, would you let go of you
That way you might win in spite of you

The most honest question a man can ask, like rock and roll and the radio, was our kind of love, the kind which lasts?