with one finger in his mother’s belt loop the child lowers then lifts then lowers again his free hand without touching once the grocery’s tile.  the long front pocket of his jacket boasts from one end the upper body of a woman whose ******* have been covered with one stamp each and from the other the woman’s bare feet I’m guessing won’t make the trip.  the child’s two younger siblings recognize me from last week when I halfheartedly rolled over them with my cart and they graciously go stomach first to ground with their fists under them as if they’ve been given charge of a rose but are unsure which has it.  the mother looks at me like I am long division to be avoided much the same as I was looked at in my prime.  I have no cart this day so instead I mock stand on the boy and girl making sure my balance keeps me.  the mother says enough and presses the right side of her nose with the back of her wrist which upon removal has on it a spot of blood I follow to her hidden belly button at which the transference clings and then reveals.  I want to tell her my brothers never retrieved a single bright kite from a tall tree nor did they ever pull from their loose and ***** jeans any kind of toad that lived.

THE KITE DREAMS OF CAPTURING THE SKY

the kite
scented the weather

sniffed the wind
took to the air

became one
with the sky

playing tag
with clouds

chasing birds
to an horizon

before the tree
caught it in its grasp

handed it back to me
still struggling

to be free of this
human hand

a potbelly
scarecrow
itching
its backside

on a tree
in a wood

where aliens
grieve.

LOST BALLOON

crawling from the crash
I couldn't have died
if I tried

I had a son to save
laughed
spat in death's face

pulled him from the flames
I forbade him to die
he disobeyed

the car exploded
burning the edges
of the night

I survive
without him
a death in itself

my reflection
does all the talking
I just stare in the mirror

Christmas now
I feel like a lost balloon
sticking to the ceiling

should I buy you candy
should I get you a balloon

I like toys and dolls
houses with small chairs

do you want to play a game
doesn't matter what's your age

I'm feeling kinda hazy
would you say I'm crazy

I forget that I'm growing up

I forget that I'm no longer
a child
my teen years filled with flowers

oh
how they die so fast

I forget we grow up
in a blink of an eye

thought maybe you and I
could find a fairy
a diamond in the sky

I like bears
pink bows
glitter nails

don't you want to play
it doesn't matter if you go
we can play tomorrow all over again

I'm feeling kind of dizzy
won't you say I'm crazy

I forgot that I've grown up

no more playgrounds
no more running around

I forget that I am growing up

once a flower
now pressed dead

If only I could believe

like I once did

all those beautiful dreams
gone to sleep

There are conversations in which my mental frame leaves the
                               parameters of my body.

No longer can I fathom the concept of ‘being in love’
        I witness dates
        and
        feel as an apprentice of such a trade might
        an inadequacy to replicate the models of those before me

Gone are my indefinite moments of sanity
        Childhood is laced in linens of silk
        Soft-spoken words
        and
        Finely crafted spontaneity lacking responsibility

Ceaseless are the times in which I must conceal the thoughts I abhor
        Depravity seems to chain my soul
        which leads to
        a Resolution in pixelation
        due to
       a visual handicap which has left my eye blind to choosing right

My friends make me happy
        but as a glass transforms back-&-forth between half-empty &
        half-full
        one glance across our wooden dinner is all it takes
        for
My thoughts to liquidate into bars of gold
Telling myself I must exchange their conversation for my motivation
        heavy on the mind
        light keystrokes

Once i reawaken at 1 A.M. from my conscious-coma
i ask myself
What good is it?
        To be thoughtful
        Yet have no action
What good is it?
        To fantasize
        Yet refuse your own inclination for renovation
What good is it?
        To be dramatic
        Yet have no one at your performance

I do understand what it means to ‘be’

        Watching Tuesday suns burn in loops of ongoing weeks
                              -    lacking peaks    -
        As I continue to lay under clothes line
        Wrapped in a melody of melancholy

But I do not understand what it means to be ‘me’

        My mind feels as a lemon candy might,
        sour at first bite -
        hollow on the inside, then gone
        Without ever truly knowing what it tastes like.