I’ve heard the footsteps,
following me everywhere
and whispering in my ear

“failure”
And I’ve ignored them for the most part,
but sometimes they cut me off
and I just want to crumble
into a heap on the floor.

Although I sometimes see it as a barrier,
I’ve realized that the doubting voices exist
mostly pushing me forward
to challenge me.
When they gain a little ground and cut me off,
I change directions,
or even push this invisible force to the side
because I love a challenge

and Fear drives me forward.

we can question the nature of art,
what it means to be beautiful.
I see hopscotch in chalk on sidewalks,
                                          children laughing and playing while a political picture,
à-la-Banksy
stares blankly down at them from a brick wall.
I see that,

and around the corner is a
spraypainted
                          tag
that illuminates the area as existing through poverty
but it doesn't stop
              kids from playing. Even if the city pays a man to take down the
             tag
because adults are afraid.
While we decide what is worth keeping,
can we please remove that
                      hideous hopscotch?
Please, it's poorly drawn, and it leads to
young people
gathering.
And that's scary,

                                                                                                                    right?

The ash will fall, settling silent
                   while the barrels cool.
          No noise will come as the last
head hits dirt.                
No words, no amount of
      prayer will set still hearts in motion.
                      No deaf ears will continue to ignore
at that point,
     and no one will wonder
about the meaning of it all.
With all weapons,
hearts,
                     and minds settled,
maybe then
we'll
finally learn.

A leaf clings helplessly as all its

companions grow weary

and weak and let their

holds fail.

This leaf

refuses, despite great

winds and storms of both

rain and snow. It holds on

and I'm reminded every time I walk

on by, that the battle is well worth

the effort.

Hold on,
           lonely leaf.

Fatigue comes and goes
as it pleases.
It comes early in the mornings after I've hit snooze
four times,
and it lingers long after.
It breathes
d
o
w
n
my spine,
taking power from already aching muscles.
It works at my body throughout the day,
but my mind
still
has the power to wander
through the night.
My body builds up its walls
but it cannot fight this ever-present force.
My mind seems to slip beyond the
wretched grasps,
even though I sometimes wish
fatigue would put my mind at rest,
if only
for a little while.

I sit high on my Mount Olympus,
a chair from Staples with an Executive
appearance (so the box said). I'm faced
with a vacant canvas, and the knowledge
that one day,                                                
I won't have time to fill it.
1A
I decide then to fill it with whatever
comes to mind. Stars sparkle from my
fingertips after painting the whole thing
mostly black. I place them in shapes
that could be confused for a belt, a warrior,
a goat, or a saucepan to those without
vision. I pause, placing large reptiles
on a green and blue dot that floats
around one of the smaller stars. It entertains
me for a short while, but I decide to
start anew with a smaller, weaker, but
smarter animal.                        
And then I observe.
I watch as first they stand upright,
their distant relatives still using sticks
to catch ants in their homes.                
They spark stones using friction, and
I'm delighted while feeling my first tinge
of fear, for I sprinkled my own intellect in them
like stars on a black canvas.

They thrive, expanding out in every direction
until they share air, exhaling while others
breathe in their exhaust.

I watch as they cut all the greens, take
clean and cover it with cement. They burn
the core, slowly, to power machines that
take them anywhere. They fight; oh how
they fight.
        The core dissipates and they fight over
it, and they fight over me and I don't
understand. All their ideas are the same,
other than those who assume that they
are in my favour . . . Location, as I've
grown to see, impacts culture; it can not create
hate.
They look to me, pray to me,
and I can hardly intervene. A new
world, it seems, is all that I could do . . .

1B
I think of my dad, who left a thousand
jokes yet to be told. Before I paint or print,
I think and think and nothing comes.
Then I paint the sky with tiny points
of white, wasting no more time on thinking.
A scene opens up before me, and it
consumes everything
that I am, or that I ever will be.

I paint my own light into the dark
abyss, bliss kissing my cheeks as
my working wrist grows weak.
I write, if only to last a second
longer than my body. I write
to continue (to matter).

I wade through the shockwaves,
Searching through lost toys and
Broken boards, old doors, a stuffed bear
And rotting memories.
They all slip by, my fingers
Reaching but never finding.
The noise is too great; the waves too
High. I can not
Search through all of this,
Surely tomorrow holds
The story I hope to
remember.

If you would lead me until death,
I'd give up my vision.
This sense only, so the others could strengthen.
I'd never see another sunset,
only to hear your heartbeat louder as you lay next to me.
I'd never read Bukowski or Cummings again,
only to hear you whisper the poetry of your day,
softly, perfectly.

To taste your lips on mine,
just a little sweeter- who am I kidding,
nothing
could be sweeter.
To inhale and be convinced of our togetherness,
despite the distance that is between us at times,
I could go without watching the hummingbirds
that float from flower to flower,
every spring.

To feel your hand in mine, fingers interlocked,
I would close my eyes forever.

In my seeing nothing, you would close one eye
because I am you, you are me,
together we would halfway see.

Deep into the forest, where none
but paws seem to wander, water
cascades over rocks, connecting
two streams. Heard from a distance,
it howls as crashing bubbles form
and fade under the weight. No
rubber boots displace this current,
and they never will. Still,
fur-covered faces scamper all about
as bliss is carried through the trees
by whispering wind.