I’m determined to find joy
in the most unexpected places.

I hope to inspire more with my joy
than I have, so often, with my pain.

I’m not perpetually depressed
and bound to a broken spirit.

I'm just, quite often,
an expression of the emoting
of the broken who feel muted.

I do have consecutive days
of the light of grace shining
on me and on you in ways
that I can see clearly.

I do have months of risings and settings
with smiles if for no other reason
than because blindness enhances my being
so that I may become all sensing.

Yet, when blindness brings the days
of my binding to the lovers of my painful cries
and I'm too blind to even sense enhancement,
I remain determined.

There is joy all around us in places
that we never think to look until blindness
forces us to sense on all levels
the beauty that love placed around us
to diminish the sting of pain.

I have cravings for you
that shatter and drown me.

Sometimes I want you so bad
that I hear echoes enhancing.

Then, other times my heart drowns
after maniacally nesting tsunamis
that lift then fall upon me.
I've been hit so hard lately

that the shore has become my lifeline.
On the borderline of consumption
I've been ordered to lay in lieu
of moving at my heart's suggestion.

My lips chap near purged wounds
as my shoulder and hip indent
the remains of our starvation.
Pearls form from my erosion.

A nearby sand castle is falling
with each passer's sinking step.
Merging into me, we become sedentary lovers
creating sound effects of restoration

that rest like my distal desires
as sediment on the walls of my longing.

Allow me to speak love to you.
To speak lovingly of how you are water to a parched world.
If only dried lands and spirits contorted by malnourishment could partake of you.
They would feast like world powers with coffers over flowing
with enough surplus to satisfy greedy hearts and hungry bodies.

I would speak of your loving healing.
How the disorienting effects of lost loves subside with each endearing word from you.
I am coherent and in my rightful place as a recipient of your love
and with your love I share your nurturing spirit with others.
I am a blessing with your love.

Let me speak of you in the elements of nature.
You are the Mother’s Help Mate and you swaddle me in the rays of your sun.
The vacillating heat of submerged springs cause me to rise as your love beckons me.
My thoughts babble like new born brooks when they roll toward your *****.
Your love draws me to what I would call home.

I would speak of your loving tenderness
and how it inspires an innocent and caring love for you.
Of birds and breezes on tender blades and flowers releasing their covering as we display no shame.
No ritual or suggestions for keeping fires burning in some oasis of romance.
Touch me and you will see me blush under your expanding warmth.
I am supple in your presence.

I speak love to my realization of you;
your flesh encasing a triune soul.
peace, joy and patience.
An acknowledgement of being
And with my words, now, I honor the love of you.

There’s an obstinacy in this freedom.
A stifling in motion.

Open filaments confuse creativity
by dropping shattered tungsten from its cliffs.
Sparks bounce then darken my mind
with compounded dreams.
Breathless searches produce elements foreign to me.

Panic tainted gifts.

Surrender surfaced to engulf me,
then, balance bridged broken paths.
Restoration created by parallel lines bending.

As I rested on one side,
she told me to stand
where I am
if I was able.

****

She challenged me to flow.
Shed light on my visions
if I had the courage.

Placed me among a resurgence of memories
that confirmed my creative inventory.
They all have been invaluable inspirations.
Yet, this existence at the brink of a new age
has caused me to sleep lightly.

I felt alone and inadequate without them
and thought of giving up.
My being hovered hardened hearts & cartilage
that I’ve scattered from my own *****.

She supports me
and I know that this gift is for me
but it’s not about me.

I rest soundly
more aware and able
to let God use me
where I am.

My poetry is the embodiment
of the creator's fore knowledge of my existence.
My birth to my death are in each line
that I've laid down to lay with.

With a power my speech can not equal
my writings demand I "let there be."
Now, she's calling for me to sacrifice it
as Abraham was told to sacrifice his Seed.

Yet his requester provided a replacement
once loyalty was shown in the raised knife.
A trapped sacrifice to spare the son
from a blade raised to honor the All Mighty.

You know that I would give you anything
yet nothing has pulled my fingers away
from the plunging of blades into my eternity
with each completed writing's lifting away.

Where is my ram struggling in strong vegetation?
Where is your voice stating firmly
that I've done enough to show my heart
and that my lineage has been spared by mercy?

Inspiration tells me its receptive desires
so God must know my divine purpose in creation
is the reception of initiating penetrations
that conceives fillers of the gap between our separation.

I will be peace
with head shaven
wrapped in monk robes
pacing my sanctuary
swinging emitting censers
placid with redemption
forehead crossed with oil
habit centered praising
under perpendicular rulers
and when I retreat
from the corporal worship
of the spirits
i won’t punish myself
not at that instant
for to be shaven
releases my past
and my prayers
drift from crystalline pendulums
to guard my steps
and the ruler embodies warnings
that I’ve ignored in surrender
while lapping fabrications
that stain my thighs
black and blue
permanent ink
helps my heart testify
that i was born accused
of worshiping your inspiration
I love to conceive
yet, conception
without accountability
has been my greatest sin
so, i seek atonement
through divine unification
and create for the spirits
as i become peace.

Drama queen dreams
have been restructured
by good therapy

which has exposed
how close I was
to practicing popping.

Stabilizers expected
to shorten the time
between hurt and healing.

She said a week
or 2 is enough
time to try again.

Scared straight sane
by the threat
of a prescription

and the visual
of the structure
of my categories.

Troubled by realizations
of not loving them all
as much as some others.

I say "I Love You"
more to them
than some family

hear it from me.
Loved, they should Be.
Revision in progess.

It is my work
since it takes much
longer to sink in.

Real love is constant.
I've experienced pain
then emotionally reneged

when a higher love
was due and within
my giving power.

Make a decision,
she said. I am
reading the lines

instead of marking
my dreams between them.
I flip closing pages

while a tilted can
revives a life, once,
wilted in my hands.

words dangle precariously
such a tickling sensation
i clear my throat
to dislodge my heart

futility
every hello sent
every well wished
it's like reading "Our Daily Bread"
just to pass the time.

i'm in a death grip
self imposed
crushing swollen glands
I want to say "I Love You"

tea steeps
fogging spectacles as tears form
i notice the sweetener nearby
as the kitchen light blows

she touched up untended walls
all alone, no party assembled
attempting to create reactions
with her color selection
and inspire sunken eyes
with the antonym for
"you are worthless" and "no one cares"
...but the paint is peeling

and her motivation runs constant
as she prepares her endurance
to spackle and smooth grooved surfaces
prime marks and hide pitted edges
to place appropriate strokes adequately
and try a little color contrast
on previously blended door and window trim
...but the paint is peeling

now bubbles form and fall flakily at her feet
as a sleight of hand starts its mischief
of defacing the layers of her self-affirmation
with synonyms for the premature initiative she displayed
so, she drops her tools and starts peeling
removing the pain that is hindering her renewal
and covering the constant decay correctly
working toward a strengthened surface
that maintains its finish against the cruelest force
and accepts loving, touches
without turning them to criticism.

i skin the street
rolling through moments
in skimpy ways
that peel my weariness

ripped while bouncing

i lose much more
when i attempt to control
what's inside of me

it feeds its desire
to oppose the tumbling
i've been tossed into

yet i'm engorged
with intentions that lack
the ability to stop.

thank God I paused
before finding rest
against an unmarked curb
along a road less traveled.

ominous clouds
warn me
that they don’t fear
my red umbrella.

It’s fiery facade
simply means that I
was being adventurous
the day I picked it out.

Though I raise it
like some powerful staff
or extension of some power
that flows to it from me,

the rain falls
and the fabric,
not the color,
protects me

and only for a short time.
For the wind moves
tossing rain pellets randomly
in unexpected directions.

Then I am soaked
due to being prepared
but not having enough
to save my lower body,

so, I run
through the puddling rain
to find immediate shelter
for me and my red umbrella

and the low, dark clouds
continue their duty
as I gaze, winded,
from this place of safety.

there is salvation and life
through our redeemer
yet due to my deeds
you are still hurting.

how can i ask your forgiveness
when i can't find you?
how can i clear my debris
when you're still going through?

it was to me mere chance
that God patched my wounds
and with faith i believe
he can tend to yours too.

i pray his omnipotence
through angels dispatched
to your weary side deliver
my apologies in tact

find peace in that fact
that my mind was lost
and that day my deeds were
chasing a greed at any cost

make me a perp or villain
i will be what you need
my heart cries for you to heal
with your heart made whole and free.

imperial candle light defies
breaths blown destructively

lives downed with double edges
****** by nescient beliefs

if we could have defended them
what would we have said?

preventing the taking of their last
with the power of our next breath

replacing new millenium latch keys
with a hand and body to embrace

loving all of our community's spirits
to pass with age. not by hatred.

I will not
fear the word.
It is too much
a part of me.
Too deep
within me
even though
I feel that
I was conceived
in moments
that were bruised
with passion.

Now, my parts
flare and retreat
within my
muted passion,
yet,
it supersedes all
that constitutes
my being.

I will not
fear love
and if you
never love me,
I will continue
to honor love.

I will continue
to enjoy love songs
and will continue
to write love poems
and give my heart
to each creation.

I will not stop
when I tremble
from hurt or heartache.
I will remain
with love because
love is with me.
Steadfast. Always.

Robotic motions don't extend to tender arches.
They still must stretch slowly and bend softly.
Placing their feet on the dry, decaying ground
that threatens to disclose their covered locations.
The cold mornings have found many admirers
barely exhaling frost from their condensing breath.
They've traveled with the dawn to simply wait
to watch her step forward into the open field.
Away from fallen feathers tangled in branches.
Exposed in full glory from crown to toe.
To pass hours watching her stand as she wonders
what desire would make one look in her eyes for hours
only to smile as they prepare to leave in the twilight.

I’ve been bleeding
black and blue bubbles
through extruded cartridges.
Leaving doilies soiled
on your dressed tables
without placing a touch.
Trying to donate gifts
from my darkening life
to a priceless recipient.
Pushing your peace away
with each bubble blown
onto ink-smeared surfaces.
My mental misfires
cause my life line
to tangle and retreat.
I’ve tormented my threshold
with a shattered appendage
that over extended its reach.
As I twist tourniquets,
I represent one unconditioned
for appreciating being love in truth.
Please, reset my uneven mending
and apply an encouraged healing
by molding me in wrappings of you.

we never want to see
our child die before us
and we still pray to precede them
after seeing them die many times
                *
you've died right before my eyes
too many times for me to count

God knows i wasn't prepared this time
to see that glazed look in your eyes
with lids that i couldn't close
as they slammed upon tears that fell like stone

crashing upon brittle locks
that shattered like illusions installed
to protect my little girl from a ******
weakened by a familiar predator
that God knew long before
we ever joined to color by numbers

each recanting of you being pushed down
then smothered by the dead weight of ****
started a death rattle so pronounced
that i reached out to leave with you

God knows we will make it through this
as you psychologically pass from me once again
to mourn aside a grave marked for this event
on the eve of the sunrise of your empowerment.