I can never find the right words
when wanting to write about you.

My thoughts become your cluttered desk.
My mind, searches,
but cannot find its way over your
plastic paper protectors.
Because you insisted that everything more fragile than skin deserves
a little extra attention.

When wanting to write about you,
my brain becomes dog-eared.

By every play, every novel, and every anthology still on your shelf.
Waiting for your hungry eyes
to return to the adventure.
You have yet to turn the page.

Shakespeare couldn't've prepared anyone
for the hurricane hearts you left behind.

There is no monologue
that can fill a pair of lungs with air,
no poem that can breath for the breathless.

I am a natural disaster trying to write
about the sun.

My head is trying to put words
to the fire you left behind.

I know now,
that California's forests are
nothing compared to an empty stage.
Your flames branded
everything you touched
With the sound of your smile...

For a while,
I wanted nothing more
than to look into your oceanic eyes
one last time.

Then I remembered, that I do,
everyday.

When I walk through that door at 7 a.m.
groaning.
coffee in hand,
ideas for poems in my head.

You are not a sonnet, or a clear sky.
You are not a tomb.

You are
the cow as white as milk,
the cape as red as blood,
the hair as yellow as corn,
and the slipper as pure as gold.

Most importantly,
you are a classroom full of wide-eyed children.
Ready for their lesson in advanced theatre.
Well, not ready, but we'll get there,
with speed and purpose.

I feel like a ripple in the harbor.
Throwing myself against
the Hull of your chest.
A place I used to call home.

Not far from Beason
liquid green
caresses silt that has
always pumped life
into this broken city.
A city where sirens and
church bells sound the same
if you just listen
to the hum of floating taxis
circulating you straight to
the heart of a
civilization learning to collect illumination.

I drag my feet along E. Pratt
listening to the whispers of our past,
a quiet riot in the distance.

Somewhere in this city
a woman is taking her son's hand
for the last time
a brother is tanking
his last free throw
somewhere
a daughter scribbles
her name in side walk chalk
one
final
time.

These children were the
city's flesh and blood.
Fells point in their bones;
a piece of Pigtown in every cell.

We've learned from
our mistakes that
burning down convenience stores
doesn't make life more convenient,
but owning a gun does.
What is the cost of protection
when you're not the one paying the price?

I hope that one day
we will build upon the ashes
and Light Street will burn bright again.

I wanted to forget
But now I can't even
Remember.

She looked for love in the backseat of his car
She looked for it in dusty store rooms
In abandoned buildings, the rough palms of hands
She didn't find it in his whispered sweet nothings,
She didn't find it in his apartment building either

He looked for an easy conquer, a one night stand
He looked for an innocent smile, naive doe eyes
He looked for it in needy fingers, hitched breathes,
He found it in her hair balled up in his fist
He found it in her salty skin, her soft thighs

She was looking for love in all the wrong places

My door is open
It is oak with brass fittings
Sturdy and handsome
I oil the wood, buff the brass
And I will never close it

why a poet?
because a poet
hears the words
which sing the
purest harmonies
because a poet
paints their portraits
in pastels
of phrases
because a poet
dances their agonies
into leaps of faith
and pirouettes
of passion
because a poet
sees
the beauty
in the commonplace
and captures
the moment
in a snapshot
of ink and white
because a bloodless world
cuts itself
a thousand times

and the poet bleeds