Red lights hit her face
Like a slap from
A cold hand
Mocking  
Silent
Unrushed
Two drunk teens
Dying from
A prom night
Car crash
Tragedy according to the news
Because they were honor students
In love
College bound
But tonight, this scene
Of street lovers
College drop outs
Killing themselves with needles
Is just another
Trash-pick-up-by-ambulance
Not newsworthy without
A garbage strike
She was the only one who knew
About the ****
That taught him
To value ******
More than himself
Uncle Frank
Was everyone’s favorite
Started failing classes
A solid shame –
Couldn’t go back home now
They talked late at night
About the government
Guess they won’t get their
Student loan money back
She wore his coat
While he shivered
Her poetry made him weep
She wrote it with a sharpie
On the sides of buses
Hoping someone
Would read it on their way
To real life
And hear how some people
Sleeping on the street
Are philosophers and dreamers
And love one another
The ambulance driver
Would not let her inside
She thought about cutting herself
So they’d have to take her
They just shut their doors
And drove away
Red lights
Absent
Her prom night car
Crashed
Without a sound

we both like to go
where we last felt the sun
because eventually, it will return

The hobby is distraction itself
Aligning physical space with
Awareness
Four inches closer to
Goal number three
When the walking stops
Does it all become dull?
Even then would I construct
Another reason, if
There they were
The prints of your beautiful feet

The jungle of green betwixt our houses
Pulse with crickets lush with lullabies
I lie awake wondering why I lie awake
The gravel in my eyes beg for dreaming
At my feet, the body of my feline
Warm and purring, weighty
In this light my mind sails to places
Of dark skies
Those with blackness so heavy
You cannot feel your equilibrium
I hear thundering waves licking the skyline
Bold stars lunging towards me
The only hope that I will not be swallowed whole
I have hands to pull plastic bags off faces
That didn't even know they were there
I am convinced that my cat is bilingual
Recurring existentialism
Gives me reasons to awaken

not every poem is about beauty
too caught we are in the moment to write about it
that is what makes it beautiful
pain clings long beyond instants
prolongs and window reflections
engulfing our bones
masticating our stomachs
from slow drip bile coffeemakers in our chest
the line from that one song starts the burning
and the eyes of a stranger flavored with reminders
i wish i could tell him i finally got to ____
my blood is chunked with tomato slices
acidic clots and stagnant passions
float me in melancholy perplexities
a minute of oddity where emotions
are unidentifiable

my voice has no freedom
thoughts rammed down
a lion's throat, my
roars rattle like a spoon
in the garbage disposal

In the transition between water and ice
I spoke my words inside an air pocket
and let it freeze over