Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
It hasn’t been as cold lately
The train of shopping carts rattles
Vibrate my forearms
Especially as I cross the yellow speed bumps on the ground

The city put those there to trip up skateboarders
And to confuse babies in strollers

Old women on walkers avoid them

There are things designed to make us slower
More careful

I think about my last poetry reading while filling the coolers
And don’t ask myself why when alone
I take myself to the places that make me most happy

My cashier asks me when he can go home

You do everything slower when
You keep yourself company
When you’re lonely
You’re not savoring moments
You just taking your time
Because you can
I set the alarms and lock the doors
The moon has been out for a while
I will go home and write

Everyone is asleep except for me
I crack open a few beers
Open the window so the moon can keep me company

Forever I thought there was something wrong with me
But I have learned
Like the moon
Some things will only shine in the nighttime
Not everything looks like gold under the sunlight
I have traveled back in time
Or maybe I have dreamt this place in 1987

A bank
My mother a teller
In the middle of a divorce
Or maybe the divorce hasn’t happened yet

My father walks in
He is a security guard
College dropout
Ex-marine
Loves fighting as much as I do

She never went to college
Maybe she thinks he is mysterious
He prevents a robbery
Beats a man in the parking lot

He flirts with her over a coffee break
And this is the part where everything goes fuzzy
Because I could never see my father as a charming man

I want to tell them to stop
If love at first sight
Cared enough to have foresight too
They’d stop

Maybe they were nice people once
If we all knew what we’d one day become
We could fix things

I want to tell them that they will have children
I want to tell them about the things that they will do to these children
And then to themselves
And back and forth and back and forth
Like a pendulum made of knives and soft things

But I do not exist in this place in 1987
And even if I did

I want to live
I want to live
 Apr 2013 Dillon Kaiser
Ben
why why?
comes the
world-weary cry,
of a
solitary wolf
with pain
in it's
eyes

as the
cold wind
blows, to
herald the
snows and
carrion crows,
whose rancorous
laughter mock
the alone

without a
pack, the
single wolf
dies, under
grey skies
with none
to bare
witness except
maggots and
flies

and the
carrion crows
chortle in
mirth for
the unforgiving
world, cruel
mother earth
cares naught
for the
wolf who
found no
home
 Apr 2013 Dillon Kaiser
Claudwell
I wrote this to say goodbye.
I lay here watching the bright sky fall shy
And look to the space between you and I
Only to find my tongue tied around words
As you your eyes swell with 'why'
We lie together, at each other, with whoever
"It's whatever"
Sick to both our stomachs knowing that attitude
won't make it better.
i used to think
that in order to think
i would have to stop
believing

i used to think
that in order to believe
i would have to stop
being

but really
i just needed
to let myself be
honest and loved
for bamboo bean

— The End —