It’s 15 minutes before I die.
I’ve been here before?
Déjà vu? Routine? Hobby?
Uneasily, I am waiting for my groom.
Loneliness has walked me down the aisle
which is my kitchen, a job well done.
And yes, I have been waiting
all day in my bathrobe
sipping wine; the one called washing dishes
-miserably preparing the witnesses.
How I want to be remembered?
How I want to be forgotten?
They’re all the same to me.
-Men. Always running late.
I’ll wait a little longer, as I’ve always.

Deep in the darkness of my soul
A darkness not even I can behold
Somewhere far beneath my eyes
A spec of light you can barely see lies
You reached out to it but to your greatest surprise
The light within is moved farther despite your tries
Nothing can save me from myself you thought
But even at that, with persistence you sought
Digging through my clusters of damage
Clusters I think not to manage
Risking the many things we that we share
The very thoughts of losing a friend, you seemed not to fear
You dug for my own good "rescue the light before it's long gone"
"For if the light leaves, this can't be undone"
Worried not by the outcome
Giving it your all "still I'll overcome"
Getting closer to the end of the darkness's frontiers
Darkness cannot help but give up "I'll surrender the light" it volunteers
Finally the search and pursue mission is over
In a cage the light is handed over
Retrieved the little light in me
Brought out the light and set it free
"The light is out" darkness begins to cry
"For when light is out how shall we pass by?"
Wiping all the darkness my light broke out
"Finally he is broken" you begin to shout


The old me is gone now, no turning back
My insides no longer painted in black
Darkness is gone, locked away in a cage
So now I can finally turn a new page

I am writing as though there were thorns in my sleeve

let me paint you a picture with my tongue instead
A marketplace in heaven, a retail store for souls
flowers of lashes open and flutter at me all day
and it is flattering to be human. Being human-
my sheets tease me of it when I lay alone.
Alone is where I am at some point, so the taste
of white noise will keep stinging.
A dark owl falls in my laps and to the ground
but as a mother would, I nudge her on to fly.
This is becoming routine. All of it, circling
over and over again, a messy time loop.
A ceiling fan with no circuits. A life.
This is where I am at some point,
alone in paradise.

Is it cliché to say that I dream of you
or that I stay up in bed thinking of you?
Indeed an apple falls far from a tree
and into a basket, somewhere overseas.
My Adam’s apple breaking over the phone
and chutzpah china slamming on the floor
leaves few words to remember you by.
My blinds will never carry a scent
yours, too much of a burden to bear.
A wooden bed with walls and moist soil
the only smell I pine for now
the only thing I can pray for now.