Three pats on the windshield,
and you say the rain has started--
but the drops fell five-thousand feet, and,
factoring in the wind, and the size of the raindrops,
the rain had started over three minutes ago.
And against the wind, against all odds,
it fell between us, parked outside your
home in the suburbs.

So when you whisper "It's over",
and grab your bag to leave,
I am still; because we fell roughly
five-hundred and twenty-five thousand,
nine-hundred forty-nine times longer
than the raindrops did to remind me
that I knew we were already done.

I've cognized you again--
a shock of nerves, electric impulse,
shooting from the touch of freshly shaven legs
to the way you clean your fingernails.
A road map lights up, all at once.

And then you fall into the pit of my skull,
and for a moment,
I am you; and you are me--
and we are one fleeting pressure
of everything I've ever known, and loved, and breathed.
We are a mass of gray, limp and soggy flesh, made bright,
fueled by the rush of blood
through a speeding freeway of pipes, and nerves
ending in a flicker.

Until you linger,
faintly,
as a node of light, (a spark),
blinking, alive, beneath my skin.

At my place of study,
a group of south campus students
of science and quiet, collected knowledge,
have long nights of graph paper and lab manuals.

But today they open a window,
and welcome the beautiful day.
"This is so north campus of us,"
they giggle--as light spills into the room.

A simpler life, they're sure,
of an artist at play.

As if we don't slave away
by the light of monitors
in the darkest minutes of night.

As if long hours aren't
spent with ink & crumpled paper

As if there's no science
in the art we create.

Yet these lines are experiments
tested in the fiery eyes of youth & age.
These building blocks
are bodies in motion
and chemicals bubbling
in the life & the lifeless;
spilling ink onto the page.

In these words are everything I've ever lived--
everyone I've ever loved.
I am these words; and
these words are me in my entirety.
My totality in a handful of symbols.

This is the science of living,
and the study of purpose;
of love & passion,
and profound, decadent
anger, and loss.

Each line a bubble of life
in a barren sea,
or a moment of clarity.

Little, insignificant thing, you plague me-- with the slightest touch,
I come undone. Miniscule, you are miniscule; yet, you chill blood
you clench fists you **** friends you fake smiles you feign tears
you forge lies. You are to me a flesh infected cancer virus parasite,
gripping me, like fingers through a chain link fence. You are
nothing, and everything--an infuriating anomaly--a stone in my shoe,
and in my heel, and spine, and brain stem...a creaking, wooden
floorboard in my neck, and brow, and knees...a nail in my sternum...

I need you
like a restless night;
I need you
like a ****** sore without the ***.

I don't need you.
I don't need you.
I can barely bring myself to want you.

I lied; I want your touch, eyes shut. You are the flame, and the moth;
you are my end, and my truth, you are the loss I feel at morning--
You are the first ray of light that robs me of my welcome dream.

You should be an attic box,
tucked away and left forgotten.
(But even your silence is heavy,
and your absence has a gravity.)

Devoid of human life,
the drone flies above
a family of four, targets,
fires. After the impact is
silence. Silently, it flies
away, toward base.
The family is dead.

Devoid of human life,
the building smokes,
and heaves its breath--
a final creak before collapse.
Under rubble freshly
wrought, and pieces
of a meal half-eaten,
scattered throughout
the street, are the
bodies.

Brimming with human life,
the streets awaken,
to find the family buried.
A cry cuts the still air--
a morning funeral,
just as the sun kisses
the open air above the hills,
his children in solemn embrace.

Seven-thousand miles away,
the pilot is relieved.

Target Acquired.

A breath.

Target Eliminated.

A smile--
               Just in time for bed.

I said I love you like a sigh,
a tired breath,
escaped from me--
I've given in.
You've won, and bridged
the gap between.

Slings and arrows pierced the mark,
and left me here,
defenseless.
I said I love you like a whimper,
or white flag torn asunder,
as I held you close, and restless.

I've given in to you, and your
relentless amity, and now
await, my dear--
I await, as fear subsides,
and scars depart from mind's eye,
for your call, a gentle breeze,
a breath exhaled, much like mine,
a tired one of conquest.

You've won, my dear,
and I surrender--
my words an offering of peace.
No longer can I stand against
what you have done to me.
I fool no man,
nor beast, nor child,
denying what is mine--
and what is mine is yours, my dear,
and what is yours is I.

I used to think the bravest man
was he who had nothing to lose--
for he, though lost, was wild,
strong, and unyielding.

But then, you made me a man
with everything to lose in you.

So I was scared,
because you made me weak--
weak in the knees, and tired
of heart. You wearied the creatures
in the pit of my stomach,
because they were in uproar
at the slightest thought of you
(And I surely know I flooded
them with thoughts of you).

(In the deepest of deep
in my chest, I knew)
I had everything to lose,
when I was with you.

It scared me
that in the brightest memory
of the brightest day, you were there--
that in the darkest pit of my heart,
you resided, as well--
that you made me weak,
and there was no escape from you.

You scared me
in the way that I am a pebble on the tracks
and you, an oncoming train.
You scared me
in the way that I am driftwood afloat,
and you, an encroaching tidal wave.

I was scared,
because I had fallen into your heart,
and it had swallowed me whole.

So I closed my heart to you;
I shut the doors with lock and key--
a mistake, I surely realize.
So now I open my heart to you;
I claw at the walls that kept you away,
for you do not make me afraid,
and you do not make me weak.

And now, I know the bravest man
is one with everything to lose--
for he, though vulnerable, will
fight to keep his world intact,

and my world, my true, is you.