Imagine if it cost your whole days
wages, just to feed on bread;

If external forces made you suffer
The indignity of debt.

Imagine if the war torn middle east
Had a minute's silence for fifty dead;

If Palestine,  Iraq, Afghanistan
Had a minute off for breath

Imagine if a days work came with
a twenty percent chance of death...

Now picture that scene in the Caribbean
Bathing, lounging, plunging, dancing

The preciousness of life it seems
is purely based on address.

The cityscape cowers beside the desk
Concrete kingdoms hide glass and brick
The adjacent high-rise hides half the skyline
A hotel sinks in anonymous uniformity.

Twelve lights disturb the chalky colour scheme
Before comfortable sepia returns to greyscale
Fatigued blue lights turn to gold and brown;
Ash to brick, fog to smoke, cold... to warm.

Wreckers creep forward as the crowds shriek,
The brutalists weep the loss of a legacy
As all around marvel at what sits behind
Nostalgia blinds us with the tearing of bandages.

The camera pans right, the dust curtain moves east
The show goes on, the crowd stand amazed
Fallen protagonists cannot hide past misdemeanors
The hero's were in the prelude, not the denouement.

Cranes move in, mile high ladders move beams.
Rebuilding the city to obscure its history
The scars themselves in their mid seventies
The tragedies which bore the bones of fragility.

When bombs rain and recession follows
The buildings we raise are only temporary
Let us thank those who battled their right to exist
Their former glory is now something missed.

Red, yellow, green…
They’re all I see
Flying backward in time
Into dimensions of warm autumn colors
Heads spinning
Dizzy dreams weaving together
Like our hands
Intertwining

Red, yellow, green…
All of them pull me back
Back to that moment
Under the stars,
Breathing symphonies
Of crisp air
Lungs tired and feet sore
The stars shining in your eyes like sparklers

Red, yellow, green…
The crunch of the leaves as we run
Run to fly again
Above the heads of people
I could never love like you
Sleeping like the butterflies
Softly lulling us into submission

Red, yellow, green
The color of the leaves
But also
The colors of our voyeuristic lips as the day went on
The colors of the golden lights that lit the way home
The color of your army jacket wrapped around me
The colors of fall
That day in October
Where you and I were more than ourselves.

We were heroes.

This bracelet
This bracelet means nothing, really
Just some plastic beads
Black thread
Uncomplicated knots with strings of offset orange, yellow, green.
It’s just a bracelet.

But it’s your bracelet.
Your bracelet.
The replacement for the blue one I lost in New York
The one I hated myself for dropping
But you never did
You just fixed it
And every time I see it,
It’s like I’m there with you again

My heart leaps from my chest
At it’s shining, vibrant face
Smiling at me like an old friend
Because that’s what we are

When I’m nervous, I twist the band
The beads click and dance and sing in my fingertips
I think of it like those ruby red slippers
Maybe if I click it enough times you’ll appear next to me

I wish that were how it worked
Wished the bracelet could talk me down
Off of this ledge of conclusions
But it can’t.
We will never be the same...
Unlike the bracelet.
Because when it comes together on my wrist,
Kissing the skin you used to

It feels like you
It feels like home

I just walk around
Looking for someone
Anyone to talk to
Anyone who will listen
Because I'm so starved for affection
For attention
That when I see you
The only source of adoration I have
I choke
At the idea of you
Because all I can think of
Is how wonderful it tastes to feel
Loved,
And how much it tortures me when you
Don't.