I thought of a man today
That writes cardboard poems
Under half-lit street lights

Flattens Lincolns on the railroad tracks
Graced with particleboard mornings
Tosses them in copper bowls brimming brightly

Take one leave one take one leave yourself
Some day you’ll find you
He grins like a fox

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Everyone thinks he might be a tip to lunacy
But it’s just a grand ragged show with no frills barred
The circus in his head badly played out with a touch of brilliance

Glint in his eyes speaks louder then the jaunty bramble his tongue leaks
Haunting cobblestone corners, seashell filled shadows
Hollow footfall scatters the pavement people blindly following busy lives  

Will never see what’s hidden under upturned chins

Meanings misplaced slipping from fingers with no idea what’s being lost
Fantastic like the soft clink of a penny hitting the sidewalk face up

Nothing tastes sweeter than freshly fallen snow
Numb fingers twisting, pulling, lacing, tugging
At your ropes tying knots in your stomach

Tangled cords pulling you toward open air

Nothing feels freer than diving face first into the sea white banks
Clammy hands grip your ankles ghosting up your thighs
Hang on hang on hang up your coat

Let the cold burn
Icicles searing into your biceps itching urging drawing you close
There is nothing like standing in a field and feeling

Snowflakes hitting your nose

Your lungs feel crisp your drowning on oxygen that’s too rich
Shaking, shuddering, freezing, shivering, quaking, trembling
With a sneeze you’ve never felt more alive

Not just once have I heard that I collect grime like a magnet
Sludge under fingernails, orange tint nicotine stains lips
Inside of middle and pointer hold that same glow
Spilt milk on my pants from last week or maybe this morning

Fresh from the shower but still ash dusts my eyelashes
There’s a smudge of something still on my cheek
The water was brown as always
Tar rivets sliding from my scalp swirling with the swamp at my feet

One day coal powdering my cheekbones like a fine blush
Another it’ll be cooking grease a far too heavy foundation
Tea coated knuckles, paint specked elbows, soot circled brow
Globs of possibly unknown mysteries cling to my knees

Looking at the soles of my heels black and shining as obsidian
Flaking oil, rust, congealed  whatnot seeped into my pores
As it will always be

I wake from a false-flashed recurring dream
Flushed stuttering soaked in cold sweat
Heart beating out a old bent out of tune rhythm
Shimmers of hope dripping from my fingertips
As salt fades in time down the lines of my cheekbone
Looking at the crescents in my fluttering palms
Feeling the bleached light filter past my corneas  
Gasping out struck by the wonder
Will this ever cease to be?