You're my best-kept secret,
my one-time fling.
The only source of this heartbreak,
yet - still -
everything.

Your absence is suffocating,
the last droplets of your name escape my lungs.
Don't worry, darling;

*I'll be gone when the morning comes.

In my arms, you belong
but you are so far away.
Tell me: what would you do
if all I asked of you
was to stay.

I miss you most
when I'm lying in bed
and I roll over
to find you
anywhere
but next to me.

My arms are empty,
but my heart
is so full.

I see you
when I close my eyes
and in
the corners of my mind
but it has been
quite a while
since I have seen you
in front of me
and been able
to touch you,
to feel you,
to hold you.

I want to memorize
the look in your eyes
when you're happiest
and kiss your tears away
when you cry.
And I want to see
the anger in your face
when you're mad at me
so I can let you be,
and then laugh
and tell you to
come here, baby,
come and
let me hold you.

Just let me look at you
so I can forever remember
the sparkle in your eyes
and the gentle curl
of that smile
that keeps me
always, always, always
coming back.

**I am constantly missing you
but I suppose I always will.

last night
I woke up
with my heart beating fast
and my hopes up high.
Only because
I saw you
in my dreams.

I remember everything...
Everything I loved...
I gave it away like it wasn't enough.
I remember everything I once said..
Empty inside with regrets...
What if you give up?
What if I learned to love?
Will you forgive me and start again?...

This is the point I get to time and time again
My fingers pulsate
                   My breathing quickens
                                    My heart tightens
because we just can't let our cynicism go
You see, everyone leaves
It's a fact
And just like the leaves on the deciduous trees
I was never meant to stay

And the more fond I grow of your company
The closer we get to that breaking conclusion
And instinctually
And hopelessly
I hold on for dear life
Because why must things be this way
Why can't our days consist of shy smiles
And matching coffee drinks
And hands held lightly
With your gaze being my favorite morning memory
I crave you

But timing is everything
And no one really gets what they want
It's not like we'll make it out alive, anyway

Warm as honey in sunlight
soaking into my soul, being
my soul's core whenever
you are here with me.
Voice of sweet melancholia
and ripe, enduring strength,
so tender, and so earthy.
Bravely you began again,
autumn years bringing
seasoned song like no
other to a world in need.
Obrigada, from my heart.

Somewhere between the dream of what it could be
and what it wanted to be, this poem hightailed it
out of town. Down the road it went, careening into
hedgerows, jostling small birds from their resting
time. Running for all it's worth, out to the sea cliffs
then arrested, stock still, before all that immensity.
Chagrined by such a rash attempt at escape, even
blushing a bit, it wondered about strange things:
What would it be like to be a badger? To always be
dressed in all those lovely stripes? To never have bad
wardrobe days?  Or what about an otter, with such
strong muscles, and an utter delight for swimming?
To never really feel the cold? These are the things a
poem can wonder about, when it isn't quite sure, just
right then, in the present moment, how to be a poem.

A free bird leaps on the back
Of the wind and floats downstream
Till the current ends and dips his wing
In the orange suns rays
And dares to claim the sky.

But a BIRD that stalks down his narrow cage
Can seldom see through his bars of rage
His wings are clipped and his feet are tied
So he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings with a fearful trill
Of things unknown but longed for still
And his tune is heard on the distant hill for
The caged bird sings of freedom.

The free bird thinks of another breeze
And the trade winds soft through
The sighing trees
And the fat worms waiting on a dawn-bright
Lawn and he names the sky his own.

But a caged BIRD stands on the grave of dreams
His shadow shouts on a nightmare scream
His wings are clipped and his feet are tied
So he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings with
A fearful trill of things unknown
But longed for still and his
Tune is heard on the distant hill
For the caged bird sings of freedom.