In the dark, I see you.

I see your room, dim and weird. Unusual artifacts from an unusual archeologist, digging through the sediment of life, littering shelves.

I see your face, framed by loose hairs from a lazy bun, all over a poorly fitting hoodie.

I see your hands, more aged than I remember, with your various rings, punctuating the oddities of your personality, acquired over a life strangely lived.

I see your tattoos, a reflection of choices and things believed at one point or another. People who influenced, and ideas that crept into prominence. I don't like tattoos, but they are like stained glass windows, and I can see their beauty, as you shine through them.

I see your car, on a mountain road. I can hear you loudly proclaim, expressions of grief, and through them, expressions of relief. A venting process, an opportunity to raise your voice and yell! To shake a stick at God, not knowing if he sees you, but knowing that I do.

I can see the three days we spent together lined up in a row, like photographs in a reel. A moment at the University, holding my hand, and my ever so subtle embarrassment at the notion. A prolonged eye contact over coffee that's not that great, but servicable as a context for deep conversation. A long phone call, after a short text, after a long time, from a short lived love.

I can see your eyes, looking back at me, wondering what I see in you. In their reflection, I think the same. I can see the shape, and the eye-shadow, applied meticulously or perhaps lazily, I'm not sure.

I can smell the lotion you use, I guess it's the same you've always used. It takes me back to hiking short hikes in non hiking county, sitting over an ugly creek on an old rusted pipe. Yet in those moments the world could not have been any more beautiful.

I can feel your hair in my hands, a soothing motion, attempting to smooth the notion, the conversation, that was ugly and disgraceful, but necessary.

I know in my heart , what you mean to me. I know that I love you, and feel no shame at saying as much.

Around you, I am free. My soul bared, I melt on to you, and carbonize, like sugar burning in a pan. How stuck I have become.

"Let a pan sit in warm water with some dish soap, before using the rough side of a sponge to remove stubborn food and stains."

Some cleaning advice from me to you.

In the dark, I see you. You glitter like the stars. In the distance, you dance in perfect harmony.

But like every astronomer, I too must accept, no matter how much I love the stars, I cannot go to them.

I watch, through my telescope of memory, where only in the dark, can I see you

I was a fish, before a man
The ocean was my home
I walk, where once I swam
At the edge of the sea foam

I walk next to the shoreline
Next to bending, bowing
Blue daisies in a jagged line
Sea winds overhead howling

I was a fish, before all this
In seaweed hidden caves
Unaware of the ocean mists
And the beauty of the days

I was stolen by a kind hand
From spinning dark and salt
To dry out, reeling on the sand
As my world came to a halt

Still, here I walk, on this beach
With visions of the seafloor
This world, is out of my reach
As is the sunlight that I adore

Soon, I'll be a fish again
Waiting silent in the shade
Yet, I will continue until then
To walk as man, as I was made

The wind rushes by
With an unseen push
Of an untouched sound
In the dark December sky

The trees speak to me
In the cold raking air
Branches outstretched
Like fingers through hair

Yet I do not understand
What it is they try to say
But I find littered leaves
Evidence, found in day

The wind yet pushes by
A pressure on the soul
To whisper long lost secrets
Trapped in a currents pull

Fog settles slow
On cold mornings

The suns gentle glow
Gives no forewarning

The day shines
Meeting the dew

Rays among pines
Start again anew

The crest of the wave
Moves silent in the night

Beneath a moon that knows
Each year that comes and goes

Takes us farther from the light

The saline mist of a churning sea
Leaves tears that fall in long runs

Scarring the rocks temporarily
As water dries beneath the sun

To start again in the new day

Once more be washed away

Life is a dream
Framed by darkness

There is no way I wish to be
But like bird, leaf, or tree

The root digs without an aim
I want to be empty all the same

In this night that never ends
To be the branch that bends
In gentle northern winds

Beneath an ever still moon
I fall in ever greater ruin

I want to be empty
And aimless

Oh but to make life
Frameless