H.Williams

Vitamins lost
in the hours of being still awake,
in the hours of feeling left behind.
These seconds are all memorized,
since I’d forgotten –purposely—how this feels.
But here I am, and there you are,
and what we don’t know
is in the space between
when there is space between.

h.williams

In black letters and sometimes red, it says
there's time for everything,
time for love, hope, and grief...
but there's rarely time to breathe.

I love too easy, and laugh if it's funny,
but I'll hope till I'm blue in the face.
Grief and I are friends,
we each take turns crying
making holes in the walls with our fists.

Life and death, opposites attract
and reunite.
Everyone lives, everyone dies,
but we're only invited to their deaths.
Funerals find us, despite our crazed attempts to hide.
If you've been born, you already died
before you ever heard a white coat say why.

Death's my pal too, though we've not officially met.
He calls my moms now and then, leaving messages and empty threats.
He diagnosed her long before I even left the nest,
which maybe means he did the same to me
but I'm not buying that yet.

But still I get a little miffed when people
talk up their borrowed time.
It's fine for them,
but I know better than to blow hot air in mine.
I'll make it up to you,
like they say they'll make it up to me
but time's a cheater at every game,
and time cheats every time, I'm afraid.

But I'm not. Afraid, that is.

h.williams

Inside the rib cage
circles around the red, beating center
   rhyme with love, rake in blood, shove out anger,
inside the outline
of the writer who sits, sighing on paper,
  staccato finger tips drum rhythms with letters
inside the window
square, clear glass painted white by ice
  solid form of water, formally cold by nature,
inside the city
dragged to slow motion
  by snowflakes set in motion
inside the wind
that winds around building sides
  and slides across powdered roads,
inside the state,
state of panic, state of being,
  state of Michigan, state of mind.

Heidi Williams


If I edit language, call me poet, a word-smith if I pro it.
But if I edit music, there's no such name, no tags of respect
just beats to collect, sometimes trash that collects.
I'm a trash collector, musical dumpster diver,
producers dump their trash
I turn their trash to treasure.
Treasure hunter, trash tuner.
There's beauty everywhere
to the eyes of see-ers, the the ears of hearers.
Seagulls see trash and turn obsessive, possessive.
And we feed the other birds, but shoo them away,
but once winter comes,
we hear seagull sounds, and we feel the beech.
We listen for summer in seagulls.
We listen for oceans in seashells,
but I can hear waves in my headphones,
and I can change the tide when the trash comes.

H.Williams 3/13

I tried and failed, not failed to try.
Retract, step back, put face against the wall, dry eyes.
They hate, but love to list the wrong steps in a race ran right.
All my mistakes in red ink, don't get ready to be surprised
when I flip the switch, if you insist on playing games, then it's on.
You chose your weapon, then I'm picking the exact same one.
I'd really prefer a sword, but instead stuck with a pen.
So, I'll settle for writing "s"-words, though I'd rather slice someone's skin.
Now I draw the line, sign on the dotted, dot every little jot-and-tittle out
scribble till I blot you out, splat this ink out, spit this out
like a sickness, you make me wanna puke you out.
I'm ink poisonous, quarantine me or I'll take you out.
I won't use the word "ill" but still, it's in my last name, like will.I.ams.
Don't let me aim, or you'll be faceless and stutterin'
buttered me up, flipped it up, tried to fry me in the frying pan.
Famous last mistake, mistaken for your ending jam,
now watch me blow up, end this game and then take all your fans.

H.Williams 2012/2013

To beat the best one of them is to find the best one of me,
but I play against me in a game of hide-and-seek.
"Ask and it will be given. Seek, and you will find."
I've got the knocking part down pat, a well-played tune, perpetual rewind.
Knuckles to door, fist to wall, say hi to trouble, hello to the floor.
Progress K-O'd by a 1-inch punch, pull self together, push up from all-fours.
Am I running from, or chasing for? And what for?
Destination pending discovery, currently unknown, I
dodge disasters, spread out across the meantime,
lie in wait and wait for that moment...one more time.

H.Williams

Shut eyes to open doors in the mind,
re-live recent moments behind closed lids,  
while they bounce off walls in the brain,
dribble thoughts through the distance when traveling.
Silence loud, like post-fight thoughts,
to echo in ears and ride with us.
Someone to miss, while they miss us,
to occupy thoughts inside airbus.
Weightless or weighed down, still aloft
like balloons from clown.
It's quiet now, though silence rebounds
I echo you, like seashell sounds.

Spine-backs of skinny hills and mountain tips
fill space for miles with no interruptions,
save for the squares of cities
and city squares, lights, and streets--
streets cornering yards, cement lines 90 degrees.
Geometric roof and pool shapes
grouped between phases of earth-states--
and interstate veins that thread and snake,
connect us all and keep awake.

Bite back sighs for the distance between A and B,
points B and A, and the pointless line between.
Balance between wingspan like a hollow-back.
Back-track, retract, align thoughts, connect dots.
Between cloud bottom and ground top,
on the path of raindrops to topography,
thoughts of you sink in topsoil, in grey matter
it all seems clear like black and white,
when it matters that you matter, and that matter
weighs on the brain, it's top-heavy...which explains
how some fall, head-over-heels for their someones,
while other just fall flat.

Weightless or weighed down, still aloft
like balloons from clown.
It's quiet now, though silence rebounds
and rings in ears like live band sounds,
that prompt your smile to stay in place,
so long as the hum still resonates.
Silence loud, like post-fight thoughts,
to echo in ears and ride with us.
Someone to miss, while they miss us,
to occupy thoughts inside the airbus.
Shut eyes will open doors in the mind,
re-live recent moments behind closed lids,  
while they bounce off walls in the brain,
dribble thoughts through the distance when traveling.