You step into the dark
and you continue to walk
forward and it gets colder
but your footfalls follow
your feet further and further
further and further forward.

Like pulling a rabbit
from an old black hat

you pull another life
from that flask

a magician
never reveals their secrets

and they never
produce real magic.

Dear man in the moon,

all I wish for
is that when it ends,
you might tell me
I am brave.

Pick a daisy
in a field
of daisies
and you have
offered purpose.

Touch your earlobes
let your toes turn to ice
think of ships that sink
and aspirations that
sail into hurricanes.
River down 45th
swim like a taxi
up for air, up for air
flowing between here, there
everywhere, everywhere
fishing for metaphors
catch one, it’s seaweed
cook it up anyway,
you’re starving.
A tower with hands
touching your ears,
losing your feet
in the sea.

"It's cold out here,"
he told me.
"I'm cold.
Coffee will make me warm.

"It's what cold people drink to be warm,
but it doesn't warm them up.
Because they don't feel the cold,
they are the cold.

"I meet a lot of cold people out here."
He grinned, coughed,
and held out a coffee cup.

The man outside the coffee shop
was always right.

The ringing in my
exhausted ears
makes a sound
like the doors
of a subway
closing.

I can tell
You're almost okay
Though you're a thousand
Miles away.

The world
can no longer
end quickly -
it has
already
slowly
been dying
since we learned
what we are capable of.

"Tell me
you love me
in your language,"
they said.

I stayed quiet.

I'm wrapped in corner winds
of morbid misunderstanding

where monsters will emerge
and turn to dust in an instant

here you endure the anxiety
of an uncontrollable silence.

Someday, you will tire
                           of defeating your demons,

        and you shall befriend them instead.

You will sleep a great deal more soundly,
      and you'll forget how it feels to dread.

We are well aware
of the cycle of history
the pull of the times
and their grip on our arm

but in immovable force
of endless movement
we run alongside together
differences are our lungs

in unmeasured numbers
we charge as but humanity
and with undeniable battle calls
raise the emblem of our hands

towards what we so believe
resisting the pull of silence.

Between you and me
I didn't know comfort
that lasted longer
than seconds
before I
knew you.

In my years writing
all I have become
is a **** good liar

I will tell you no truth
but all you want to hear
will fall with sincerity

from silver velvet lips.

Meet me
at the bottom
of the world
and we'll
climb up
together.

When you find
you feel uncomfortable,
we'll dive into
waterfalls
of colour

then we'll find a way
to console the moon,
so the current
stays awake
in a tide

when rhyme runs out
and reason's the sun
we'll out-flower
underwater
mountains

and when the volcano
erupts with a reef,
we'll know that
you're safe
in the sea.

Grocery store chocolate chip cookies
and cold milk in chipped whiskey glasses

on a dreary Sunday, foggy afternoon
the radio just feet from us, silent

rain gave up several minutes ago
so now it's just your voice and I.

Like pajama clothes
we don't at all match

incompatibility clashes
you'd never wear us out

we fit poorly in pattern and
nightmarish combination

we are cut of conflicting cloth
and yet we are so comfortable.

Do not be
the candle left
in the hurricane,

be the warmth
in the shelter
from the storm.

You must tire of waiting in dreams
for imagined colours to meet you
sleeping through monochrome alarms
with sprites that don't make morning

when you wake to black and fade to grey
and arms of temptation lull you back
you recite prayers to keep you awake
just as exhausted as the day you missed

red wishes you a way to wake to colour
the greens and blues that wait for you
day misses you as much as you miss her
so must you keep hiding in night lights?

You are not going to die
they were shouting at me

I couldn't really hear them
but *you are not you will not

terror fell from their eyes
and that is what I heard

then I saw blue and black
more more and more until

you are not you will not
you will not leave me dark.

Now the water
is at your neck,
you swam too far
into what you didn't
yet understand and now
it's too late to make it out
from under this next wave.

Only the foolish are faithful,
and only the faithful are foolish.
Isn't that wonderful?

I know all too well
how to speak as if
we are strangers.

The mind is clay
but body and feelings
are the many, many layers
you must be careful not to break
on the way to soothe and mold the mind.

As our days count up
so does the possibility
that we'll regret having
burned up so many days
together, ignoring the end.

You have raindrops
from storm clouds
on the windows
through which
you see the world.

You should probably
wipe off your glasses.

This black jacket
will fade as I do

and these old shoes
will age with me.

When her slippers don’t make
the sound she knows so well
on the scuffed, yellowed linoleum kitchen.

When the telly tells her
a boy that looks like her grandson
was out breaking windows last night.

When the kettle misses its turn
When there are no car horns
When her boy has not called since Wednesday.

When ice wraps the fading window
When her ears turn the colour of autumn
When she can’t find her glasses on her head.

When weather reporters don’t smile
When Stewart does not come home
When she remembers he will never be home

she worries.

"Did you miss me?"
wondered the water,
beautiful and cold

"Where have you been?"
wondered the dock,
groaning with age

"Was it worth it?"
wondered the breeze,
wise and curious

"What have you become?"
wondered your shoes,
kicked off beside you

"Have you forgotten?"
wondered your reflection,
remembering everything.

I'm going back to the hospital
you tell the train window

that's good* I say to your hair
it's best to be safe

I don't know what is best
yes you say but you don't know either.

Your blank canvas birth
was long enough ago for you to laugh at.

Now look at you,
skin rich with life,

formed and developed,
a moving, articulate photograph

of crystalline lightning
coursing over you like water

blank canvas death
is now impossible.

You have
wasted
your time
on me.
Thank you
for that.

I keep trying to **** myself
and I keep not dying* you tell me

do you have any idea how frustrating
this is you ask but expect no answer

I know I say what else can I offer
I don't know how to do this

but I don't want you to go I don't
*I can't stand to let hospital flowers die.

I see the way
your t-shirts fade
your book pages crease
your nose turns up
your clothes aren't folded
your ears turn red
your tea isn't strong
your lips don't close
your stubbornness wavers
your shoulders are warm
your thoughts circle
your eyes flicker
your shoes get *****
your cheeks get spots
your beliefs are relentless
your fingernails chip
and I love it.

Imagine,
living vicariously
through your own reflection.

In a place
where a light
isn't easy to find,
it's wonderful to be
able to see you glow.

Leaving bridges in flames
and walls in glorious ruin

I stepped into the open air
tears reaching my collarbone

while sledgehammer and matches
slipped from trembling fingers inside.

At the fatal intersection of Jopling and Tyre
you're able to look up through creaking maple arms
to see the flawlessly vertical snow raining down
falling to earth the way you convince yourself you did

your walk home is a distant everyday memory
a dream you wake from as you twist jagged keys
time to think it used to be you used to have time
and now this is your only chance to stop thinking

but today take a breath take a walk take your eyes
look around as if you do not see this everyday
because frankly my dear you haven't in years
looked really at these overgrown maples

the wooden hands that lift you and your hopes
at the fatal intersection of Jopling and Tyre.

So hat someday we will wake
without dressing in armour

so that we will be equal in the eyes
of these goddesses we uphold

so that our sisters, undefeated
have no more scars to compare

so that in the end, by whatever name
we are our own and will remain so

so that the stories of our hands
will write the pages of history

forever.

It is said so often
that if they love you
you can go anywhere
and they will follow you

every poet dreams this is
the truth as we run from love
but it isn't. We have been lied to
by those that haven't ever known

that love they write about so often.

Dear man in the moon,

I will rarely tell you what is true,
but you and I
have a lot of catching up to do.

"Hi, it's me,"
they said,
and you knew,
so you smiled.

I'm rusted,
worn and tired
like the bronze strings
I keep forgetting to play
and the swings I left alone.

Gunned down
on the front lines
of historical progress
are the best,
the brave,
the exhausted
and those
who have always
been fighting
for change.

We can sit
wherever

we want
to sit and

we can
count the

fireflies
that shy

away from
kissing us.

Life is relentless
and love is grey,
our hands get tired
and our feet don't stay.

Now the water
is at your knees.

Of course
we are
all of us
fighters

of course
we each
have our
causes

causes
to which
we must
devote

ourselves
completely
though we
struggle

the force
of our minds
of our hands
unstoppable

we are power
we are change
we are strong
we are strength.