I did not rise.
I unburied.

Fingernail by fingernail,
from beneath the collapsed arches of who I thought I was.

There was no anthem.
Only the slow recognition
that the sky still ached for me,
even after I forgot how to look up.

And there—
in the first true clearing,
where the ashes no longer smoked but simply were—
stood a figure.

Not a savior.
Not a siren.
Not a cure.

A mirror, carried in human hands.
A lighthouse, burning not with rescue, but with recognition.

She.

She did not find me.
I found myself,
and there she was—
already waiting.

Not as prize,
but as witness.
Not to my ruin,
but to the slow architecture
of something holy rising from it.

She touched my hand, once.
Lightly.
And the earth did not tremble.
I did not fall.

Instead, the bones beneath my skin hummed
with the strange, quiet music
of being known—and still free.

I realized then:
I had not been climbing out of the past to reach her.
I had been climbing to reach myself.

She simply stood at the gates,
smiling like someone who had seen the stars rebuild themselves before.

Brrrr Tuesday
Baby it’s cold outside
Jackets and scarves required
The air is crisp and clear
The sky is clear gray
The city is awake
Traffic moving
The café is almost empty
Too cold to come out
People huddled with their coffee
The steam offering warmth
Baby it’s cold outside
Hard to go out
Bed sounds nice where it’s warm
Winter has returned
Brrrr Tuesday

Alcohol.
And train schedules.
A commuter's tightrope.
The last stop, Hpnotiq.
Where it rains sadness.
Where they're numb
To the moment of inertia.
Preferring instead to
Live on the rim.

Those that people believe all religions as equally true

The philosophers that believe all religions are equally false

The politicians that believe all religions are equally useful

In nature's math, the seasons turn,  
From green to gold, and blue we yearn.  
With science as our guide,  
Through time, we glide,  
Embracing changes we all discern.

Every breath, a whispered prayer,
In silent winds, I find You there.
Each heartbeat drums a sacred song,
Through fear and night, You lead me on.

When shadows fall and feet grow weak,
Your steady hand is all I seek.
Through breath and beat, through dark and light,
I walk by faith, not by sight.

Young men in glazy unison
wreck over lipstick shoals

until last call's klaxons
lure a few to paddle back

& pony up for a last fist
of foaming heart.

I'm past my sailing days,
so I watch from hot shade

with germanium on/off eyes,
surrounded by ten brave

who said yes to an evening.
Leaving into the electric bower

under bud-sparked trees,
our heels are free of night,

everything is open,
& forty-five seems no great age.

I was starving in
Pennsylvania.
One night, I had
enough.
Done with it all.
The poverty and
sickness.
The drunken mad
nights
and dog-fight days.
Brutality for breakfast.
Served sunny side up
runny yolks with
butterflies trapped in
the yellow sunshine.
Spiders built webs in
my soul.

I stood on the torn-up
couch in my living room and
yelled at the walls.

Listen, you devil.
You want me, you better be
ready for a fight.
I paced the floor like a
washed-up heavyweight champ,
eyeing the ceiling like a
drunken sparrow in a cat's mouth.