My wife, a psychiatrist, sleeps
through my reading and writing in bed,
the half-whispered lines,
manuscripts piled between us,

but in the deep part of night
when her beeper sounds
she bolts awake to return the page
of a patient afraid he'll **** himself.

She sits in her robe in the kitchen,
listening to the anguished voice
on the phone. She becomes
the vessel that contains his fear,

someone he can trust to tell
things I would tell to a poem.

"I knew this girl once,
she had long hair, so long it whispered tiny kisses along her hips and waist
she had the oddest bluest eyes i'd ever seen, the color of the sky right before it gets completely dark
her thick, long eyelashes framed those eyes, and freckles formed constellations across her cheeks
i could almost draw the big dipper and Orion's belt on her milky white face.
She didn't know i existed but i admired her from afar. I could tell she was educated- She always had some form of poetry in her hand. But of all the things i could have noticed about her i noticed her bookmarks. She would lose them all the time, i would see her chasing after the scraps of paper as they flew through the wind down the street. She'd stick anything in between those pages, wrappers of all sorts, leaves, pennies, shoelaces, once i even saw a page ripped from a different book. It became my favorite game to guess what the next bookmark would be.  After awhile she stopped chasing the various bookmarks across the city and she cut all that long hair off, then awhile after that she started using unoriginal, uninspired plain old bookmarks.Then even awhile that she stopped bringing books altogether, until one day she didn't show up. Nobody knew that beautiful, mysterious, bookmark making girl was locked up inside her own mind. Nobody knew she hated her long hair and her freckles and even those baby blues. Nobody knew that she couldn't stand to live in her skin anymore so much that she swallowed a couple pills one night to ease away the pain. Even worse was she didn't know i watched her for so long and thought she was the most interesting human being i'd ever encountered. That girl committed suicide because she hated herself learn from her mistake, my mistake, everyone who ever noticed her bookmarks mistake, and don't do this, don't off yourself with a .45 before you've even had a chance to live" he's desperate now  
"please please you don't have to do this" he sputters

I answer simply " I never was much of a bookmark girl, i always dog-eared my pages"

*bang

Speak, Little one. Before it's too late.
Before you learn too much, and decide not to say what you're really thinking.
Before you live in fear of what others will think of the words you say.
Speak, Little one. Paint us pictures of your young, hapless mind.
Influenced only by apple sauce, ******-Doo, the color blue.
You carry with you only whats left of your first blanket.
Sometimes the questions of the Unknown, as "Why" "What" and "How" appear more often than not.
You cling to its cotton, frayed edges. Not knowing how long it will be before it's forgotten.
Like your words, the little things, they come and go.
Be swift, Little one. Return to your fort between the living room book case and the television.
Constructed eloquently of blankets, pillows, and my leather jacket, it is safe.
Speak, Little one, for soon you will outgrow your fort, and become part of a world that's not
Continue to speak, little one, as your words will grow in confidence and importance
as you grow so abruptly and follow no plotted coordinates.
And eat, little one, and clear all of your plate,
So you can get back to speaking, before its too late.

Love.

It's such an easy word to scoff at.
We are born with our parents
nursing us on it.
With promises of never letting
that well run dry.
We live the rest of our lives
dedicated to finding that love in another person.
To discover that true, pure chemistry with someone.

As much as I hate to admit it
I want all of this and more.
I'm only human.
I just can't break out of this cage.
A cage built on a foundation of
ignorance, Jesus, loneliness, and hate.

That must be what a tiger feels like.
Living everyday enclosed by thick glass walls
watching everyone else live the life you want.
To be able to walk outside
with my fingers interlocked with the person I care about most
Without being stared at
Without being told it's unhealthy
Without having bibles thrown at us.

I'd ask my parents to make me free
But they'd just swallow the key
So I'd stay in there forever.
Because letting me breathe the outside air
would be conceding to what their upbringings told them.
It would be admitting that their baby boy is abnormal.

Somehow they didn't get me the memo
that I can't share my love the same way the normal people can.
That I'll never be able to feel the soft skin of my own child
or be able to hang a piece of paper on my wall
announcing my promise to keep my love forever.

You know, it's not like
I ever wanted to be in here.
I didn't choose to be trapped.
I didn't choose to have my life criticized and nitpicked.
I didn't choose to feel like a pariah.
If there was any choice involved
It certainly wouldn't be this.

I spend my life screaming
and pounding the glass
hoping people hear me but
really wanting to hit hard enough
to shatter some of the glass
and let the shards meet my skin
so I can feel something other than
guilt
shame
and embarrassment.

For now, I just stand hear
Wishing, hoping, needing
Someone to see me.
Someone to hear me.
Someone to find a key
And free me.

I am half of you.
Right?
You are 23 of my original 46 chromosomes
Yet,
I barely know you.
But that’s a two way street.
While your second marriage is failing and my relationship is thriving
And I might be drinking a little too much and you might be earning not enough
I have late Friday nights while you are...
Wait.
I don’t know what you’re doing.
My bright blue eyes reflect nothing of your dark chocolate brown
The only thing we seem to have in common is our reputation of being
The tallest in the room.
Dad, I’m growing up.
And it’s not my height this time.
You have always been a man of few words
Well, I’m just the opposite.
I wish we could sit down and pour our hearts out
I want to understand what goes through that forty-seven year old mind of yours
I want to know what sprouted those gray hairs on your head and
How high school changed your life
I want love advice
Tell me funny stories about all the wonderful mistakes you made
As long as you don’t mention the one
Where you forgot to speak to your daughter.

oh, sweet mistakes
how dear you are to me
i'd never know success without you

every skinned knee brought the eventual feeling of restoration
every heart ache whispers of future empowerment
and with every black eye - the promise of beauty returned
one must feel their weakest at some point
in order to ever fathom true strength

i've found myself in the heaps of rubble
left behind by what i'd never wanted to become

in ruin we are reborn

so let the levy break
let the water wash away what we've made
let the words evade me
let the type-writer's keys stick
let the ribbon jam
let all of my thought-out conceptions of what will happen
         never be
let it all go to ****
and get lost
and crumpled and bruised
let it all snowball out of my control
so that i can let go
and let it be how it's meant to be

let me rise from the ashes
dust off my wings
and cling to the hem line of the ever-twirling skirt of the sky

let me fly

it's been so long since i've tasted the freedom accompanied with the abandonment of the flight-plan
how i've missed the adventure of being lost
and the undeniable sense of self-worth acquired by finding yourself

i am new