I am stealing these few moments
When the lights are out
And my family is asleep
Not because I have anything of importance to do with the time
But just because I want it.
I want to own it.
To add it to my Collection
Along with the books that crowd my bookshelves
Which wait in vain to be taken down and read -
The LPs
That rarely get their turn
on the turntable
To release the music hidden inside their shallow black grooves;
The plans I made when I was younger
That were going to make me famous.
Or rich.
Or both.

Only now do I realize that I have violated
The cardinal rule of all serious collectors and hoarders-
I allowed myself to use the time
To write this poem.

And now it is gone.

When I think back on my mother
My heart begins to churn
With a complex and volatile mixture
Of memories and emotions.
Maybe because she was a complex and flawed human being.
Or because I am.
I yearn for a child's simple
Hand drawn joy -
Appreciation without judgement.

I remember that feeling
Or more precisely
I remember remembering it.
It is always set in the spring,
The sun is shining and the tree outside my window
Is becoming greener by the day.
I run down the hallway
Excited to feel her embrace.
Excited to look into her eyes.
Excited to be loved.

On this day set aside to celebrate
Our mothers
I try to hold on to that feeling for as long as I can -
Like a child holding his breath under the water in the bath,
Counting the seconds
Unaware of everything else in the world.

So many possibilities
Endless paths
Endless choices
And yet fear keeps me moving
In the same direction today
As yesterday,
Making a mockery of free will.

I cry out to the wind
******* away from my plotted course
Challenge me to find new worlds
Hidden in the mundane details of my surroundings
Let me walk slowly down the streets I always pass by
Converse with friends who have remained strangers to me,
Listen to someone else's favorite music.
Let unfamiliar fragrances tickle my nose
And whet my appetite for new foods
I want to run my hands along the trunk of a gnarled tree that I've seen a hundred times
Or feel the warm pulse of life through a newborn's soft skin.
Then I'll learn a few dance steps
And embarrass myself in front of strangers
Maybe there's someone who could use comforting in these stressful times

Or I could just binge watch some mindless sitcom

So many possibilities

I watch men I do not know.
How they smile,
twitch,
scratch-
how the ***** steel bristles
cut through their cheeks and chins;
their tatoos
dull blue and grey
on sweat washed arms.
How they rub their hands,
push back their hair,
adjust their collars,
breath,
laugh,
belch.
I am looking for someone
I never knew.
I am looking for my father.
If he were near, I could not
let him pass by unseen, unfelt.

Meeting him,
I do not know what I would say.
hello
or
do you know me?
Maybe I would say nothing.
Maybe I would just sit and stare,
like a soldier,
seeing his own arm
****** and torn in the road,
wondering why the fingers don't move
when he tries to make a fist.

Buoyant, Oblivious
Drunk on manufactured insouciance -
How did we did not notice life’s quickening -
As we were caught by the pertinacious story-currents
Of our lives.
The torrent
Of consequences delayed
Long disconnected from their antecedents;
Of our personal mythologies -
Lies, truth and misremberances
Churned together into an exploding froth:
The anxious anticipation
Of our ineluctable destruction
At the base of the falls
Where the water, like a perpetual gospel choir
Shouts and sings in joyous celebration at being made whole.

So we hold on tight.
To whatever we can.
To today.
To each other.

This is a tree
In the backyard of an apartment
In Jamestown, New York
In which an eleven year old boy sits
Silently considering
The sounds of the cars driving past
A man yelling for his dog
The ommm of a distant lawnmower
The smell and smooth feeling of damp tree bark
How his thoughts and feelings
have become unspoken sentences
How the images of the past have lost detail
How his anger tightens the skin of his face
How the blood hums in his ears
How his toes push against the end of his tennis shoes
How it might feel to fall face first from the tree
Or fly away over the house
And the people hidden inside
Higher and higher
Until everything had grown small with distance
And so much quieter
Until even the words in his head would be silent
Then he would let go
Then he would fall

If you should come upon a painting by Mark Rothko in a museum -
I'll assume you are not one of those billionaires who has one hanging on the dining room wall, or hidden away in a secret room behind the bookcase -
but either way, do not just look at the painting or you will see nothing.
Well, except color. You will see color. Rothko loved color.

But wait a while and you will begin to hear it whisper its secrets:
How lives are layered upon lives;
how painful sacrifices
get buried beneath petty ambitions and lies
and joys and succes as well-
oh, and perhaps another layer or two of color.

Each generation scrapes the parchment clean
and blithely scribes new marks on its surface -
confident that they will not forget the lessons
that seem so absurdly obvious.

Empires disappear beneath overgrown vines
and dieties who, drunk on the blood of virgins
would feast on the hearts of conquered warrors
but now shuffle past each other
with oblivious nods, grousing about the food,
wait for the day someone remembers their names.

Listen and perhaps you will learn
how every layer of life is a forgotten secret
discernable only by its subtle influence
on the layers that are built up above it.

If not. There is always the color. Rothko loved color.