violet violence
i find it sort of sad
that this was all we ever had
even now, after the fall
you are still violent in my thoughts

I can’t fix your brokenness
or heal those cracks in your
heart left behind from someone
who came before me.

I will not promise you stars,
or diamonds or forever.
These are things that
I simply cannot do.

Instead, I will write you
bad love poems on bar
napkins and sneak
them into your purse.

I will give you the first
lick of my ice cream and
the last of my fries when
yours are already gone.

And when it is two
in the morning  I
will read you children
stories in different voices.

I cannot promise you much
but I will love you the
only way I know how:
with every piece of my soul.

I was a child
I was a raving maniac
A raging lunatic
A prophet
Who saw god in all the symbols
And the symbols in everything
I made connections to the plants and the soil
The moon and the stars
To the times I read your mind
Knew the deeper meaning
Or just what was implied

I was a child
A selfless lover
A bitter fool
A dreamer
Who looked forward to every new day
I didn't know
I couldn't grow wings and learn to fly
I knew I could
My heart was pure
My love was innocent

My world was a vibrant dream
Full of wonder and opportunity
And color
And love
I didn't want to believe in pain
I couldn't
I was a child

Today someone said to me
That there was a certain kind of beauty in the missing
Of two fathers
A blossoming because of the devastating floods
A sharper, deeper kind of romance.
Did they die so that we could live?
I think suddenly of your life impacting mine
Like the two car accidents we could have died in.
I think of glass shattering like a fallen icicle
The stony, absolute crunch of metal
Of our separate bodies
Tossed against steering wheels and car doors
Our bones fragile and temporary.
But we are alive, you and I
And even now
I feel the lull of your breathing
Of your quiet hands
From thousands of miles away.
I open for you like a wild rose
And you know me as I am
Sweet and wary.
Such strange and heavy secrets we bear
My darling, my dear
Such strange and heavy secrets.
Your arms hold me up
Cradle me against your beating heart
And we are wet with kind rain
And shared sorrow
And the tears I cry for both of us.
You grow a beard
And I cut my hair
And no time has passed in heaven.
Come
Let me bear the weight of your heart, my love.
We will meet them holding hands.

I'll drop a twenty dollar bill into the take-a-penny tray at the local gas station today
A tiny donation to the broken mother with four kids who needs a tank of gas to get her to a job that barely pays her the money she needs to feed her children
She goes without tonight

I'll smile at the Walmart door greeter this week
An acknowledgement that will ripple through her subconscious to tell her that suicide is not an option
The boy on check out lane 4 is

I will pull over expeditiously for the ambulance racing by
The new father to be is craddling his newborn baby
Crying out helplessly while his fiance bleeds on their new kitchen floor
Her life will not be lost today

Your reactions to the world around you are what show the world that it does not revolve around you
You revolve around it
Feet planted firmly
Gravity holds down the ability to stay content to my skin like microbs burying into a foreign body

Hold the door tomorrow
You might meet your reason to wake up