My heart keeps the beat
as we tangle up our
arms and feet.

Your hand takes mine,
my heart keeps time,
suns rise, stars align.

This moment is the world
as far as I’m concerned,
flaming lips leave a sweet burn.

We laughed.
We kissed.
I got my wish.

You said I get four.

Wish number one:
Can we please just hide the sun,
let the night fade to eternity.

My second wish:
The words to match this kiss,
but they’ll never be.

Wish number three:
For you to come back home with me
I know I know, but I can wish.

Wish number four:
No. I don’t need anymore,
because it came true,
I’m here with you.

I saw stars
where there was only dust,
much the way high school hearts
confuse lust for love.

I felt forever
in the most fleeting of scenes.
I'll do it again.
Mistakes are built for repeat.

I heard you say, "Come closer dear"
as you were sprinting out the door,
clearly wanting less,
but all I can give is more.

I dreamt we were at peace
as shrapnel burst through the bed,
and I denied in my heart
what was clear to my head.

I hate hypocrisy.
I hate mine the most.
Sometimes I swear I feel your breath,
when I'm sleeping with your ghost.

She tethered me to the real world.
And the worst part:
I was grateful for it.

I smile, wave, and say goodbye,
because you can’t come with me on this ride.
Floating home, up to the sky,
I never knew I could use these eyes.
Lifting off familiar ground,
a dizzy feeling begins to astound.
And all at once, every sweet sound,
Has me drifting up and getting down
I never guessed, what nobody knows:
clouds taste like sugar but feel so cold,
or the nourishment of lands where nothing grows,
or how to walk out the front door, into my home
All these unfamiliar faces borrowed my smile,
but that’s ok, we can share for a while.
The day is looking long and the weather quite mild,
there’s something to this far north style
But days end and storms begin,
“goodbye’s” are quite common where I’ve been.
So look towards the sky, I’m coming home,
with clouds above, I‘m never alone.

Leaves are swept across the ice of the pond,
     like helpless dancers.
They left home and are gone as gone,
     in a futile quest for answers.
Never knowing puzzles can take so long,
     or that winter is a cancer.
The wind howls a loud and mournful song.
     Of course the trees just stand there.

The Siren song
   Sung by the Sea
   Sounded so much
   Sweeter
Before the boy
Was born.

Truth be told,
   I was born that day as well.
   We shared our first breaths.
   Delicate and enduring atmosphere.
   Sweetest, most overlooked element:
   OXYGEN
   Awoken our lungs
   And spread life out
   Through our
   Fingers,
   Toes,
   Tears.
      (His were louder,
    Mine were longer)
We shared more than
rarefied air that day;
Excitement.
Confusion.
Love.
Fear.

Before I knew it
My Scorched sailor’s skin
      Sought sanctuary
In
   Landlocked love.

You see
   The inconvenient, unfortunate, and unavoidable
   Fact of humans is,
   They like to eat.
      And warmth is also nice.
   Diapers.
   And Kathy next door just got this great icebox and she says she doesn't know how she lived    
   without it and that in the long run it will actually save her money, what with buying in bulk and not
   going to the store so often and leftovers.
   So there’s that too.

So I work
   Willingly, willfully
   With wetness
   On Back,
   But not behind ears.

And my captain is a good captain,
   A true captain.
   Our pay is always waiting when and where promised.
   Pennies are not pinched when providing rations.
   He gave me this job out of the goodness of neighborhood.
But he has no child.
   No wife.
   Little reason to head to port,
   And less to linger long.

I see my boy’s chestnut eyes in my dreams
   And they act like the cruelest potion,
   Which, when sipped
   Leaves the drinker with only more thirst.

But there are dollars here,
And, what other skills do I have?
And, bellies are full.
I try not to complain.

Tonight,
I want the fireplace,
   Roaring.
Our boy smiling, laughing
   His cheeks having played chameleon
   With the scarlet of our flag.
His mother;
   Her eyes,
   Outshining her hair,
   Outshining the sun,
   Scroll between our boy and the page,
   As she reads his favorite book of tales.
   He doesn't understand a word,
   But I do.
   We share an unnumbered smile.
   He likes the pictures.

My mouth has tasted of salt for
   64
   Long
   Days.

The ocean gives,
And the ocean takes away.

There is something before the words,
Before the light of labels
Descends from the sun of thought
To name her yawn:
Cute,
Precious,
Important.

There is some knowing
Prior to calling it a “yawn”.
Say the word “yawn” repeatedly
And it will lose all meaning
And fall down a technicolor faucet
Towards ridiculousness.

So what is this fracture in time?
This single extra slide
Spliced in before the movie begins,
Displaying more meaning
Than the entire film that follows.

Perhaps it is instinct.
We are (grateful) slaves to the genomes
Of our ancestors.
Do the graceful notes Jerry hands to me
Dance through the synapses of my mind,
To remind me that community means safety?
And success in our endeavors once meant:
Food
****
Sleep
Repeat

Or is it emotion?
Testosterone rising up to battle butterflies in my gut
Because the romantic in me knows
This one
Is worth the wait
This one
Is worth the risk

Is it God?
Fighting with all her might
To tear into our consciousness,
But turned away
At the inhale
That precedes the sweetest of songs.
Sorry God –
Life is short
No time to think about it.

And here is the kicker.

It’s none of these things.
How could it be?
How can words describe
That which comes before words?

It isn’t anything
It just is.

More or less
She simply loved me less.
And I can't fault her,
For less was her best.,
And lest I speak wrong
While seeking to impress,
That through it all,
Nevertheless,
I loved her the best.

All this freedom
has built me a cage.
Lean my head ‘gainst the walls
to hear the breaking of waves.
They sing the harsh chorus
of another wasted day.
All that I was given
is what they took away.

I hum myself a tune
a neighbor taught me in my youth.
As I’ve gotten older,
it’s only grown in truth.
It tells of a brave boy
who stood up to a brute,
and how that beast cut him down,
for some are born to lose.

All my life I’ve been told
that I am free as can be,
and asked to ignore
these shackles, wrapped around me,
but try as they may
they cannot change what I’ve seen.
Red, black, and blue
coalesce as I bleed.

I used to run so hard,
maybe 18 miles a day.
There was no end to the race,
but I was not running away.
I was stuck on a track,
every pace kept me in place.
I had nowhere to go,
so I was sentenced to stay.

The food in here ain’t bad,
and it’s a warm place to sleep.
The warden treats me well,
gives me his own book to read,
The TV is so big
that I could never even see,
I was born in a prison,
and I was born with a key.

Well young man,
You’re old, alone and done for.
A brittle, fading shadow
of the fierce lion you once were
Another victim of the pestilence
bestowed upon us at birth,
but will you gift to others
this ever growing curse

The scales fall
revealing dark, deep set eyes.
For the first time exposed
to the blinding darkness of the light,
Yes, you once stood proud
so sure you were right,
But that’s not today
and it won’t be tonight

Should you settle or stir,
now that you know you’re all in?
Answers evade you
as vast questions descend.
They tie-dye your thoughts
into a most confusing blend,
“Do you dare to go out
Do you dare to stay in?”

All around you’re listening
for songs of hope to grow.
Not sure of the all the notes,
but once they’re heard, you’ll know.
Convince yourself of one direction
and once you have just go.
But I’m just as lost as you
So perhaps it’s best you don’t.

I've got some scores to settle
      With the man upstairs,
And they range from the red on his hands,
      To the grey in my hairs.
7 billion fools sharing 13 stool
      In this game of musical chairs,
And a set of ****** rules
     Worse than middle school dares.

I dreamt of Marissa early this morning.
We were at a beach,
and in my basement.
all at once.
It made quite a lot of sense at the time.

She was lying to my right.
Heads inches a part -
my legs at Southeast,
hers southwest.

I knew we were still broken up.

Blur blur blur

“I love you Marissa”.
Calmly, almost sleepily:
“I love you more”

It was the best moment,
because all had been returned which was lost,
with interest.
And it was the worst moment, because I knew it had to be a dream.

Familiar sand
Makes  bed below my toes.
Strain to open my eyes
Find they've been glued closed.
Where are the waves?
Noon’s sun is starting to hurt,
It hits me in the throat;
I’m lost in the desert

I spin round and round and round
Till I’m dizzy with disease,
Then fall down and down and down and down,
Right down to my knees,
And then I beg and beg and beg and beg
Oh please, someone please,
Won’t you run and run and run and run
Come to rescue me

I never knew
I was fragile like glass,
Till the cloth got pulled
And I shattered with a crash,
Now I’m stuck waiting
For all the Queen’s men,
To work impossible magic
Making me whole again

I was a statue
Standing firm and strong,
Braved wind and rain
Fought four years long,
And all of these pieces
Add up to none.
Cause I used to be two
Now I’ll never be one.

A crash.
A blast.
A splash.
A laugh.
A head.
A hand.
A foot.
A heart.

Like a child, I don't know how to love in halves.
I ignite, touch the sky, and crash.
I sun-tan and smile, laying in the ash.
Like a soldier, I don't live in half.

Like an earthquake, I tend to reach too far.
Always chasing round mistakes at bars,
or running down mad shooting stars.
Like resolutions, I never get too far.

Like Atlas, I pose proud for all eyes,
using my burden as the prestige disguise,
I keep hidden my motives and all I despise.
Like believers, not blind, I just close my eyes.

Like the night, I'm destined to die young.
Even if death comes at one hundred and one,
to the door of one loved and a job well done.
Like the last breath off innocence, I'll still be too young.

I'm sitting by the beach.
And there are so many others,
Sharing this sand.
Why?
Not here to swim.
Not to pick up love.
Not to fish.
We gather here,
Simply
To be near beauty.

Beauty is our magnet.
We want to situate ourselves
As close to it as possible.
To crawl into bed with it
And drape an arm over.

So is my love for her.

I just see so much beauty
In all of her.
It's gravity.

Racing towards twenty,
no hands on the wheel.
I have a Peter Pan plan:
run when it gets too real.

There is an aching deep within me,
that I hoped  time could heal.
Threw desperate looks at the clock,
but it ignored my appeal.

I like myself much more
when I take the time to read.
Yet I only stir and sleep
or stare at petty screens.

The sand, it just keeps falling;
each night I hear it piling.
When the sound comes from within,
there is no such thing as hiding.

My biggest fear:

I will wake up and be thirty,
but an old old man.
Always talking about what I was
and all I could have been,

Then I’ll turn round and be forty
Just like all suburban slobs,
who have never read the classics,
grateful slaves to dead jobs.

Fifty will approach,
I’ll swear it’s too late in the day
for a man to make new ways,
deathly afraid of change.

Perhaps when I’m ninety,
scales will fall from my eyes,
my head will hang in sorrow;
having wasted my only life.

Red roses, red ribbons, and war.
I’ll fill you up and leave you wanting more.
White wine, white lies, and dust.
I’ll turn your “might” into a “must”.
Dark eyes, dark nights, and a game.
I’ll be the winner, you’ll bear the pain.
Clear head, clear heart, and hope
I’ll hang by your feet at the end of my rope.

You’ll dance on my fiddle,
and seek my acquittal,
as I stand, non-committal
and feed you love’s riddle.

One hit, one kiss, and a hook.
I’ll script the ending to your repeatable book.
Two more, too much, then again, more
I’ll be the curse you long to endure.
Three hopes, three ghosts, and a ****’s crow.
I’ll write the only truth you’ll choose to know.
For what? For whom? You’ll plead.
I’ll offer a reminder: you exist for me.

I’ll act as gravity,
a pull towards depravity,
and at the brink of insanity,
I’ll walk away, earth-shattering.

I built myself up then I fell right off,
And I did with the characteristic passion of a Karamazov.

I don’t know where I get these ideas, but they fill up the room.
They must be born of a mutilated peasant womb.

They stampede and conquer my days.  At night they melt down my walls.
I don’t dare to leave, because I know they’re apt to ambush the halls.

They  may come quiet, but they build to thunder.
They spike their wagon wheels and throw me right under.

There I lay trapped and beaten.  A born winner, dead and defeated.
I never stood a chance against the poisonous egg and *****.

The things I want to want I never do desire.
I burn to be the light, but only ever play with fire

This time I flew  too close.  A moth-brain in my head,
I simply took a nap, and that killed my father dead.

Am I guilty if I wanted him to die?
Am I guilty if I sleep well tonight?
Am I guilty for an averted eye?
Am I guilty though I never told a lie?

Am I guilty if I didn’t pull the trigger?
What God could ever die for this sinner?

Once I was playing 1st base,
dreaming of the ice cream truck.
Now I'm rounding 2nd base,
just hoping she wants to ****.

Paths diverged in the woods
and I just stood and stared.
I waited for the tears or joy,
only to learn I never cared.

The waiting game came and won,
leaving me cold in its path.
Still waiting for the rising sun
that never seems to last.

The theme song of my twenties:
loss of innocence, that old cliché.
Learning to hate my friends
that still slur the word gay.

Bukowski gets so arduous,
and who wants to marry that?
I bet it all on truth.
No room for love on that track.

I built this golden reputation,
only through subsidized kindness.
I rob the words of minor poets.
My love is a plagiarized styling.

My head is on the pillow now.
In due time my eyes will seal,
and then I'll melt into my dreams,
just hoping they're what's real

I’ll never see you boney face,
or get to feel your hunger pains.
Instead I’ll play familiar games -
drink and smoke those thoughts away

Why do you treat me so unkind?
Ruin my day from time to time.
take the meaning from my lines
rob my faith in a pure design.

What would you think of this here house?
The dollar bills I toss around?
What would you say about the frown,
from a girl that comes and gets me down?

So I’ll toss time at a screen
and still not feel a single thing.
Oh God what could you think of me?
I’m selfish and even worse I am weak.

I know you’ll rest your head tonight,
to dream of water, warmth, and rice.
Only I can hear your quivering plight,
but not right now, it’s time to get high.

All that I’ve got is this rich white guilt,
but indulgent feelings won’t pay your bills.
I am owned by rich white guilt,
Try to forget so I can’t sit still.
A spoiled boy with rich white guilt,
the only thing I’ve ever felt.
All I am is rich white guilt,
and you’re the one that it will ****.

With dirt-caked cheeks (on fire),
With ****** knuckles (both dry and flowing),
With a sweat-boiled brow,
With Christmas morning anticipation,
You will your tired, desiring eyes
Above the jagged, pinnacle stone.

You pinch your eyelids.
Breathe.
And open them
To be cast upon the vista
You have toiled towards for all those sleepless years.
Only,
It is not.

It is nothing.

Blackness, emptiness, silence.
Devoid.
The void.

And it just knocks the living hell out of you.
Your breath leaves you
(hand in hand with your sense of comfort).
Your stomach turns to starving snakes.

Avert your eyes!
But the image remains the same;
North, South, East, West.
The darkness has lain down upon the entirety of the compass.

So you turn round,
Look back for the familiar mountain path,
But it is gone.
Where there was once struggle and life,
There is now only empty atmosphere.
So you turn inwards,
Close your eyes,
And see only
The endless absence of light.

We’re all just dancing.      
That’s life, an infinite and cosmic dance.      
The sound waves that the world produces wanders from polka    
to jazz    
all the way over the Appalachian mountains    
to finger picking bluegrass.    

Yes, life is simply a dance      
But dancing is not simple.        
What is the goal?        
To feel good!    
But for who to feel good?    
Is it enough that my endorphins rise    
To the rhythm of experience?    
No.    
To dance alone is beautiful,    
But not enough.    

So the point of the dance:    
To feel good!    
I    
and    
you    
and    
her    
and    
them    
and    
all.    

But how?    
Cause that is important.      
Well, first you have to hear the music    
Then you have to listen to the music    
Then you have to feel the music    
Then you can live the music    

We’re all in this beautiful dancehall    
I believe it’s called, The Universe    
And the music is soft    
So we have to listen close    
And we have to get close    
Cause we wanna get each other high    
But we have to watch out for each other’s toes    
Happiness for the individual is only possible    
When everyone is dancing to the same tempo    

The song can be different    
But the tempo must be the same    
Everyone moves in syncopation    
Toes are in tact and souls are in communion    

And there it is    
The cosmic dance    
To get my high    
I get you high    
And to get us high    
We get the neighbors high
And it can be a beautiful cycle    

Just, when your neighbor steps on your toes    
Pretend you don’t notice    

Life is a dance    
Dancing is fun.

So often I write the phrase “the wind whispered”,
but the wind is not whispering now.
No.
The wind is screaming violently in my ears.
The frenzied scream of rebel soldiers in the midst of bloodshed
cognizant of the ****** that lies ahead.
Maniacal.

Yet, it is not the howling air I think of
even as my hair is tossed in all directions,
like bowing trees appeasing a hurricane.
There is no time to think of the wind.
The concrete is only thirteen stories away.

Somehow I think of something even less relevant than the movement of air.
I was nine.
The ice cream truck parked next to the football field
playing that song.
The one that calls to children like a Siren.
The proud trumpet of capitalism.
I approached,
“I’ll have the pink one please, with gumball at the bottom.”
“You got it.  That’ll be a dollar fifty young man”
my hand slides into my left pocket  –
quarter, dime, penny, penny, dime.
Right pocket -
Dime. Dime. Nickel.
Impatient eyes.
Back pocket s-
Nothing.
Horror.
Embarrassment.
Then the man steps up from behind me,
gray hairs creeping out of his nose.
Gold ring, with a ruby red stone.
Three dollars on the counter,
“Make it two of the pink ones.”

My mind has not seen that man in years.
Perhaps I have made a mistake.
Then I see her eyes,
and I know have not.

Dams give way,
and women drown.
If you’re going to fall
then make it count.
Don’t just slip
but dive deep down,
into the depths of hell,
where hollow truth is found.


You should have seen me then
   when my hair was brushing the sky.
Lesser men strained their necks
   just trying to see that high.
So I made them medicine
    because I was that kind of guy.
Yes, I slept soundly
    in my nightly bed of lies

I broke bread with the poor
   and took drinks with the rich.
Some said I gave too much
   but I could never resist
an outreached hand
    and the implications in it.
Little did I know
   how palm can grow to fist

Then it started to change;
   that god forsaken splash,
too late, too cold,
   I froze and turned my back.
Mirrors haunted my head
   long after the fact,
and the trumpets that praised me
   changed keys to laughs

So I tried to plug my gaps
   like a doomed sailor fighting the sea,
with women and with whiskey
   then **** and ecstasy.
I filled those women’s hearts
    and left them empty,
but that’s of no concern
   when I live for only me.

I tried to burn the town
   with my wicked words and ways,
but I was still given praise
   for my false yesterdays.
Sticking to the straight and arrow
   had led me astray.
So I set sail for better shores
   where all life is grey.

So now I haunt this bar
   the Pope of Little Mexico.
I make rain with my tongue
   just to make the Nausea grow.
I flew with the Eagles
   now I’ve fallen down so low.
Things have never been better
   I have found my heart’s true home


Dams give way,
and women drown.
If you’re going to fall
then make it count.
Don’t just slip
but dive deep down,
into the depths of hell,
where hollow truth is found.

The height of her heels
    Shrunk with every passing year.
Each "December", torn away from the calender
   Was a buzz saw, sometimes taking a sixteenth of an inch,
   And during winters that seemed particularly cold to her bones
   Nearly a quarter of an inch would be devoured by time's steady march.

At 18 her heels were confident, tall, strong,
   Proud pillars supporting the pantheon,
   Complete with Houdini-zippers and unnecessary birthstone buttons.
The Uncomfortable beds
   Of the comfort class.

At 26 her friends whispered,
   With martini breath,
   That they could swear that she had shrunk.
One suggested that she had simply adopted a new hairstyle.
After all, who has time to daily consort with the curling iron
   And still make the 6:47?
Good friends make for the worst critics.

At 41, on certain nights,
   Like when the Jove's had their annual tree-trimming party,
   Believable sources say she could still be be seen
   With 1/4 inch tree-trunks beneath her feet.
There were no buttons or zippers any longer,
   To announce her presence as made her across linoleum deserts
   Towards the desserts.
Her footprint was further softened
   By the Doctor-demanded cushion,
   Which eased the weathering toll of
   Each.
   Next.
   Step.
Everyone at the part paid words to her image:
   "Such soft skin."
   "Eyes that look truer blue after each blink."
   "Pilates or Yoga?  I have to know you secret."
But none of the husband saw her on their eyelids
    As they masturbated in the shower that night.

At 70 her wrinkled dignified carriers
   Were most at home in slippers.
She rarely removed them,
   'Cept when she let her toes soak like veteran driftwood
   In a well deserved baby warm tub.
For some reason the "News" insisted on covering award ceremonies
   And she would always feel a sharp
   Pain ping-pong between her heel and toenails
   As she watched the young actresses climb each step towards the podium.
She would still go out, now and then,
   But nobody noted the style or color that her feet were wrapped in.
   Why would they?
For the record:
   Plain, black, flats.
   Appropriately

She died at 82
   And although the casket was closed,
   It can be taken on good authority
   That this regal eagle of a woman
   Was buried barefoot.

I like to think that she is flexing her feet
   Somewhere eternal,
   Just to see how the sand feels
   Between her toes

She wakes up to the sun’s alarm,
takes a stretch, scratch, and a yawn.
She straps her bra back on.
Before he wakes, she’s gone.

Walking home in last night’s clothes
must be getting old.
But no one wants to sleep alone.
Sometimes Hell can feel like home.

Still in bed
He calls a friend
“God, it happened again.
I know, has got to end.”

His bright heart weakened in the dark.
Though he felt not the slightest spark,
he still pursued the yielding mark.
Fourteen hours, and game restarts.

In the heart of each singer there lives a breathing bird,
Who awakes and greets each morning just to spread his word.
His breast, it swells with air straight from Olympus Mountain,
And the people drink of his melody as a shaded backwoods fountain.

The morning sun invites the song and the singer must oblige;
And when that star takes rest, the song still illuminates the sky.
There is no moment of any spinning day that some tune cannot make               right.
Every singer knows that the Song of Silence often holds the most delight.

Now, where does music grow, but straight out the land and seas?
Amidst the fields and lily-patches live the sweetest melodies.
Many blind optometrists trample song with their learned, leaden feet.
But every child knows to cherish both the flower and the ****.

Whispers of death
   crawl through the protective cloud of smoke,
and pierce the worn armor
   built to protect all dreams and hope.
They funnel in their doubts,
   silencing the crow.
Whirlwind round and round,
   while obfuscating home

A quiet voice at first,
   like a stranger shouting fields away.
Yet still it steals the focus
   and turns the sharpest hues to gray.
There seems to be no plan.
   Crowned chaos rules each day.
One by one they come and go,
   but still the voices stay

They are masters of volume,
   calculating for the optimal strike,
like when they scream during sleep,
   keeping the children up through the night,
or softly during work time,
   counting all that isn’t right.
They reach out their hand,
   but it’s nothing more than a vice.

Now laughter’s no cure,
   but it sure can help the pain.
And if no one’s telling jokes,
   three tall bourbons will do the same,
No one ever wins this war,
   but they can be kept at bay.
Oh the fight to cling to sanity
   is enough to drive a man insane.

My virginal shoulders could only support so much thought,
Before they succumbed to that virulent, green Iblis.
Sons will be what they are, and what they are taught:
A morality drawn to the image of Darwinian fitness.

Casted in His image, but then caught in the net,
Stretching chained hands towards freedom, just to see it sublimate.
Never a seat at the table, but always a back for the Debt.
And to be born of this blood is enough to incriminate.

Shoulder blades tremble, just at the sight,
Of the burden born from that first gasp.
Left with no map, friend, or eyes in the dead of the night,
But have no worries, He loves the first to the last.

*******!  My knees have collapsed and split,
You sit unattached, removed, indifferent on my chest,
But it was you!  You are the one who started all of it.
And when names were called, and the cards were down, you just up and left.

This I pledge:
To my peers,
To my enemies,
To my unborn children,
To those who have left blood in the streets
(And their better years unrealized),
To my Mother,
To strangers,
To myself.

Yes, this I pledge:

I will be a warrior.
I will charge at full speed,
Without reservation,
Having removed my brakes,
Having cut holes in my safety net,
Having burnt all bridges leading back to safety,
I will rage and rally
against injustice
against oppression
against empty stomachs
against tear soaked pillows
against razors stained by blood
against those who hold open arms while exhaling poison
against silence
against apathy
against the chains holding humanity down.

This I swear,
This I promise,
This I guarantee,
This is my bond,

This I pledge:

That injustice and I
shall be in constant battle.
He will remain busy throughout the night
and I will wake in a sweat
and sprint from my bed
only to return once I have been properly bloodied
and removed a chunk of skin from the beast of oppression.
Wake, repeat.

I will not be win.
Defeat will not be defeated.

But, this I pledge:
So long as I breathe
there will be no peaceful coexistence
between pointless suffering and my soul.

This I pledge:
To give my life in this struggle,
For you and you and you.

I'd lost my faith
once before.
It was harder with you,
because,
when it came to God,
I always had doubts.

I sometimes wish I wasn't such an ardent adherent to rationality,
so I could believe the universe truly has it out for me,
but I know the world gives no thought to my shattered dreams.
My bruised essence is a symptom of my own disease.

This callous ellipse will continue to spin, twist, and turn,
unyielding to my protests, unrepentant for my burns.
I sit at strict attention, though there is no lesson to be learned.
I inhale endless ashes, searching for meaning in an urn.

Some see spirits, for better or worse,
but the first time I ate mushrooms, I up and left the Church.
Yes, I once reveled in fairy-tales of the absurd,
until my mind saw the pellicle-like nature of the Word.

If I could turn around and rewrite my story, would I?
Is it better to be alone with truth, or sit at the joyous table of lies?
The truth is, it was never something for me to decide.
That part of me once lived, but like all life, it had to die.

Truth.

The face
Of an elderly widower,
At the funeral
of an old friend.

The snow in my backyard mildly thunders below my feet
Making a statement of solidarity with her fallen brethren, the autumn leaf.
I make the choice to hear her untimed song, rather than the complaining chorus of popsicle fingers.
Our ball of rain’s most miraculous makeup, hiding the blemishes of men and gods,
In my backyard, on a snowed-in, slow and lovely Tuesday afternoon,
the snow paints the moment perfect, and freezes it for just a flashing moment.
But perfection is too hot, even with mother nature’s Achilles-strength oven mitts adorned.
The moment melts.

The deer have been here, perhaps an hour or two prior
Based on the gentle, temporary fingerprint of existence they left behind.
They are perfect today, and I like to think them well-fed and basking in the holiday spirit.

The coffee is likely ready by now,
And the driveway is not going to shovel itself.
I’ll walk out my front door
And the snow will be stained with 21st century existence.
There is no known cure
And it is terminal to dreams,
But at least for these few frozen frames
I can pretend that the whole world
Is like the snow in my backyard.