Rain rain come today
Please wash my pain away

I sometimes fantasize about meeting you younger,
Before you had bled yourself dry.
I'd like to know the kinder you,
The softer you,
To be me and you,
You and I.
I imagine myself saving you,
Shielding you,
Keeping you
I could bottle the ocean for you
But it would only make you thirst more
And I would cut out my eye had I looked at you wrong
But you'd no longer think I was pretty
I sometimes fantasize about meeting you younger,
When fists were only for bumps
And paper, scissors, rock
When my bruises came only
From climbing trees and beanstalks
I sometimes fantasize about meeting you younger
Before the sun had scorched you red
The burn that returned in your anger
The burn that you kissed on my cheek
The youth are richer,
You know as well as I
I wish I met you younger
When eyes were dry

He is tall with limbs that stretch like  
         roots,
     Eyes and teeth and ears sing joy
  ‘What does love feel like?’
He asked my friend
Her nose twitches, her ears spike up
Like a bunny offered a carrot
  ‘Like a deep breath in
       Like walking through the door,
           And dropping your bags.
              You're home.’
                  Exhale
She smiles so bright, I'm sure
she has swallowed the sun
   ‘What does love feel like?’
He asks me
    ‘Bug under a boot.’
Exhale

A long endless road
Reaching out to desolation
Mile markers stand
Martyrdom, tribulation

Foot after foot
Miles or kilometers
A heart of soot
It doesn’t matter

Grevious each step
Calculated disaster
Lonely tears wept
The big there after

And I see
The invisible things
We are ‘we’
Dents, bruises and dings

And I know
The language we speak
And I show
The birthright of the meek

It is all upside down
We color outside the lines
World will bring us down
We dance out of time

A moment to find
An ancillary rhyme
In limerick skew
We do what we must do
To take ownership of our time

Maybe I am an Image
A comic book villain
A video game antagonist
Unlocked and playable
Free for your narrative

Maybe I run on
hearing-aid batteries?
Quietly chirping for
your attention
and affection
A dot matrix
mess to clean

Maybe I am
a Happy Meal
invisible sustenance
to tear through
to find the toy
Cheap joy

Maybe I am
The time you
wet yourself
discreet accident
of only your
awareness
The secret
of shame

Maybe I am nothing
A thing
that remembers
You
in absence
of us

A man goes to a doctor—
“Doctor, I’m depressed,”
the man says; life is harsh,
unforgiving, cruel.

The doctor lights up!--
The treatment, after all, is so simple!

“The great clown Pagliacci is in town tonight,”
the doctor says,
“Go and see him! That should sort you out.”

The man bursts into tears.

“But doctor,”
he says,
“I am Pagliacci.”