Sometimes I thirst
So intensely for something
Which I cannot identify
That I
Drink glasses
Of ice water
Until the feeling of nausea
Takes over
And I
Forget my illusive thirst.
And though
It isn't for water that I thirst,
I am unable to name that
For which
I do thirst
And am therefore
Forced to quench
The only thirst I know.

It isn’t what it seems, life isn’t but a dream.
A porous umbrella, a selfish Cinderella,
A deafening silence, an unfaithful alliance,
An inaudible roar, a dry liquor store,
A tell-all magician, a tell-all politician,
A stuttering thespian, a boy-crazy lesbian,
A sober alcoholic, a glad melancholic,
A deflated balloon, a dried-up lagoon,
A real-life oasis, a movable stasis,
A saddened hyena, a fat ballerina,
A one-item list, a sixty-pound mist,
An illiterate writer, a cowardly fighter,
A concrete bed pillow, a smiling willow,
A ****** librarian, a caring barbarian,
A fresh-water ocean, and a straying devotion.

We're wired in a
profound way
for battles
against monsters
and misperception.
The value of chaos
and the value of
the unscripted
is false.

It's the mysterious,
the young,
and the possible
who incur wonder.
Let them project
and expand.

All it takes is time.

Words coiled in your brain,
Her whimsy and
Her choice of partners.
He is messy and barely-there.
Atlas founded the juxtaposition
Of stillness and speed
And she needs to come to life
In a solo, like a triangle
In bloom.

I might not be the one
or the only volunteer.
We're doing something
emotional
to hide the injury,
to be normal,
to get isolation.
But I have more to do.

It's easier in
limited isolation
I think.

I am learning about the night terrors,
Only experience can teach it.
Warm, they rush in without breeze
But give more breath than lungs can hold.
I gasp as I learn, I weep as I learn,
Only experience can teach it.

On my last day
In America,
Everyone I know
Was busy.
I had to pack
My things,
Call a cab,
Kiss myself
Goodbye.
No one would know,
I thought to myself
As we flew higher
In the air,
That here I was born,
Here's where I lived,
And here,
I swear,
I was loved.

It's a fact of us
That our highs
Are never as high as we hope,
Nor our lows
As low as we fear.