Dear Hello Poetry
I am very appreciative
Thank You so much for
Providing this wonderful
Platform for me to
Express myself
I don’t think I ever remember
feeling in place as I’m feeling
right  now
Wherever I’ve been
I’ve always felt like an outsider
it seems to have been the nature
of my life to be in that place
I used to grieve not ever feeling
accepted  and spent so much
energy trying to find acceptance
But more than anything
my refusal to stop believing in
myself worth always seems
to put me at odds with a very
cynical world
But today is like no other
for I have arrived at a place
of acceptance but not by others
           Rather by me
I’ve come to accept myself
and find peace in that place alone
           It truly is a freeing experience
I’ve told you my story so
You my friends can always remember
You are unique and it is perfectly okay
to create your own place in this world
                            For
From where I’m standing you’re exquisite
an unrenewable  resource with great value
       and beauty in your very existence
I hope you all fall asleep with renewed                                        
           confidence in who you are
on the way to who
                   You are becoming

           Love yourself

         With love from Black
               Love and peace

requited love

the heart pounds
its engines and its seas -
mend and free.


unrequited love

in the wild and
desolate sea we drown
our hearts full
of sorrow.

I continued the gentle climb
passed building, birdbath, “bathtub Mary”
and was stopped by the sound--
Endless mission of the river
as she made her way over the rocks of early summer.
I knew I'd found our home
At the top of the stairs
a wooden deck off second floor
Up the fourteen stairs to our new door

I could see her now fully
gleaming
beyond the red oaks and wild cherry
framed unspeakable
by greens
and fragrance of the multiflora rose
just coming into bloom
I could go on-- but there are so few words that fit
the sound of a river so content

She whispered to me between her gurgling song
“Hush....”

Later at the same address
A storm of words reaches flood stage
A couch is bobbing in the currents
towards its mangled ruin-nexus
of matchsticks in cyclonic flow
among the renegade
trash
hanging
from the limbs like tinsel

Meanwhile
chair heaved through her door
Like the river
I am not above my rage
at this stage
of more than enough....
Clever daughter's got my goat
Turns my words on dimes
Lays into me
her score of blame
Each blow to drop me further

presses all my buttons at one time
despite the flashing
Warning! Warning!

“Fine! Fine!”

She blows-out through the afternoon
right past me
in a torrent of curses
A stubborn perfect storm
of words
has taken out parental dam
and blown out toward the Bay of Freedom
to the sorrows of her day

The river may crack its whip
But its got nothing on her

nothing is left standing
in her way