Chirp chirp
A sparrow hops and flitters
Jumps and flutters
From branch
To branch
To wire
Lining up with all her friends
Waiting for some skybus to take them away
Twitter and chortling about the world below
Silly humans in their lucid bubbles of
Space
Squirrels chattering and cussing from the trees
Thieving birdseeds and peaches
Meanwhile the sparrow bounces on the wire
Jittery and full of energy
Twitching and flicking her feathers and tail
Boune bounce hop
Fidget and jump on straw thin legs
And then whoosh
All leave at once
Their invisible skytrain pulling away as fast as it comes

I know I blame you
For the hurt and break
For the sickness and longing
And for the invisible barrier between us,
Thin and strong as spidersilk
I deemed you hardhearted
Mercurical in emotion
And swift to raise walls.
But perhaps I was too quick to judge.
After all, you came here at just eleven years
You were tormented by peers, much like me
Your family has been split and shattered
When we were together, we were so close,
I clung to you like a baby bird
But I think you clung to me as well,
I just didn't see it because you held differently
And your touch was so gentle.
You claim to be over me, and to have successfully
Forgotten what we had, even though you also
Claim to have loved me, right before the split
But I think your indifference, your shields and shells
Are made because you also were hurt and ache and
Are created if only to protect a tender belly and soft heart.

I'm half in love with you
And I'm half in love with him
But this story twines two ways
So where do I begin?
I knew you first
Loved him later
Emotion, confusion
Is this fate or
Something else,
To consider
Because my heart won't belong
To random bidders
I know this is cheesy
And probably cliché
But I need to find some sense
In all this fray
So bear with my confusion,
And my state of mind
I hope only for love,
And one not unkind

My friend lives
With anemia and a stomach ucler
With the past of an alchoholic father and an abusive brother
With emotionally abusive ex-girlfriends
Who sometimes plays the butler
With a crammed-full-to-the-seams schedule
With a previous eating disorder and cutting
With the mind of a genius
With the heart of a saint
With the hands of an artist
With a bevy of friends, willing and eager to help
With freedom and a job
With with me, Wyatt, Julia, and Tom on the other end of the phone
Waiting for his call for help
But he is so quiet, pushed into a world of silence, dark, and miserable art
He shelters himself from all, and so we hover nearby
Searching for a crack in the walls of his dungeon, but all we find is a window
He holds the key, but does not yet realise it
So we coaxe and console and soothe, vocalising our concerns and aid
Reaching towards him to pull him away, to touch his heart with the
Hope that a gentle caress, a well placed sweet stroke of kindness may
Free him from his torment
But as of yet, we are still trying

Halloween approaches,
Creeping toward us,
Like the decomposing remains,
Of the undead,
Rattled and shaken from their place of rest, of what should've been eternal slumber,
But now eternal hunger,
Draws them from enshrined and honored pits within deep and moist and decaying earth,
Drawn by the sweet aroma,
Of candy corn and miniature snickers,
Milky way and skittles too,
But in the end,
Their only appetite,
Is for me and you,
Happy Halloween.

Inspiration is a fickle muse
A touchy maid
A picky flirt
Tempting the artist and author
Flicking a tendril of light
In your direction so it
Barely brushes the mind
Enough to see that it's genius
But not enough to see what it is
So many lose this tickle of an idea
But a few are prepared
Armed with papers and pens
Walls and paints
Stone and chisel
They scribble and splash and carve it
As best they can and then refine
Shape and sculpt to better suit
Their idea of perfection
So that the same tendril may touch thirty
But only ten capture it
And none in the same manner

I am Muerte, no not Morty
I am the big 'M'
Death incarnate
I will come for you, I'm coming to get you
And you will regret crossing my path
What's that? You're looking for the boss man?
Muerte, the big 'M'
Death incarnate?
Who are you kidding?
I'm not him, I'm Morty.

Half awake, making coffee
For my dad, not myself because I don't like it
No mugs so I grab a clean salsa jar
Fill it up not quite to the top so there's room for cream
Add the cream
And as it pours in, swirling up from the bottom,
A cream mushroom appears,
Growing in its ebony liquid environ
Swelling and dispersing to even the color
Mixing so the color is that of caramel or toffee
Still thinking about the mushroom
And the possibility to capture it as an image,
If only I can remember it

Red is the color of passion, but the passion of love
A firey burning sensation, heating and fueling lover's desire
Orange is the color of energy, blinding, and fast
Zipping through space and recharging the multiverse
Yellow is the color of friendship, sunshine and bright
Lifting frowns and bringing joy to all
Green is the color of life, growth, expansion
Of Gaia and the vibrant vivacity of Mother Earth
Blue is the color of sadness and melancholy and despair
Of the salty water of both tear and sea
Indigo is the color of calm and surging stillness, contemplation
And intellect, the color of knowledge
Violet is the color of passion also, the passion of music and art
Powerful and strong, mellowed and smooth
And octamarine is the color of magic, the eighth color of the rainbow, falling off the edge of the world into space
White and black, not contained within a rainbow, but both contain the rainbow themselves, they intertwine, yin and yang
White signifying good, pureness, gaiety, life
Black symbolising evil, taint, gloominess, death

I am the zombie of Tinkerbell
Her living corpse
Dress sparkles all faded
Tinkling like a broken bell
My fairy dust no longer brings children the gift of flight
But endows my prey with the curse of second life
That I may twice devour their
Squirming, wriggling,
Writhing, scriggiling
Flesh
Just the way I like it
With a wide dark grin across my face
Teeth stained with blood and broken into points
Eyes dim, dull, and hallowed
Skin sallow and torn by the fighters,
Who battle for their death
Combatting the loss of their dignity
I lure them in with stale illusions and sickly sweet snares
Torn wings are no match for swift feet, but I manage
Pushed onwards, pulled forwards by a need, urge
To devour, consume, and engorge myself
Again with tender meat
And imbibe upon the sharp lifeblood
Of faerie.
For I, am the zombie Tinkerbell, and I hunger.
It's dinner time...

Blip. Blip. Blip
In the black of my room a red light pulses langorously on my phone
Steady green and blue lights and a rapid orange define the router across the room
Red digital numbers stand in the place of the clock
At precisely 6:00 am my alarm goes off(a deranged rooster entrapped in my phone)
A flick of a finger dismisses the crowing and the day has begun
After dressing and any other trivial task, I  am headed downstairs
A chik of the toaster
One beepbeepbeep of the microwave
More digital numbers, this time green, indicate that my bus comes shortly and I dash off
The headlights of the bus announce its presence half a block before it halts and the doors jerkily slide open
I text Graham from five feet away, because I don't yet know enough sign language
On the bus the driver may make an announcement, various lights and a few wires around her seat
School starts with a bell and the mindless herd shuffles in
The hallways bustle with the noise of teenagers chatting noisily, ipods playing, cells buzzing, beeping, texting
Homeroom and every period after is marked by a bell before and after until the last bell, freeing us from our institution of education
Now everyone is really alive and the clammer of sounds is three times as loud as the morning.
On the bus all but the most obnoxious are silent, closed off in their little world of a cellphone, ipod, or mp3
The kids file on and off the bus, only waking from their technology induced zombification to rapidly vocalize with their friends
Once I get home microwave humms as food is reheated or quickly cooked
The rice cooker is prepped and light flips on when plugged into the wall
Coffee maker may be set, and if my dad is home, his workspace is humming and light-pulsing as well
Brother and sisters argue over which tv show to watch or first computer turn while I'm wrapped up in my world of texting homework and poetry
Mom arrives from school and dinner is made
Stove humming loud and food stirfryed
Dinner no blips beeps or pulses matter, just the clinking of silverware and conversation
Afterwards, faucet runs dishes clattering while I wash
Imersion resumes and videos, games, and homework take over until bed
Teeth are brushed, pajamas donned, and members of this family mess around in bedroom before slowly transitioning to bed, and then sleep
So ends another day for me in the 21st century

Cold. Distant. Lonely.
How am I supposed to explain to you how I feel when I don't even know?
When you have a girlfriend, but you still comfort me and soothe my self-doubt?
When we walk and converse together every day and I feel like I know you, but I don't know you?
Am I supposed to traverse this path alone, or with you, or with someone else?
It's fall and it's getting cold, so I need you to cloak me in your warmth and wrap me in your arms to shield me from the elements and my loneliness.
There is a dance tomorrow that I want to go to with you to, but all I've got is a field trip while your girlfriend is on both of our minds.
I just need an embrace, a touch, a physical sensation to tell me you care about me.
You and I and our friends know that she's the kind of girl who will break your heart, rip your already fragile and many times mended heart to throbbing, aching, weeping pieces.
Our friends try to play matchmaker, and I play a different game with the same objective.
How can you not see that she is like the others?
All her predecessors who fragmented you?
Won't she do the same?
But if you will not listen to reason, and true and pure love, then I only hope she will take care of you, cradle your heart in her hands and give it strength.
I hope that she will give you what you need, and more.
However, if she does not deliver, I will be here, waiting.

How can one be half in love?
Perhaps with half a heart.
But how does one have half a heart?
Your soulmate is missing.

I want to go back, back to my New Orleans
This place that I call New Orleans is actually Louisiana
But still, the gorgeousness of this dirt and grime
The live oaks stretching over the 6-lane wide streets,
Touching leaftips, making a canopy over the passerbys
Crepe myrtles showering streets with lacy pink faerie dresses
Smells of beignets and seafood fill the French Quarter
Intense, consuming, warm, loving sun burning through your shirt
In New Orleans to say horses sweat, men perspire and women glow
is to be ridiculous.
In New Orleans everyone sweats like pigs.
As for the grime I mentioned, this exists mainly in
the sidewalks cracked by live oaks which make an adventure of every walk down the street
And in any semi-deserted street
To have a Mardi Gras or St. Patrick's Day without a parade and citywide party is to toss aside traditions and the New Orleanian way
The New Orleanians are welcoming, hearty and heartwarming, tough and unafraid to talk to a stranger on the streets.
An old black man once greeted me with 'konichiwa' as I walked past
A middle aged white man once struck up a conversation with us as he realised we had shared the same ferry earlier in the day
An old asian woman conversed familiarly with our family at Cafe Du Monde simply because we are Vietnamese as well
A teenaged white boy waved at us as we drove past him jogging
A different old black man stopped and serenaded my siblings, mother and me with his trumpet just because we smiled
Several young mothers and women have stopped my mother to gush  over my siblings and me, usually when we were very small
I, myself, have given directions to a tourist or two, lost near Cafe Du Monde or the levee,
And I hope that the warm smiling spirit of the Big Easy will remain forever immortal.

America, the perfect
Land of Opportunity and Golden Streets,
Land of the Free and Home of the Brave,
is not quite so perfect.

Some people like fall, but not me.
It's full of death and decay, the gorgeous pieces of fire drift
from their skeletal homes and burn out into
sodden mushy brown paper.
Hard smooth and brown pebbles, spiky holey bombs, and twirly helicopter blades fall from the same skeletons and hide
beneath the paper, waiting for an innocent victim,
lying in the perfect position to slip someone up so that
they lose their bags and packages as they themselves go
slip slide crashing into the ground.
The victims are sure to rise up again, but with some bruises and bits of soggy brown, stuck all over their clothes
In fall, all the blooms of color decease, all fruit and vegetable and good green things die and leaves the world sodden mushy and brown.

Some people say they like winter, but not me.
It's a cold cruel and heartless season, robbing any last trace of life
from all helpless and left-behind creatures.
The vegetation becomes glazed over with melting glass and is the
one spot of beauty, as the only green left resides on prickly evergreens, housebound plants, and the occasional tacky
coat.
In winter, there is no way to leave your personal fortress without mountains of clothes, and so every person becomes a
chapped lipped, red cheeked, stiff fingered puffball.
Every time you jump into a mound of the white fluff that accompanies the dread season, some is bound to creep into your shirt and boots, freezing whatever it touches, and then ever so so slowly flowing along your skin, one of Gaia's little tortures.

We both lean in, both eager, and me hesitant;
not for what is to come but the thought that once it happens,
There is no more chance for the First.
Leaning in, I inhale sharply, breathing ragged breaths,
Eyelids half shut
Faces so close I can hear his steady breathing, even though this is The First for him as well,
Bodies so close I imagine I can feel his heartbeat, chest expanding with each breath
Whisper unintelligible sweetness into my ear, words tickling my skin,
And the smell of sweet boyish deliciousness.
His nose presses against my cheek
Soft lips touching mine
Pressing
Breathing
Never wanting this moment to end.
We kiss and it feels like time stops only for us and we are barely touching but it's more than enough
And then my little sister runs up, and I have to take her home.
We stand and shyly gaze at each other, your bike, my sister and a few feet of air between us as we say goodbye and you mention looking up something insignificant at home
I walk the seventy-five feet to my house and you race off on your bike, both bashful of what has passed between us and still thirsty for more of each other.
The next day at school we meet in the hallway and walk to first period together, murmuring shyly
about It, air between our arms electric, and I'm desperate.
Desperate to touch you,
To fall into your embrace
And touch my lips to your neck,
Face,
Lips,
And never leave you for an instant,
No need to say a single word
Just be with you and comb my fingers through your hair,
And breathe.

I'm periwinkle,
Peri, perry wrinkle.
Perry the platypus in a time wrinkle.
A blue growling platypus in a time-space wrinkle.

I'm trying to free this masterpiece
that's stuck inside my brain
if it isn't released,
the pressure will make me insane.
So I put my pen to paper
and try to make it flow
but for my inexpertise
there are details I can't show.
The movements of the pen
and traces of the ink
represent what I can do
not what I can think.
So the cartoon scrawl that
lays upon this sheet
simplifies the imagination
that stands upon my feet.

I'm sorry to tell you but the little things you treasure;
An old letter from an ancestor
A silver trinket
A memory
Will all
Crumble into dust
Tarnish into black
Fade into nothingness
So before all the years and months and weeks fly by
Detach yourself a bit from your clutch on these
small things.
Read the letter.
Play with the trinket
Enjoy the memory,
But all things must away and so
I urge you to live in the moment
Rejoice in the light of the present day
And shout for no other reason than your existance.
But heaven forbid,
I implore you otherwise,
Please do not say
YOLO.

First name:
A fire red, carrot orange, and dull rust
A dusty-on-the-outside-bright-spicy-and-wet-on-the-inside tuber
A dancer and cartoon
Second name:
Three short letters, one tonal syllable
From my mother's motherlanguage
Joy
Last name:
Hill of deer in German
(Also a Jewish name?)
Sounds like a chocolate sandwich
Makes my name a score of letters long

When here, you are a knife ****** into my heart and twisted to draw blood.
When away, you are the painful throb of longing in the middle of my chest.
When I see you pass without a word, I die, but rejoice at your merest glance.
When you are not anywhere, I search and worry about you even though it is not my place.
If I accidentally graze your arm or get you to utter some mere greeting, I feel the glow of a hundred thousand suns
And the edges of a million blades because you will never be mine.
But there is hope for the ease of my release, there is another
One who always returns my smiles and glances and greetings,
and laughs at my jokes that aren't really funny
Who cares that I exist and does not tarry to comfort and console when I am sunk in the marshes of despair and
when I wallow in pools of anxiety
I once thought you were sweet and wonderful, but now I know that he is truly sweet and kind, the quintessence of a gentleman and good friend
So I'm leaving any thought of you behind and strolling away in a better friend's company

If our multiverse revolves around
Our universe revolves around
Our galaxy revolves around
Our solar system revolves around
Our sun.
Which is orbited by the Earth
(Which is orbited in turn by the moon and our space junk)
Which is composed of people and continental plates and oceanic plates, all drifting around and bumping into one another
Which are composed of molecules
Which are composed of elements
Which are composed of and are atoms
Which are composed of protons and neutrons in the nucleus
Which is orbited by spinning electrons that we can't even see,
Who is to say we are not an atom to some greater being?

I wonder what chocolate rain would taste like.
Would it fall from chocolate clouds?
And after it dried, would it leave a thick sweet brown coat on the world?
I wonder if my secret love loves me.
Would he ever want to hold me and caress my cheek?
Kiss and touch me as I would him?
I wonder what would happen if I lit the world on fire.
Would anybody notice?
Or think it was a new quirk of nature to ignore?
I wonder if the sun shines more dimly than yesterday.
Would it even be measureable?
I wonder how long we can last, and if an apocalypse would **** us all.
Would there not be a survivor?
Would there not be a fight for life?
I wonder if there is or was a god, and if so, for how long?
Would he create himself?
Could god even have a ***?
I wonder if this world is a construct.
Perhaps a mental image stuck in space?
But if so, whose of?
I wonder if a butterfly flapping it's wings in China truly creates geographic ruin here.
And if so, on what scale?
I wonder if what we do in this world truly affects our afterlife, or if that even exists.
Will this compilation, this assembly of words make any impact on anyone's life?

I love you.
I love you more than the skies and the air currents and birds that dance amongst the clouds
I love you more than the lands and the mountains and the beasts that play in the forests.
I love you more than the oceans and the oceanic plates, and the aquatic creatures that frolic in the waves.
I love you more than life and death.
I love you more than words can say.
I love you, but you want to fly free and they say if you love someone, let them go.
So I release you and you scamper away as I try to hold back tears.
And I never tell you these words.
I love you

Have you ever done something other people said was so completely wrong for you because it was in fact entirely right at that moment in time, but later you think about it and say that was utterly stupid and wrong for me, and still later you want to try it again and repeat the cycle, even though you know you will be hurt again, but you want to try in the hopes that that brief period of sweet release will be worth it.

One friend is deaf but manages to hear twice as much as I do,
while simultaneously embedding himself in games and genius.
One friend is kind and smart, always complimenting and supporting others before herself.
One friend is quiet, and she is both easily embarrassed
and easily embarrassing.
One friend is the previous friend's brother,
and crushes on me while never saying enough.
One friend is very intelligent and geeky,
and detests wearing skirts even more than I.
One friend is really in your face and dramatic,
pushing the boundaries on everything, but noone hates him.
One friend is the unfortunate brother of a great annoyance, but is her polar opposite.
One friend has hair of constantly changing color;
blue, green, pink, black, yellow, brown,
but always the same hoodie no matter her hair choice.
One friend has a thousand faux laughs,
but guards his true one from the light.
One friend has a mocking joke for everything,
and you can't help but laugh with her.
One friend has a treasured hat and while sketching everyone, everything, and everywhere, lays my insecurities to rest as I do the same for him, both of us in need of some love
and understanding from a kindred spirit.
One friend has an obsession with a band and a book and a show, and an overbubbling enthusiasm for everything in her life.
One friend has a meme for everything,
and a perverse thought for every situation he encounters.
One friend is half blind but she manages to see twice
as much as me and explains everything beautifully.
One friend is crazy and gets away with the exclamation of abraham lincoln in any awkward silence because its just his nature.
One friend is as a mouse, but a genius in every aspect
and hides behind her glasses.
One friend is obnoxiously loud and more of a dork than the gangster his hoodie implies so everyone simply laughs.
One friend smiles like a duck in the cutest way,
and wears her square glasses in the best way.
One friend longs for a love that is loyal
and hide s behind his temperment

I am an exoskeleton
Falling to pieces
Half alive yet entirely dead
Crumbling and translucent
Delicate, and drifts, fluttering
With a single breath from someone
Nearby
I could be crushed or mangled
By a strike of the hand or a flick of a finger
But because I am considered beautiful and strange
I am kept preserved
The world revolves around beauty and
Oddities and I become one of these
Studied anomalies, a curiosity, merely
Because I am not like them
I am Oriental
And Occidental
I am a Southerner
And a Northerner
I am malnourished
Yet well fed
I am thin and short
But my stature belies my power
I am a geek, nerd, braniac, dork, and overachiever
But remain a stupid, ignorant, procrastinator
I am certainly an curio; a
Living
Breathing
Walking
Oxymoron

Men have died
And angels cried,
All for love.
I have wept,
And secrets kept,
All for love.
Kings on thrones
And men of bones
Have shuddered,
All for love.
Nations have clashed
And creatures thrashed,
All for love.
Will you ever cry,
And inside die,
All for love?
Poets and troubadours
Have sung its praises.
Playwrights and authors
Have written its woes.
But who in the time
Of the cavemen would have
Thought love could ever
Be shown by a rose?

Love is a feeling so powerful,
so consuming.
Men have gone to war for it,
gone to great extremes in search of it
and yet sometimes, despite their efforts,
sometimes because of their efforts,
love is lost or flees from the pursuer.
Love is not a material thing,
a treasure like gold silver and jewels are.
Love is an emotion, a connection,
an attraction between people that pulls
them together. Sometimes its a one
way pull, but it pulls and functions
nonetheless.

I climb out of my window in
the middle of the night onto the
cool metal roof that warps
beneath my bare feet.
I sit and lean against the wall,
below the window, sweet breezes
that send a pleasant chill all over my body,
brush my clothes and
tickle my arms with my hair,
which, four days ago was chopped short
so that it barely reaches past
the short ends of my shirt sleeves.
I wrap my arms around my knees,
close my eyes, inhale and rest
for a moment in the near perfection of the silence, feeling so overwhelmed with love and happiness for everyone and everything that I feel as if I will implode or explode, word choice doesn't matter in this exquisite moment of bliss embedded in the insanity that is my life.