"and i thought,
'i'm doing the right thing,'" you said.

my brave boy,
you are.

my brave boy,
keep breathing.

two-years friends and lifetimes of knowing,
i've seen you, and i know now.
when you said the words,
the look of contentment you had -
the solidarity of self you had -
the knowing of heart you had.
who can say it's wrong?

the church who locks people behind bars of unhappiness
for who they love?
you are above them,
you and all your love.

my brave boy,
love like you do,
and love who you will.

"and i thought,
'i'm doing the right thing,'" you said.

my brave boy,
you have.

tell it to the lighthouse boy
the sleepy-eyed resounding boy,
tell it to the lighthouse boy,
who wakes his days away.

sing it to the lighthouse boy
the bright-mouthed smiling smart-*** boy,
sing it to the lighthouse boy,
solemn, sweet, and still.

cry it to the lighthouse boy,
the hold you close and call-out boy,
cry it to the lighthouse boy,
who thinks his thoughts alone.

fling it to the lighthouse boy,
the bending low and catch it boy,
fling it to the lighthouse boy,
to carry on his own.

and oh,
did you ever see eyes so sad?
blue-green as the foaming sea they watch,
stiller than still and deeper than you can imagine,
gazing to your depths and
speaking nothing of them.
so tell it to the lighthouse boy,
the sleepy-eyed resounding boy.

tell it to the lighthouse boy,
who casts it out to sea.

sorry you ****, babe -
probably because you're a lying,
thieving,
attention-seeking *****.
probably because you're an inconsiderate,
inconsistent,
ingenuine little *******.
sorry you had it all coming to you -
sorry everyone's forgotten about you -
sorry you're a miserable excuse for a human being.
sorry you slice up your arms and parade them around
and still no one cares.
sorry you'll stop at nothing for an inch of spotlight,
and still no one gives it to you.
sorry we all know about you now,
sorry you can't handle it,
sorry you had to run away like the
***** you are
because you burned all your friends along with your bridges.
sorry we caught on,
sorry we're not taking it,
sorry you're alone (so all alone).
sorry you can't handle all the
minor inconveniences in your life
with the grace everyone else does,
and sorry you lack the integrity to try.
sorry you have to pretend to be ****** up
(honestly, what in your life
is causing you pain?
is it the parents that love you,
or the friends you could still have?)
sorry you ****, babe -
and i'm sorry i don't give a ****.

well this is how it goes, this,
shattering of hearts.

a small tap to hear the tremor and then a STEPPING BACK
arms spread, for the awe.

your tap becomes a sharp crack and my heart,
well.

it breaks for them, for you,
a million crystal pieces at your feet.

well watch me, i'll pick them up with all the dignity imaginable,
a professional at this now,
look you in the eye:
"how was the show?" i'll ask.
"did it all
go like you planned?"

and i'll walk away,
piece it back together from those crystal-clear shards and i'll know it better then.
know you better then.

and i'll put it back where it belongs and i'll know me better then.

watch me -
i'll braid my pixie-short hair,
wear stars in my eyes and
dance like everyone's watching:
can't be done? i'll do it.
never been done? it has.
watch me -
i'll laugh at all the wrong things,
trip both ways on the stairs and
get up beaming:
i'll snag my hair into pretzel-braided crown around my merry face and i'll
spark my eyes at you when you look at me doubtfully.
watch me -
i'll rock what i rock
talk what i talk and walk how i walk:
swirl black into wings over my dark lashes and
my eyes will laugh underneath,
smile my wolfish smile with my one wonky back tooth,
and i'll blow you away.
watch me -
i have no idea what i'm doing,
and it's a hell of a thing
to see.

nora,
4 years young,
you lovely little girl,
let me thank you for the good
you've shown to me, the world.
your dimple-strewn sweet smiles
your shrieking raucous laughs
your wild unbound stories
(oh, i wonder).
you tiny little pearl
in the oyster of the world,
your mother's middle baby and
your father's only girl,
my darling and my laughter and the child i once was,
i wrote this and i thought this
all for you, nora-bug.

something me-shaped with you-shaped and crab-legged and two-faced and kindly and fast-paced and sweetness and slow tastes perfection for you and for me and for worlds that could be in your smile.

have you really gone away?
my darling, won't you stay a day?
i brewed some tea for two and i have savings put on lay-away
for when we run and stay away
it mountains, fields, and day-all-plays
dreaming just to pass the rays
of sunlight, cup to lips.

they'll build boxes for my bones,
and i won't stop them.
they'll seal it
(doubly)
and i'll break through, calm and easy.

they'll curse.
"****!" they'll say.
"we sealed it
double this time!"

i'll not be held in your boxes.
i'll do nothing but laugh when you curse.

Boy,

Those girls who are breaking your heart,
oh, my darling - you don't know about them yet.
What a cruel
and vindictive bunch,
who will eat your kind heart out
and who will snap your fragile bones.

That family that stings your pride,
oh, my dear - they don't know about you yet.
Your pain, my love, hurts me in deep-down ways:
Your pain in your imperfection,
your insufficiencies,
your too-hard caring -
You are enough for me.
You are perfect to me,
and oh, my dear, I love you.
Your pain, my love, is the same as mine:
Your all-you-have is their not-good-enough,
but you are good enough for me,
and I am good enough for you.

We are two kind people in an unkind world,
two almost-there-trying in a too-fast whirl,
and I'll hold you up if you'll hold me.
Boy, you know you've got it,
and boy, I know I'll have it,
the sparkle in your eyes that means
(you'll be okay).

We could be okay together, you and I.

Boy, I think you're perfect
and I think the world revolves around you.
I think the sun shines out of your smile
and the stars live in your eyes,
I think the moon is in the soles of your Nike's.
Boy, I think you're something,
and boy, I think it's one thing,
that I simply can't afford to ignore.

-Girl

dear sarah.

i heard
today
that it was in your blood,
your bones,
your body
(the cancer, sneaking and slipping its way
into your sixteen-year-young heart,
that beats the same as mine).
i heard
today
your sister,
weeping,
and asking us if we could please,
just sign this card.
you're scared
and it would help.
i heard
today
the boy who loves you,
sniffling into your sister's shoulder
(no one had the heart to tell him
that the blackness is inside you),
and i heard, today, my heart
stop
and my throat
clog
and my eyes
fill.
dear sarah, i don't know you
well
but i wish you
well
and i heard today
so many hearts
break.

have i, then, ruined
everything?
am i such a betrayal to your picket-fence heart?
you
all i wanted
and all i want.

what poetry is:
a cacophony of tangled-up images
and slashed-to-the-bone words.
a waterfall of bitterness and
passion and
(words, just words).
a jumble of unorthodox punctuation,
and spacing,
and spelling,
a painting with verses of rainbow-colored years.
foggy-eyed venting,
bitter-mouthed shouting,
soft-hearted pleas
to the people
(hearts and love).
not-quite sentences,
half-finished ideas,
cliches and brutal originalities,
shocking in their genuine
and raw
and profoundly inspired power
(things we didn't know we were capable of).
cravings and achings and wantings and knowings and
(words, just words).
so won't you read between the lines?
it's all so much simpler



than it seems.

the emptiness in my belly
is brought on by the knowledge
that you have your funny-tragic
thinking-feeling
trying-failing life
without me in it.
and the fullness in my heart
is brought on by the thought
of your voice and your face,
your shining-eyed and dimple-pocked mischief,
and by the hope
that someday
i'll have you.
the tears in my throat
are brought on by the fear
and by the realization
that i am not
the only person
you could love;
by the revelation, of our sameness
and of our happy differences.

and the words at my lips
are brought on by the thoughts in my head
which are brought on by the beating of my heart -
*i love you, i love you, i love you.

his whole life, in those
big-brown eyes
(burning, why aren't you helping me?)
everything wrong with the world is in
the divets between his ribs
the sharp jab
of his collarbone
against his black-black skin
(****, my iphone's broken again).
this kid has got to be twelve
starving years old
(he doesn't look half that).
we first-world *******, looking at that photograph
(feel sorry for a moment).
his whole world pooled in
the furrow over his eyebrows
(not understanding
his misery).
a hand wrapped
all the way around his arm, pulling him
back towards
the hunger,
but he stares
he
watches
that camera lens,
waiting
for
his
call
his
cry
to
be
heard.

The cancer ate my sister's heart,
her liver, her bones,
and now I'm alone
with my sick-stomached guilt
and my never-told confession.
Remember, we were younger. Our neighbor's sister
came home with a ****** nose and you turned to me,
"What would you do if that was me?"
6 year old certainty, "I'd **** them,"
swelling with 6 year old bravado,
"I'd ****
anyone
who hurt you."
Our mother was appalled and our father told me not to say things I didn't mean, but
I meant it then.
And sweetheart, I mean it now.
I can't **** the cancer, because it's already killed you.
I can't **** the husband, because he's already dead
(left you widowed and heartbroken, my only sister,
and I am to blame).
And so I'm standing here, looking at the
jagged-box-shaped rocks so far far far below,
and I'm thinking
(stacking box, after box, after box
in her empty-floored apartment),
and I'm wishing
(to the crier of sorrows I've never known)
and I'm breathing
(if only he hadn't been the adulterer)
and I'm jumping
(with me).

we watched the sun spill the sky ******
and we painted pictures in the sand.
we watched the ocean i so feared wash the shells
a different color, ruder and ruddier than before,
duller with each passing wave
like blue jeans in the wash
or hearts on a string.
you were the moon, pulling me on and pushing me back,
and i was the sun, laughing at you.
we ran barefoot over reefs and rainclouds,
never minding that we tattered the hems of our pants,
and i had to remind you that there are still stars in daytime.
we watched white-black clouds over pink-and-purple skies
and we laughed to see the birds just wheeling.
we watched the ocean i so feared wash the shells
a different color, brighter and righter than they were before,
lovelier with each passing wave,
like stars in the night,
or hearts on a string.

things i love
   (such as)
books and rain, knowing snow
will come again
have nothing to do
             (i'm afraid)
with you.

count the paint stains on my finger-breadth
one for every year of my life, or
       one for every color of my heart?
  paint my words into tapestries of canvas-strewn
truth.
                
things i love
     (such as)
leaves in autumn, breezes in spring
  walking my dog in the midewestern rain
have nothing to do
   (think what you will)
with you.

things i love
     (such as)
a golden haired boy
   particular small niceties from strangers
thinking
writing poems in margins
      dancing by myself
holding the world in my always-steady hands
have nothing to do
     (cry me a river)
with you.









so there.

remember, i'm recieving loneliness like
tears bought, nothing for frightened
and still loving.
leaving like dying, under skin
twirling under rain for death, dancing.
open my falling for words and a boy
dropping life.

she was brushing her hair
when she glanced out the window and caught a glimpse
of him cresting the hill.
she sprang to her feet with a yell of
"****!"
and then
"ow!" as foot upon foot of hair
got trampled under foot slippered foot.
the tower was high
and she thought she'd hidden it well
but they always came,
and she really wasn't
in the mood
to be rescued.

nothing bothers me more than people who say they have found god.
no one has found god.
life is not about finding god.
"GOD" is intangible and not something we can grasp,
but we pretend to.
people put quotes around his words
and then put those words in his mouth
they string ideas of her into beads and crosses -
what exactly are  you clinging to?
people don't know.
we are too small
and we are not wise enough.
god is the whole universe.
god is nothing.
god is a tree, a bird, a thought.
god is a little boy with a piece of candy stuck in his hair,
an artist in a garret,
a dog on a cushion,
a girl in an alley.
i don't believe that god has abandoned the church.
i believe that the church has abandoned god.
i don't believe in my catholic roots.
i don't believe in christianity.
i don't believe in buddhism.
i don't believe in islam.
i don't believe the bible.
i don't believe the priests, the shamans, the medicine men.
i don't believe the trappings we place around god
(our weak ideas of her,
our sorry attempts to define him).
i believe that god is people
god is rain, god is the sun
god is the night air
god is the words on paper
god is the paint on canvas
god is creating, god is being, god is gone.
god is here, now, and everywhere
and i only call her god because i lack another name for him.
it has no name.
i understand this
or i think i do.
god knows me intrinsically
or not at all.
god loves infinitely and sees to the depths of humanity
or else god is old, decrepit, and alone
curled in a corner of the world
trying to shut out the mayhem of his earth
(what have i done?).
god cringes at our killings
rejoices in our births,
or is vengeful, red, and full of war and death.
god is spring, summer, and fall.
he is the snow in winter, she is the birdsong
at my window.
she is multitudes and she is one
wildly insignificant
and all-knowing being.
she is the creator, the destroyer, the lover.
she is nature, she is earth,
she is people,
she is the industry, the tapestry, the travesty.
she is love, she is me.
she is loss, she is you.
she is life, she is them.
and i love her,
as anyone loves her -
if you can love an energy,
an idea,
the ungraspable concept that a grain of sand
is the same as the greatest mountain in the world.


but i don't presume
to know her.

can't you see it?
  my pretty smile, my petty laugh?
i will scorn you for scorning me  -
               your half-hearted aggression!
i will still see magic
i will still see love
you will see nothing of that
   nothing of me.
my secrets
             so beautiful
                            and not for you.

twirling sweeping circle-strokes of a paintbrush
on a color-soaked canvas
and humming softly in the
quiet
of the room
and the
quiet
of the creating
and thinking as a dip into the
swirl of color on a rainbow pallet,
the point of the brush into a dab of
yellow-green and blue
red at the corners and a swirl of
purple
and drifting across
already paint-curled surface giving
life to the lifeless and
color
depth
meaning
to something simple
and so, so complex.
studying, softly, with
open-swirled mind
dizzied with the colors and the
unspoken and unspeakable
meanings they have and they hold
you.
sighing and shifting, glancing
from one painting to the next
to your own and
spreading colors like a waterstain
beautiful and unstoppable, this
madness
this
abandonment
this
knowing of the world in a point-tipped paintbrush
this
holding of the world in your paint-stained hands.

You are a burning in my belly
You are a lilting in my thoughts
You are laughing joking singing
You are when my walls all drop
You are a flutter in my heart
You are dancing in my soul
You are a weakness in my limbs
You are all I care to know.
You are a sparkle in my eyes
You are a fire on my tongue
You are a dazzle to my smile
You are old, you are young.
You are the best to all my worst
You are a heat inside my head
You are an accidental smile
You are everything I am.
You are what I want to know
You are who I want to be
You are something nothing everything
You are you, we are we.
You are an almost-have-it wanting
You are a hesitation on my part
You are a can-I should-I would-I
You are a seizing at my heart.
You are a shy-eyed-glancing-laugh
You are a whispered three-word phrase
You are a wanting and a weakening
I am I, you are you.

******* baby-voice-fake,
carrying around that ego of yours
(where'd you even get it?)
stringing your hair into
strands and
straggles,
painting your lips attention-***** red,
parading around those
scars on your arms -
******* try-too-hard-fake,
making noise to make noise,
words that aren't words and
thoughts that aren't yours,
i'm not hearing it.
smiling and then secretly
hateful and spreading
lies
(you were *****, you were molested,
you were exploited, you were robbed)
tip-toed on poser-high heels,
chopping your hair into stunted shortness
(a rat-nest red-chemical version
of mine)
you can *******.

guess what?
you can't lie to my best friend
you can't tell her
that so-and-so sent you that
( frickin ****'s )
picture
(funny how you saved it)
you can't rope her back in with your
manipulation
,your
modification
of the truth,
and you can't buy me with your
half-assed excuses and you can't tell me that it's
none of my business
because you've exploited her
and you've lied to her
don't mean
that you've earned her.
she deserves better and you deserve
to be alone forever
with your self-pity
and your short-sighted
under-the-table
pathetic
selfish
actions.

guess what?
you can't tell me she has a choice
when you've given her none
telling her
she's the best things in your life
(how 'bout you treat her like it?)
and by the way
can i have a picture of you
( insert thing she's not going to do for you
here )
and there's a reason
you filthy
lying
cop-out of a human being
i won't hear you
tell me that
she's
chosen you
that she's
happy with you
because
if she's happy with you
how come
you still have to
spend so much time trying
to
convince her?

guess what?
i don't buy you.
i hate you.
i resent you.
you make me
sick.
and even if she doesn't see it
even if she holds onto your pathetic
whining
excuses
i see through you
you bile-throated liar
and you don't ******* deserve
one single tear
you've pulled from her,
you don't ******* deserve
the dirt on her Converse,
you don't ******* deserve
this poem.

because it makes you seem
almost like
you're worth something.

you've got sunshine in your eyes, her mother told her
and she knew it.

her toes itched to skip-skap
across pavements and leaves, swirl through
snow
dancing in their boots.

you've got sunshine in your eyes, her mother told her
and she felt it.

her smile could light hearts
set flame to
the day,
and laughter -
music.

you've got sunshine in your eyes, my mother told me
and i learned it.

i built an ice castle around my heart -
it's hard to break, and even harder to melt
so i thought it would be perfect.
i put a sentinel outside the door
i gave him your face
and how your hands feel.
there's no way
you're getting in.

i built an ice castle around my heart -
it's cold, but it's still pretty
it appeases my vanity
and inside my blood gives eskimo kisses to strangers.

i built an ice castle around my heart -
and you laid the first brick,
so don't be surprised when i'm cold to you
when my eyes are frosty
and my words are short and sharp as shards of ice,
because you put my heart in an ice castle,
and it's sure as hell not melting

for you.

If I'm swallowed by the sea and my heart
ceases to beat,
I'd have you know a thing or two about me.
Tell my mother and my brothers that
they colored up my life,
and be sure that my poor father knows the same.
Be sure my father knows the way
I tried for him most every day,
and when my mother starts to cry won't you won't you
comfort her?

Tell the boy I love all the times I almost told him
And hold my best friend's hand when they pull me from the ocean.
Read the notebooks in my room
Laugh at what I thought of you
Give the gods and all the angels my regard.
Smile when you see a bird
wheeling in the rain,
and think of me when you think that spring won't ever come again.
My father's only daughter who is so scared of the water
will dance with you when you're asleep and dreaming.
I'll see you when you wash your face to rid yourself of my ingrace
And I'll hold you when you bend, begin to scream.

pining and finger-twisting;
watch me weak with wanting you.
your golden-haired laughter,
and your soft-crinkling eyes
  do they read the words behind me
    (three of them, overused but
   achingly true)?
haven't you heard?
well, i won't spoil it, but
they're spilling over, so i'd
brace yourself, if i were

you.

you got serious, talking about a girl
we both know.
you said, "she is not special," shaking your head,
and i nodded.
i fell in love with you then, the stars in your eyes
and the one dimple in your cheek,
the not-serious gravity
of the way you talk.
you joking
mischievous
and clever boy.

you look at me sometimes, thoughtfully
just looking
in a way that makes my hands shake
and my heart rabbit-tap against my ribs
(so loud, i'm sure you can hear it).

i am pining, i am pensive.

the next time i see you, my pretty boy,
i refuse to stand in the hallway next to you
while everyone talks about what a great time they had
or lay on the floor next to your chair while you explain
some war game to me, that you're not half as serious about
as every other guy on the planet.
the next time i see you i will plop down on the couch next to you,
shoulder to shoulder,
and i'll talk to you, lightly, about how
i'm not sure
if you like me.
i'm not sure
if you like anyone.
and i think you probably do like me,
and that i
definitely
like you.
"so i think,
we should hang out sometime
or something." and then maybe i'll get up and move away again,
or sit there with you.
maybe i'll plant a little kiss on your cheek,
or put my head on your shoulder,
or just sit there with you.
maybe when we leave
i'll smile at you like i always do,
but i'll also make my way through the ocean of our families
and hug you tight enough that they'll all finally stop bugging me.
maybe i'll do that.

where have all the words gone?
they burst through my fingers
they pull and they push at me.
they would be seen
they would pull from our souls the essence of our humanity
and they would string into the most stupendous
and riveting stories.

I wish I felt original
I wish that I was brave.

My life is belly-laughs and hiccuppy tears
and I don't know what to do with it.
I feel things too much
or not at all
And I wish I could write about something other than myself

for once.

the first time i felt afraid of death
was when i thought there wasn't anything
that i would be gone, without eyes, without breath, without heart.
i thought of seeing nothing
feeling nothing
being nothing
and i felt afraid.
now i'm not saying i believe in heaven
and i am not saying i don't
but i do believe
in the vivacity
tenacity
audacity of souls
and i believe that mine
will fight
to the finish.

hello, poetry.
no, no, keep your seat.
i just wanted to talk to you about
how i can't stop writing you.
if you could stop pushing into my head
and making my fingers itch
and my eyes wander,
and if you would stop showing up in the margins
of my geometry homework,
well,
i guess i just wouldn't be me anymore
(probably be doing better in geometry though).
so, i was going to ask you to stop.
but, on the other hand -
it would get pretty lonely.
just me and the margins.

i'm becoming cynical, jaded, and edgy
my words
rap-tap out of my mouth
sharper
and harsher than i mean them.
i worry that i'm becoming
the people i despise.
i worry that i'm a poser
and a fraud
and i worry that i've forgotten my own kindness.

hearts are strange things,
and they do tell lies
but this is the truth of mine:
it pulses, it breaks, and it heals;
crookedly,
but it does heal.
it is susceptible to almost anything
and hardened against nothing.

isn't there hope, after all?
my quick angry words betray
a deep tenderness that i fight for,
that i protect,
and i believe.
i believe in the instrinsic power of human beings.
i believe in magic,
that music is the most powerful thing in the world,
and that words can change
minds
can color
hearts.

i believe in the power of dreams,
and i believe that things are temporary,
that they are fragile,
that we must become oblivious to nothing.
i believe that people are becoming ignorant
and i believe that we are coming back from ignorance.
i believe that i am a remarkable
and i believe that i am painfully
insignificant.
i believe that at least 50% of poems
(maybe even this one)
say nothing at all,
and i believe that the other 50%
say the things we need most
to say.

*and i hope that i don't believe
for nothing.

fingers like stardust and lips like moonlight,
she smiles.
shapes traced across the hollows of hips and his whispered words,
and the rocking of the ship will surely make me sick.
the light spilling from your smiles and the stars that spark from your eyes
catch stories
like sunlight
on the walls.