Our ancestors' DNA
altered our own

I bet
My ancestors
were runners

Maybe they
ran from lions
ran from fire,
ran from fear

Sometimes
I have the urge to run
I would be sitting in class
And it would suddenly hit


My fears are indescribable,
Unspecified

I run
from conformity
from reality
I run towards habit,
I run back home

Reverting
to my old ways

Falling
in the same hole,
black hole

I run
because I don't know
how else
to silence my brain

It yells so loudly sometimes
Sends impulses
Stronger than lightening
And my muscles shiver

I can't stand still
whilst self destructing

I need to know
That I've tried

I have tried
To fix myself
In the only ways
I know would work

Even if they are
The same ways
That ruin me

Illness has an odd way
Of ordering affections
sorting priorities

Nausea is illness
But the unsourced kind
it is a warmth
an unpleasant heat

An indication of error
But what?
Is Wrong?
Nausea is the stubborn sick
Refusing to disclose its root

It fills and sloshes
Like a coagulating soup
The only cure is to here it told
“Your mistakes are forgiven”
“Your body will be made new”
“Your grieving is heard”
“I am listening”

Nausea is a stubborn captain
of a leaky ship
O bail my ship
O captain
Make all things new.

in the landscape of you
I am a wandering soul
with but my words
                for protection
as I make you my goal
in the expanse of your vista,
I wear the cloak of our depth
your heartbeats in mine
as we breathe
           the same breath
I feel your rugged peaks,
your valleys that sink
your core's wildflower essence
that stains me with ink
I bathe in its fragrance,
a tattooed poet's imprint
in the primal spheres in my being
enveloping my core
all the clearer
          for seeing

and when your rough
                 tempest storms
are afar, yet in view
I dive straight to
                  their center
into the magnet of you
for
     I will water your deserts
infuse fresh creeks
                        in your dry
I will run through your forests
as I call to your wild
as I straddle your cliffs,
festoon your tundra
             with blooms
steam will rise from
                your earthcore
and fill up my womb
Through the dew on our lashes
through my lava that flows,
the stars in your eyes
make my universe glow

these geographic measures
                                 I take
as you let me inside
our bloodstreams merging
as we get lost in the tides
electric pulsed woodlands
that spread iced wildfires
slaking the loops
  of floodgates' desire
and I will hold you together
if you fall, torn apart
bonded forever
in this map of our
                    hearts

The hole in my heart is only as deep as the void it contains
The void which is full of your absence and full of my emptiness
I wish you could carry it for me just for one day
Lift the weight off my shoulders
And put it in your pockets
Take out the emptiness
And fill it with only air
Breathe me in, absorb my grief, exhale the toxins
Isn’t that how the body works?
Pour out my tears
I will donate a pool to you
**** out my sorrows,
I assure you, I can live without.
Carry my heart and teach it a lesson in healing,
That’s what you’ve promised anyway.
Shape the edges, draw circles, switch on the light.
And when you’re done I’ll willingly take back that heart
And transplant it back into my chest voluntarily.
But as for now I’m lacking space.

Pale blue dot in an endless void,
This rock has turned again and
     the skies are swapping places
     once more,
Regrets of things done or not done
      drag behind on the ground
      like a chain,
whilst hope for the new day
      flies ahead and above like a kite,
A day closer to death or
      a day well spent?
Either way, tomorrow it begins anew;
So turn, turn and turn again,
Pale blue dot in an endless void

What She Look Like?
  
…Like one
tenderly hushing
water in her lap
Elemental peace
No place to go
No more to be
…Like the ocean
in the background
of a photo on a warm spring day
belying
rage
and the random possible
thrash--

out!

at all guilty ******* in her path
Toss in the next sentient soul
who should happen to pass
within range
who should have seen
who should have known
what a storm could do….

Moody in the aftermath
and sorrier than rain
With the tide in retreat
grumbling excuses
Hiding out waist-deep in dusk’s Merlot
Waiting for night to sleep it off

to heal the rifts
cleanse the shame

Rising
yellow, bright— and

“What the hell happened, here?!”

____


Her hair
a winter’s tragedy of trees
upside down—
No wait— the wind has put her right
to ragged random branches
swaying, wet with intermittent hues
of dark and silver
caught in collar, flying inelegant and free
at the shoulders of the levee
tossed and softening shyly
sagging jaw and nose a stump of tree
All perspective changes…

if you watch a while—

She’ll raise her eyes
into the sunset
to catch an eagle
entering
flight

…and then you might…

___

She looks like—
a pudgy robin
querying grass
mud soaked
that hides the fire of her breast
tugging at a worm
more than half her length
“I will feed them, **** you!
Give it up, you son of a snake!”
_____

...Don’t miss her hour of music though
for anything
Encroaching darkness
from the rooftops
she listens to the hearts she breaks

Remember this in winter
she can give but she will take
it out on February
when you’re longing
for her

Did I touch you as I left?
That night of beer and music
Almost tipsy,
laughing good-byes

Backing into blindly
I felt an arm... a moment
guide me
before I all but fall
against you
Knew that warmth
of mass was male

You exhale
I sense your being--
behind
Amused
By accidental intimacy
I come unglued
By your flirtatious
catch of eyes
in lowered light
By faint fragrance
of whatever it is
you've drunk or used
to put yourself together

Turning
guarded
Apologize
glancing down


Women always look, though
however briefly