Sometimes
I wish my body
Was softer
In hard places
And my mind
Would soothe
In dark places
Sometimes
I wish I could
Press my lips
So quick
To liquids
That could numb
And other times
I don’t wish at all

Unfamiliar
Like a dog
Brick alley
And chills of winter
Suited up
In feathered armor
Cold and
Longing for
Home

I take pictures of my hands
But not because they’re beautiful
Marked by my gnawing
A sense of growing older
And the tobacco stains
From each night before
I take pictures of my hands
To hold my place

I sink in
Window like a screensaver
People living
Moving like
The leaves still attached
On the brink of
Fall

I sink further in
Cerulean chair
Bones from the 80s
(Could’ve been the 90s)
Cut & carved
With a story
Never ending

Photographs like light captured
From the edge of your smile
Wholesome threat
And your snaggle tooth that at sometime
At some point
I’d pray to never forget

I’ve been seeing
Shadows at the foot of
My sleeping sound
Sleeping so
Much my back creaking
At the thought of moving
Moving on
Moving forward is
so hard when
You won’t let me go
Like the thousandth
Cigarette smoked
Back to back
And discarded on
My porch

I wake
I see you
And I beg
That you leave me
Alone

Dreams of running in tunnels of sand
And burning cop cars
Making glass
A call and response
But the cry is never heard
Sand makes
Mass
In our self contained
Timers
But how long have
Some folks been
Waiting for just the
Toe to ground reaction
From white folks
When cop cars
Make glass
And white heat
Makes violent
Gas spitting at
Peace
When will I be
So old to see
Any change?