I'm in love with someone's daughter
living in the shards of a broken home
Cutting herself on two year-old letters
These are moments she can't fake;
reasons to feel alone
So used to abuse, her tears start to shake
I hold her close as her head starts to ache
"I love you too much,
so I can't let your heart break."
She said, "I know you love me,
but you've made a mistake."

I never meant for anyone to be my pulse.
I promise not to step on your feet
if you teach me how to waltz.

I saw the old man circling the tree trunk
Weather beaten skin, bent gnarled hands
and piercing blue eyes

He seemed to study every knot and crack
in that ancient timber

Then without a word turned and picked up hammer and chisel

The wood chips then began to fly and like confetti on the ground lie soon in heaps some ankle high

Occasionally he would stand back and look but never once a rest he took

Mallet strokes both hard and soft some from under some aloft fell there with unerring skill always busy never still

Long into the night he worked now by the light of an oil lamp and so the tree stump 'neath his hand then became a work of art

At long last he stood and turned to me and said three words " that'll do lad"

I approached to see just what he'd done and there I saw the perfect rose every petal and leaf in place the slender stems in the breeze did sway

With no plan or picture he had made the start
And created the perfect work of art.


So what is creativity? Well that's your next challenge.

No love poems because they've been done a million times. This time something unique

I would've given birth
To you,
Endured whatever
Mothers do.
Instead, I did
What Dads do.

I rocked you
Til my future shook;
Watched you til
I couldn't look.
As you changed,
I changed too,
To do the things
That Dads do.

You were bathed,
Dressed and fed;
I loved you so much
I was saved.

If there's credit,
Well, I get it,
For teaching you to read.
I took the blame
When you got bored
With school's ABC's.

I followed you
In all your roles,
Your teams,
Your solos,
Your trips,
Your shows.
First to clap,
Last to sit;
I taped it all,
From start -
To finish.

I taught you
How to tie a lace,
Ride a bike,
Golf and skate.
When time arrived
For you to drive,
You learned
On standard,
Never stranded,
You came home alive.

Your highs
I took in stride,
By example taught
Humility's pride.
Your lows,
I couldn't internalize,
I dropped my guard
With my eyes.

When Dad's do well
It's a double edge,
The future wedge.
The world
Revealed
Desired you too.
I don't dismiss
What mothers do,
But when Dads do well,
Both lose you.

that trendy ******(e) addiction
becomes you- and your fiction

goes well with the pale
-skinned thin western booted
blue-eyed shooter
riding sidesaddle
on your scooter

does she kiss like me
and bring you coffee?

i could lay you both down
in the in-betweens
and make heaven-

til hell is heavy as a monday
track day in albuquerque
while she sells your jewelry
in sante fe where it's trendy

-i'll be waiting
on the blue mesa.

r ~  9/19/14

i still try to remember
to take my boots off
at the door

my feet are wet
from walking in the rain

i leave laetoli footprints
on the pine floor
-like the first man

trying to walk upright
but can't seem to
get it straight

There's a lot of empty space
in a house
so full of quiet

wishing for thunder.

r ~ 9/5/14

Poetry...Are you kidding me?!
And you call yourself a man?
Do you like Unicorns with paisley horns
and rainbow marching bands?

Is your love in life, butterflies
that give sweet sticky kisses?
Flutter off holding hands
with fluffy cuddly kittens?

Do you also ride on girly bikes
and play with Barbie dolls?
Poetry...Are you kidding me?!
Now I think I've seen it all!

i had chocolate for dinner,
and cried right after.
maybe it was too sweet
but mom have you ever wondered

that maybe the memories of my love and i
were the ones causing it?

i took a longer time in the shower
and still cried right after.
maybe she bathes too slow
but daddy have you ever wondered

that maybe the memories of my love and i
were the ones causing it?

i stay up late at night while blood lies there
still i cried right after.
maybe she is just crying again
but sister have you ever wondered

that maybe the memories of my love and i
were the ones causing it?

my eyes are more distant, the songs i sing are too
i compose and cry right after
maybe it's just another night
but brother have you ever wondered

that maybe the memories of my love and i
were the ones causing it?

Back
         when       we still saw things
through Incandescent eyes &
undiscovered memories
                        waited for us
like
             a first snow in January
She showed me the midnight sky &
                      All the blinding pinholes in it
     where
                     angels peeked at us
The
watercolor sunrises
        while lying on the hood of her car
                         How
kisses                on the forehead
              could mend shattered hearts &
    scattered                         thoughts
         & chasing each other
through art galleries
        out         into droplets of rain
                brought us
closer        
               to
                          god
Those days when
riding on trolleys or
         drifting off to sleep    next to each other
Meant believing in love
           because
                            we wanted to
Furthest from my mind was
              the simple fact,
                        That she
        could make my entire     atmosphere
Collapse into nothingness
                &                        She did
She introduced me
                        to the stars & the sky
&
              willfully brought them down
         on top of me

We are all
just lifetimes
searching for
       infinities.
     And the broken
    parts or who
we were
      should never
          be excluded
   from the beauty
of what we
are.
     -Andrew Durst

faces like yours aren't meant for touching
and i'm beginning to think that closed-casket funerals were created for you
and sometimes the overwhelming desire to share something of yourself with someone--with anyone--is too much to bear

and suddenly i understand every spraypainted feeling under every freeway
or sharpie sentences scribbled in bathroom stalls
or muttered comments or notes in library books or songs on repeat played a little too loud
and i understand why pretty girls write stories on their arms

you were never the type to tell the truth
you were always talking
you never understood the way i looked at my feet when you laughed or how i spoke in hushed tones


some days are better than yesterday and some days make me question tomorrow
some words make me question you

today i wonder what the bigger sin is

is it your lying?
or my hopeless belief in words i know aren't true?

words are meant to be spoken and hands are meant to be held and love and sorrow and anger are meant to be felt and enjoyed and EXPERIENCED
and everything has meaning
everything but you