Even exploding stars wear strings of pearls.

Holding a conch shell to my right ear,
I can hear the whisper of the sea.

The thing the shell wants more than anything.

It makes me wonder,
If you were to listen to my heart,
What would you hear?

Would it be your name whispered
over and over and over again
or would it be something else?
What would I hear if I listened to yours?
If the sound tells what we want most.

One word and we pause,
        Hanging suspended in space.
        Limbs the very picture of elegant restraint.
Two heartbeats before release.
        The tension is shattered.
        Feet once more on the ground.
Three bodies moving together,
        En pointe, flying as one.
        Somewhere, I became the tulle of my skirt.
Four limbs is all we have.
        Our limbs and our hearts,
        And the dance already owns them.
Five positions we move through,
        Having already etched them
        On the pillars of our memory ages ago.
Six minutes the music endures
        And we along with it,
        Transfixed in time by tradition and passion.
Seven criticisms we each weather,
        Holding our breath,
        Grace comes with a hefty price.
Eight beats and we move once more
        -Folding and unfolding-
        Balanced on a knife's edge, we can breathe again.

Once upon a time,
I knocked on the gates
Of paradise and asked for a secret.
Saint Peter said to me,
"Live boldly, youngling.
Evening stretches on
Longer than the daylight."

Awake again, I smiled
Because I had indeed
Been given a secret.
But it wasn't what old Saint
Pete had told me.
The secret was
That I already knew
And I smiled anyway.

The day I turned 18,
I took a look at my life.
Searched out every little
Thing that I didn't like,
And cut it out.
Some of those things
-Like fear-anger-hesitation-
Kept trying to come back,
So I took little things,
A ring, an elastic, a piece of string,
And I used them to remember.
I could have gotten a tattoo.
But I didn't.
Because, I won't need to remember forever.
One day, I will win.
I won't need to remember to be brave,
To be kind, to be passionate.
One day, I will be all of those things.
I can shuck off those training wheels
Because my life itself will be the reminder.

I watch the sun and long for the moon,
Endure the night and crave the dawn.
Their eyes were watching God,
With their minds upon themselves.
Angels newly fallen from heaven,
Climbing onto a shelf as ornaments.
We scream for progress in one breath,
Then lament the past with the next.
Give me your burden and your blame
So I can pass it along to someone else.
Give a man a fish to feed him for a day,
Watch him steal one tomorrow morning.
Go with the flow, take the easier road.
Get what you want in the moment, but
Never satisfied for longer than a heartbeat.
Take no risks-life under an outcropping
As wilder spirits dance in the rain.

In loving memory of Kurtz's last disciple:

Welcome to the circus,
A three-ringed show in
The center of the dark.
In our multifoliate arrogance,
We seek out a familiar face
And forget to turn on the light.
Fumbling by touch,
Grasping at straws,
When faced with the truth,
We crave the lie instead.
Each and every one of us
The architects of our own catastrophe.