The last time we were in court she said I could have Ava’s Roasters
But here I am and here she is
What the hell
The judge said specifically since I’m the one with insomnia I could have the 24-hour coffee shops
It’s two in the morning
She’s never awake at this hour anyway
It’s like she’s a whole different person now that we aren’t together
She’s not even here with anyone
It’s not like it wasn’t a fair trade
She got everything else
She got the grocery stores in town
The two main parks the freeway commute the bar I showed her in the first place
I mean she even got the burger joint, she doesn’t even order burgers there she gets the ******* salads
My lawyer said I should’ve kept some of the things in town
I know I should’ve it would’ve saved on the gas but
There was going to be fights and I just wanted this **** to be over
Besides I don’t hate the drive and I mean I haven’t missed running into people from high school
I just wish I could call the judge about this
It’s my time
I have poems to write about her and how could I possibly do that while she’s in the room
I mean since when does she need mocha’s this late
This is my thing
She already stole my heart

His hands were callused and cracked
They were rough on my cheek
I had never been pulled in the way Clark Gable pulls them in
Like in all of those movies I had seen when I was a kid
The way I had always practiced
Back then my ringtone was the sound of bells chiming
More specifically the bells of Notre Dame
As his stubble grazed mine they rang out
He let go of my face, his untrimmed nails scratched my chin
I would weep for hours that night
Stare into the dark corners of my room
Trying to identify all of the shadows I used to think were scary
I knew now what scary really was
Scary was his hand on my rib cage
Scary was liking it
He never did call
I changed my ringtone to the whistle from Robin Hood
I was set up on a date by my best friend
She was kind
Her hands were soft and smelled like Love Spell by Victoria’s Secret
She had no stubble to graze mine
She pressed her lips on the scratch he left on my chin with his untrimmed fingernails
And I flinched
This too was scary
This too I liked

Alright so if you walk in to my bedroom
Pressed in the far corner is my bed
The headboard against the left wall
And, if you’re lying in it, the left side against an interior wall of the house
On that wall, the one on the left side of the bed, is a painting that came with the house
It is a long rectangle
I would describe its artistic value to be
Obligatory-Motel-Room-Painting
Blocks of color and weird squiggly bits
Not a picture of anything as much as a tool to bring the end table and the drapes together with the sheets
It’s on canvas stretched around a wooden frame
Nailed into the top bar of that wooden frame, dead center, is a jagged piece of metal
Normally you’d just put a nail in the wall and center that bit on the nail there you go
But this house has those paper thin walls that a nail with an ant on would tear through like Robin Hood sliding down a royal banner out a castle window with Maid Marion under his arm
So you can’t just hang the painting on the wall
But the room has crown molding
So instead of a nail in the wall
There is a string tied to the jagged piece of metal that extends up the center of the wall to the top
Where the string is tied to a fishing hook that is clipped into the crown molding

All this is to say is that sometimes when I lie in bed alone in my thoughts or otherwise
I reach my hand up and push the painting
Like a brother in the backseat being told not to touch his little sister I just kind of give it a poke
And I watch it swing from side to side
Or rather I expect to watch it swing like a marble on a string in a pendulum prop at a CEO’s desk
Side to side
Evenly
But it doesn’t
It wobbles while it sways
Like how at Disneyland
The Tea Cup Ride
The cups spin in circles while they go in circles
The painting wobbles while it sways back and forth
And I just don’t get it
Like I don’t understand at all
See I’m a smart conceited man so this gets on my nerves
And I know that if I spent my junior year of high school, first trimester, third period paying attention to Mrs. Whatever’s physics class instead of eating turkey sandwiches in the back with Sean then falling asleep that I’d be able to tell you exactly why this happens
But I got hungry at like 9am back then and I can’t help that I didn’t give a **** so I can’t explain it

And all of that was to say that I spend most of my daily energy trying to feel normal
Trying to be a sane person
Waking up all five days of the work week on time
Showering and brushing my teeth
Taking my kid to school and not forgetting to pick him back up after work
Not taking shots on my lunch breaks
And we all have the internet
And we all like poetry
So we’ve all heard the phrase “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting diff…and you know where I’m going
I’ve been in therapy since I was eight
Been on all the medications
Kept myself alive even when I didn’t want to
Worked a job long enough to get promoted a couple times
Live a real life, with real consequences
And every once in a while if I’m not looking too hard
I start to feel like a normal
Like a sane person
Like someone who is of his right mind
And then all of it gets undone by a ****** painting hanging on a string in my bedroom
Because I know what it means about me to push that painting and expect it swing every time and to every time watch in shock as it wobbles while it sways

That this world is full of sparkles and magic if you’d only look up
It’s not all bar charts and logic and predictable outcomes
Sometimes, things, don’t go how we thought they would
And sometimes it’s true they go even better
I know it’s crazy talk
You think it’s logical that I won’t find a love that will want to marry me
And that it’s even more illogical to think they’d want to sing Joshua Radin’s  “One and Only” with me
And even more ludicrous still to think I’d be able to learn and play the Ukulele during it
And I’m here to tell you
It is logical to think that maybe I’ll fall in love with a girl who loves me back
That she might want to sing with me at a wedding of ours
And that I can learn an instrument
Law of big numbers says so

Roman candles aren’t always lit on the Fourth of July
Sometimes it’s New Year’s Eve
Sometimes it’s the tingle in your spine when a kid jumps off a swing at the peak of their pendulum
Sometimes it’s gunpowder and colored sparks
But other times it’s hormones and spring and eyelashes
I know the world is safer when we do cost benefit analyses of our Friday night options
I know if we all acted like insurance adjusters that we’d never get hurt
Did you know if you go outside right now and look up, you won’t see the Milky Way

I am Aladdin, I have a carpet, and I know where the magic is
I know how to cast levitation spells
Have you ever turned a rock over just to see the bugs run
Ever kissed a stranger just to see if maybe that love at first sight thing was real
I dare you to take a left when you always turn right and see what the world brings you
Maybe you’ll run out of gas, sure, maybe
But maybe you’ll find a bench
Or an old woman who needs help across the street
Or the best photo opportunity you’ve ever seen

Shirk a responsibility for me will ya and play tag with a firefly
There are waterfalls worth chasing
Love is one of them
Laughter is another
Fear can be sometimes
Friendship is always one

Magic is everywhere
It’s on Wednesday night meetings of old strangers at the pub
It’s the first time you hold their hand
It’s a falling star, just the one you saw, in the whole sky
That you never would’ve seen if you stayed home
Go find it
Open your heart to the world
Close your eyes if it helps you see
Magic is logical
If magic wasn’t everywhere we wouldn’t have poems
Or songs
Or Disney
Or a hotel made entirely of ice in some far away country
It’s not so hard to find if you look for it

I’ve got one
A simple one
No risk
No cost
Can’t hurt anything
Won’t miss nothing
Go outside tomorrow
Right during sunset
Don’t worry about the sun or the horizon
Leave your cell phone at home
I know, the horror
Find a stop light
Look at it
Keep looking at it
Stare
Just a little longer
Look for it
The magic
It’s as quick as a flicker
You’ll know it when you see it
Here’s a hint: it starts with a spark
It’s over in a moment so don’t look away
After that it’ll just go back to a stop light you’ll never think twice about
But for a moment it will have been the best stop light in the world
Better than all those fancy New York City stop lights
Pretentious *******
Because you were under it
Because you watched it come alive
Or maybe just because you wanted it to be

Sure life can be a ***** sometimes
And thinking ahead can save a lot of turmoil
Oh but what’s a boat ride if the sailing is smooth
Certainly isn’t a story worth telling
And I want my life to be a story worth telling

That moment when I’m at the wedding I didn’t give up looking for
Where the flowers are my colors
The center pieces my dream come true
On a stool next to my wife on a stool singing a silly love song to our family
I won’t be thinking yeah, you’re right, it was illogical to keep looking for this
I’ll be twisting, turning, free wheeling
I’ll be surrounded with shimmers and sparkles
I’ll be Wingardium Leviosa-ing all over that dance floor
And the cost benefit analysis of looking harder for what I really wanted
Will look like my middle fingers doing the hustle in matching velour suits

Stop worrying about what might happen
Start dreaming about what might happen

I’ll be home soon
I’ve been on this trip for a while now I know
Longer this time then last time that’s for sure
But I promise Chuck I haven’t forgotten where I live
I just can’t imagine myself there right now
I must disappoint you greatly
Out here in space dodging asteroids and avoiding life
Some days it all feels like progress
Other nights it feels like shame
I know what you’re gonna say but Chuck I tried
Well, I mean, I thought really hard about trying
And I can still see my son’s lighthouse on the kitchen table
I could get home if I really really really needed to
I’m sure of it
Listen I’m not some lost cause
Left drifting through galaxies with no hope of return
I’m E.T. and I know where the pay phone is
It’s just I’m not done up here
I’ve got more to find and more to see and more to discover
Sure Chuck, I’ll prove it
Home, it’s right there
Past that nebula and through that asteroid belt and around that comet
See
See
I could’ve sworn it was right there just yesterday
Where’d it go
Oh **** Chuck
Now what

1.  Put the plastic bat on the ground
Press your forehead against the top of it
And spin in circles ten times exactly
Or as close as you can count to ten times around
Use the crab grass as a marker while you turn

2.  If there was ever a girl I was meant to be with her name was Megan Briley
By fifth grade I knew she was a girl who was going to need saving
I didn’t know back then that saving was what I would cling to in the dark
It was a long November when she moved away
Neither her or I knew much of the other and we never will
For obviously good reasons

3. Push the bat down onto the ground
Look up
Dizzy as you may be
Find the cone and run to it
Do not fear the grass stains as you sprint around it
See the finish line and run with all your might

4. Luggage poured out of the overhead compartment when we landed in Shanghai
Contents had shifted
The air was thick
And soggy
And it all just looked like smoke out the window of the airport
My dad told me it was just the way the air was here
It made me sick for weeks

5. All you have to do is tag your friend’s hand
Then collapse in a heap at the end of the line and watch
To see if your team is going to win the relay race
Allyssa Clark is the fastest girl in the yard and she’s on your team
Odds are good you’ll leave this party a champion

We drove together to the road’s end
It’s not like what you’re thinking
It was just the end of the road
We took a left
Ended up lost somewhere on the hill behind town
It’s not like that
Didn’t even make out
We just got lost
Never stopped
Didn’t get out to look at the stars or sit on the hood of the car like they do in the songs
Just drove until it became clear that neither of us intended to talk about it
Also if I didn’t figure out where home was I was going to run out of gas
And besides we both worked in the morning
There’s nothing louder than a love song on the radio turned all the way down
In a car with two people who can’t decide if it still applies to them