Drift in space with me, firefly
and guide me on a sea of stars
to the city limits of the Sun, so that I may feel warm again
and no longer need the light
from your chemical imbalances.

We were both utterly hopeless,
I thought, when your eyes
glowed when our faces grew close,
when ***** made your cheeks flush,
when your hand was allowed to tickle, to linger, with lips parted
and a smile easing onto your face;
when we sat and studied and sang
and took time and wrapped it up in laughter and whispers;
when you reached out to me, and
I stayed in the darkness so that you would always search
for my helping heart.

Then one night, as I stared at the hillside dotted
with candle lights of lives beginning to sleep,
and we were exploring our world again and I was dreaming,
You walked behind me
your arms slinked around me
your lips searched for mine
you said, "I'd rather have this now than never have it at all."

And there I was, the one utterly hopeless, for I saw
the shackles around my wrists.
But I kissed you anyway.
again and again and again,
As if each kiss could capture back
all the bits of hope I had lost
by placing them in you

My voice is hoarse with silent shouts,
fists tight and lips tighter;
They can stand smiling but not understand.

They react (or barely act) with
jealousy or suspicion, awe or a wandering eye -
the stories tire of being tossed about
from Apathy's embrace to Ignorance.

I felt more than I ever felt;
I loved stronger, walked longer,
I drank deep and breathed deeper.
I became an unfamiliar familiar same.

I found my Me.

I cannot tell the tale without making it sound
so very hollow,
when there, there was where
I was full of the richness of life,
and here is just the shadow, the hesitance,
the doubt of whether my moments were true.

Loneliness
is in the motel room
on the outskirts of Manhattan at midnight,
when cars are driving
and I know
you are in none of them.

Loneliness
is in the glimmer
of light upon my phone
so my heart flutters;
but the shadows just play tricks
and I know
you have not thought to send a word.

Loneliness
is in our embrace,
when I cling to you
with the naivety of a child,
while you give
a muttered whisper;
your nonchalant goodbye.

Loneliness is
my Self yearning
to touch the elusive Self of you.

Revealed, the boots rest in bittersweet calm.
The laces fray and choke a lonely moth
whose wings are sliced and cast into the dust.
The leather decays and its dye fades to
the equal of pigments of ashen flesh.

Nothing stirs.

The boots stand at attention against scratched
records, silent since American Pie.
They bend the picture of that girl from a
dreamer’s days, oh summer of ‘69.
All tarnished, as the ‘Nam dust settles on
failing dreams.

These boots had sat in front of Saigon’s door.
These boots had been stained with the “world of war”:
with the colorful hues of long-gone friends,
with a son who never had the chance to
kiss his mom, his dad, his dog, his simple
life goodbye.

These boots carried a wasted soul, Saigon’s
pesky tricks lasting longer than prayers do.
Wasted time, wasted mind, wasted, wasted -
as the world tries to truly understand
the feelings of a place called Vee-it-Nam.

So it is.

The boots sit on ‘Nam’s thick dust, laying in
a closet of tormented memory.
For a man may walk on without his boots.
But he cannot rub away the imprint
of his feet,
nor the heavy steps that he has taken.