I never made a poem, dear friend--
I never sat me down, and said,
This cunning brain and patient hand
Shall fashion something to be read.
Men often came to me, and prayed
I should indite a fitting verse
For fast, or festival, or in
Some stately pageant to rehearse.
(As if, than Balaam more endowed,
I of myself could bless or curse.)

Reluctantly I bade them go,
Ungladdened by my poet-mite;
My heart is not so churlish but
Its loves to minister delight.

But not a word I breathe is mine
To sing, in praise of man or God;
My Master calls, at noon or night,
I know his whisper and his nod.

Yet all my thoyghts to rhythms run,
To rhyme, my wisdom and my wit?
True, I consume my life in verse,
But wouldst thou know how that is writ?

'T is thus--through weary length of days,
I bear a thought within my breast
That greatens from my growth of soul,
And waits, and will not be expressed.

It greatens, till its hour has come,
Not without pain, it sees the light;
'Twixt smiles and tears I view it o'er,
And dare not deem it perfect, quite.

These children of my soul I keep
Where scarce a mortal man may see,
Yet not unconsecrate, dear friend,
Baptismal rites they claim of thee.

Her blanket of curls drape lightly around her face
as she carelessly handles a cigarette between
red-stained lips that grip
white and tan paper.

A flick of a flame grazes the tip, smoldering incandescence
highlights her mouth, a shade of sun-burnt orange;
the tiny lit secret sits at the ridge.

Without hesitation, she takes one long drag
and emits a lifetime of fear, worry, joy, and love
that settles into the nightlife. The escaping smoke coils
into the air, leaving a soft haze above her head.

She knows who she is,
and she knows where she is going, something
the man next to her at the bus stop has not quite figured out.

Neon red brake lights play off her face
as she glances towards him. Her wide eyes burn with intent,
jewels of sapphire blue. The huffing bus makes its presence known,
and he holds out a hand to motion for her to go first. She smiles,

and they slide into the light.

I'm an echo of misguided direction.
An arrow stuck to an elephant
whose only desire is to rip his shirt off,
and shout like an eagle.
Stomping the ground to make his presence known,
beating with fists clenched, his legs and chest
to know of his own presence.
Gritting his teeth and erupting,
punch through the sky with un-synthesized experience and emotion.

My brain knows more than I knew
so I'll feel the texture of my steps,
straighten my shoulders, chin up
and let the ground wince for once
I tread consciously.
I tread consciously and my path will scream it for me.

I am acutely aware that I
changed tenses in that story.
It is better for me in past tense;
his face was beautiful.
I know that he will not
talk to me. Not until
his time frame has come out.
I don't know what that frame is.
But I know him,
and that there is one.
I still love him.
It defies what I know
about the love mechanism.
It defies my past experience.
It is not unlikely that we
will not speak again
until I am over him,
and it is possible that
that will be never.

In the dark
time shows no sign
forward backward or up
the diligent digital clock
tacitly ticks its tocks
dark recedes to dark and then
only to spare no light again;
But suddenly some scowling scream
("Still survive!" he shouts at me, according to the OED.)
shatters silence, tears the scene,
rips a hole in the dark, serene,
before any morning can be seen;
Some hidden pigeon's cackling
time revives, unshackling,
though the day is yet to come,
as if to offer a reminder to one:
"keep to the fore,
look to the sun."