I took her to the beach where we jogged on the sand.
She took my photo of her, my heart and my hand.
It was a beach we'd been on years before.
And we talked of our first date as we ran on the shore.

And I took her home and sang her a song,
Of all the songs I wrote i hadn't sung in so long.
And you wrapped and old string around my ring finger
And asked me if I'd be hers forever.

So we went where we met for the very first time
We shared a slice of pizza and I used all the lines
Cause I knew that you knew, that if I ever would ask
This would be the place and the way, but I passed.

And you punched me pinched me for pushing your buttons.
And I acted like I had no idea, and it was just sweet nothings.
And then we went to majestic and talked for a while,
Of all the times and dates before and how I made you smile.

And I took

Her mind a map, I'm lost.
Her mind, a map I lost.
Her lost mind, I map.
I map her loss.
I lost her.
Her loss.
Lost

Rub me clean down to skin,
Raw and i'll ruin,
With sweat i'll chafe black indeed
Scrub me cleaner and I'll bleed

Chain me until
Marks bleed still
And I will sing
Until bars swing

Beat me until I am silent
I will be violent
With my eyes above
And hands that love

I will never be white
I will never be held
I will never be quiet
Until your hatred is felled

Slept alone, awoke to familiar eyes.

Write me something beautiful she said,
And I kissed her a sunset of poems in bed.
I made her laugh when the tragedies flowed in her head.
I got writers block when rage made my heart run red.

Write me something beautiful she said
I put my pen down and just listened instead
To what was between the lines where no ink was shed
And helped close the wounds where nothing bled

Write me something beautiful she said
So I took her hand in joy and dread
Signed away every memory ahead
And promised with this ring thee I wed

Oh I met him in the garden
And he called my name
I'd been watching him in the open
But I was ashamed

Cause I knew he was
What I could never be

It felt like a thousand years
Passed by in a flash
I sold my souls and tears
For approval and cash

Now I knew for sure
What I could never be

Now we're back in the garden
And I see him again
He's a stone's throw away
Saying his amen's

The spirit's still willing
For what I could never be

Here's a garden on a hill
With just three trees
His mamma is still
clinging to me

He's looking to me
To be what I could never be

I'll race you to the garden
Where we laid him down
The tomb is open
Angels around

I finally believe
In what I can never be

The gardener prunes
He'll bear fruit through me

Now the voices have gone silent
And my mind's an empty hall
Every thought's an echo bent
Every word an unanswered call

There is music in my heart
But it's nothing pure or free
My soul has lost it's spark
There are no songs left in me

So I'm lost in the chorus
I'm caught in the verse
The world is before us
And it's getting worse
And we're hollowing up
For the day prophesied
Cause in my heart, the music's died.

So I'll stick to listening
And drop the pen
Post a ghost posting
On whisper again

And maybe it's fine
That the song's dead inside
Maybe it's gone rotten
And my creativity's died

So I'm lost in the chorus
I'm caught in the verse
The world is before us
And it's getting worse
And we're hollowing up
For the day prophesied
Cause in my heart, the music's died.

She opened my heart with melodies and maladies
And closed my eyes
With kisses
And whispers
That dispersed the doubt
Until the darkness came out
Then she left and my eyes opened like clouds
Squinting through the rain at the sunny day.

Tomorrow I vote,
Not because I can, but because I must.
Not for a politician I trust,
Or a person I know,
Not for a friend or against a foe,
Not to support a candidate,
Or to change a nation's fate.
Tomorrow I vote,
Not for a party or fee,
Not for the economy.
Tomorrow I stain my fingers,
And make a choice, between promises, and premises,
What was and what may be.
Because people died to give that right to me.

To let me decide,
Majority or minority,
The destiny of one man,
And find if absolute power corrupts absolutely,
Or men can rule, for the people humbly.
A government for and by the people.
And one vote for little ol' me.

So tomorrow,
Tomorrow I will vote because I am free.

I fell asleep in a dream
And woke where I was from
A place beyond the seams
Of forever and beyond

Where light was a song
And water a light
And life was a metaphor
For joy and delight

I fell asleep to the world
And woke from a dream
To find the world unheard
Untouched unseen

A mist un-missed
On the mountain of dream
Where I exist and belong
And yet have never been

I never knew loneliness... until you

I find with every word
I lose the things I've heard
And know more
The unknown before

I find I live for your reply
Die when it's denied
See to read your lines
Blinded by your mind

By your sentence
It condemns
By your words
My world ends

Your words are so much more
Your letters worth living for

Beside a well waiting for rain.

Yesterday you were what a kiss has always been,
A promise that means what a ring has meant.
To belong and find belonging in another's being,
To love solely and sold out but never spent.

Like a seed reaches for the sun and earth,
And yet is never stretched but grows from the reaching.
And in touching both sky and stone finds worth
Tangible and intangible, and branches like fingers budding.

Flowers like rings,
Limbs like fingers,
Fruity things,
Whose sweetness lingers.

Soft to touch, sweet to taste of sunshine grown.
This is what a kiss is, the loved are never alone.

Love what you do, and what you do will be loved.

I fell in love with the walls around your heart
An elaborate maze, a work of art
So high no one could climb
So deep no one could find

You

Never counted on an architect
Finding your masterpiece perfect
And wandering the corridors
Walking every floor

My

Heart leading me deeper
Pulled not by the design any longer
But by the heart crumbling as I walked through
I came to a door and I knew

You

Were inside,
Our hearts collide
Our walls collapsed in
But you were wrapped in

Me

No more walls just skin
Roofs of hugs and chins
That the rain drips down
As you hold your ground

We

Are standing vulnerable and same
Troubled and strange
But now I know your name
That wall won't change

It's more beautiful than anything you ever built.
Because it is who you are.

I found a piece I lost of me
In a songs release I found a key
So high it opened doors in me
Set a trapped note in my heart free

And every word flows over us
Over flows at the chorus
And something lost has come
Come to life from an anthem

And I am never as before
I am the encore

There are two kinds of people, one thinks there are two kinds of people, one knows people are people.

I'm searching for light in the shadows
Beyond where light ever goes
Because it's easier to look for it
Than to be blinded looking at it

There is nothing in here worth saving
Nothing worth taking or leaving
But I can't let go
I can't just go

Because there in the stillness
There in the panic and illness
I find me
A lost me

But it is still me in the mess
Just ignore the ssilent hiss and rest
Knowing I am
What I am

Because you are beyond my scars
You are beyond my stars
In your own shadow
Looking for windows

To send light into the dark of me

Overwhelmed underpaid, looks down at pavement.

Your love is like a slash to the core
That will bleed until the day I'm no more
But if I'm sick of you it's cause I'm sick of love

Like being vulnerable to every word you say
Broken when things don't go your way
It's not that I'm sick of you I'm just sick of love

And when you can't find the strength to speak
I'll break the quarantine on your cheek
And I'll love you until you're just sick of love

Love is patient love is kind
Not kind of patient before you lose your mind
Well I'm losing my mind, but I'm not yet sick of love

Some say love is a raw disease
But if it's contagious spread it please
Cause you ain't living healthy if you ain't sick with love

And when you can't find the strength to speak
I'll break the quarantine on your cheek
And I'll love you until you're too sick of love

And when you can't find the will to weep
I'll hold you tight till you fall asleep
And I'll love you until you're too sick of love
I'll love you until you're love sick my love

The storm came out of nowhere,
And you were there
With wings ready to fly
And as the clouds broke the sky

You didn't leave

You were my shelter
From the rain and thunder
And when it ceased
And the wind eased

I didn't leave

The rain you stopped
Rained down your core
And every drop
Held like a store

It didn't leave

Until the gust shook it free
And you rained down on me
Cold and sharp but how could I leave
When you held it all of this time for me

I'll stay with you.

My refrain is sung with refrain, because one
Who was accustomed to customs at airports and ports
Was to deport, and depart from my home
And my heart tomorrow
To borrow time and leave me
Rhyming why's and lies and sighs
Just to get by, by falling back on moving forward.

Her sentence sealed my sentence
"It's never enough to be home
Without ever being home"
Her point pierced home.

So with all I had left she left,
To be seasoned by seasons
And return turned into what I understood
Might not love me, mightily.

But Mays and and Octobers don't last,
And at last, what passed became past.
And may have brought me closure, and her closer.

Spring sprang a surprise on me.
On a windy road on a windy day
April, June summer may or may not have been.
When like a flower I like she appeared.
Daisies dazed me with brighter brights
And the sky's blue hues were new hues of blues.

Because cause belittles the little bees and the birds.
Who get by trusting the skies and flowers.
And while I was wondering of hope wandering in misery.
She solved her mystery in Him and me.

There is a shadow in my heart before your throne.
From a man who would dare dethrone you.
But the more he bows the more he knows.
That the shadows in my heart are not true.

The more he kneels the shadow fails
The more he sleeps the light prevails
And when he dies, all will know
He wasn't the Son just a window.

She numbed the pain without needles

My mirror seems angry with me

I'm gonna sing a song
On the roof in the rain
In keys that are wrong
So everyone can say

That boy's crazy
Always was
But I'll do it anyway
Because just because

I'm gonna lie awake
And draw you in lines
In the dark that shakes
In the back of my mind

That boy's crazy
Always was
But I'll do it anyway
Because just because

I'll stare out the window
Beside the door
Remembering the shadow
That's not there anymore

That boy's crazy
Always was
But I'll do it anyway
Because just because

I'm not the man I used to be
You're not the one who fell for me
We're not the people we once were

You stare at me like broken glass
You see through me the hours pass
We're not the people we once were

But back through the cracks through the blight of the scars
What lack brought her back to the slight of these arms
You fight the shadow you hold the shards
You light the window you hold the stars
And they shine through me
And my mind's true free
A thousand rainbows gleam lighting that wall
A thousand shadows mean nothing at all

Loud like lovers kisses stills streets
Like the flare of trumpets
But when lips and goodbyes meet

Love silently yearns
Waiting for love to return

The crash of glass and china on walls
As curses crush and claims confront
With every word on  ear and hall

Love is silent
Longing for love to be silent

When the living wail aloud
Midst those in night's garment
Among the tombstones in life's shroud

Love is silent and keeps
Knowing love is asleep

When the gavel condemns vice
And loved deserves the punishment
Love steps forward to sacrifice

Love silently
Dies willingly

When love is silent.
Love is never unheard.

You made my dad a grand father
But he doesn't mind
You've been the son at the back of his mind

You made my ma a grandma
And made her heart glow
Funny she's never loved something that made her feel old

You made my malla and me uncles
It feels kind of cool
To think now after being spoiled we'll be spoiling you.

You made Akki a mom
Or you made it official
I don't think she's been anything less than maternal.

You've made James a dad
And a fine one at that
Time will prove that i'm right and of that I'm glad.

Welcome to the family!
We were born into it too
It's wierd at first but it grows on you.

And we will do our best
To make you feel one
Friend and a loved nephew son and grandson.

Hello lonely eyes
Looking through the lies
Bright as the summer shine
She's easy on the eyes

We're in churches in chains
Singing of a love that's blind
Her chains are chained to mine
She's easy on my mind

Oh lonely eyes
If only our love were blind
She teases me with goodbye
But she's easy on the eyes

We swim in the rain
In the river we find
When we're drowning in pain
She's easy on my mind

Oh lonely eyes
Reflected in your eyes
And you're reflected in mine
You're easy on the eyes
You're easy on the mind
You're easy on the eyes
You're easy on the mind

When I say I love you
I mean like a friend
When you say I love you
It means without end

You mean it like a father
Loves His child
I mean it like a feather
Loves the sky

When you say I would do all
I mean in the figurative
But you're more literal
Your life you would give

Turn heaven upside down to get to earth
Turn earth right side up to get me to heaven
Turn your life to death to give me worth
Turn death to life to make us one

And you called me son
Not servant
Not one of the hundreds to come
Not pilgrim vagrant

You called me son
You say I'm free
You say eternity
Literally

And you're not being figurative
You're not playing with hyperbole
You're not using superlatives
You're just being wholly

True
When you say I died for you

Your words cut like scalpels
Through hair skull and scalp
Culling the cunning thoughts
My Foolish heart has bought

But your blade is truth
No anesthetic
Can dull, numb or soothe
Unsympathetic

It removes the lie
Like a tumor
Until my life's
A rumor

There between my mirror and me
Is a darkness, a dislike
Between the same and opposite I see
Is a sense of spite in-spite of me

I'll close my eyes
And try to see
The humor in a raspberry
But I still see what I can't see
Who I am
Is not who I'm meant to be

I swear
If you lose my heart
I will tear your room apart
Until It's found
And if it's not around
I will split with yours
And hide it because

We'll both be lost hearts then
Following the one who lost them

Just love on display
Ever dismayed
Stripped ripped
Undone
Shunned

Love hidden in secret
Overcomes the violent
Vindicates the silent victim
Ends the torment within
So we can know freedom

Yes we all need to decide
On the path we'll abide
Until the love inside can live outside

What I long to be
Is just beyond reach of me
Because to be what I long to be
Would mean to lose my goal
Completely

To let go
Of what I know
I can achieve
Is to look in a mirror and say
I don't believe.

To walk this middle path
Between victory and art
Is a life half lived and never fulfilled.

There in your eyes,
Is a reflection of me.
And you stare at skies
Like your ma did the sea.

And you tell stories like nana
Without the pauses.
And cringe like my brah
When I clean your bruises.

You laugh like a man
And you smile like my dad.
I don't understand
How all they had,

Got into a heart
As small as yours ,
And still makes me start
Just because,

You have a spark.
That lights the dark
And reminds my heart
Of a work of art.

Red splashes and dark
Finger marks
Of someone
More than anyone,

More than you and I
More than this love of mine.

This poem leaves me torn.
Because I'm your father.
But you haven't been born.
But I'm full of fear.

That you'll never see my reflection
In your eyes.
So here's my reflection
On your life.

So you'll understand.
Before your life began.
I saw your reflection.
I saw your perfection.
And loved everything about you.
Through our fathers' eyes I know you'll know it's true.

There in the wreckage of me,
Where I hit the blood stained tree.
I breathed my last, You took my past.
My flesh died, but my spirit flew free.

I was walking one day and,

I felt it slip like a shadow between me and the ground
And it flips me off my feet and but i'm falling without a sound,
Or momentum or the hum of wind, just a shadow beneath and within.

I can't explain it in words, but it's the fear of failure
And the dark, and all unheard and stark and the masks whisper,
That I am nothing in a million eyes, and my disguise is known and paralyzed.

Remember to breathe.
Remember the bliss.
Remember others need you to get through this.
Know that your frail.
Know that you're scarred.
Know that doesn't stale who you are.

Walk on...

Words do not a writer make
Nor poems nouns or prose
But the heart that breaks for breaking sake
Beyond calling Rose a rose

It's not the nouns or adjectives
Or strings of sappy lines
It's seeing love where nothing lives
And seeing darkness shine

A writer sees beyond the words
But sees the great divide
Between what heart says and what is heard
Never satisfied

A writer does not fill the page
With words that others need
But the page the page is the stage
Where their emotion bleeds

Of the things I think a writer holds
You may disagree
But if your heart is moved to words so bold
A writer you may be

With three words we give our hearts away,
To people who hold it lighter than a word on the ear.
Lighter than a whisper.

With three words we give our lives away,
When people echo those three words strong and clear.
And hold each word dear.

With three words on one dark day,
We will give those lives away with words heavier than rain.
That fall in puddles on deaf ears.

With three words every day,
We will remember them with joy and pain.
Until they wake us with three words whispered in our ear.

There is a brush stroke in the sunrise,
A pencil line around moon.
There's a bar code in your eyes,
But we never notice it too soon.

I strike the keys, and the letters appear,
But the words don't strike a key in here.
Or turn a phrase, and it's been this way
For minutes, hours days and days.
I long to feel the mystery
Of my own words
Turning the keys,
Opening rooms in me.

Slip
And there it goes,
My heart skips, and my eyes close.
I see the sky, my body jerks, my hands reach out
But nothing works, It all slows down.
Right now, speeds up,
Ground,
Ow!

Lover, Slide between me
And what I could be
And keep me comfy
Asleep and warm
Zeal brings great harm
You have me charmed.

Purpose is the thing between amazing and now,
And somehow I find that I am now the in between.
The seen and unseen not in the darks hold,
Held in the folds of fog, because I want to be light.

I remember as a kid
I would lie with my face next to a bed sheet,
And the closer I slid,
The wrinkles became waves and I imagine a desert of dunes and heat.

Or pull close to a wall below a window sill,
And press myself right up against it until,
All I could see was the edge with the light outside like a beacon.
And imagine I was trapped from a fall in a canyon .

The thing about imagining you're small is you feel more alone than you actually are.
The space between is the same, it just seems bigger.
Because you're more out of reach.