Restless/awake they live
in separation.


On his night stand there is a ring.
Thick and black and full of a promise.
Next to him, as he moves in his fitful sleep
there is only an empty half of the bed.
In dreams she's there
(all freckled kisses and soft hair.)
next to him.

Miles away she turns the ring on her finger.
Small and gold and half of a whole.
She smiles at the dark night sky,
knowing that somewhen he went to sleep
without her.
She knows he'll toss and turn
(his smoker's mouth like an urn)
and reach for her.

Love/longing they know
in isolation.

One of these nights...

I will race through broken homes
and closed doors.
I will feel the driving rain
against cold momentum.
I will reach out into the darkness
and know that your hand
will meet my hand.

I will feel around in dust bins
and old insecurities.
I will climb over mountains
of stone and of doubt.
I will believe you when you tell me.
I will try to.
I swear I will.

One of these nights...

I will watch the tail lights fade
into memories we make.
I will force away the guilt
I will...

...One of these nights.

Stone me on your Altar of Lies.
I am not scattered light upon the stair!
You're all stuffed mouths and hollow eyes,
Spun from whole cloth but left bare.

The ****** never stirred, but only watched me leave.
Where's the Watchmaker for his Meek?
Tell me, where's the freedom in your Mustard Seed?
How can this be the Love we're meant to seek?

I am no Lamb!
I won't have your Love!
I couldn't give a ****,
and you, sir, are no Dove!

All seen equal, except those You exclude.
Let's not tout the best of us?!
I can see the cunning, you are shrewd.
But that still just leaves the rest of us.

'Cause what're we but broken people?
Empty lives and Original Sin!
Gird your *****! Guard your Steeple!
This is a club I won't belong in.

*Don't you preach to me
with ***** ******* hands
Holy love and His truancy.
You issue His commands.

Kicking out against the sheet,
trying hard to find sleep,
I wake and wonder why
when we fall we don't shy
our eyes against the sky.

The truth, if ever there was one,
is you find the ground when falling's done.
To feel the earth below your feet,
to wander empty city streets,
to keep from flying when complete.

But to reach out toward the sky and soar
imagine wanting that and nothing more.
When we are young we could trade it all to fly.
If asked the moon in return we would comply.
To see it all, our world, from on high.

Whatever happens to this urge?
Why dismiss it? Where is it's funeral dirge?
I think it comes back to us in dreams.
The little cracks in our lives between the seams.
(Maybe it returns in our winter.)
It lives on both ends of age's extremes.
(As our minds begin to splinter.)

I hope old age finds me thinking of flying.
Hoping to soar when I'm dying.
I have to try to find that place,
before I finish my solitary race,
where I can reach above and hope to touch space.

Staked to the ground we find ourselves at
the crossroads.
Though no deal is to be struck,
no bargain arranged
and no promises kept.
This is a place for looking
and, if we are all very lucky,
a place for seeing as well.

Stand here with me, in these chains,
and sing me the song that is
the night.
Breath this starlight and look out
on the expanse of our ever
expanding universe.

Do you see it yet?

Pinned though we are,
wondering though we might,
we have to find the single spark,
we have to see the light.

It is here, in the darkness that we revisit.
That we revise.
That we dig it all up and decide.
Because tomorrow, thankfully not today,
we grow toward the sunlight
more efficiently,
as the people we have to be.

We are staked here, at the crossroads,
but when these pins are drawn,
our chains lifted,
we will soar the skies above the crossroads.
We'll wonder, one has to hope,
as we look down on the trail that
had become our prison,
The path here is crooked,
so many obstructions
too many hazards.
The paths lead nowhere...
How did we ever get around?

Tripped on an errant root
in a tiled hall.
Took a dose of ******* silence
and slipped from it all.

Remember when true was truth
and love was bold?
Can't reconcile these lines with lies
Not still young, not yet old.

Don't know how to search inside and find
the mettle.
(Be a better man?)
Try to grip the flower, but tear out
the petal.
(Turn you to dust, to sand.)

Find her sat against a lower shelf
down on time and health.
Can't figure who to be from self,
hard to know coin from wealth.

How do you not see the things you can do?
How can you see your life,
this thing you've built
by yourself and with your own power,
and not see the triumph within?
Because who cares if you're not
what we all thought we would be?
Fortune and fame are such
trivial things when compared
to having nothing, which
(To let slip a small secret of the universe)
is all we are ever given,
and making from it something.
What you do?
How the **** does that matter?
Why would it ever matter?
You are what you are,
my friend,
you are what you have become.
But, hold your breath this is a big one,
you have managed, somehow in spite
of all the **** this world has to offer,
all that is forced on you,
you became yourself.
How amazing an accomplishment is that?
You, sir/madam are an amazing,
an astounding,
a fantastic
accomplishment!
How do you not see the things you can do?