If you wake tomorrow with
bruises blooming purple-yellow
across your knees
lungs stinging fuchsia  
muscles coiled tight and red
only to find you’ve run out of tiger balm
and friendly shadows have grown long
in the distance of years and the unknown

read a poem

Sift through the smoking ashes
of countries lost, rooms emptied, songs forgotten
breathing verdant sparks into the rotten chambers
of your heart. Poetry is soul kissing,
holy sinners meeting palm to palm
under the wild banners of longing
waving, aching and strong.

I work poetry into my pains
through my fingers, onto the page.