If you don't say something now,
It's not going to be alright anymore.

your name is
forbidden in
my mouth
or in my heart
because when
i think about
you;

i'll cry a little more,
hurt a little stronger
love a little softer
because you no longer
make me feel sober

i'm drunk on the
memory of you

Last week

seven of my

children were

all together for

the first time

in a long time.


and as each one

came into the room

to greet me.

I felt my roots

grow

deeper and

deeper to

the center

of the universe.


and in their smile

I saw the smile of

my father,

the smile

of my mother.,


and as I drank

in their laughter

I became

drunk with

life.


and when night

fell

I looked up to

the heavens

took a deep

breath into

my soul.


then I

memorized

the exact place

of every star

and shimmer.


and I knew

I had finally

found my

place in

the universe.

They say lots of things about love,
They make it seem it is the ultimate desire,
Wanton and wilder than the known universe,
An cataclysmic explosion of two personalities,
Born separate, reborn together,
And yet...
I have loved worse men,
And lost better women than I deserve,
And now my convex chest is as vast and devastated as abbey ruins,
sanctuary,
sacred,
crooked,
ruined,
beautiful,
still here,
After hundreds of years.

Maybe I will live on in my memories,
For there are graveyards in my bones,
Eulogies imprinted on my arteries,
Long lost love letters scarred on my very marrow
For those that I drowned,
And those I saved.
My faith is a moorland hillside war memorial,
An obelisk to reach the very gods,
Your love is but a squall,
My hope is a trickle, a stream, a reservoir, in the deepest steepest canyon and Valley,
Your love is but a rain drop,
My clarity is at the bottom of a whiskey bottle,
Your love is but an ice cube.

Do not ask me brazenly to die for you,
When ******* me is your finest hour,
And I am but a pleasure boat ride for your masculinity to take a trip in,
We are not divine here;
My expectations are as low as your esteem:
A water you paddle in, a toe dipped perhaps,
but you wouldn't swim through, dare to at least,
And yet,
I am a rushing beautiful rainbow of a waterfall on a sunburn induced day,
The haze in the corner of your eye,
When you begin to question,
"is this too good to be true?".
Yes.
We are all but fallacies.

Dip your fingers and cross yourself,
As you wish for clemency.
But still,
Be still,
And know,
That,
I am,
God.
Am I?
Or am I just divine on your tongue?

I didn't want to wake
up this morning

(people who like the winter
most of all enjoy making their
own warmth)

be my summertime?

Why Men Cry in the Bathroom

For so many reasons.
I will tell you the why.
I think you know,
Or perhaps, you think you know.

Men are always O.K.,
Even when not.

We expect the worse,
Accept the worse,
Nonetheless,
We are forever unprepared.

Wearily, we cry,
In the bathroom, in private,
Lest sighs slip by,
We be unmasked,
Early warring, strife signs warning.

Copious, tho we weep
Before the mirror confessor,
It is relief untethered,
Unbinding of the feet,
An uncounting
Of beaded rosaries,
Of freshly fallen hail stones,
Of night times terrors
By dawn's early edition's light,
and welcomed.

But look for the mute tear,
The eye-cornered drop,
*** tat, that never drops,
But never ceases formation and
Reforming, over and over again,
In a state of perpetuity of reconstitution,

The tippy tear of an iceberg revealing,
And I see you peeping, wondering,
What is beneath

Look for:
the torn worm-eaten edges of spirit,
thrift shop bought, extra worn,
grieving lines neath the eyes,
where the salt has evaporated,
discolored the skin.
worry lines,
under and above,
browed mapped, furrowed boundaries.
the laugh line saga,
where better days are stored,
recalled, as well as recanted,
publicly, privately.

Why just men?

I don't know,
Perhaps,
it is all I know.


Jan 6, 2013

They tossed the golden ring I never caught
Whether or not it was my own fault
Right here, right now is where I'm at
As life gets set for another lap

I can clearly see what's in front of me
Being this close to the dead end street
Miles ago I'd hoped for a cul-de-sac
But imagine that, there ain't no turning back

I'm tired of what these times have done to me
Bent so long you knew I'd break eventually
Which makes me even tireder still
The bend and break of a man's beaten will

At what point did I lose my belief
That the grasp I had would help me to succeed
Did I let go at the last bump in the road
With so many potholes we may never know

It's hard to see through the crack in the windshield
These bitter days what is fake and what is real
As the crack continues widening in its gap
Until the day there won't be any protection left

I'm tired of the same old grind from day to day
And the optimistic crowd that says it'll be okay
I'm tired of this as much as I'm tired of that
Tired of the life that fits all of these facts

You say I'm just feeling sorry for myself
But if I didn't I wonder then who else
Seems I'm stuck inside this all alone
This house I've built that'll never be a home

Which brings me back to the golden ring
Where all I've ever been is a working machine
Taking my fingers down to the bone
Which makes any grasp that much harder to hold

I'm tired of the ups that only let me down
The promise of much that's never ever found
Any fool can see where I'm clearly at
And those that don't well I'm even tired of that

When you stop to think, would death be better than life... Then you know you're tired

After the ball game
on the high school
playing field
Shoshana is still

sitting there
with another girl
so I go over to her
and she blushes slightly

and I say
what did you think?
she looks at me
and says

not very good
are you?
I smile
no not much

but they will
insist I play
at least you're honest
she says

I am
best way
I reply
the other girl

stands up and says
don't want to play
gooseberry see you
later Shoshana

and she walks off
something I said?
I say
no I think she finds

boys embarrassing
Shoshana says
I look at her
sitting there

dark hair
long straight
bell will ring
in a minute

she says
best get back
towards school
she stands up

and I say
where do you live?
I live a little way away
I get a school bus home

she says
so do I
I say
I know you do

she says
you get on
the same bus
as I do

I look at her
do I?
yes you've not seen me
I get on as quick

as I can
she says
I see you though
a bell rings

from school
well see you later then
I say
and she's off

leaving me there
and I wander back to school
across the grass
watching her go

her slight figure
in the afternoon sun
taking note
of her neat ***.