Maybe time will work at me
Like a mango.
Softer and softer, full to bursting,
I just want to bloom. To burst and explode,
And then be done, and rest.
Bruised, perhaps. Soft, sweet.

Maybe I will mellow. Maybe I will lose the shine
of being stretched over all my insides,
All the swimming flavor,
Veined together, contained and fibrous.
Maybe the stem will snap at last,
And I will hit the earth, mangled.
Juices ****** away,
Soaked into the ground that split me.

I have always been the umbrella type:
Cloudy, with a chance of dying.
Water is petrifying—
When it rains, I listen to sad music and enjoy the view
Hoping I never have to venture out to you
Because I have no idea where you’ll flood into
And then I’ll have to peel away my dress you seeped right through
And nakedness is frightening and sitting in the shower
--shivering--
is not very inviting.
In fact, it’s very unpleasant when you’re by nature private
And have a hundred empty places to keep quiet
Covered and compliant.
Getting wet is terrible when you’ve spent forever piecing together
A paper-mache umbrella to cover
Your cracks.
Storms are not my style, I’m still trying to dry
From the tears I was born crying.
I was born cloudy with a chance of dying
Cloudy with a chance of never even trying
And when you’re born with a heavy heart
the last thing you need is to get
drenched.
Wringing yourself out is just a defense
It’s common sense--
--to never lose sight of the shore
SO, this is why I hide from the downpour
Under dusty cotton covers
And don’t ever even wonder
What it would be like
To be dragged in your wake
It’s not like I’m safe from you anyway.
I wasn’t built on stilts
I’m not a flood-proof gate,
I’m a rusty fire-escape that only reaches halfway
down
And I don’t want you waiting at the bottom and begging me to jump but of course you are,
You always are
But even though I know you’d catch me
You are scary and I’d rather jump to concrete because at least it looks like solid ground
And when I go down, I comfort myself with the 100 percent chance that at least
I won’t drown.

We’re finally “together.”
It’s like a crash course on each other
After months of restraint I finally get to that “place” in you.
An intoxicating crash, our paths finally “collided”
And two human hearts beat fast,
With a relational feasting, a deepening
A seeping saturation with each other,
over-taking
And not realizing
A little scientific fact called:
Momentum.
We crashed and combined but could not stop and life has a way
Of moving you often and sadly,
People are intersections moved right through, because we all have
Different directions.
Courses connect and then somehow we just—
Well, it’s not that we forget.
It’s not even neglect
But a slow disparity collects
Whatever tugs us takes us and even if we don’t feel the pull
We feel the distance, when it’s full.
Our hearts are weak and light and we are flighty
And we don’t know when to fight
And even if we don’t mean to flee
People leave. It happens
See,
The way I saw it
Parallel was a pain.
Moving along the same course but never any collision, only frustration
Separate lines never meeting at a glorious point we could call us.
I said, better to have loved and lost
Than to love and love and love and never get there,
As if love is a destination.
But people don’t come with a “finish line”
There are no simple lines in love.
Nothing is straight--
We are fluid and incongruent
And swung by each other’s shifting weight.
Because, momentum keeps us moving and that movement is often claimed
By another little scientific fact called:
Entropy.
But if something huge
Something really huge that will not fail moves us then that means
It will not sway us.
It draws us not to each other, but to something much bigger, a much better “somewhere”
Then that little point us.
And when we’re both drawn to the same place
By the same force,
When we’re on the same course
Not as finish lines for each other
But as runners in the same race
As evidences of the same magnetic tug we try to trust
Too weak to be faithful satellites of each other
But revolving around the same one--
Then we’re truly together.

If it was a man that I loved on the cross,
Instead of Christ
How would I take communion?
Not with complacency, nor discontentment.
Surely with tears and remorse and regret
For one who wasn’t always dead and limp.

A man I loved: someone I touched,
Someone I smiled at,
Someone I spoke to.
Someone with warm blood coursing through his veins
Hair on his chest, maybe freckles on his arms.
Eyelashes, lips, ears, elbows.
Tears, words, hugs, smiles.

A man that I loved:
How could I ever be the same?
If he were to be hung
Bruised, crushed, pierced.
Dead and limp.
Hair on his chest, maybe freckles on his arms.

How could I walk out of the sanctuary
And pay for a sprite
And bend the straw
And forget?

You are hopeless when you fight
As if you you’ll win!
Beloved, why must you battle so long
For a moment of sin?
Why do you persist?
You are starved by stubborn will,
You wretched child,
You raise your fists
And yet I love you still.

And don’t you think I want the chance
To make you pure?
Beloved, look at what you settle for -
Is your heart so sure?
Beloved, you want me!
Though the thought you quickly ****,
Many idols
You make love to
And yet I love you still.

Beloved, I cannot be still and fail
To stir your heart, for this I know:
Your desire is towards me, but
You do not see it so.
What heavenly joys I offer!
But you are blind to my good will,
You move through life
Unmoved by me
And yet I love you still.

Beloved, I do wish to love you;
As a lover might.
I delight in you, my darling
And would cover you each night -
The LORD desires you, and yet
You seek pleasure in an earthly thrill!
You will not know Me
As your Husband,
And yet I love you still.

I have borne the deepest scars,
You need not bear your own.
Why hide yourself from Me, Beloved -
When you are fully known?
Known, yes, and even –
Wanted!
Does the very thought not thrill?
For I have known
Your innermost,
And yet I love you still.

How can I think this is joy?
I’ve never tasted more.
I climbed through a window
Too impatient
To look for the door.
And now, I wish I’d followed you!!!
God, give me a door!!!
I climbed through a window
Too impatient
Too wait for something more.

And what did I miss?
Something grand, I fear.
I climbed through a window
Too impatient
And now I’m sitting here.
I’ve never been so far.
I’ve never been so near.
I climbed through a window,
Too impatient
And no one loves me here.

So many sweet names on the tip of my tongue for you
When I remember whispers that you haven’t whispered yet
I hear an echo of them
Like I sometimes I hear that stage-voice of mine
That tiny whimper sounding through my hollow insides
And sounding suffocated and small out here
Because I’m nervous and you do something bold
Like take off all my clothes.
I take off my own clothes and I see your hands
Wrapping around my shoulders and
And
And it hasn’t happened yet.
But I catch sight of people that I think one day might make me think of you
And certain smells make me think of crawling over cushions to be with you
Dusty blankets usually
Those definitely do
And when I make coffee in the morning I wish it was for two
I definitely think about you, baby
So many sweet names
On the tip of my tongue
With the taste of your lips and the silky feel of your teeth and everything else about you
That I haven’t licked
Yet
When you crawl over cushions to be with me please don’t forget
How much I’ve always missed you

I cut for the tears trapped in my veins.
The ones that worry people, the ones that make them look again.
I cut for the tears that sting and burn
Oh my God, that hurts, and I know why.
No need to look for an excuse to ache.

I cut for the tears that no one forces from me.
It wasn’t him leaving, it wasn’t her lying
Or them, not even noticing. No.
These tears are mine! Mine alone to cry!
Only I can make them flow.
Only I.

I cut for the tears that leave a scar. Though mine, you hardly see.
Just clear white skin over whole blue veins
Not a mark….but one or two.
Small white lines, barely raised.
More like winks, to remind me:
Healing isn’t beautiful
or free.

And that’s not how I cry now.
Clear tears come and go,
And my wrists wink,
And I am whole.

My hands looked like ghost hands against
Your ghost body
Are all ghosts cool and tall
Or is that just you?
I like to fancy myself cool and small
But I'm burning
Like a house that's been saturated with fuel
(House equals me, fuel equals you)
For weeks on end
(It was forever and ever The End)
Sitting. Soaking.
Everything seeping
And finally flaming
You set me on fire
In that vulnerable moment
When I wasn't sleeping
But already dreaming.
(Dreaming meaning
I was silent as a ghost
While I was screaming.)

I don't believe in ghosts
That doesn't mean they aren't real
Just that I don't trust them.

Why throw yourself at stone and stars?
Bright things can’t hold a breaking soul.
Wounded things find solace in each other’s scars
And hands that know the handle blade
Can still another’s violent storms.

Two cracked people fit together better
Than two ivory gods—whose perfect hearts
Don’t skip a beat, or speed or slow.
Or shudder when they’re touched by hands
That could wring blood, or slowly stroke to bliss.

Two birds fighting in a cage make better love
Than statues carved to last forever
Decades old—yet just a breath
Representing love’s great prize:
The reason fighting rubs us raw.

I hate to say I 'gave' it away.
There's nothing to say about whatever
I lost.

I'd like to lose the thing I
finally got.

I have been growing memories of it
like weeds in the rain,
Coming up through cracks
in a parking lot.

The only thing I lost that night
was the thought that being touched by you
would change my life. It has not.

It has added to my poetry.
But not a lot.
Another thing to say and write:
"I've been touched."
So what.
It happens every night and day.

I've been touched
In every way. Been kissed,
Shown bliss.
And still nothing to say.

People make people into banks.
I put everything I had into him
And waited for the day I’d get my check.
And then I figured love is not a debt
Love is not settled like a score.
Love is not for clean black ledgers
Love is like a messy sea that pushes up against a shore
Even though the shore will always push it back.
The only time that love is measured is when you see that line
That marks the shifted sand
Where love relentless
Reached and tethered
Herself to land.
Where she turns white from clinging,
Where, though she drags herself away,
She is always returning—
—if the shore grows weary of her hugs
She is not hurt
He does not owe her.
She does not ask that he adore her,
Or implore her “stay. . .”
Only that he let her nuzzle him as gently or
As fiercely as she feels her current sway.
She is tidal, she is beautiful
Almost brutal,
But, giving more than taking,
The sea is faithful as well as wild,
She can change the shape of a continent
And kiss the toes of a child.
She will be gathering him deeply under her heavy waves
And lingering to lick at his soft edges
Sprawling across the coast like a bed
She will love him this way,
Until the moon crumbles
And all earth’s tides are dead.

A good man who wished to fight,
To raise his fist and shake the stormy skies
Once dropped his sword, and never knew
That he was wise.

A good man who wished to shout,
To raise his voice and speak his angry word
Once held his tongue, and never knew
That he was heard.

A good man who wished to stay,
And not be known as someone weak or wrong
Once walked away, and never knew
That he was strong.

A good man who wished to live,
And not be torn, but set himself above –
Hid his heart, and never knew
That he was loved.

There are no words to express
The feeling in my core
When I’m
Cradled at your lips
My heart is the size of your fists
As they tangle with mine.