I sat outside
Lauren's LS classroom
While everyone else was at lunch
Chewing up and equal mixture of
Soggy bread and lunch meat.

I sat outside
While my back went numb
Against the cinderblock
From leaning a little too hard.

I sat outside
While other kids
with different schedules
Wrote elongated essays for English
Just to make 500 words.

I sat outside
Of Lauren's LS
While she tried her hardest
To explain to me
Why I got 17b wrong
And
Of course
How to fix it.

And I sat outside
Doing test corrections
For a poisoned class called
Geometry

I sat outside
Because of my 57% score.

I sat outside,
And I decided to study.

She may be ******.
And she may check my fingers-
Slam her hard metal pole down on them-
Each time we practice lacrosse.
And she may roll her eyes
At
Me.

But I don't hate her.
I feel sorry for her.
Because I think I'm the only one
Who pays attention
Through the laughter and fun
That
He touches her.

And she makes a joke out of it
So her minions snap out of their dazed state and
Chuckle a little bit.
But his crawling fingers are greedy
And her words are scarce.

All of the brain-dead minions
Laugh when she jokingly screams,
"****!"

Except me.

Sometimes the poem
doesn't want to come;
it hides from the poet
like a playful cat
who has run
under the house
& lurks among slugs,
roots, spiders' eyes,
ledge so long out of the sun
that it is dank
with the breath of the Troll King.

Sometimes the poem
darts away
like a coy lover
who is afraid of being possessed,
of feeling too much,
of losing his essential
loneliness-which he calls
freedom.

Sometimes the poem
can't requite
the poet's passion.

The poem is a dance
between poet & poem,
but sometimes the poem
just won't dance
and lurks on the sidelines
tapping its feet-
iambs, trochees-
out of step with the music
of your mariachi band.

If the poem won't come,
I say: sneak up on it.
Pretend you don't care.
Sit in your chair
reading Shakespeare, Neruda,
immortal Emily
and let yourself flow
into their music.

Go to the kitchen
and start peeling onions
for homemade sugo.

Before you know it,
the poem will be crying
as your ripe tomatoes
bubble away
with inspiration.

When the whole house is filled
with the tender tomato aroma,
start kneading the pasta.

As you rock
over the damp sensuous dough,
making it bend to your will,
as you make love to this manna
of flour and water,
the poem will get hungry
and come
just like a cat
coming home
when you least
expect her.

What a pity
You disappeared without a trace
What a shame
That I can't forget your face
You should know
You tore my world apart
You left me with a black cloud on my heart
The wind blows hard
I still feel the raindrops stinging
I need escape
From the emptiness it's bringing
You're like a storm
You rushed in like a hurricane
And left nothing behind
But damage and pain
There are nights
I wake up fighting mad
You threw away
Everything we had
And I must admit it took me by surprise
When I saw the look of leaving in your eyes
But the eye of the storm is passing through
And maybe some day I'll get over you
I'll rebuild myself stronger than before
But there's still a lot to weather in this storm


(This was actually intended to be lyrics, which is why the timbre of it is off.)

The Flowers Eager,
To Break Through The Foot Of Snow,
Which Still Loomed Over,
The Roots Inside Their Bodies,
Were So Anxious To Break Free

The Sun Slowly Dropped,
Behind The Grey Of The Clouds,
The Stars Peeked Through Them,
They Smiled As They Sparkled,
On Top The Vanishing Snow

Not A Single Cloud,
Dots A Square Inch Of The Sky,
The Blue Has Returned

He was climbing a mountain.
There was, but a moment ago, the soft sound of summer thunder,
And the tender drift of curling winds.
A voice, that knew no constraint of time or place.
It spoke as if it had always done so, as if it were all at once memory and potential.
Its sentence had no end, its syllables outlasting empires.
It made him pang for the world he once new.
But it was far away, for now,
He was climbing a mountain.

Upon the way,  one traveler found another
One took refuge from the climb, his hands bloodied, his will broken
The other sat perched on a cliff edge, never facing his cohort, never truly meeting
The climb is far from easy, called the ****** man.
Come, let us eat together and tend our wounds.
The man of the cliff did not answer, not immediately.
His gaze was fixed upon the implacable horizon,
Its forms were grains of reality, blowing across the plains of perception
To look at one was to see no other, for this is how it is.
"We do not wound," he answered at the last.

Will you not face me, called the man with bandaged hands
That shifting sky is nothing but the wastes of life
The knowledge it holds is not for us to know
For we are the ones who climb.
The cliff's man remained silent, for he grew weary of climbers
You are not the first he thought, and you surely will not be the last
For the climbers had minds for not but the mountain
They are born to seek its peak.
Before him were the storms of life
Where beings of light roared across the world
Their lives ended within a blink
Each one, shimmering like unclouded stars against the silky black of night
Each a triumph of failure, for even in death no fall awaited them
They knew only ascent
Perhaps that was what the climbers sought?
Perhaps they wished to be as they?
But the cliff, he knew, was the end of all things
Its precipice, the boundary of the divine
It was the only true ascent, it was all that he could crave.
The climber had lingered here long enough
And it was time to send him on his way
"We do not hear the Nightingale."

The man with the mended will had no time for puzzles
To the sands with you, may the winds take you to your beloved rifts of chance
There's a mountain that needs climbing, for why else is it here?
Whilst you are betroth to destiny's stir, to the sky's delight,
I have known the beauty of her touch, the loving warmth of her breath
She is not to be watched, she is to be held, to be kissed, to be yours.
He turned his back to the cliff and its watchman
He had been sated by his stay, but it would be folly to remain
He was climbing a mountain