The storms of late summer did not snap
and surge. The pepper plants did not 
kneel , weary, beneath the rains 
that came
and came.

(or was it a drenched swoon of devotion?)

You didn't hurt my feelings
in an otherwise unremarkable moment
and I didn't react with silence.

I didn't cradle that silence like
a delicate, damaged thing.
(the bird that each of us
tries to save—
shoebox, eyedropper;
our mothers knew it would die,
but let us figure it out)

I didn't have myself convinced
that no one had ever hurt like this.

My silence didn't get deeper.

You didn't wade through it to get to the door.

A blank canvas
waiting to be painted,
waiting to turn into
the ocean
with gentle waves
slicing deeply
into the slowly falling sunbeams.

It waits
to become
the jagged edge
of the highest mountain imagined by its evil creator.
Vicious trees budding
giving birth to more complex ideas,
that will soon be on their own.

It waits
to evolve
into a mama holding her baby in her arms
in the rocking chair
in the front room
with a look
as if she'll always remember,
always remember that tone
in her baby's bright blue eyes
that's whispering "comfort"

It waits
to morph
into something it wants to accept,
something it wants to be,
something it wants to love.
It waits
for its future.

he speaks like a poem,
asking me if the train is going forward
or if the tracks are going backward

and
i'd never tell him, but
i'd walk on backwards train tracks forever and a day

if he was holding my hand

Blinded by its mocking glare
why must it taunt and stare

You get what you ask for
years of lifelessness is the score

Weight of the revulsive gem
is too much to comprehend

Chop off that which desecrates
freeing your spirit to consecrate

Blood pours out, stirring your need
coughing up bits, a bitter defeat

Reminisce of lost years which lapsed by
****** your life as your passion ran dry