I hear one note
I close my eyes
I hear one beat
I start to smile
I'm not just hearing
I'm also listening
How could such fimiliar words
have such different meanings
I might be percieving the sound
but I am also giving one's attention
Not only the sense of hearing
but the sense of feeling
it hits my core
chills from all of my toes
to the tip of my nose
to the back of my neck
from a shoulder to another
I let out a sound
Just to realize its over


now I feel nothing

I saw your fire red lips today,
Lighting up someone else's world
With a kiss, to the air, to their lips
I'm sure their heart was in flames.
I wanted to feel that burn
And I missed it, for a moment
And a lifetime.

Times like these are when hearts sink,
Like lame Titanic references, inserted here,
Because I'd like to think it sinks in deep.

Sometimes I feel like it's better to be alone for a long time before trying again.
Sometimes I'm wrong about these things and regret it in the end.
Sometimes I'm right.

This time I'm right.
And this didn't go the way I imagined.

Burn on.

my lips, limbs
this skin
I don't recognize them
I breathe out
& breathe in
my lungs do without it
how did it begin
to then end
before it is poured
I am opening doors
it is yours
this is yours
I'm picking my sores
& my bones off the floor
I cannot bend anymore
all of my laces have torn
& I'll front-face a storm
I haven't a fear of disaster
it is my hope that gets choked
& sharp pains replace laughter
what did I look like before this
& who's is this voice
what comes after you've left
I do not have a choice

I've not been known to nest low
I've stayed fairly high
but I've been let go to shatter
& glass birds do not fly

At midnight I will scroll through all
of the names on my phone looking
for ones my hungry heart can
devour or savor for a moment or two.
I will find yours from two months
ago when we talked most recently
and think yes, yes this is who
can cure the insatiable appetite.
My mind will say no, no,
bad idea, nothing good will
come from this reaching out
of a hand too eager, grabbing
for purpose, don't do it.
Fingers will type regardless, a
text of hey or how's it going
or where are you or what's up
or maybe even a somewhat
unconscious I miss you,
I will try to say I love you
without saying it at all.
Holding my breath, I will press
send and it will mail off to you
so you can read my desperation
like a casual hello when really
I've packed a million words
unsaid into the few that I have
picked out to type hesitantly.
At 12:02 I will stare blankly
at a message that has yet to
be replied to and I will continue
to, waiting until my eyes are shot
from staring at a lit screen for
too much time, I will then stop.
I will turn off the phone but before
I do I will breathe in the letters of
your name one last time to remind
myself why I do this every night.
I do it because I'm lonely or
maybe it's because I don't want to
come back to an empty room, the
quiet of a bed holding my body only.
You are the remedy for this craving,
even if you do not answer until
morning, or next week, or never
I will search for you always

In all honesty I've never been good with words. I never knew what to respond after the doctor would ask me what hurt, or what to tell my mother after I saw her cry when my dad left. Poetry is placing words in all the wrong places in order to build something right. Poetry is taking apart the puzzle and forcing the pieces into spaces they don't fit. I tried to write you a letter to tell you that I miss you, the problem with poetry is that there's no metaphor that makes this emptiness inside my chest any more beautiful. There's no personification real enough to make my sheets feel like you're laying in them. There's no simile literal enough to make my heart feel as though its healing. I wish I could place these words on my tongue and roll them out for you to hear, but since I've last kissed you I can't even find the motivation to part my lips. I always find myself questioning why I keep writing; because the problem with my poems is that you're never the one reading them.

We do not get a human life
Just for the asking.
Birth in a human body
Is the reward for good deeds
In former births.
Life waxes and wanes imperceptibly,
It does not stay long.
The leaf that has once fallen
Does not return to the branch.
Behold the Ocean of Transmigration.
With its swift, irresistible tide.
O Lal Giridhara, O pilot of my soul,
Swiftly conduct my barque to the further shore.
Mira is the slave of Lal Giridhara.
She says: Life lasts but a few days only.



Life in the world is short,
Why shoulder an unnecessary load
Of worldly relationships?
Thy parents gave thee birth in the world,
But the Lord ordained thy fate.
Life passes in getting and spending,
No merit is earned by virtuous deeds.
I will sing the praises of Hari
In the company of the holy men,
Nothing else concerns me.
Mira's Lord is the courtly Giridhara,
She says: Only by Thy power
Have I crossed to the further shore.

i walk on the unsteady floor
the sandy bottom slowly
moving beneath me
wildly i loose control
my feet slipping
i fall down
tearing up my body
the tears i push back
making the sea any wetter is not needed