I took my lyre and said:
Come now, my heavenly
tortoise shell: become
a speaking instrument

"So surely is she mine," you say, and turn
Your quick and steady mind to harder things--
To bills and bonds and talk of what men earn--
And whistle up the stair, of evenings.
And do you see a dream behind my eyes,
Or ask a simple question twice of me--
"Thus women are," you say; for men are wise
And tolerant, in their security.

How shall I count the midnights I have known
When calm you turn to me, nor feel me start,
To find my easy lips upon your own
And know my breast beneath your rhythmic heart.
Your god defer the day I tell you this:
My lad, my lad, it is not you I kiss!

My father made a new friend
Mother does not approve of.
Draped in orange and white,
bears a fire in her he cannot handle.

But with lips pressed against her
he took in her hidden ugliness.
She was too clingy.
He said,
"I can't breathe."

Those three words became the worst we'd ever heard
right behind
"You have cancer."

Time became a distant tune;
waiting,
waiting,
waiting.

My father has expiration dates
tattooed under his eyelids.
He plans his funeral like the 50th birthday party he will never get
but there will be too much blurry vision and black,
no one will know the difference.

to be alive
is all
I ever wanted

and the desert
set me
free

unencumbered
light
dancing

with star
filled
eyes