Most mornings, my first waking thought is:, ”Life is the best gift anyone has ever received,
surpassed only by consciousness and freedom.”

When this happens, it’s impossible to leave
without first setting a plan to pursue
the sparks that ignite my ephemeral flame.
I want to leap with abandon, 
fill the day with never-befores, 
and share every last thing in my head.

But the long days have ways of reminding me
that I am a player
in the less existential realities of others.
That I chase fruitless romantic dreams.
That I am not truly free.
That if I don’t slow,
I will destroy every structure
that scaffolds my sturdy life.

But is it worth the fall?
I’m afraid that I might truly think it is.
When I feel that shine -
when I have that glimmer in reach -
when I’m intoxicated with the scent and the buzz -
when I begin to glow -
I really do.

But of course, I could be wrong.
And maybe my freedom is like a religion.
It feels real to me,
but all evidence points toward the contrary.

There are false idols in my room.
There are false idols in my head.
To idols, I have lent my life.
To idols, I have lent my bed.
Statues of the world I seek,
Semblances of what I know,
Truth has burnt its image here,
But ever floated on, its glow.
Holding tight to broken dreams
That crumble-crackle as I clutch,
I could have built them pinions fair
But I have strangled them too much.
Now fresh lucidity is here
To wake me from my sluggish sleep
Oh, glorious sanctity of light
Your mindful meaning I shall keep.

"I'm a synesthete," I said.
"The neurons lay close in my head.
I'm always mixing stimuli,
For example, letter 'A' is red.
For me, everything's got to be
In color, value, shade, and hue.
Sounds, tastes, names, words,
feelings, memories, people, you."

"Me?" he asked, so curiously,
(I knew the question held in store)
"What color do you think I'd be?"
(A question I've been asked before)
And though I've always answered true
And never been shy to reveal
A lavender, or slate, or blue
This time, I pause before I spill...

"You are the world in the golden hour.
Glittering, gleaming, and perfectly grand.
You are a paintbrush on every flower
Sweeping out across the land."

"You are a hillside dripping in honey,
Drenched in sweet, auriferous splendor.
I'm not sure how - but it's so funny -
You're the best iteration of every color."

"You're orange and red; an unwavering light,
Your name is a hopeful, amber belief,
You're apex of day, pinnacle of sight,
And my time in your glow is always too brief"

"Then, with the twilight's parting streams,
You are periwinkle memory.
Until you're the moon's reflective beams -
The pearlescent silver of my dreams."

And with a pang I realize,
That I should not have chattered such,
For anyone with ears or eyes
Can tell that I've revealed too much.

I struggle to hold myself up
(to a standard, to an ideal,
of self-care, self-respect,
and protection of heart)
But this is a slide
that I have no power over.
This force that pulls me -
(yes, this very idea has gravity)
- This force is unrelenting,
gnawing, sneaky, persistent,
not intentional or malicious,
simply inevitable.
It is a slow erosion
taking a mountain out to sea
when I look,
and a great landslide
swiftly collapsing
when I turn my back.
Where once,
I hung precariously,
I was at least secured
in a temporary equilibrium.
But now
just one cord snaps
and I am swinging,
falling,
a safety net not yet woven.

Lately
I **Long
for the Love
that I once Left
when I chose the Lonely
path of discovery and difficult Learning.

My
steps Melt
into the Miles
I tread when Meandering
round town each cloudy Morning
'til each crisp and tender Midnight

Softly
I Sing
the tender Songs
not meant for Solitude
and gently drop a Sigh
waiting patiently for another ripe Summer

The weight of the night is starting to settle on my shoulders
and everything is heavy and everything is breaking
And I’m honestly lying on the open carpet
Shifting between positions where I might not get sick
From a hangover of tears and sinking realizations
And my body aches badly where you pinched me too hard
Yes you’ve drawn some blood and left some scars
Yes you wanted too much and you clung too hard
But  it’s proof that you played an equal part
And that you cared to stop about as terribly much as a brush fire
cares about leaving the earth un-charred.

Today there is a veil upon my world:
A gauzy muting of sound,
A mist that’s permeated the corners of thought.

I know there is a crisp clarity outside:
a pounding passion in the sunlit world,
A million hues to roll in and embrace.

My tingly thought centers all recede:
Rejecting stimuli like adventurous taste buds
Recovering from exciting, scalding tea burns.

I just have to remember and accept:
Sometime there are going to be days like this.
Lazy, hazy.

He is in love with questions
And the lilting world of words,
With the fabric of philosophy
And the taste of fresh ideas.

He is in love with the smell of green
And the shifting sands of dreams,
With the hunt for profound moments
And the hunger-lust for purpose.

He is in love with his books
And the zodiacs cross the planet,
With patterns of chain reactions
And the way we cog and gear.

He is in love with pools of stardust
And fanciful notions of theory,
With darkness, deep and coveted
And the fabric it is made from.

He is in love with one who left
And the poisoned past he bathes in,
With being perpetually lonesome
And floating twixt life’s sabulous banks.

He is in love with memories, and the universe,
And nobody else.

With my choking heart, I’m grasping at dust,
And I am in love with him.

I chose to look closer into him than most do

My discernment found worlds in him that most would not

I clung tightly to pages of mystery bound by him-ness

Grasping at tendrils of smoke and mirrors

Looking between our hands for a hidden universe.

And then

Quite suddenly

I saw him:

Just skin and words and memories

I’d simply been looking through

To find reflections of myself

How relative is time
That when I have an address
Of where to send my thoughts
I may march through the days
With my coveted "tasks" of penship
Fulfilled
Yet when I lack this focal point
And fumble into doorless walls
Each dizzy cell zips about
With not a patient comfort, all
Panicked

I am loud,
Demanding attention.
I know when I am being charming
Because I try.
I put on my impressing face
And do my impressing hair
And speak my impressing words.
I tell you my embarrassing drinking stories
And everything else about me
That you probably shouldn’t know.

I am not good at being quiet
Because that’s not who I am.
I am not the sweet girl
Who will leave you with a smile
And a touch
And a glance
Or a single word.
There is nothing of this fashion of romance
About me.

I am the girl who will point out your flaws,
And take you outside to see the stars,
And remind you how human you are,
And what a wonderful thing that is.

I am the girl who will talk about science,
And music and theology and history,
And point out constellations, laughing,
When you don’t know the big dipper’s name.

I am the girl who will make witty references,
To classic literature and science fiction,
And will tell you stories of how I once,
Made a gingerbread replica of a lighthouse.

I am the girl who will stand on a table,
And sing at the top of my lungs on the highway,
And act like a chicken or quail or velociraptor,
Or nuzzle your face like a lion to make a point.

I am the girl who takes too many shots
And then coaxes you to bed on a Russian liver,
And knows all the right places to bite, and tease,
And follows with exceptionally coherent pillow-talk.

I am not a thin silk scarf on the wind.
I am not a thing hard to capture.
You would not spend a perilous journey
Through a wild, perfumed jungle,
Searching for my slender garments
Hung beside a pool
As I wail to the breeze.

Rather, I am the bird who flies overhead
Making too much noise
Distracting from the trail ahead.
A bird whose plumage proves
What an interesting life it must be…
What a colorful life for me…
Perpetually strange
The lone comic relief.

I am many things.
But I am not quiet.
Of this I am sure.

Infatuation.
It’s a girthy, 5-syllable word and you’re
In a fat, juicy, situation.

It’s a swollen, darkened fruit
That begs to be taken completely,
Flesh devoured entirely.

But it’s a trap.

The sweet and tangy blood of it
That dribbles down your chin
To your neck
To your *******
To your heart
To your stomach
To your hips
To your groin
To your ***
Down your thighs
To your nervous toes
Is not love.

Nobody wants to hear that.

But some day
- If you are incredibly lucky -
You will look at your maroon-stained palms
And the dry, sticky rivers of years running down your wrists
And laugh until you cry when you realize
That you could wash your whole body
Because love is not in the juice.

It is not your addiction,
Your summer picking,
Your hungry belly,
Your well of adrenaline,
Your rushing of heartbeats,
Your tangling of bodies,
Your jealousy, yearning,
Nor pride.

If you are incredibly lucky
You will suddenly know love.
As silent, simple, and strong
As the fabric of the universe itself.

My past is this landscape of places that I’ve only ever seen in documentaries;
It can’t exist but somehow it must.
Your eyes are these temples built high that have fallen into sandy desecration;
Though once worshiped, they have not stood the test of time.
I was once able to say you were my world.
I miss being so simple and wrong.
It was easier.
Back then.

I have made the night mine,
no longer asking,
"May I accompany you?"
Instead, inquiring
"Would you like to accompany me?"
I have made the forests mine,
no longer requesting
"May I show you this place?"
Instead, fielding
"Will you show me this place?"
I have made the mountains mine,
no longer begging
"When shall we go?"
Instead,
Filling my calendar,
Filling my backpack,
Filling my heart
with what is mine
And going.

In a daydream
You kissed me.
It was clumsy,
But measured.
Slow,
But thoughtful.
A gamble
To be mulled over.

In a night dream
You kissed me.
It was intentional,
And passionate.
Sudden,
And enveloping.
A fire
Coursing with the unspoken.

In a daydream
We are playful and cautious,
Determined to make it work.
In a night dream
We burn right up
Until there's nothing left.
And when I wake from either
I must calm my hopeful heart,
And hold dreams and reality
In places far apart.

I recognize loneliness
in myself
as an indicator light:
something is in need of change.

By myself,
it means that I have things to learn,
and more time alone
is the only way to tease them out.
I am never lonely too long
by myself.

With others,
it is so much harder to diagnose.
It is deeper, darker, and lonelier
with others.

In May
The forest
Erupts
In aromas
"Did you miss me?"
It teases.

The mountain
Peaks
Denuded
Of white shawls
Flirt
With the sun.

My body
Subsists
Efficiently
On fruit,
Nuts,
And clear, cool melt
In May.

There’s a rumbling a-coming
And yet I build my dreams from glass;
I hope you’ll peer through to find my face
Through the fancy, frosted, crystalline patterns.
You blew sparks into me that became novas;
Now they fuel my beaming eyes in the melt.
Watch as sands of time are blown into fragile fantasies
And yesterday’s memories twist their colors
Into improbable dragons and stars of tomorrows.
Glimpse me through my new frail fortress.
Keep watch as I hang tiny galaxies in the rafters.
These walls are your windows.
Use them well,
For the rumbling’s a-coming,
And I might need a savior
Who knows my dreaming face.

My sensibilities are broken,
How dare you turn me into this?
Learning to live without you
Is learning to live so dangerously.

Gone are the halcyon days of
Danger, danger...
Where’s my coffee?
I fell in love,
(That's what I do)
I fell,
before I ever knew
just what that kind of bitter was.
It tastes just like it always does,
And I can't keep it  longer
on my tongue.

Dear distant stranger,
I would like to get to know you
But I’m afraid
I’ve no more quarters for the telephone.
Oh well, I guess it’s not okay.
I’ll hotwire my way anyway.
I guess I’m getting sorta good
at being where I know I shouldn’t.

I guess I never really saw you as vulnerable
With love all around
But now I see you’re just as broken.
(Well that’s just my luck this round).
And I guess I could be a life preserver,
But honey that’s not my job,
And I’d grow weary-sick of *******
-Need to wash the neon orange off-
Well, you wouldn’t want it anyway.
Flounder, drown your dreams away.

Look at me and look at you too,
I’ve made you an animal in the zoo.
I’m gawking,
Always do this,
Talking,
Like ‘Come on now, let's do this’.

Shut up and break these tiny voices
Telling me what I ought to do.
Convince me that there is no cycle
And that I'm not just
Giving my life to people
and my heart to their ideas.

I would like
To witness you in another habitat,
And childishly pester you at work,
And awkwardly make pointless conversation-
Just enough to keep you wondering
If I came to see you or not.

I would like
To delicately undress your mind,
And walk up out of nowhere,
And playfully invite with a coy little smile-
To discuss your philosophy
Under the mundane guise of “coffee”.

I would like
To introduce my spirit to yours,
And let them circle each other in the park,
And sniff out each other’s aetherous attributes-
Perhaps initiating a game of fetch
Between two nervous systems.

I would like
To steal a busy night away,
And show you all my mundane wonders,
And see what you have to say-
Could you ascend truths in my walls
Unbeknownst even to me?

I would like
To be perfectly forward,
And say “You sparkle and intrigue me,
And I would like to get to know you better,” -
Do people do that?
I would like to.

Being with you
Means I don't have to imagine
What it would be like
And I can just be.
Being with you
Means I don't have to worry about
What you really think,
When to time my words,
Or if you'd kiss me.
I know that
You will tell me what you can,
My words can tumble without stopper,
And we won't touch.
My wild imagination must be tamed
Or it will plumb the deepest depths
And climb to treacherous precipices.
Being with you
Quiets this beast.
Being with you
Is always better, brighter, and steadier
Than I imagine.

The birds residing in my heart
Did beat their wings with such force
There was nothing but the beating
So many beats all out of sync
Throbbing. Thumping. Racing.
Finally, I opened my mouth
And one by one they each did fly out
and soar
and my heart grew lighter.
After many hours,
one by one they returned to roost,
folded their wings, and tired,
tucked back into my heart.
A mass of gently moving feathered bodies
Whirring with a soft, electric hum.

I close my eyes
to try to make it as dark as I can
to shut out the light from the hall
from the street lamp
from my alarm.
To make it as dark as the sky
that we lay beneath.
I re-populate the darkness with the pinpricks we know so well.
Would you give me permission
to do more than imagine,
to accompany you out to the open dark
of the plains and the mountain tops,
if only to spend the hours it takes to get there,
voices alight,
learning your favorite things,
and then hours under the stars
in awestruck silence?
Excited breathing. Buzzing. Elation.
A late and innocent night
on the edge of dawn.
I open my eyes
To the headache of the hall light,
the street lamp,
my blinking alarm.

I just want to delicately cull my favorite blossoms from your mind
Until I've traveled the neural networks so,
That you might later allow my feral traipsing.
I just want to throw our backpacks in the backseat
And take a careless adventure
Wild. Jovial. Unbridled.
I just want to take you out from this fencing
To see you in new surroundings once more
To abandon labels, structure, and facades.
I just want to admire your strengths and your work
That you have shaped with your hands,
your will,
your individual cut.
I just want to take you out
To the open road
To see what you would shout,
how reckless you would be,
what abandon you could inspire in me.
I just want to do human things with you.
I want to enjoy pure moments of our nature.
I want to feel the Earth move with you.

I’m afraid for you to leave
Because when you’re gone
You won’t fit in any of the little picture-frames
I’ve built for you in my mind.
The edges will be blurry
And I’ll be losing part of the picture of you.

I’m afraid for you to leave
Because when you’re gone
You’ll continue to find all the beautiful new things
and you’ll try to shrug away the old.
You’re still learning to live;
It will hurt too much to keep this fresh.

I’m afraid for you to leave
Because when you’re gone
I’ll have one less thing that draws me to the hills
And the valleys and rivers of home.
Now that you too have heard the call
To venture from the blanket we’ve woven.

I’m afraid for you to leave
Because when you’re gone
You’ll find that you can never really come back
No matter how much your heart complains.
The world is too vast and you’re too young
To live amongst the things you love.

I’m afraid for you to leave.
I’m afraid, most of all,
Because when you’re gone…
Despite all the beautiful things that you’ll find
And despite all the lessons you’ll learn over time
And despite the new loves and new dreams that await
And despite the fresh views that new places create
And DESPITE that your conscience will blossom and bloom
And despite that new life and new love you’ll exhume…
I’m afraid of one thing, and it’s breaking my heart
To be scared, when you’re daring this brand-new start…

I’m afraid your long glance is the last that I’ll see.
I’m afraid that you’ll never come back to find me.

Let's breathe.
Let's place our feet in the mud
and count the birds' songs without numbers
but with our souls
Let's let the branches speak to us,
the moon flood our skin,
the sun flood the land,
the flood chisel the river,
the bed grow to include us
Let's see life so precious circumnavigating
pushing on differently a little changed
Soon we succumb to the same
So laugh with a grim love and peace
that you come from the sun
sister the moon
become the mud
and the branch
that the circadian chatter of birds
will serenade
as we breathe.

Like treading water
Like waking from dreams
to find the day hazy and surreal
Like the inability to stem
the begging hunger
that threatens to rend
polite tasks asunder
Is waiting to return
to the mountains
and real life
with you.

I keep creating
impossible lists
to save myself
from listlessness,
of books to read
and things to do,
for I know the only
way out is through.

The photo you took
and then gave to me
still hangs framed
above the altar,
next to the calendar.
Should I have taken it down
when your words slipped away?
Perhaps.
But it hangs as a reminder
to hope
for Lovely, Wonderful,
Improbable things.

He creates miracles
And I don't know how to handle it.
I want to show him off,
But he is not mine to share.
A rare, crafted magic
Flows forth from his clever hands
Turning the world around him
Into banks to hold rivers of the stuff.
I am not the only one stymied and awed.
How then, am I alone,
With my strongly beating heart
Watching as he creates miracles?

There are moments that wake you up
That knock you squarely
from what once passed as reality
into a new frame of being.

These are the moments,
When the Milky Way
snaps into perfect clarity,
When a breeze off a creek
whispers the cyclical secrets of its past,
When perfect music or perfect silence
replaces the voices in your ears,
When your hand is held with care
and you're electrically grounded,
When you're suddenly in existential peace
with all of your fears.

These are momentary lapses in the definite -
Brief flashes of eternal significance
in the obvious meaninglessness of life.
Moments that transcend the inevitability of death.
A reason for existing in a reasonless existence.

My ribcage:
Full, then hollow,
Snatches of memory,
then fear,
Press, snag, then release,
Like Breathing.
Heavy, ponderous breathing.

Like a new leaf
Turned over,
And blooming in spring,
Some days
I'll grow
With the light.
But all new leaves
Require rain to grow,
So some days
Will pour
I know.
And when storms break
And I'm fighting
In the dark,
Feeling like I did
In the fall,
I'll shake,
Draw a breath,
Take a sip,
Find a spark,
And give thanks
That I'm growing
At all.

It’s 6:08 AM
and 6 degrees Fahrenheit outside.
My window sweats on the inside and
a truck motor runs on the street for ten minutes
working to defrost its inner cargo.
The frosty hills are still dark as hell.
Somewhere hours away you’re waking up
choking for coffee and running off
moved by the efficient early metro buses,
the graying slush,
and the misty chandelier of streetlamps.
Maybe next winter you’ll be here
to coax me to put down the books
before the too-long awaited dawn.

Until then,
Good morning.
Goodnight.

Finding twigs in my hair
From where I impulsively rolled in the grass.
Ha.
Should have known that days of summer
Were too good not to pass.

Oh, red Mars,
So close in space and mind,
Your presence stirs a storm here,
As above you fall behind.
Oh, retrograding god,
You wage your wars in me,
My choices all are second-guessed,
Devoid of certainty.
Oh, oxidizing plains,
Hung high in glowing sight,
You're far from the abrasive truths,
That I must face tonight.

Oh Summer,
Would that you would make me your bride,
For l'll come back to you endlessly,
Body and soul
Brimming to full
With the deepest parts of me
Both at peace and at play,
Consistently
Sun-kissed,
Wind-blown,
Soaked in halcyon brightness
To the bone,
This divine passion
Never fully served
By memory alone.
Oh Summer,
My truest love,
Would that with you I could stay,
For I hold you in heart year-long,
And pine all the while you're away.

One of these days, the glimmer in your eye that knocks me out will actually break me,
And then my words and reservoir of tears will shatter into shards of truth
That stick into and stain your hands when you apologetically try to sweep them up.

It’s not a ******* secret that I live for the hours that I can pretend that maybe,
One of these nights, I’ll be with you in more than just my mind and yours
As you grip the banister to ascend to silken sheets and wine-fed dreams.

I bite my tongue so words don’t leak, and lick my lips so as to keep them here,
Rather than the curving place behind your ear… the stalwart jaw… the capable lips that draw me near…
The things I’d do were waters clear…

The answer’s written in an inky, contractual ultimatum that squashes the fruit of imagination.
And yet, a fierce, poisonous force rises from the depths of a desirous ***** within,
And whispers to me that with contracts, there are ways to blot, smear, and tear. It scares me.

I lock it in a closet of infectious notions that I’ll slowly dematerialize with clean blood,
But rivers of the stuff won’t run clear when they’re magnetized so close to the sin
That doesn’t feel like sin, and that beckons as a beacon of bright and beautiful things.

It’s a difficult conclusion to arrive at: I must be the bad guy.
I am the mind’s mistress, the secret-almost-lover, the temptation, the promise, the snake…
Yet also the forgotten, the disappointed, the frustrated, the one who MUST keep control, the Saint.

We both know that I’ll keep floating back; my curiosity, passion, fascination, and need to learn and share
Will always countervail the weight of my exasperation and guilt-laden vexation,
Until one of these days when the glimmer in your eye that knocks me out actually breaks me.

My eyes fly open
And flick to the light
This time your ghost
Has stayed the night.
Your smiles and laughter
In dreams I've kept,
But I've held too long
And overslept.