last winter
at a downtown coffee shop
I sat on the bar stool near the window

I watched the people on the sidewalk
pulling their coats and scarves around their necks
keeping the wind out

I sipped a peppermint tea, a temporary comfort,
and watched
as they entered their apartment towers
moments later, high up, a window would light up with a yellow glow

a far away
warm, bright, home

and I’m looking at them, and I know, that I should go on
to wherever it is that hearts go on to
that it’s not doing me any good to sit here
wishing for a brightness of my own

but,

what’s hope for if not this?
I’m not sorry
I can’t be sorry
I won’t be sorry
that I’m going to stay awhile
looking at the lights in the windows
of everyone else’s home

The section i find most difficult to articulate
Whilst of minimum complexity,
Sparking such innate debate.

Scorning my own persona’s voided,
True personality remaining avoided.

Each multifaceted side of mine plenty,
Evoking analysis of my true identity.

I am everybody yet nobody,
I am everything yet nothing.

Constant contemplation of reality
(though part of my normality)
Evoking analysis of my true identity.

I envision each person i encounter,
-though see the tormented oh so clear.
Each time drawn into to the tempest like vortex,
Of another quite so mutually complex.

I am everybody yet nobody,
I am everything yet nothing.

What About Me

Did you think about me when you gave her apart of me?
when you were searching for your heaven in her,
did you truly feel at peace?
Did you feel what you wanted to feel?
taste what you were craving for?
Did you ever think in that moment
about me?

Wiping Out A Planet

Will it be called a plan-out
Or continue as a planet?
The question
Mass extinction:
Holocausts that came about
Five times before, long, long ago.
We know when where and how
And still we don’t believe it’s happening now,
Right now.
The cause not asteroid, volcano, no!
The cause ambition, greed and wars;
In other words:
Expansion and the chain that follows:
Degradation moral, ethical most subtle -  
For all causes have effects long term.
I squirm
At the prognosis.

Wiping Out A Planet 7.11.2016
Our Times, Our Culture II; Circling Round Nature II;
Arlene Corwin

She was beautiful but
she was sad.
And I know you think this is just another
poem about a girl and it is but
I just need to tell someone about how
loved she was now that she
can’t hear me.

And I don’t think she ever could,
not when I told her I
liked her hair not when I
held her hand not even when I
kissed away the tears on her
freckled cheeks as she looked at me with
those eyes so haunting they keep me awake at night,
all her brilliance beaten and caged and it showed
whenever she smiled but I knew she was somewhere else.

And at some point she
retreated into herself,
a golden castle dark inside, a
much-touched body that had felt the caresses of
many a passing hand
now a prison of skin that
repulsed her.

And the boys still looked at her in the halls
and the men still looked in the street.
They still reached for her,
touched her but
she never felt it never even
knew how they dreamt of the feel of her phantom body
on theirs.

And it wasn’t long before
she slipped through my fingers too.
And it’s funny how I thought I knew her best,
thought I wasn’t like the rest of them
and yet I never expected the call, the message from her
crying and saying
forgive me, I
hope you can and the drop
of the receiver from her shaking hand and
where was I?
In my
car with
roses on the seat next to me and a
sad song on the radio and the
stupid thought that I alone could
make her better.

Life is an splendid source.
A kiss can hack our heart.
A hug can cure sadness.
A Smiley, move clouds,
For a brighter day.