You were never mine
But my heart is always yours.

~for betterdays, and all Aussies~


the fires massifs all around, the smokes surrounds,
the house invaded with closed-out-of-college students,
mother and father who are similarly workless, a fire bounty,
all this a treat to an nine year old (no school) boy and his dog

newly self-appointed ringleader, the little boy,
in his fire heaven, with a gang to command, to entertain,
some adults, silly college students, who don’t know “no,”
when he says this is the game we are playing next

this vignette, is not a Manhattan variety^
but an insight story heard, unwitnessed, but of
those who tell the tale, unwittingly, of finding small joys
amidst sky-full clouds, all grayed bunting of burning stink

few wiser than my old, tired and smokey clouded eyes,
though, one yet detects those who are truly not lost,
those who are found, and those who will find them all,
and lead them to the safest places inside themselves

and my heart and brain, at last in unison,
forgives the restless adults who with grownup worries,
yet can! just barely detect those mini joy-rivulets among the whiffs
of destruction and bravery, losses and new hands extended

So I ask, Mum, what game shall we play next?

Perhaps, Noah’s Ark?

took double what
the label said;
first time
kinda scary
kinda don't care;
yet appropriate too
he needed to go
away

The blonde girl in my first class
Shares the same planner habits as me
Invited me to a party, my first
I watched a clock tick away
In tandem to music six blocks down
The girl, my “name twin”
In geology lab, playing with rocks
We traded phone numbers
She has her own group of friends
I sit by myself three rows up
The girl sitting across from me
Effortlessly thin, stark tattoos
We think and feel so similarly
She just made a friend, so
I only ask what they did for fun
A coworker, moving states away
I thought she was a cool Cali girl
Brunette ice princess
She hugged me on her last day
Now I smile at her 3AM Instagram selfies
At opportunities, I tried to jump
Misjudged the distance and fell instead
I scraped up my hands, leaving scars
I’ll remember you, years later
You who could have been a friend

I've thought about it
countless times,
how you could have just
admitted awkwardly,
that this is what we are, only ever
up to here, this overgrown unseeable
space between us
you see, perplexes me
I like you,
unuttered words
between a coward and a skeptic.

Maybe it's not
The world's best idea
To drive down today
And go to a **** beach