I dare not listen to the news.
I squeeze my eyes shut and refuse.

Torrential cries and senseless violence
I look past to hold my silence.

Is this so wrong?
It's not as if
My worrying the world will shift.

I do not know if it is right,
But I will skip the news tonight.

My soul cries out for truest peace
But flesh trades rest in mindless ease.

My soul, it yearns for truest love
But flesh says pleasure is enough.

My soul will strain for freedom dear
But flesh holds comfort out of fear.

My soul will long to show pure love
But my flesh decides it's done enough.

My soul wants selfish thoughts to break
But my flesh will live to only take.

"Enough," my soul arose and said,
"I will not rest 'til Flesh is dead.

"It can't be done in just a day,
But I will fight and find a way.

"I'll struggle hard as it holds on
And grapple with in 'till the dawn."

I'm choosing not the path of ease.
Now I will fight for truth and peace.

Bleak when I'm gone            from your embrace
Grey is the sense                   without your taste
Mistiness                                instead of blood
And when it bleeds              it's like the sun

Those aimless roads             they end with you
A moment's touch                to fill me through
Drowsy eyes                          and still I gaze
Reach to your chest              perhaps too late

Is my body an
expensive house:

Should I be careful?
Lock my doors?

For days flooded with sun and days shining with rain
For suffocating joy and blinding pain
For hallways left empty, for rooms full of laughter
For dark raging storms and the light that comes after
For the pounding music that leaves pounding aches
For frustration and accidents and every mistake
For walls that tell stories and the stories not told
For jokes between friends that never grow old
For bright blues of the day and dark blacks of the night
For little things, big things, and in-between things alike
For those brought together and those torn apart
For stars in our eyes and love in our hearts.

I want you to know,
Oh, I wish you knew,

That I still miss that smile,
I still miss you.

I still miss your touch,
I really miss your kiss.

I miss your hands holding mine,
And that feeling of bliss.

I miss your laugh,
I miss your look,

I miss the drawings you did
In that old beat-up sketchbook.

I miss the Tuesdays,
I miss the Sundays,

I miss the good morning texts,
Except for on Mondays.

I miss the alley,
And the field below.

I even miss your annoying brother,
And your black lab, Shadow.

I miss you and,
I wish you were still here.

But what I miss the most is
When you still held me near.

How could such a tiny flower
over my heart have so much power

You will always have my heart
it was yours right from the start

this awful summer heat
makes me feel like a piece of meat

thrown on an open fire
I surely will expire

You can hear my moans
as it burns me to my bones

I don't like this at all
I am so ready for the Fall

I love to sit in the bogs
and listen to the frogs

I love to hear the sound
as they hop upon the ground

Their croaks "music to my ears"
it always brings me to tears

The place I like to romp
inside the darkened swamp