Do not tread here,
Not on this land.
These grasses hide graves,
This dirt is a death-land.
If you must walk this desolate space,
Step carefully, travel light.
If you're not nimble,
This journey may be your last.
Adding another body,
To this grim grass.

Last night my poem hit 10,000 degrees,
Does that mean I burned myself a place in HP?
Or am I still on the path of becoming,
Hoping to get a lucky stroke and blow up?
Almost everything I post gets a reaction now,
I'm a name people know,
But does that make me somebody though?
What if I'm an actor,
Just playing his part,
I'll disappear when the director yells, 'Scene!'
If my art is recognized,
I've accomplished something real,
While living a dream.
But I am author enough,
That I could have a career in this?
Or will I start this journey,
But hear them yell, 'Dismissed!'

I journey towards the night
watching the light recede.
Awaiting me, an unsteady
dreamscape of losing
things and beings
and never finding them.

But, there is also the ocean,
of waves cradling me to sleep
with the lullaby of my name’s
repetition- marooning me  
from the sound of others,
the fears, anxieties to come.

Yet, my unconscious tugs me
towards the new tomorrow, forcing
my drowsy mind to count backwards
from sixty to one, until the gravity and  
heaviness retreats into the
light and life to come—

the awakening that  turns
the dark blue inside to light blue sky,
the rising eastern glow that is
the morning star affirming
to my eyelids that this dark life
was just a dream of my fretful mind.

Awaiting me, the to-do list of my morning:
the ritual of the toilet, scale, finger ******,
Psyllium powder stirred in water, catering
to my dog’s and wife’s love language of
gourmet kibble and Nescafe— an  A.M.  life
measured out in watery tablespoons of love.

The cadence of my feet lives itself out in
thirty steps and half minute treks, a sacred
pitter-patter in rhythm with my breath that
allows the traumas of the past- the dead, the
cancers, the broken houses destroyed and rebuilt-
to exist in hidden memories and bad dreams.

1
On that night, pierced by the sound of rain,
Everything is possible...
When one is washed in cognac,
Drenched in sorrow,
Haunted by the unknown...
And when one refuses to remain a stone.
So why—
Do you consult the coffee cups?
Why—
Do you ask the endless questions?
And why—
Did you come to the sea,
If you fear the journey?

2
Between October and October,
Like the warm sugar flowing from the heart of fruit...
Leave your fate to God, and sleep.
For your ******* come into this world by destiny,
And by destiny, they fade away...

3
Love will come in its time...
So wear your Egyptian caftan.
I now recall the cotton fields of the Delta...
Sit wherever you like,
For the piano concerto
Will erase time,
Erase you,
Erase me,
And erase the burdens we have carried since birth.
Love will come in its time...
And passion will come in its time...
For the piano concerto
Washes all things in camphor and oil,
Melts the ice off the faces of lakes,
Summons strange butterflies,
And brings forth fields anew.
So let things be natural... effortless...
For the piano concerto
Finds its own solutions.
Love will come in its time...
And the piano...
Will call us into its watery chamber,
And I do not know what it will say...

4
Everything is possible...
On that night, pierced by the sound of rain.
Tchaikovsky—
Now passes like a bird through Petersburg’s squares,
Slipping like a green dream from Montparnasse,
Drifting through the memory of roses,
Gathering the yellow leaves of Europe's forests,
Praying in Hagia Sophia,
Weeping in the sacred halls of Najaf,
Between mirrors and golden domes...

5
Everything is possible...
On that night, pierced by the sound of rain.
So wear your Kurdish caftan...
I do not know why—
But I recall Mosul in spring,
The water reeds swaying in the marshes,
The orchards of Al-Rasafa,
And the writings God inscribes
In roses and gold,
Upon the palm fronds of Shatt Al-Arab
At sunset...

6
Good morning, jasmine... are you well?
The piano concerto
Lit the fire for us... then vanished.
Now, I recall the orchards of Al-Rasafa,
The shanashil that line the banks of Al-A’zamiyah,
And the writings God inscribes
In roses and gold,
Upon the palm fronds of Shatt Al-Arab
At sunset...

7
Good morning, jasmine... are you well?
The piano concerto
Lit the fire for us... then vanished.

It’s time to begin something new.
Something small that never grew.
It’s time to bury something old.
A long story far overtold.

Blackened
In shadows deep, where silence reigns, A journey marked by unseen chains.
Through corridors of night we tread, Seeking solace in the dread.
The echoes linger, cold and stark, In every heart, a lasting mark. To depths unknown, we cast our gaze, In twilight's grip, we lose our ways.
Enticed by voids, we break the ties, In newfound space, where darkness lies.
With every step, a story traced, In haste we move, yet time erased.

You would say something about the push and pull of every day. And we would plop down with ideas. Think of this and think of that.
Throwing words like imagine and wouldn't it be amazing out into the open. You would even make plans, with patterns and colours for something to go on your wall, your own wall, whenever you'd have a wall. How many of those open docs do you have on your computer, with half-finished chapters and riveting denouements? I know it's hard to believe the people we once used to be. And sometimes fistfuls of carpet can feel like your only way to grip onto the world. Sometimes it feels easier to tear yourself limb from limb than look for your voice. It feels easier to sink into your bed, asleep or searching for sleep than to walk the miles ahead. Waking up every morning, de-shelling yourself, and stepping outside of who you are and used to be can make your bones ache deeply. There isn't much to say about the push and pull of everyday, except that there is a wall, your wall, and it's blank.

There are no stars in the daylight.

Aren’t we all equal
No matter the journey?

Some will burn out quicker
Than others.

Others will shine as long as they
Need to—even though they’ve

Had enough.

We need to be here for each other,
Making sure flames don’t die,

But don’t do it for the night alone.

In this ceaseless, surprising journey,
it seems unthinkable
that you could ever flicker out.

You drift through thoughts,
piercing the event horizon,
touching the impossible,
deflecting off the wall.

You turn back along cosmic paths,
your photons comprehend
the nature of who we are—
a sum of chance and fate,
woven into living threads,
floating endlessly
in the tender night.