I come from the cracked sidewalks of Chi-town, stoops
where we sat baking in blistering sun, listening
for the bells of the bicycles, so bold & eager for change
we could plop on the counter of the corner store.

In the constant drone of the deli, Italian grandpas
convened in their drab plaid, pressed khakis — coursing
the quiet confidence that comes from living that life
in the fast lane, simmering to a peace that permeates
each measured step. The bowls of minestrone soup
to warm their old bones: dead dreams reigniting.

I come from the family that never had anything
to own — but still didn’t allow me to go hungry.
I come from a steaming plate of sizzling
homemade dumplings, each juicy morsel
containing a mother’s fierce love for family.

I come from a long line of trauma responses
and the healing that only comes from truly creating.
I come from a great-grandmother, a grandmother,
a mother that poured out even when the jagged pieces
cut up our throats coming up. I come from having

lost my entire mind, frenzied forces pushing
my body up against a cold psych wall, no escape
in sight for me. I come from the guilt I'd held
for far too long, for missing the entire first
month of my daughter's life on this earth
when I couldn't even take care of myself.

Somewhere in the midst of coming to the end
of myself, I found You. You had never left.
I came home, battered and so broken, and You
enveloped me in Your healing Light. Selah.  



I’m walking in restoration, deep restoration,
a coursing river engorged with living water.
I finally allow myself to be fully immersed
in the wellspring that never runs dry. And there, fully
surrendered in the depths, I find that I can finally breathe.

I did not board the train this time
its whistle soft as a wish I once made
before learning the cost of arrival

There were other hands to hold,
small rooms to fill with quiet work,
a garden of dreams still waiting to bloom
in the soil I help tend each day

The map stretched wide with longing,
but I folded it neatly beside the bills,
between the unopened letters
and the list of things love asks us to carry

Not all journeys begin when the door opens.
Some begin when we choose to stay—
when we say: not yet,
with a voice that still believes in someday

Let the wind have its turn
Let the stars wait a little longer
What is meant for me
will find me walking—
with full hands,
and an open heart

It is so boring yet alluring,
So strong and weak in just a nick of time,
To drive all night without hesitation,
To come back in the morning with a broken spine.
To switch the role of a conqueror to victim,
And juggle stories to make up a perfect line.
In retrospect, come up with better answers,
To realize it's all a waste of time.
It is a moment of complete misunderstanding,
To fill the cranium with what is wiser to be off.
There is an end that points to the beginning of a new axis,
It turns upwards, completing the dimension of a cartboard box.

It is not gullible as paper, still able to be molded and reshaped.
One day a hopeless sufferer surrenders
And talks oneself out of the noxious place.
Outside the box, imagination blossoms peacefully
Without the coerced necessity to play within the walls.
New tales embark on unexpected journeys
Demanding the narrator be an explorer to behove.
To find out better moments in decisions.
To finish pointless crushing of the bones.
There is a start that shifts the living
After the point of no return.

The rocky vessel
I’ve stood on
My whole life

Still leaves me swaying—
Though I’ve since stepped
Onto land.

'Twas but three years ago
I set my pen to sea, a vessel born
a fragile craft of ink and fervent flame
with compass cast in yearning, not in security

The waves lapped soft with secrets,
a few saddening,
fewer sweet.

Each line cast: a current pulling at my feet
no charts existed
no charts exist
for waters this deep nor wide
where poets dream,
struggle,
fight,
cry,
accept

and ancient myths
shared from one to the next
reside

The sky, a parchment vast with thousands of drifting stars
drew constellations shaped like hopeful scars

i
you
we,
search for love – the poet’s atlantis
a realm where whispered truths and passions flow


clouds
like veils
concealed what lay ahead
storms were born from longing
words went unsaid
crucial words
I chased reflections that danced on the waves
illusions
forged in the poet’s unforgiving mind

the siren’s song – a melody of doubt –
called me close
not once, but repeatedly
–
somewhere
I know
Janus smiles
–
called me close then took away my sound
took away my hearing, and my voice.
and what was it that was so alluring?
the shimmer? the glint? the gleam?
or just the ghost of a forgotten dream?

Ink dripped like rain upon my weathered scroll,
a log of my journeys,
a testament to my voyages,
each line, each stanza, each poem,
an ebb of the sea carrying me ever further on my path

There, at the ocean’s floor
lost in fragments,
scattered arrays —
a compass
broken,
fractured remnants

one night
tides of silence
waves of wait
the poet’s curse
the lover’s fate

until

a flash, a beacon–
love’s distant flame–
guided through tempest,
called my name.

–
still it glows
a lighthouse, for all ships
that pass
–

not all who wonder
sink or drown
not all condemned to be a poet,
a lover,
a feeler,
are left to fall
fall
fall
ever lower into the depths of the cold
dark
deep
waters.


Beneath the veil of night,
a whisper grew
a secret kept
only silence knew.
the heart, a vessel sailing starry seas
found shore where love’s soft voice
dissolved unease

no longer lost amid the waves and foam,
the poet’s quest
had brought him safely home
adorning not treasure, nor gold, nor gems
but a reason to put down the pen
a reason to discern
the clouds from the storm


I stepped onto sands
warm beneath my feet
where time and tides and two hearts
met

a poet’s journey
ended

for now, when he
causes the ink and parchment to embrace
once more
it is not for the same cause as once was
–
to express his discomfort,
drifting about on the waters:
his only support;
a 4 legged stool,
built solely to hold his skeleton-
but never built to bear the rest
–
but rather to express
the dilation of his pupils
as dawn approaches, and the
the morning spills like
honeyed gold;
a whispered warmth the
night can’t hold.



the ink now flows from calmer, steadier hands
the poet, now having resigned himself
to the discomfort of the ocean
finally lands.

–
She is my peace
her arms my warmth
her smile my joy
her love, my home.
--

Remembering the shadows
Staring at the footprints left behind,
All through the journey—
A heart filled with regrets,
And eyes pouring futility.

Can’t blame the seasons,
No use cursing the mirror.
Life’s been falling like a dried leaf,
And the mind is filled with chaos.

Still, there’s a calmness in the silence,
And regrets hold a deeper meaning.
Fallen leaves enrich the soil—
Where new life begins.