Christmas music echoes off the walls.
Apple cinnamon candles fills the halls.

A mistletoe for every absent kiss.
To remember those who we miss.  

A memoir to commemorate the old days.
The way to honor our ancestral ways.

Traditions pay homage to those who have passed.
To let them know our love will out last.

isolation's comforting; none here to object

memories do hold
a thousand feelings
that linger in our hearts
and make us feel alive

a sunny morning
reminds me of the time
where I made him smile
because of a cheesy burger in exchange of his hard disk drive

a windy afternoon
when I first heard
him deliver his corny joke
while he fixes a subscriber's telephone line

a gloomy 3 pm
when he drove to see me
hold back my tears
for a friend that failed to battle for his life

a quiet sunset
where he gave me
his birthday gift
and watch me as I open it with delight in my smile

a rainy night
where we both ate
our take-out McDonald's inside his car
as we listen to the radio and held hands

wistful I say,
that these kind of days
remind me of my
one great love

I'm from hate and discontent,
from words so caustic that they burn after 35, 40, 45, 50 years.
I'm from nowhere and everywhere,
I'm from nine schools and fourteen houses.

I'm from "You'll make new friends,"
and "Quit crying, we didn't live there that long."
To the KFC Christmas and "They're too old for a tree anyway."

I'm from slammed doors, and curse words and silent treatments.
I'm from high expectations, icy glares, straight A's, and disappointment.
I'm from 800 miles of claustrophobic silence in the family car and 18 years with no vacations.

AND

I'm from lazy days at the family farm
and hard-*** work a few years later.
I'm from rides on the tractor with Grandpa,
and watching the illegal sabong... with the sheriff.

I'm from Uncle Martin and Mary Lou,
and the tiny apartment with the swimming pool.
I'm from the mean man in number 9 screaming at us to be quiet
and Uncle Martin telling him to, "Shut the Hell Up!"

I'm from David and Richard, my cousins, my brothers
I'm from poison oak adventures at the creek
and countless days at the beach

AND

I'm from Gentile and Jew,
From Asian and White,
From Catholic and ****.

I'm from St. Patrick's, the old church.
I'm from stained glass and wooden kneelers,
incense, and Latin Mass.
I'm from Ego te absolvo and Dominus Vobiscum

I'm from tradition and sanctity,
dignity and peace.

I'm from Hellfire and Brimstone
Screaming, Bible pounding preachermen who are slain in the Spirit,
babble in tongues, and exhort the congregation to be "Washed in the Blood of the Lamb".

AND

I'm from love and loss,
and love again

I'm from Lisa, and Donna, and Carole,
the girls who were far too pretty to have been my friends (but were)
I'm from Jaki who wrote me letters letters every two days
and sometimes more,
and Laurie
and Kelly.

I'm from Cardinal and Gold
from Conquest and Traveler,
from the dorm and the Row.

I'm from 90,000 screaming idiots,
I'm from Greek Week and road trips,
and long nights in the reference section.
I'm from typewriters, card catalogs, and white out.

AND

I'm from gritty men and terrible places.
I'm from peace, and war, and peace, and war again.
And peace - with war thundering in the distance.

I'm from the cold wet ground on cold wet nights,
and I'm from blisters upon blisters; blood and water.

I'm from the Blacksheep, the Alphabots, and the Ranger Creed.
I'm from the M-249, the 203, and the A-2.
I'm from Colt, not Beretta; that's the M-1911,
and I'm proudly from jungle fatigues and black berets.

AND

I'm from a fateful encounter on a random night
an order of pizza and beer that would change our lives
Days together and weeks apart
Time didn't matter
She'd captured my heart.

I'm from loyalty and faith,
Trust and honor.
I'm from a small ceremony,
nothing to big or too fancy,
and groomsmen carrying guns, pagers, and foreign passports.

I'm from odd jobs and uncertainty and graduate school
I'm from UPS and PKP, and Summa *** Laude,
MISD, WM, and the birth of Anthony.

I'm from safety patrol and tug-of-war,
Accelerated math, now Maria's born.

I'm from the Blonde Mafia, the Bumblebees,
the Shopping Girls, and the Ubermensch.
From 14, and F, and back to 14, and 15.
Principals Emerson, Anthony, Blix, and Mellish.

AND

I'm from the Middle School
and teaching only math until
I'm teaching math and tech until
I'm teaching math and tech and study skills until
I'm teaching tech and study skills and more tech until
I'm teaching tech and study skills and media and Spanish until
I'm teaching tech, tech, tech, media, and Spanish with
Principals Miller and Budzius and Lucas and Stone

I'm from the animé girls and the theater crew
From the gamers and poets and dreamers
From the introverts and hackers, autistic kids and slackers
I'm from the kids who don't fit anywhere....
Neatly

(To be continued)

I write poetry
in the midst of solitude

of infinite miseries
I yearned to elude

words engraved
in a rose-kissed canvas

are fragments of hidden
memoir of the past.

The blue squares were safe.
The white squares were lava.
The cool kids huddled in their corners were irrelevant.

It didn't matter where I was going
or what I was exploring.
Maybe ancient pyramids,
perhaps a dinosaur dig.
Probably "the jungle," wherever that was.
I always changed my mind half-a-dozen times.
It didn't matter where I went
because I could handle every adventure
all by myself.

The benches were safe.
The wood chips were lava.
The crawl space under the rock wall was my escape pod.

My crew both was and wasn't imaginary.
If they had names, they had the names of real people.
Just versions of those people who were
around a little more often.

The loud days were safe.
The quiet was lava.
Then the quiet was safe,
and loudness was lava,
and then I never could tell what was safe anymore,
really.

But, oh, I'm so glad I found You again.

Your embrace is safe.
Your heart is lava,
and every day is a quiet adventure.

Stupid GPS doesn't have a clue.