A young writer
sat in my regular chair
inside the bookstore cafe.
He banged at the keys of his typer,
angry and without mercy.
Once he drained his coffee cup
the writer kept ******* at the rim
for a few remaining drops.
After staring blankly at the wall
for several minutes, the writer packed up
his supplies into a ratty backpack,
and walked out of the joint.
Finally, I figured, my chair had enough
of the games. It felt my presence
nearby and thus decided
we had sins to paint.

-Ron Gavalik

i have a lover like no other,
and i can't explain him.

he's a writer.
he's lighter in a pocket,
a doobie, doobie doo.

he's my flashlight,
lighting me
up like the sun's
rays.

he's an old man,
a young man,
somewhere caught
in the middle days.

twenty-four and
five-foot-eleven,
is what he says
he is,
but my god,
that isn't even
a percent of him.

he's a lion.
he's a lamb.
he leaves me in shambles.
he brings me back together.
he's my **** day camel.

wow.
i can't even write something
as perfect he.
he makes me ramble.
i'm babbling.

he's looking at me.
my heart is fluttering
like it hasn't in years.

i'm muttering even
when i'm in tears.

he can't be explained
with words or actions.

all  you can do is take him in
like the ocean,
crashing into me.

you think you know it,
but you never will.

and that is the beauty
of why i love him.

i have a lover like no other,
and i can't explain him.

A friend asked me
how to be a writer.
I wanted to say,
lock yourself in a room,
scream until you have
a poem and no voice.
Open your veins and bleed
until you know that your bones
are pure words and sorrow.
Act as if you slit your own throat
and all you can bleed
are your own regrets
and all of the darkness
you boxed up for inspiration.
Write your mom a letter,
tell her you're leaving
and you won't be back for awhile
Because being a writer is traveling
through all seven layers of Hell
and denying anything is wrong.
Forget loving yourself
when all you have is a pen and paper
fused to your wrist
and Jesus is tapping at your skull
saying turn back now.
Warn the neighbors that if they smell burning
It's just your soul
clawing at the front door trying to get in.
Learn how to be alone.
Learn how to lose everything you have
in order to feel release,
learn how to only feel deceased
from now on.
A friend asked me
how to be a writer.
All I said was
don't

Your actions echo love,
My rendition of it;
Why don’t they linger
Like words will.

Your actions parade love
That I applaud;
Why can I not trust them
Unless I have it in print.

I write
Poems of love
For a man of few words.

I feel
Acts of love
For a writer, is it not enough.

At the end of a great writer...

"The most important moments are at the end.
10 minutes in youth may be unworthy.
These last moments will make all the difference to me,
but I will not remember one of them."

The newborn speaks and the men listen...

"Is the soul in the mind of the writer, or in the writing itself?
How does our consciousness pass on?"

The old man lays down his glasses the last time...

"I will now sleep and dream, and in the morning I may cry my first."