I bought a few sprigs of lavender tied with yarn from a boy outside the bookstore during the brightest days of summer.

The small decoration lay on a stack of books by the bed, scent fading with the passing days, inches from my pillow.

Meanwhile I ran about dusting and polishing, fluffing and waxing, making everything nice.

At night I fell into sleep moments after lifting my feet from the floor, forgetting all I dreamed.

My head is a tangled mass of string and wire

They don't connect

They don't lead into something greater

I am full of yarn and old embroidery thread

lonely autumn nights
blisters and calluses
forming on my stiff
cold hands

(pure cotton
is forgiving of
hasty tendencies
or picky forms)

wrapped and wound
tightly around my fingers
every loop an attempt
at controlling chaos

(thinking about
how i'm not
an outcast and
i never was)

i'm the shoe in the pair
that is slightly too tight
on the one foot that's a
bit larger than the other

or the shirt that you
keep wearing for years
because it fits but you
don't really like it

i am the paint on your
windowframe that's just
fine except for the white
flecks it left on the glass

(i've never been
an outcast
i've always been
different?)

i don't like to say
i'm different because
we're all different
i was just different
enough to be a slight
nuisance or distraction

i apologize too much
for what's not my fault
and too little for what i
should take ownership of

*(something about my personality
maybe just misplaced anxiety
dictates that all things must be
stacked and aligned perfectly.)

Life is a mandala!
Everything is a mandala!
-oh my God, I can use my lungs-
Nothing lasts and nothing
matters, however lovely
or terrible

Murderous fingers ripping
unimposing string of
yarn, row by
hourly row

Once upon a time
A bard told a tale so wonderful
So moving
That it was told and retold again and again
Across all nations
And in all tongues
This tale became the greatest myth
More believed in than any religion or god
It became a part of every culture
As important to our genetic make up
As any particles
As integral as breathing
Pumping through our very souls with each beat of our hearts
Yet this story's happy ending remains elusive
But such is the profound power of this yarn that men and women drive themselves to ruin yearning for its realization
And upon such an occasion are consumed by the fiery nature of the story never to be the same
This fable has a name
And it is Love.

Captain Marryat's chariot
Was hijacked by Judas Iscariot
But with the aid of a lariat
He got it back.