the ever-distracting daydream is a form of presence
   says the window
my hand unconsciously crafts doodles
before averting back to words



if I were a poem
I would be everything
  in between the letters
unseen and often misunderstood
to feel me
    you would need to let go
of meaning
           float off paper
     beyond lines
through open airwaves
   don't try to read me
   I need to be heard

if I were a poem
            [wait what]

if I were a poem
            [yo, did you hear that]

if I were a poem
my stanzas would be disjointed puzzle pieces
horcruxes spread to different verses
each with a fractal of spirit
  but never the whole
put me together at the end
for the big picture
    I wouldn't make sense along the way
I would hold magic in my brokeness
enough power in my message to build
  ...and destroy
      ...and rebuild again

there would be so many gaps
you would wonder where the years went
  come and go as they please
I would only speak when silence requested
my composition would paint
           Surreal Renaissance Futurism
                     yea... make that make sense...

if I were a poem
I would allude to imaginary numbers
and friends
fictitious characters and places
just outside that window pane
            like [c'mon you saw that]

side-quest-obsessed
catch me on a tangent
lost in a daze
   days     hours     minutes     seconds
catch me relative
just like the hands of time

if I were a poem
I would require second chances
  over and over and over again
but I'd be worth it
  be worth the suspended disbelief
just for the amusement of it all

if I were a poem...

g@#dgvxdbyhix&*u@ggcuybbdjhgus$%

Peace.                 Peace- short lived
Boredom.                Boredom- soon come


A hum.     A chirp.     A shattering of glass.
Questions. Questions. More questions.
Rampant questions. Barraging questions.
Stillness       stirs muddy
Strained mixing of unknown content
Syrupy. Thick. Sticky and difficult to wade through.
Questions.     Answer. More questions.
Distressed confusion.


Silence- uncomfortable.
Stillness- uncomfortable.
A thrashing of drums. A clashing of symbols.     A chirp.
Noise for noise’s sake.

Say something! It’s too quiet in here
Talk to me. Talk at me. Say something
A conversation about everything.
A conversation about nothing.
A chirp.




A chirp.



Aren’t you glad I didn’t just stand here in silence for a minute?

An archeology of silence.
Peace.                 Peace- short lived
Boredom.                Boredom- soon come

Who
          wh          wh          who
     What
          When
Where
          wh          wh          where­
     Why
          How

if life was a sentence it would end in a question mark
no judge setting bail
just animals caged in the medulla
stuck in query
                    asking
WHO am I
     WHAT is my purpose
          ...WHEN is my deadline...
                  WHERE am I going
                         WHY am I asking all these questions
and HOW, HOW the **** do I do this right

B  B  B  C  A     D?
my answers are not guesses
but they are just as insecure
give me a multiple choice test
and I will eliminate all irrational possibilities
I have been taught that way

solving equations is a step-by-step process
nothing to get dyslexic about
cranium: mind as _ : spirit
how do you answer when choices aren't presented
logic and reasoning
will determine your percentile

I learned that pawns
if tactical enough, cunning and resilient
can become anything they want
except a king
I learned this under the stacks
at Benning Road library
much like the best kept secrets
it was hidden under pages and pages
of words

words, logic, never imagination
these were the rubric for marks
B's  B's  B's  never C's or lower
but I was always told
letters were my pass out the hood
then my pawn was picked from concrete
and propagated on private property
on manicured lawns behind high fences
my tongue was trained in Latin and Greek
by bishops who had all the right angles
my ebonics colonized and cultured

but pawns are not just limited to one square
I learned this from the triangulation of a plane
how there are other kingdoms
with alternate rooks
if you choose you can be a knight
their movements are practically unpredictable
take 'L's and jump squares

C  D  D  B  A
my answers are all guesses now
yet uncertainty feels secure
multiple choice tests look like a gam
of connect the dots
and I make artwork of standards
compare me to                            no one
contrast: intuition tells me I am
outside the realm of possible
an 8x8 grid: globe as _ : freedom
I write in curves
sign language that is more metaphor
than literal
I heard in a forest recently
that a pawn can be a king
if it resigns to the rigidity of rules

I do not know this alchemy just yet
but I am still learning