He weaved throughout concrete aisles
Collar up
Chin down
Avoiding bodies
Ravaging through
Piles and piles
different sizes.
I can vividly recall
The broad-shouldered
Black coat, he pulled out of the rack.
Analyzing the quality
Glancing slightly at the tag,
Slightly enough to where he thought I didn’t see.
He held it up against his chest
Nodded
And handed over the ironed dollars in his pockets.
He watched her closely,
The cashier,
Ensuring the coupons were valid.
We walk out,



He wore it daily
Guaranteeing every dollar would be put to use.
He wore it over his church clothes,
And his bulletproof vest.
Pulled down the sleeves to hide his tattoos for job interviews,
And pulled them up to show drunken women his “story” after his eighth can of Budweiser.


He wrote his will on a  Shoney’s  paper napkin
Giving me everything, including the coat and the map of its story.
He described the location of every hole, every tear, and every patch
With a story attached to each imperfection

I remember one patch vividly
It covered the tear of a barbed wire fence, as he ran from the “bad men”


When you grow up in the sector I grew up in
You have different fears than most children
Most kids are scared of the dark or of clowns
We were scared of the “bad men”
The men our fathers told us about
And our fathers were never wrong

The men that prowled the streets
Eyes of lead
Spewing bullets from their tongues when they spoke


Flaunting their colors,
Badges,
And Entitlement,
With every heavy footstep

They were the men with power
hearts filled with ammo


They were my father’s only weakness
Only fear

They were the police…

20 years later I stand beside them
Everyday defending the people just like me

every morning I grab my holster and my badge
I stare at the coat hanging by the door
And understand the error of his ways
The police are not the enemy
And I am not him

The coat collects dust.

Some days silence is utterly stunning
The aspect of talking without a tongue
No mistakes made to send people running
No pointless chatter chaotically sung
And some days I wish the world would just hush
Finally, people can listen for once
Maybe we slow down, forgetting the rush
Pause the media and behold a bunce
Or maybe our world is now too far gone
Silence affixed to the staticky past
No longer do we hear the birds at dawn
But then again nobody ever asked
Whatever happened to the quietness?
It’s muffled by our own self-righteousness

One day I wrote her name upon the sand
Reminding me of staring at her grave
I try my best to purely understand
The way she swayed within the crashing waves
And on that melancholic day, she passed
Sorrow spilled slow, into the boundless sea  
Her soul flows within the water spread vast
The sand swept away, I must let her be
But oh I want her more than life itself
Her voice in ocean breeze, a symphony
I cannot arrange her life on a shelf
Never forget the day of infamy
But somehow water washed away her name
I will seem ok, but never the same

He pictures her chestnut hair falling delicately onto her petite frame,
her small nose twitching when she laughed.
He imagines her creamy smooth skin and perfectly rosy cheeks.
He envisions her breathtaking eyes, that glimmered in the morning sun,
that were sheen, freshly fallen dew.
He closes his eyes and reminisces about her gleeful laugh that reminded him of gardenias blooming
and the way she twiddled her thumbs when she was nervous.
He misses her kisses that brushed across his cheeks like a butterfly flapping its wings.
Tears swell in his dark eyelashes, and his blue eyes turn a milky grey with despair.
Thinking back to the day she told him she was ill,
the agony he felt in his chest arises yet again.
He remembers the day her gorgeous hair started to scatter onto the floor,
the floor he would lay crumpled on for a week after
that collected his pearly tears
and cooled his splotchy cheeks
he thinks back to the days that she said she was fine
but wished to die.
Her emerald eyes started to fade in the last couple days of her life,
a sweater that had been washed too many times.

It's like that between us I think
You getting infuriated
Me constantly paying the price
You causing me to change colors
Black then blue then deep magenta
A nasty chartreuse color spreads
The lengthy process of healing
Even when I shouldn’t have to
I shouldn't have to take your fist
Splattering crimson blood around
I shouldn't have to wake up, gasp
Because your gnarled hand is clenched
Nails digging into my frail throat
I shouldn't be weeping silence
Iron and salt wash down the drains
I shouldn't bow down, begging you
I should say no to your abuse
Stand physically, mentally
No to your beautiful ice eyes
That stay a worn denim color
Even when you beat me maroon
Like your evening bottles of wine
No to you and the games you play
No to your brutality, and
the colors you force upon me
Me who once loved and cherished you
Me who convinced my own **** self
That I deserved it, all of it