Thank you for dropping in -
I know your time is short
And mine is passing quickly.
So quickly you will

Learn to tie a bow,
count to 10, and
catch a ball

Make you own ponytail,
drive a car.
Flirt.

Find a guy
Say good bye.

Everyone has a song
deep in their soul
It’s the dream
that makes them whole.

Makes them believe
in God and love
and all that’s good.
You are my song.

My life is a trip
through a candle shop,
lighting one for each
dream, where I stop.

So many have just
burned out, dropping
wax on the table, turning
cold and just stopping.

A few still flicker,
but all grow shorter
and dimmer as time
and dreams grows colder.

I light one more -
there still is a chance,
for at least enough light
for life’s last dance.

I put Wits End
in my GPS,
to help me find my way.
It said I was already there.

This can’t be right,
I thought, and
drove to another
side of town.

And when I tried again,
plugging in Wits End –
It said it’s where I am
and also where I’ve been.

Been holding on, doing ok
Kinda, some days.
Not really though
Just what I say

I keep moving on,
Running through the night
Down this nowhere road
With no guiding light

Tired of feeling
like just getting by
and losing hope
at the speed of life.

We are the homeless,
that faceless blob in tent cities,
under bridges, on park benches,
in doorways and the woods.

We are the homeless,
the ones without TV
to hear the lies about
for every one and unity.

We are the homeless,
that’s what you call us,
our name is just Homeless,
not John or Jane, or even people.

We don’t vote and
we don’t donate.
We don’t burn and riot.
So our voices are never heard.

We are the homeless,
People, not just homeless.
Homeless People Matter Too.
HPM2

She was just the one you call
for a last-minute date for the ball.
For a quick fun trip to the beach,
or a painful trip to the mall.

She was just the one you call
late at night, just to talk,
or early in the morning
just to go for a walk.

She was just the one you call
who made anything fun.
How did you not see
she was just The One, after all?

I think you are
my in-between love.
The one between
my last heartbreak
and my next one
with you.

We loved
therefore
I was.
And am
No more.

Love is like a sail boat.
Hope is the wind and
dreams are the sails,
carrying you through
life’s rough seas,
always to home

My sails are
torn and tattered.
My hull is leaking
lying battered,
on the rocks of
Isle Alone.

Sometimes I stay up too late
and I start to think
and then I think too much.

And when I think too much
I start to remember,
And then I remember too much.

And when I remember too much,
I start to drink
and then I drink too much.

And then I go to bed
and stare at the ceiling
and I stare and think too much.

And when I go to sleep
I dream of losing you
and then I dream too much.

And then I wake up
from my dream of losing you.
And then I scream too much.

They were kindred spirits,
so very much alike.
One man leads a company.
Writes business plans.

The other man writes poetry.

The one, what I pretend to be.
The other, me.

Your eyes have hands –
I bet you didn’t know.
They touch, more than fingers
and hold, more than arms.
They hurt, more than fists
when you simply look away.

The Past and Present
are the same.
I live them both
and loathe them both
equally.

The Past, ever unchanging,
haunts me never ending.

The Present, ever unforgiving,
tramples my daily living.

The Past and Present
are the same.
The past all night
The present all day
The same haunting thoughts
that won’t go away

Just a random thought –
It is truly a wonder that
husbands are not pretty close
to being perfect people
when you realize
how very often
their errors and transgressions
are pointed out to them

She named him Alfred.
The tree where we would park
and talk about dreams
or climb in the back seat
and create our present scenes.

Back in the days
when people parked
instead of tweeted
and loved instead of liked.

Love is a colossal flying kite
and all you can do
is hold on by a thread
until is slips away
or comes crashing down.

The March deadness
Blows down the beach.
I sit.  Without the nerve
to walk on, but with nerve enough
not to walk away.

Water at my feet.
Tired.
I will not run-walk away
The tide is slowly coming in.

You and me,
we disagree
about Democrats
and rioting,
socialism
and increasing taxes,
illegal immigrants
causing lower wages,
betraying farmers
fostering hatred of Blue,
and failing our schools.

Is BANG BANG all you have to say?

Everyone gets a box
of marbles in their life.
Shooters by the score.

And every day we pull one out
And shoot it at the world.

Sometimes you move the world;
sometimes it swallows you up.

But tomorrow you always get
another marble.

I heard today
A man is dying

I guess that’s
insignificant
in this age
of atom bombs
Viet Nam
Kennedy’s and King
Iraq, Iran and
Afghanistan
And 50,000 dead on roads.

I mean,
he’s just ONE man.
JUST one.
And what’s just ONE MORE?

Those of you
who think this true
do not know
the man is you.

I have been in the arena
and heard the crowds roar
and been in solitude
and heard the silence more.

I have been the hero
and heard the ovations
and been the loser
and heard castigations

I’ve been famous
and heard adulation
and been forgotten
and heard denigration

I’ve been in love
and heard birds sing
and been out of love
and heard nothing.

I prefer the arena.
And hero.
And famous.
And especially love.

Sometimes someone passes
through your life, and
years later you cross paths
again, and that’s when
you realize you didn’t know
what you had back then

And then you realize
how lucky you were
you didn’t know.
Because you might not have
what you finally have now.

Marshmallows
are just clouds
you can eat
or squish
between your fingers.

Clouds
are just marshmallows
all grown up.

We’d been at church all Friday night,
drinking the holy water.
And on the way to somewhere else
We stopped to buy more blessed stuff

A case of beer, I said,
and I will ride my bike
from here to there
across the railing of this bridge.

A dark steel flowing arch,
at least 10 inches wide
would take me on my midnight ride
over the river to the other side.

My headlight pierced the moonless night
As up the rail I rode.  I yell
You will all owe me –
And then -- OH HELL!

On the down side of that steel belt
The light shone out into only darkness,
And not onto my narrow path.
The tire slipped off the edge – and FELL

Hanging on the bridge, I watched
that 40 foot slow motion trip
and cried out #&%!#@&%$
when I heard it hit.

My bike in pieces
on the rocks below,
the remains a remainder
of a drunken ego.

BEGINNING I  

You’re a strange world
laughing eyes
softness
tears for crushed flowers

You make a strange world out of me
when you touch me
and make me
begin to think
of kids and kites
and going to church again
on Sundays
and breaking promises
I made to me.

BEGINNING II

The sun and you
are going,
the pain is coming
and I am
beginning II rain

BEGINNING III

I am beginning
to believe
it’s time to quit.

Believing
Hoping
Hurting.

Ok, it’s 2 AM and
I am sitting in a
dim-light room
staring at a computer
writing prose
about living life.

What a contradiction!

The best we have
dress in olive drab
or blue or white
and go fight
and die forgotten
by those dressed
in politician suits,
who get statues built
honoring them
for sending the best
to die and lie
beneath forgotten crosses.

I am a painter,
not a poet.
Painting with an alphabet brush.

Colors only you can see –
red to you
is different to me.

A Mona Lisa smile
might be a frown,
when written down.

I do not write
to make you see
my world as I see it.

I paint with words
what you already know
but don’t know how to say it.

You thought
you should go.

I thought
you should stay.

You won.
Forever away.

Sometimes I feel the pieces of me
are no more than
socks and underwear,
randomly stuffed in a drawer,
symbols of the pieces of a man
stuffed not so neatly in a mind.

Today I’ll put on yellow socks,
blue pants and green strip shirt,
red baseball cap with
Batman tennis shoes,
and other random choices.

And everyone who sees me knows
my brain is working like my clothes.

There are so many stereotypes –
All blacks are rioters.
All women are feminists.
All Hispanics are illegals.
All whites are racist.
All politicians are liars.
Ok – so that one’s true
.

The shell of the gun
left the shell of a man.
Twice.
The one shot and killed and
the one who shot and killed.

She passed in December –
No time is good, but
that seems the worst.

Until you remember
God decorates the heavens
At Christmas first.

Before you,
all my yesterdays
were hopeless hours
of grey skies and
starless nights.

You came
and changed
everything.

Now you are gone and
yesterdays are here again.

We are all the CIA,
members from birth
‘til we leave this earth.

Some join openly.
Some never know
they belong.

But the
Creative Intelligence Agency
is part of everyone.

Some write.
Some paint.
Some sing.
Some hug their children
and wipe away tears.

But we all
make an imprint
on the creative soul
of man.

I saw you sitting
all alone
staring blankly
at your phone.

They all walk past
and none say Hi.
No one even
sees you cry.

They all pretend
that you aren't there.
Alone is not
a place to share.

Come sit with me
and take my hand
Talk to me.
I’ll be your friend.

Poets are hoarders,
collecting every memory
and emotion
and random thought,
and putting them
on a scrap of paper
or in a notebook
or a file somewhere
until the notebooks
and files and piles
of scraps of paper
become an infinite
collection of the mind’s
random capacity.

At the corner of
Justice Way and MLK Drive
he set up a booth
under a light
and a sign that read
Right of Way

He put up a banner
over his booth –
Media Must Always
Tell The Truth.

The press rallied ‘round
and tore the booth down
and shot out the light –
no one could tell them
the Way of Right.

For the first time ever, I understand
how hard it is to be a man.

You’re smarter than the other guy
but only half the time.

And smarter than the women –
NEVER

My doctor says I drink too much.
Coffee, that is.
What does he know about true love and such?

So I cut back, from six to five.
Pots, that is.
It's hard, but I am still alive.

But what I really fear
is what he makes me do next year.

I rarely ever think of you,
and soft kisses,
gentle touches,
laughing eyes,
and furtive glances.

Except when I
sit in a bar with friends,
or sit home alone.
Go to church.
Go to work.
Go to sleep.
Wake up.
Other than that, I rarely ever
think of you at all.

Everything evolves.
Species improve
or become extinct
Mountains and oceans
grow and shrink
Love
grows or goes.

Sometimes I feel the pieces of me
are no more than
socks and underwear,
randomly stuffed in a drawer,
symbols of the pieces of a man
stuffed not so neatly in a mind.

Today I’ll put on yellow socks,
blue pants and green striped shirt,
red baseball cap with
Batman tennis shoes,
and other random choices.

And everyone who sees me knows
my brain works randomly like my clothes.

Love,
if you should decide
to someday
try me again,
please don’t.

I could not
again
be what I was
with her

and I cannot
again
be what I am
without her.

I strongly dislike
People who hate.  
Because of color
or where they lived
or who they love
or even their favorite team.

I strongly dislike
People who judge.
As if they know “right”
better than you.
I leave all that
For God to do.

Falling in love isn’t a plan
Somehow, it happens ,
and somewhere
eyes just meet eyes
and both know
at last
I’ve found you.

I watched the moth flittering
around my light, frittering
time and life away.

And in the light of day,
below the light, he lay.
Dead and gone.

Like the words I meant to write
to say,
to make you stay.

Darkness
is a lack of light
like existence
is a lack of love
is a lack of life

and I know

Man was not meant
to live unloving
so I cling
to thoughts of you
and love unliving

while

I hope for more
than mere existence.

I love
You love
We love

I love you
You love me
We love us

He comes
He loves

He loves you
You love him

I go
You stay
He stays

I cry
You love
He loves