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!

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.

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.

A heart on the run
can’t be much fun.
Just good for a little
time in the sun.

So I’ll never be
THE ONE.

I’ll never be the
photo on your desk.

I’ll just be part
of a collection
In your iPhone
memory chest

Be a candle
in the night.
In the darkness
Be a light.

Too much hate.
Too much spite.
Share your kindness
Be a light.

In the middle
of the fight,
be the peace
Be a light.

There is no need
for always right
win every fight
words that bite
fears that incite
to prove your might
The world needs help
just being alright.

Be a candle
in the night.
In the darkness
Be a light.

Man is basically just
heart and soul and mind..

Some lose heart
and become the cruel,
who care only for themselves
and no others.

Some lose soul
and become the evil,
who care nothing about
damaging the world.

Some lose mind
and become the crazy,
who care little about
reality and truth.

Some lose all three,
and become politicians

Poetry is that secret panacea
meant to be shared
by those who pain so badly
that only literary
band-aids help.

Forget me –
my smile
laugh
tears
and anger

Forget me –
my touch
caress
hugs
my ***.

Forget me –
holding you,
wanting you,
loving you.
Leaving you.

Forget me –
I am gone.
I am no longer.

Women are the #1
cause of drinking.

When you find the right one
and times are fun,
you drink to celebrate.

When the right one
becomes the wrong one,
you drink to forget

And when there isn’t one,
and you are hoping for one,
you drink to pass the time.

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

Sometimes,
in the dead of night
I remember us.
Not how we started
or even how we ended.
Just the goodness
of being us

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.

Today
Was a lot like yesterday.
It rained, I sat
in a room alone
thinking of you
and what almost was
and now is not.

Tomorrow
I will sit in a room alone
thinking of you.
It could have been – but isn’t.
It might have been – but wasn’t.

Someday
I will get up
and leave this room
where I sit alone
and think of you.
I will forget Almost and Maybe.
But not today.

I’ve never been
much of a dancer –
my feet were clay,
made for running away.
But if I was gonna
learn to dance
with someone, with anyone,
I should have learned
to dance with you.

I should have put on music,
soft and low,
held you close,
danced every night,
spun you around
the heart’s dance floor,
instead of running
out the door,
leaving you dancing alone.

I should have played
“Have I Told You Lately”
on perpetual repeat,
singing “that I love you”
softly in your ear,
holding you so close and tight
you didn’t care
I couldn’t dance.

I was never good
at holding on,
dancing
‘til the band plays
the last slow song.
It’s never been
what I do.
But I should have
danced with you.

I should have danced
forever
with you.

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.

I am the Raucous Liberal.
It is my right to protest.
Ardently and violently.
Not only for my beliefs
but also against yours.

Freedom of Speech
is mine, and only mine.
If you want to voice
an opinion that differs
I WILL shout you down,
shame you to silence,
boycott your business
and call you racist or
any other derogatory
name I choose.

I will hide behind
worthwhile causes
to create disruption
and destruction.

Freedom of speech
is mine - and only mine.
You have no right
to disagree with me.
So shut the hell up.

Tell me what you’re feeling.
I know that’s not an easy thing.
Tell me if your leaving.
My heart can take the pain

Tell me what you’re thinking –
do we still have a chance?
Tell me what you’re hoping,
or is this our last dance?

Even if this is goodbye –
(that IS my greatest fear)
tell me what you want to say,
not what I want to hear.

What will we remember
in the coming years,
if all this ends in tears?

If passion become patience
and dancing becomes TV
and I love you
becomes good-night?

What will we remember?
Good times or just good byes?

After she left
I thought a lot
about why she was gone.
I racked my brain
for all the things
I didn’t say
and didn’t do.
Until I finally understood -

Sometimes,
good things just die
A tree grows old.
Your dog grows old.
And sometimes,
even love grows old.

I’ve had so many
cuts and stabs and
holes punched in me
by the women who
passed through my life,
that when a new one
comes along and
we drink a toast to us
I leak all over
everything we try to be.

She stabbed me in the heart, and
walked away without looking back.

The pain is slowly killing me –
someone please, pull out the knife.
Hold me, kiss me, give me life.

The path through the woods
Seems to entice the eye
The solitude is clamoring
Calling, screaming, that I
should follow it
to that quiet place
where I can dream
in solitary space

We always talked about forever.
Now, as I walk down the hall
the last time
turn and look in your eyes
the last time,
walk out and close the door
the last time
I realize –
Gone is forever too.

A day or so of yesterday
I walked this land in joy.

Why am I so lonely now?
Why am I still here?
Waiting, always waiting.
Longing – where is she?
There is no end, I fear.
I will not be free.

Looking back to gentler days
and forward not at all
I find myself
Just wishing
that my life
would
simply
stop.

I believe
in Santa Claus
Peter Pan
the Easter Bunny
and Love.
Although sometimes
I am not so sure
about the latter.

I am not sure how it happened
I am not sure why
I thought she was saying good night
But she was saying good bye.

Another grain of sand
on a summer beach
waiting on a midnight tide.

Another leaf
on an autumn tree
waiting on a winter wind.

Another flake of snow
in a winter storm
waiting on a warmer sun.

Another drop of rain
in a spring shower
waiting to evaporate

We are all just waiting
for whatever takes us
forever away.

I have a friend,
named Pen Dulum,
a handsome man
who loves the pretty ladies.

And sometimes
my friend Pen
also loves the
big, stout lads.

So I guess it’s true,
what everyone says.
My friend Pen
swings both ways.

I am dancing naked in the rain.
There is no better way to dance.
And nowhere else to dance.
But the rain.

I do not dodge the drops.
I do not try as I once did.
There is nothing else to do but dance.
And in the rain.

I did not really dance before,
although I really thought I did.
Before I learned nothing is stronger
than the rain.

And I wore clothes, back then
when I really thought I danced.
Before I learned of the need for nothing
in the rain.

I am dancing naked in the rain
It’s doing its work, beating me down
Until there is no one remaining.
Just the rain.

I fear losing you
because I fear
not trying hard enough
or doing enough
or being man enough
to make you stay.

Tonight I’m setting up
A GoFindMe site.
I need everyone’s help
For someone
To GoFindMe me.

Watch for me.
I slip by easily,
a breath of wind
on April nights.

Watch for signs of me
in the road
to know that I have been –
dust, disturbed
by feet shuffled restlessly
in places I have pauses too long.

And if you look to find me,
do not look where I have been,
for I do not return.

I could give you words
and things
and thoughts
and moments in the sun

and promise you
no promises to break
if you’d just let me
love you for a while

When love
is lots of pieces
of someone
I hide my address book away
for that rainy day
when love
again becomes pieces
of lots of someones.

The silence is louder
than any cannon
in the moment
before battle begins.

I crouch, waiting,
scared, angry,
ready to ****
the man across the field
who is my enemy.

And in the moment
before battle begins,
I realize
that I am also
the man across the field.

I am millions
of men across the fields
in thousands of battles
through thousands of years,
waiting
in the moment
before battle begins.

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.

Do not say I’m handsome –
I know too well I’m not,
with tracks of time to mark
the memories I’ve got.

Say instead you’ll stay a while
And let me share your touch.
There’ve been too many through the years
that would not give that much.

Love is an hourglass,
the slow trickle
of a relationship
building like flowing sand.

A couple grains of smile,
a few more grains of kiss,
a lot of grains of laugh,
some grains of holding hands.

Each grain of sand,
memories of another
“moments like this”
grain of together

The flowing pile grows
‘til one says I love you.
And one answers back
I love you too.

I still reach for you
in the dark, dreaming
you'll be there.

When I close my eyes
I still feel your touch,
still taste your kisses.

I still look for you
every time
I walk in the door

All the tears with you
were never like
these tears without you.

I still see you
sitting with me
in every coffee shop,
every restaurant,
every movie,
every drive
along the coast.
And I still reach
for your hand.

I still open doors
to let you in,
like you’re still there.

Still tell the waiter
table for two,
still order
two glasses of wine,
I still
buy two coffees,
buy two donuts,
buy two
ice cream cones.

All the tears with you
were never like
these tears without you.

All the years with you
we’re not enough
All the days without you
are still too much.

I still reach for you.
Reach for your hand.

I still reach for you.

My wife always says
I never express my feelings.

So I started telling her
I feel hungry.
I feel thirsty.

When I said
I feel *****,
she just said
OK, enough.
Stop.

Sometimes,
you just can’t
please a woman.

We were fast cars, back road racing,
kids with no missions
except the next good time
around the next curve or corner,
hell-bent angels,
flying with wings on fire.

We were a small town road show,
fast friends sharing life at 3-digit speeds,
and that wild man wild times bullet-proof
young man kind of living,
hell-bent angels,
just flying with wings on fire.

Eating life like a buffet
of crazy endless days
and never-ending roads,
daredevils laughing at it all,
hell-bent angels,
just flying with wings on fire.

And then one day we watched
as they put out your fire
and folded your wings,
heaven-bound angel,
too young to be
flying here no more.

Too young to be
flying on earth no more.

Two loves diverged in the words, and I
I was the one that said goodbye.

And now, for countless nights
Long since gone by
I sit and wonder why.

Another one in 2 rows
marches to the drumstick click.
2 rows of 3
carry one more soldier home.

A mother cries, maybe a wife,
listen to the drumstick click,
2 rows of 3
carry one more soldier home.

The young are pawns
and pay the price
of leaders in chambers
safely at home.

And so another, and another,
marches to the drumstick click.
2 rows of 3
carry one more soldier home.

An old man is chasing me –
I look over my shoulder
and see him getting closer.

But the sun is still shining,
And I am still running
away from the old man.

The night darkness is near,
The roads are harder to see.
I hear him gaining on me.

An old man is chasing me –
I look in my mirror
and see him looking at me.

The Old is winning –
Old always wins.
But I am fighting hard.

Once in a while, I forget
to keep control of me, and
I let me be unsupervised.
And then I realize
how many blank pages
there are in my life,
on which I have
not allowed myself to write.

There is a struggle
deep in my gut –
between the lie that
I don’t miss you
and reality

A battle between
believing that
I don’t really need you
and the fact
that I really do.

A war between
I will forget you
and the fear
I never will.

I always knew,
if I looked hard enough,
that you would find me.
One night,
you’d see me standing
on the platform, waiting
for the train.
And waiting
for you to find me..

I always knew
if I looked hard enough,
that you would find me.
One morning,
you’d be standing
In the coffee line, waiting
for your morning latte.
And I’d be there waiting
for you to find me..

I always knew
if I looked hard enough,
that you would find me.
One day
You’d bump into me,
on some city street,
or hotel lobby
or concert ticket line.

I have always known,
always believed,
that you were looking too,
and you would find me.
One morning, one day, one night.
you would find me,
waiting on a train or
in a coffee shop, or
on a city street,
waiting, praying,
for you to
take my hand and
find me, waiting.

You will smile,
ask my name,
and I will  know
that I am no longer waiting
for you to find me.

Otherwise there’d be no reason
for me to be

still standing here,

still waiting,

for you to find me.

Sometimes I need to be alone,
to close out the world
and just be alone.
I don’t want you to be
a helping hand – I want you to be
a friend that leaves me alone, and
let’s me get through whatever on my own.

Sometimes, really, I just need to be alone.

Without you I’d just be a falling star
with no tail lighting the sky,
a tiny dot in black heavens

Without you I’d be a southbound train
with no smokestack trail
rising in the sky behind me


Without you I’d have no music,
be still-dancing all alone
to no favorite song.

Without you I’d have no rememberies
filling cracks and crevices in my mind
and holes in my heart.

Without you, I’d be no me.