we’re both getting old,
but she still has dignity and desirability
and a demure sensuality and
all I have is a cough

Gentle was his touch
Silken breeze upon the heart
Whispers of true love

frightfully british but
also roman catholic
ate no meat on a friday
was always fish and chips

he told me:
“addiction is just gravity.
you try to climb out,
but it pulls you back,
over and over.
at some point,
you stop fighting.
you call it home.”
then he wiped his nose,
snorted another line,
and laughed.
like gravity was a joke
only he understood.

Sometimes the past slips away -
a dream that never was.
But the wanting stays,
like a ghost in the hallway.
We carry it,
each step a little lighter.

You touched me,
and I remembered how stars bleed
before they die.

there‘s a room in my head
where I put all the things
I can‘t say to anyone.

it’s cluttered.
broken chairs,
half-drunk bottles,
notes scrawled on napkins
with words
I was too afraid to mean.

people tell you
to let it go,
but what they don’t tell you is -
the heaviest stuff
floats right back.

A long endless road
Reaching out to desolation
Mile markers stand
Martyrdom, tribulation

Foot after foot
Miles or kilometers
A heart of soot
It doesn’t matter

Grevious each step
Calculated disaster
Lonely tears wept
The big there after

And I see
The invisible things
We are ‘we’
Dents, bruises and dings

And I know
The language we speak
And I show
The birthright of the meek

It is all upside down
We color outside the lines
World will bring us down
We dance out of time

A moment to find
An ancillary rhyme
In limerick skew
We do what we must do
To take ownership of our time

He is tall with limbs that stretch like  
         roots,
     Eyes and teeth and ears sing joy
  ‘What does love feel like?’
He asked my friend
Her nose twitches, her ears spike up
Like a bunny offered a carrot
  ‘Like a deep breath in
       Like walking through the door,
           And dropping your bags.
              You're home.’
                  Exhale
She smiles so bright, I'm sure
she has swallowed the sun
   ‘What does love feel like?’
He asks me
    ‘Bug under a boot.’
Exhale