It’s not an art museum,
it’s a Waffle House,
and you’re looking sleepy
as you sip your tea.
It’s three a.m. and
I know we still have a few more miles until my house,
but I’m home and you know it.
I’m ripping up a napkin with my
hands as we talk about the concert.
I know I enjoyed it more than you,
and I know I cried on the way home
because I thought you didn’t love me,
but you still came to the concert
even though you didn’t really like the artist,
and now we’re at a Waffle House at three a.m.,
and the garish yellow decor reflects on your skin,
and we’re sweaty and tired,
and I love you in the rare, inexpressible way
that feels most potent
after concerts at Waffle Houses at three a.m.

take me to Waffle House
(preferably late; it's best for people watching)
and enlighten me
about life outside suburbia, USA.

there is something stunning about listening to the world
escape through someone's lips.

Claim my burden but never

offer your shoulder

to confide, 

to cry,

But you have no tears to spare.

Trying to eat the slice of pie

I spent hours baking,

you spent seconds eating.

Those peaches were freshly picked!

Bathed in bicarb! 

I scrubbed the dirt

until it was nothing but

another piece of myself

for you to ******.

I do not swallow sweetness, 

I choke on copper,

throat bursting to the brim

with pennies-

the same pennies you offer

in penance 

for the burden of lead that

nooses my neck. 

You wear it by choice;

by Gold, 

by Glory,

believing our blood is the same drop split in two.

Though it is proven to be yours for the taking,

you will be tasked with breaking each 

frozen finger, 

forced to pry your prize from

my bruised palms.

I only enjoy things
when they happen organically now
bars, new drinks,
a warm hug,
waking up
without the alarm.

Nostalgia and melancholy
what a heavy burden,
to carry a weighted heart.
But my arms are getting stronger,
learning to grip,
to lift,
to cradle it with grace.

I don’t know who to thank,
but I’m grateful.

This too will sink I know
Like the others before
This too will go
Behind shut door.

Once a place of rejoice
Where I poured my heart
Leaving is now the only choice
And make a new start.

My work is my blood of toil
Come at a high cost
Digging deep into the soil
What I grew is all lost.

I leave this holiness with pain
Will miss all you gave
Leaving the circling dots to reign
And send old poems to grave.

all evolutions,
revolutions
to absolution
by liquid?

can we drive always away away away
our sins that are burnt into our
skin?

Without the spillage of a
witness of wetness?

is my own sweat insufficient?

product of sunrise and rays
testing the body’s hydration,
my words beckon to reckon
to emerge,
purge my seditious  sins,
my owned dissolution,
with false, half hearted acts
of contrivance contrition?

Why are
my daily confessions,
halved by inability
to give myself up a
full~on
fullsomeness,
but words available,
censored by a stub of
unwillingness
to embarrass
what little honor
left in my shrinking
possession

I am guilty of ******.

this act of admission
is legally insufficient
to sustain even
sky painted clouds
to cease moving,
there, it’s sad said,
and i breathe no easier
only comfortable that my
shame is openly accounted
for by you, my jurors…

I don’t know
what I want
In 5 years,
Or what I
Want for
Next year,
In 5 years I’ll
Be 29,
So close to 30
I don’t know if
I want to make it
To 30,
But if I do I just wish
For me to be happy.

I am of no use, is what it tells me.
That I have nothing special, and that
I am nothing compared to those around
me is the truest lie I was ever told.
It allows me to be soluble
in the lives and achievements of  others.
The individual pieces of me dissolve
into insignificant, infinitesimal specks
that serve no purpose, and amount to nothing.
Anything I do - any talents I have - will be surmounted by those
who are more than I could ever wish to be.
Alone I am whole, where the love I keep under my
sheets and between my arms tells me
she values me.
But out there - out there in the world
I am of no importance and
infinite expendability.