you are very strange
and not in a good manner
id like to see you change
and be a little thinner

you are not very clever
you're clumbsy with your words
'you wont get into heaven
if you're head's stuck in the world'

for these words do repulse you
and obviously , no
you are not hating truth
just dont know where to go

I would serenade you with guitar but my fingers are too clumbsy,
I would sing you a love song but I cannot hit a note,
I would paint you a masterpiece but my hand is not steady,
I would dance with you forever but I have no sense of rhythm,
There are many things in this world that I cannot be for you,
But I can hold you, kiss you, love you and always be true.

Living in

her shadow

over forty

years have

gone by.


But I still

remember

her **** rule

as if It

were yesterday.


Mrs. Satterfield.

my fourth grade

teacher

at Lincoln

elementary

in Lynwood California.

.
and every

now and

then when

I think about

her. I feel

a need

to straighten up

my posture,

turn in

all of my homework

on top

her cracked

and peeling old

wooden desk.


spit out

my gum.

and look

to the

nearest

clock,


and count the

minutes until

lunch or

when I

get my release

to go home.


"no

gum chewing

allowed!" I'm

certain

it is on

her head stone

somewhere.


but I am still

much too

afraid to

go on

a little

escapade  

to look.


so I sit

still.

very still.

waiting for the

bells of

independence.

from Mrs. Satterfield"s

fourth grade

class to ring

in my head.


sometimes it is

almost like

I never

left.


sometimes

I can see

her looking at

me from across

the room.


and sometimes

forty years

later, bless

her soul


she smiles.

There is no graceful transition
of a cup of hot hot coffee
from one hand to another hand,
the cup only has one handle.

It is inherantly akward,
almost as if it’s intended,
a brief, forced, colaboration
to keep the coffee in the cup.

Contorting to not spill a drop,
Still, clumbsy, after these long years
and a thousand repetitions,
ten thousand hot cups of coffee.

We angle ourselves to the task,
a brief intimate fumbling,
until the cup is handed off,
and the best part of it is gone.

                                     -Still Here