Cool kid euphoria with our pastel colored pants and our Raybans on is what we all are in the basement of the 50’s house.
Our phones blowing up while we sip whiskey and wine.
Trying to get the attention of the cars on the main road
By handstanding and flashing and cheersing our beers
And we receive our victorious honks.

Guitar clock radio with numbers around the fretboard and Sir Paul smiling and crooked, acid-trippin’ guitarist/violinist/celloist looking product of orange and gold look down upon as our patron saints.
Swingin’ low, Sweet Chariot words stares up at me from the 70’s floral carpet.
Ralph Stanley and Eric Clapton singing solos and duets in my head keep me company as the boys play and figure out key changes.

Painted screen hiding the Etta James microphone stands forgotten in the corner—
As I take in the teals and roses and golds.
Give me a heart shaped box where I can store my love
I fly so high in the world above
I’ll come back down eventually.

Lava lamped water stain engulfs the ceiling. As fingers go up frets
And they go down frets
And they go up frets
And they go down frets.
As you don’t enunciate when you sing.
We all mourn  our fallen brethren, the base of the telecaster with no strings and no head and it weeps silently from its place on the water pipes, hearing his cousins WAAAIIIIILLLLLL.

As Cool kid euphoria is created with our pastel colored pants and our Raybans on in the basement of the 50’s house.

We work all day so we can drink all night
Getting high off the drug that is each other
Chain-smoking Pall Malls like it’s our job
Listening to oldies as we shoot the eight ball in the corner pocket.
Garden tools and Lawn Mower parts as a sweet, creepy décor in the dank basement
As we breathe in mold and dust and cigarette smoke.

We are gloriously young.
So *******.
We still think we can change the world.
Not through politics or through fear or by means of war
But by doing just enough to get by and loving everybody for who they are, even the parts or religions or particular ways of life we don’t like,
Because people aren’t what they do or what they believe
They’re who they are.
We still think we can change the world
And Maybe one day, we will

But for now
We’ll just be here,
In the basement of the 50’s house with our pastel colored pants and our Raybans on.

Everybody's heard about those rose-colored glasses
the ones that make the world look sweet.
If I had to choose between roses and RayBans,
the roses would win in a heartbeat.

Whatever you look for is what you will find:
cold and dark or sunny and bright.
I'll take the rose lenses every time,
to see my world full of light..

My Night With Paul Simon

On the night train, the red eye plane,
Flying home to NYCeeeeeeeeeeeee,
From the city of Los Angeleeeeeeez

Feeling flush, dropped some cash,
Got me a seat in extra large first class

Seat 2C, plenty of room for my toes,
To wiggle  to dance,
lay down some poetry tracks,
pretending I'm a **** jive,
bad *** from the
make-believe west coast

A short guy, with fedora down low,
An older man,
looking about nine years older
than somebody I might know,
hiding his eyes @ 9pm
neath some excellent Raybans,
slip slides into 2D,
gives me a smile,
And says Hi, I'm Paul

I look once at his face and say,
Listen Rhymin' Simon,
I'd know you any place,
No worries, your secret,
with me is safe,
Cause dudes in row 2,
gottta stick together, be cool,
We're riding first class,
over the land of the free

What ya do for a living he asks,
A little of this and a little of that,
All of which, ain't no **** good at!
So I spend my cold, hard time
laying down cold hard verse,
Can't stop, cause it's my daddy's dying curse

He said that's cool,
I like to do that too.
Guitars on planes
drive passengers insane,
They take up too much
overhead compartment space,
I just scribble me some rhymes and
Let the music come
when I got two feet
on the ground in the city
we both come from.

Paul:  You got any stuff writ
on that yellow sheet,
or just pretty blue lines,
a big pad of nothing?

Dude: Man you may got diamonds
on the soles of your shoes,
But pay me some 'spect,  
you talking to the man who penned
Sad Eyed Teenagers of the Lowland
on Hello Poetry, gad ****!

Paul smiled and said
you can call me Al,
And if you feel like blowing some lines together,
We got five hours till we can see
the house that Ruth built.

Dude: Hit me with your best shot,
I'll show you what I got

Paul: And she said honey take me dancing
But they ended up by sleeping
In a doorway
By the bodegas and the lights on
Upper Broadway
Wearing diamonds on the soles of their shoes

Dude: Just cause the union of the  monkeys
in the Bronx Zoo done gone on strike,
Don't mean the lion ain't
still king of the hill
inside this New York city jail

Paul: And the sign said,
"The words of the prophets are written
on the subway walls
And tenement halls"
And whispered
in the sounds of silence

Dude: A home-grown poet.
I am, Soul enslaved to words.
The alphabet - My oxygen molecules,
I am both, Addict and dealer
A ****** poet ******

Paul: You don't need to be coy, Roy
Just listen to me
Hop on the bus, Gus
You don't need to discuss much
Just drop off the key, Lee
And get yourself free

Dude: Contact with the atmosphere
makes self pity die,
my blue blood turn red,
the TNT tightness in my chest exploded
I got no place  to store these words,
the cops think I'm some kind of Terrorist

On and on thru the night,
Riffing, rapping, rambling, and spitting,
Ditties and darts, couplets and barbs,
Single words and elegies,
Free verse and a lot of fking curse words,
It was a moment, a time
that deserved
to be preserved,
and so this poem got writ

*You may think this story apocryphal
Which is another way of saying untrue,
But I got his boarding pass and it is signed,
To this crazy poetry dude, long may you rasp,
And it is signed by Mr. P. Simon, a big fan,
And it has never since that day,
Left my grasp

   The killer
came crashing down
smashing,  thrashing through.

What is tender's  tender
       so  for itself,   to do?

        --As it runs
        right over the top of her..

       This taker.
       This killer.

In the black,  
now in between;
so lightless and thick..

        blotting out  all screams.
There is an annihilation  here.
A void.

A terror.
To stay, means certain death

      but to leave  
      also means certain death
      So the  d is m e m b e r men t   begins
      as she is ripped, completely into half

And those halves,  into half..

.. into half

--into half..
        into half.

     And still it tears.. rips..  shreds--
Until all,  in between
is nothing  but black.

A black it can now  pretend to fill
with all of its empty promises..

and all of its counterfeit, everything.

..And then--  just up and leaves
once it is fully satiated.
     And for a while..
     the black had something.


Clinging to the rocky crags
on either side of the unlit valley
are now  the pieces of her--
war-torn and shuddering.

Terrified

Of the black, black   empty.


Of what is now  fully
     and  completely   dark.

      ~       ~      ~       ~


Timmy  ain't real tall
but look at his stature,
as his majestic strings   dialogue
the introduction.

And Warren's gotten so fat
See him now, looking so dearly,  back
at his half-pint of Chunky Monkey--
picking it back up,  for the fourth time..
scraping... scraping.. scraping..

But watch his eyes  light up
as Timmy looks up--
  over the top
of those wild-man RayBans

And with a gentle nod,  it all begins..


-- as our Warren  now digs  deep
into his Gibson's beautifully-wanton  ways..

    identifying.


    clarifying.


­    Rectifying.


Clarence, the Magician..
Stephan--  Humble, Unparalleled
And Dave's  so chill
he's part Creole.. I just know it.

So great a cloud of witness:
surrounding you, my beautiful..

coaxing  you.

    Identifying it all for you.

I would have this girl, she would have a black bmx. We would ride chest to back, my hand prints burning on her shoulders. As she wore her brown raybans, she would call out to the cars nearby, she would howl like the mutt dog, and race after tailpipes. I would love her slender hips as they twisted over the seat and her legs tinted by the sun as she pulled tricks no two-bit dollar ***** had never seen, just to catch some sun. It looked like she was thirsty for the heat, and she was packing it, whooo-whee, she was packing it. And I loved her from her helmet head to her scuffed cons, from where she had put the brakes on, just to turn around and kiss me in the rush hour.

Anything to have you near, girl, I would tie streamers to my wrist to make it look like we were flying as we rode past the world. I would stand back and hold my arms high, wearing my scruff deep headphones, and a tie to clip her heart to. She wore her grandfathers cap, on her days off the ramp. It was too cliché to wear what the others wore, and she soon too became an article of clothing, many tried to copy and clone. We would lie on the grass, chipping beers bottles and picking daisies, that she would string around my wrist, promising to one day buy me a sidecar.

I tied a plastic rose around her handlebars, and left it for her to find in the morning. She woke me up with a kiss and a cracked mug of tea and told me we had some riding to do. I climbed on the back of her, and tied my arms around her charity shop tee, tight. We zipped between traffic and I told her ‘its a lipstick jungle out there’  and placed my nose behind her ear as she sought out new paths for us to sneak down. When the evening drew closer we found each others hands, and kissed parts of the skin that had arrived pink with the sun, and melted every so slightly into each others hips.

And then the wind came, it threw us off the park and past the roads. She left in the morning dressed for different days. She came home caked in mud and I washed her hair in the bath as she lay with her head in my lap. I told her tales of battles on ships, and stories of fighting, surrender and rising again in the new light of day. At nights we sat by candlelight and sipped ***** wearing lilies in our hair. We sat ink to ink, in bed and watched forgotten movies and laughed till we cried from the sham of it all. We understood each other, her pants hung low from the moment she moved to the time she stopped. Her, my girl, the one with hat and the black bmx; She was my street fighter in a pavement world.

My raybans still covered
my swollen  eyes as I stepped
inside the Rite Aid,
in my pathetic attempt to
hide from the neighborhood how much
I had been crying.
Tears of anger and
some of despair and
others of sheer exhaustion
had coated my cheeks
and worn the edges of my eyelids
raw and reddened my
corneas.
I had stumbled out of my apartment
in an effort to rid my body of
feelings, assuming the brisk spring breeze
could somehow sweep up everything
I felt and whisk it away as
quick as it had come.
I squeaked past a couple
******* clad women with
sunken eyes that bore holes
into the glass of the cooler
as they stared longingly at the
rather large variety of
malt liquors, the selection of soft drinks
lesser than the collection of
40s I passed on my way to the
back of the store.
I distracted myself imagining
the taste of the various soda pops,
a wild cherry Pepsi dissolving into my
daydream tongue right before it
turned to Big Red Cream Soda.
Diet Sunkist in hand,
I stared at the ingredients on the orange soda bottle and reread the same words
over and over as he interjected himself again and again.
I made my way to the counter,
feeling ever grateful for my sunglasses
as more tears welled,
and I cleared my throat before mumbling a way-too-weak-for-an-outgoing-girl hello.
Before I knew it my distraction faded
from view, and I turned left down Oak
as his face peeked out in my
rear view mirror in the majesty of
the sunset.
I shook off a feeling of admiration and
reminded myself that even after all this time
he still manages to disappoint me as
he always has.
I murmured something about how,
"He ain't ****" like I'm some bad
***** that doesn't give a **** about a dude.
But then I remembered how deeply I had loved
a man who never loved me back and
never failed to prove it.
My stomach began to drop,
leaving me feeling as empty as the
messages he had sent me in his pathetic
attempts to convince me of ******* masked as
the rhetoric he knew I wanted to hear,
just enough to keep me around for his
(admittedly) selfish reasons.
I loved him and hated him all at once
as I realized 4 months ago when
I told myself (and him) that I was moving on,
it was only my head that had,
my heart still staggering, like a
drunk stumbling off a belly full
of cheap whiskey,
And as I later drowned my sorrows in
TV dramas and artificial sweeteners,
I vowed to get that last piece back and really let go...
I'll start tomorrow
when I sober up.

Dog days fly dust to dust over a hick
pit sardined between corona bikinis that house
the unmistakable stench of lukewarm apple
sauce in the c-cup padding and toothless
******* sitting indian style. Graveled friction
fading the back pockets of their overall
dungarees. Amongst them a settler on their native
turf accepting a Jim Beam peace pipe while above
the influence commercials march in protest claiming fried
egg consequences from engaging in the act. The culture
shock is worth the weekly once-in-a-lifetime chance
to sip the tabasco-glazed opening of my chemistry
teacher’s flask while he schools me in perfecting
the cotton eyed joe. A muffler spontaneously
combusts, melting the raybans off the face of a tragically
hip spectator taunted with “that’s why dad named you Joe Dirt.”

It was a Sunday afternoon when I
went for an impromptu drive,
keeping my foot on the gas and snaking
among the one-ways and the
downtown traffic as I
made my way to the river.
I put the heat on
ever so slightly just so
I'd be warm enough to roll
the windows down and feel that
fresh spring air on my face.
I wore my retro hat backwards,
and my Raybans covered my eyes,
my cool demeanor and slouchy posture
in sync with the steady rhythm of the
90s hip hop booming through my
speakers.
I watched the sun as it made love to
the river's chop, and
I snuck a glance at the stolen kisses
the green grass shared with the
tall trees on the shoreline.
Beautiful yellow and purple buds
splattered the bushes like
Impressionism,
thick dabs of color that all blended
into a beautifully disorganized
vision of the season of
rebirth.
I sprouted wings and flew outside
my body as I inhaled
pollens and flower nectar,
as my skin reddened under the
bright sunlight,
my self got lost in the time and space
continuum that swallowed me
like ground swallowed up the last
traces of snow, replacing my ground
with the warmth and
rebirth that spring always brings
after a long winter.

The sun’s bright, even through my raybans
Old school and Black,
I found them at a party amongst some old cans,
Anyway, the sky is clear and bright,
Like the smile on my face and the glint in her eye.
Everything is good and I think maybe I’m happy
The sun makes her glow, sat next to her I’m one happy chappy.
She works the pout because the camera’s about
So I Smile, it’s effortless, it comes so naturally.
Everything is good and I’m thinking I’m happy.
A mouthful of that Sainsbury’s cider
And I’m thinking to myself I want to be inside her.
It’s cheap and has a strange tinge to the flavor
She’s looking at me I’m sure, god this tastes like feet.
But she’s all-sweet, one glance and I’m beat.
It’s all banter and larks from the boys,
Summer dress in February, summer joys
She talks of love and a broken heart,
I’m thinking this girl’s precious like a piece of art.
One of a kind like Mona Lisa
And I’m dying to please her.
Inadequacies kick in and I’m self-conscious again,
What if she likes big muscles, flat stomachs on her men?
**** it she’s here with me now,  
Some guy says something and she laughs,
That cackle that cry, now my minds in two halves.
****, he’s funnier than me, skinnier too,
Now I’m panicking, AH! What do I do?
She’s averts her attention back to me,
She catches me staring  so I look at a nearby tree,
Pretend to be in wonder, at least I stole his thunder.
She thinks it’s cute, if it works I’m not going to dispute.
But the next thing I know
Hours have passed and the suns gone down,
I’m still in sunglasses when we’re off in to town.
Despite the temperature drop, I don’t feel the cold,
Because holding her hand I’m back to 12 years old.
On the play ground and shy, running about like I’m a jedi.
Excitable, laughable and most of all Happy,
Nothing matters I’m care free
Free to be me, even if I did want to be Obi wan Kinobi.
She’s even more beautiful in the pastel orange glow,
The street light warms her face, my smiles still on show.
Beatles hit the nail on the head,
So we twist and shout till we’re talking of bed.
Talking with out words, because its her eyes that speak,
And I’m weak.
Embarressed at the prospect of what to expect
I look at the floor, then her eyes,
Oh God this is happening, I’m about to score.
The awkward thing is
I’m acting like nothing like this has ever happened before.
Im not saying I’m a *****,
just I wouldn’t complain if it happened a bit more.
God she’s Beautiful, and what was half is now full.
Her dress comes off and and so does my jaw
I could’ve rubbed my eyes red raw,
but I don’t
I appreciate every dent every shape,
Don’t get me wrong my mouth was still agape,
And something downstairs was trying to escape.
My hands tremble as I place them on her skin,
And we begin,
She softens my nerves with a kiss,
What more can I say… That night, was bliss.

Tom Sutton

My Night With Paul Simon
(Posted originally on June 5, 2013)

On the night train, the red eye plane,
Flying home to NYCeeeeeeeeeeeee,
From the city of Los Angeleeeeeeez

Feeling flush, dropped some cash,
Got me a seat in extra large first class

Seat 2C, plenty of room for my toes,
To wiggle  to dance, lay down some poetry tracks,
pretending I'm a **** jive,
bad *** from the
make-believe west coast

A short guy, with fedora down low,
An older man,
looking about nine years older
than somebody I might know,
hiding his eyes @ 9pm
neath some excellent Raybans,
slip slides into 2D,
gives me a smile,
And says Hi, I'm Paul

I look once at his face and say,
Listen Rhymin' Simon,
I'd know you any place,
No worries, your secret,
with me is safe,
Cause dudes in row 2,
gottta stick together, be cool,
We're riding first class,
over the land of the free

What ya do for a living he asks,
A little of this and a little of that,
All of which, ain't no **** good at!
So I spend my cold, hard time
laying down cold hard verse,
Can't stop, cause it's my daddy's dying curse

He said that's cool,
I like to do that too.
Guitars on planes
drive passengers insane,
They take up too much
overhead compartment space,
I just scribble me some rhymes and
Let the music come
when I got two feet
on the ground in the city
we both come from.

Paul:  You got any stuff writ
on that yellow sheet,
or just pretty blue lines,
a big pad of nothing?

Dude: Man you may got diamonds
on the soles of your shoes,
But pay me some 'spect,  
you talking to the man who penned
Sad Eyed Teenagers of the Lowland
on Hello Poetry, gad ****!

Paul smiled and said
you can call me Al,
And if you feel like blowing some lines together,
We got five hours till we can see
the house that Ruth built.

Dude: Hit me with your best shot,
I'll show you what I got

Paul: And she said honey take me dancing
But they ended up by sleeping
In a doorway
By the bodegas and the lights on
Upper Broadway
Wearing diamonds on the soles of their shoes

Dude: Just cause the union of the  monkeys
in the Bronx Zoo done gone on strike,
Don't mean the lion ain't
still king of the hill
inside this New York city jail

Paul: And the sign said,
"The words of the prophets are written
on the subway walls
And tenement halls"
And whispered
in the sounds of silence

Dude: A home-grown poet.
I am
Soul enslaved to words.
The alphabet - My oxygen molecules,
I am both,
Addict and dealer
A ****** poet
******

Paul: You don't need to be coy, Roy
Just listen to me
Hop on the bus, Gus
You don't need to discuss much
Just drop off the key, Lee
And get yourself free

Dude: Contact with the atmosphere
makes self pity die,
blue blood turn red,
the TNT tightness in my chest exploded
I got no place
to store these words,
the cops think I'm
some kind of
Terrorist

On and on thru the night,
Riffing, rapping, rambling, and spitting,
Ditties and darts, couplets and barbs,
Single words and elegies,
Free verse and a lot of fking curse words,
It was a moment, a time
that deserved
to be preserved,
and so this poem got writ

You may think this story apocryphal
Which is another way of saying untrue,
But I got his boarding pass and it is signed,
To this crazy poetry dude, long may you rasp,
And it is signed by Mr. P. Simon, a big fan,
And it has never since that day,
Left my grasp

14 April 2014*

On quiet mornings like this
The fog withdraws b'fore the dogs brawl
The shroud of despair covers me
Like last night's cold sheet
All over us, like some unseen wall
Wherein we cannot hear each other
You don’t talk to me–
You no longer do.
I wish, I would know why
I wish, you would say somethin'

I miss you, like that—
The sun, exploding b’fore
Raybans and endless blue sky
At sunflower fields where
We play hide ‘n’ seek
You flash a smile at me,
Like how the sunflowers—
Follow the sun
All through the day
‘til it got away.

I was just a wayfarin' stranger,
B’fore I was your summer love.
I was out of your plans,
You didn’t see me comin'.
I was not part of the symmetry—
The Fibonacci sequence
That runs in your blood
In your hair, in your skin,
In your heart.

I am just a distraction—
In the morning, you will see
The light, guidin' you
Some orbit, holdin' you in place
'til you complete a cycle
Of your seasonal journey;
Prized seeds of youthful aspirations

You will wilt, soon enough
And close your eyes
After the crows devour
On your dreams—
Nightmares that fed,
On exotic seeds.
But I am here, guardin’ you
Will scare them ‘til they—
Fly away ‘n’ never come back,
Like this once summer
We all ever have.
For our love ‘n’ happiness
Only grown in sunflower fields

On the night train, the red eye plane,
flying home to NYCeeeeeeeeeeeee,
from the city of Los Angeleeeeeeez

Feeling flush, dropped some cash,
got me a seat in extra large first class

Seat 2C, plenty of room for my toes,
to wiggle, to dance, lay down some poetry tracks,
pretending I'm a **** jive,
bad *** from the
make-believe west coast

A short guy, with fedora down low,
an older man,
looking about nine years older
than somebody I might know,
hiding his eyes @ 9pm
neath some excellent Raybans,
slip slides into 2D,
gives me a smile,
and says Hi, I'm Paul!

I look once at his face and say,
listen Rhymin' Simon,
I'd know you any place,
no worries, your secret,
with me is safe,
cause dudes in row 2,
gottta stick together, be cool,
we're riding first class,
over the land of the free

What ya do for a living he asks,
a little of this and a little of that,
all of which, ain't no **** good at!
so I spend my cold, hard time
laying down cold hard verse,
can't stop, cause it's my daddy's dying curse

He said that's cool,
I like to do that too.
guitars on planes
drive passengers insane,
they take up too much
overhead compartment space,
I just scribble me some rhymes and
let the music come
when I got two feet
on the ground in the city
we both come from.

Paul:  
You got any stuff writ
on that yellow sheet,
or just pretty blue lines,
a big pad of nothing?

Dude:
Man you may got diamonds
on the soles of your shoes,
but pay me some 'spect,  
you talking to the man who penned
Sad Eyed Teenagers of the Lowland
on Hello Poetry, gad ****!

Paul smiled and said
you can call me Al,
and if you feel like blowing some lines together,
we got five hours till we can see
the house that Ruth built.

Dude:
Hit me with your best shot,
I'll show you what I got

Paul:
And she said honey take me dancing
but they ended up by sleeping
in a doorway
by the bodegas and the lights on
upper Broadway,
wearing diamonds on the soles of their shoes

Dude:
Just cause the union of the monkeys
in the Bronx Zoo done gone on strike,
don't mean the lion ain't
still king of the hill,
roaming free,
inside this New York city jail

Paul:
And the sign said,
the words of the prophets are written
on the subway walls
and tenement halls
and are whispered
in the sounds of silence

Dude:
A home-grown poet.
I am
soul enslaved to words.
the alphabet - my oxygen molecules,
I am both,
addict and dealer
a  ****** poet
******

Paul:
You don't need to be coy, Roy
just listen to me
hop on the bus, Gus
you don't need to discuss much
just drop off the key, Lee
when get yourself free

Dude:
Contact with the atmosphere
makes self pity die,
blue blood turn red,
the TNT tightness in my chest exploded
I got no place
to store these words,
the cops think I'm
some kind of verbal
terrorist

On and on thru the night,
riffing, rapping, rambling, and spitting,
ditties and darts, couplets and barbs,
single words and elegies,
free verse and a lot of fking curse words

It was a moment, a time
that deserved
to be preserved,
and so this poem got writ

You may think this story apocryphal
which is another way of saying untrue,
but I got his boarding pass and it is signed,
to this crazy poetry dude, long may you rasp,
it is signed by Mr. P. Simon, a big fan,
it has never since that day,
left my grasp

June 5, 2013

Yellow lemon shirt, bright purple shorts
You grabbed the end of my salmon colored sweater
“I like the texture. I have this thing with textures."
You said to me, our clean swift tanned feet
Escorting us to the city dwelled beach
You wanted to surround me with the same familiarity
You had practiced so many times before
But I was
So new, so fresh, so unknown.

I remember you sat on the bus, and popped open a beer
Too nervous to sit next to me, I kept my cat eye sunglasses--
On all day, your circular RayBans reflecting only me.

Remember the first time you walked into the room
Your longboard in your arms
Swan, brooding in black glamour, your eyes and chest
Seemed so interesting, to little ole me
But you jump swiftly into roof top pools
Budding and swimming, disappearing
Text me only to update me
Pint of Jim Beam, I knew I could keep up with you
I thought maybe you could too.

Theres something about reflecting back on this time
The innocence, nostalgia of it
That fills my bones up with summer soaked skin
Margaritas in the sunshine
As you doted on me through a cellphone
FaceTime became our middle name
As you reached from afar,
Promises we could have written into the sand
Only to watch the wind blow them all away.

Fast forward to walking down the street, arm in arm
You still extend to me sometimes
It feels like we have arrived on different planets
When we choose not to now.
Wings and outstretched newness remaining
Crying under your strong limbs
My heels make me an Amazonian Princess
You chose to not invite me tonight
I guess I don’t blame you
As you walk away from the bar,
I’ll always be eons and centuries far
Away from what we hoped we could be.
Kisses that grew with intensity and longing
Ducks and swans eating eggs and pie
Such contentment, falling asleep nestled like little dolls
You wanted
I wanted
We wanted
We hoped
For this to be
It.

Sweeping into our childhoods
Our families, the cities we thrived in
They’re so different, we couldn’t be more different
We ate sandwiches and should have held hands under the table
Like we do now at times at late night diners
Our loneliness and longing
We reinvent with time and poisonous bottles.

You said the other day
That my poetry feels like a story now
But I teach a lesson with each?
Green leaves edging up the length of your legs,
Our mamas so eloquently speak the truth
Your spine, remember all the times
You professed your love?
As I watched with careful eyes
Running away a little at a time.

We walked to the movies together
Lips smudged in deep red
I remember turning to you afterwards
"I love the fact that a WOMAN edited that!!"
The look of wonder in your eyes
Has kept me here
Bopping and bebopping
All along.

Fire hair, unicorn woman
Other men and women dance next to you
But your eyes shift away
Looking into my face
But you turn to go
Once you see I was never yours to keep.

Unbuttoning, dancing into the wee hours of the night
Across gallery openings
Crowded rooms
The windows of buses
Brown hazel eyes that look like mossy green forests
In the natural sunlight
Delicate but hard rugged skin
Tattoos that made sense under the ink of a gun
Spiky hair that can’t decide which way to sit
Chiseled features, and those lips I’ll always miss a bit
Strength personified by angels sewn into skin
A stature often teased but so mobile, grounded, and free
And lastly the beating entity in your chest full of carefree
Amorous beginnings and endings, humors manners
Compiled into the nymph who ran away with my heart in May
And I lament, "Will I forever be chasing pixie dust?"

I love you.
So much.
I do.
You love me.
You do.
So much.

But I watch you sprinkle the environment
The atmosphere,
Swans biting and swirling around it all
Directing and flying into the shining sky
A beacon of tomorrow and the tomorrows to come
As we inch forward and inch back
Like wild hunters on the loose
With your kindness, your sincere interest
Wonder
You always understood me.

I don't have the answers
I don't know how to keep you
I don't know how to reinvent what we were
As our bodies demand and beg for love
But we
But you
But I,
Insert the perfect answer here.

I knew I always would—
Drifting further and further away with each day
Sometimes I long for you to rush
Through the rip tides and muddy waters
Of the deepest ocean
To rise on the other side
Gasping for air, fingers reaching
As if escaping from a pirouette
I long to encircle it all in frothy candy canes
Unicorn blood stained new found friendship
But we send pics, conveying how removed we are
Blowing out every single candle.

I thought I would have all the proper words
That I could articulate so simply
So simply and with lightness
But you turn 24 in 3 minutes.

I guess I imagined all of this differently
Entangling myself in all of the vines of my words
My thoughts, my fears, my joy
I gave them away to you like little trinkets
A book of poetry, sums up everything we were
But if I compiled it all
It would take me years.
Everything we are
As I curl with love into who I am
As I explode with prophetic cinematic splatter paint
As the ripest orange zests and still professes
Just like we did that warm fall Missouri wedding day.

Thank you.
Thank you for the stories to share
For unknowingly becoming a muse
In my elfin ear.

I placed a sunshine emoji next to your name
In my cellphone
Last week
Because thats what you are
Thats what you will always be
No matter how many times our hands reach
Only to fall back to our sides
As we remember and dote on the time
I told you I was a Southern Woman
And you chased me down the street
Inked yourself with the metaphoric image of me
I wave farewell to it all--
As I held you so dearly in the palm of my hand
Little porcelain
Little porcelain

Baby.
Doll.

Happy Birthday Zak.

Florida,
You raised us in South.
With a palm tree mentality,
I can't find paradise.
In this heat I feel paralyzed,
Returned on a plane from the mid west,
thought I was doing what I knew best.
The UV rays ****** with my head, creating a false oasis.
The only rays they tell you to **** with are those called Raybans, so we can look like the rest of us.
Suggested tan like the rest of us.
Skin damaged like the rest of us.
Drink martinis like the rest of us.

Sometimes I feel like tour brochures got the best of us.

I'm alive with diesel
Bathrooms
Goo Gone
and
Cheap Lysol

A Pendleton plaid shirt
and hot pair of RayBans
Polo green and Redwings

All things I used to take for granted
Because of you
Trees
above and beside (next to you)

I'm set apart from the mira clay
above it all
A good day earned
Like a diamond ring

A spokesman to the splintered
Frayed and reglued; revived
Likewise includes all this-
Including your doing

No expression
Drown my sorrows
Unconscious
Neck (nectar)

They'll still be poor on Sunday
when the congregation and the Padre
drive away in their four by fours,
they'll still be poor.

Them
and we know them,
heartless, pitiless government men
would have them disappear
hey
presto
look, no longer here
and would we notice
would we care?

Well
put your ******'Raybans on
and move along
because
one day soon we'll all be gone
and if the teachings of the church
pan out
which I sincerely doubt
there'll be equality in
eternity.