This is for the soul searchers
This is for the song writer who feels like who he is doesn’t fill the space

of who he was meant to be. This is for the depressed cigarette smoking chain smokers.
This is for the poet who writes a thousand lines and keeps them all to
herself, because nobody else deserves to hear them.
This is to fight the starless sky of every midnight wanderer who looks up
wondering, cause if there were more like you the night time streets wouldn’t be so empty.
This is for the traveler who never got a chance and lies below a rock with
his name.
I don’t even know if I’m old enough to say it, but it’s for the generations
of baby boomers of old women and men whose ideas and values are shushed by an obnoxious generation.
This is for the wedding planners whose weddings never seem to come.
This is for the beautiful girls that somebody told otherwise.
This is for the 15 year old gang member who can’t leave.
This is for the second place finishers and the C students.
This is for the guitar strings never threaded and the scripts never
written and the thrill voices that never cried hallelujah because they didn’t believe they could.
This is for the incapable,
Because you and me both are incapable.
This is so you can look at me differently like I was an amputee.
And what I’ve had cut away was my expectations.
I was supposed to be huge—
I was supposed to be the first rose ever planted in the desert—
I was supposed to be the first paint on the ceiling in the Sistine chapel—
I was supposed to be either Axel Rose or Frodo Baggins, and whether
you’re cool or not you understand that line.
I was supposed to be the first pope with a full body tattoo—
I was supposed to be Neil Armstrong—
I was supposed to be the first life on another planet—
I was supposed to be bleeding iron and nails—
If you saw me as I was supposed to be the contrast between me and the
rest of the world would be unbearable, but I’m incapable.
‘Cause nobody ever pushed me,
Nobody ever pushed me,
Nobody ever pushed me and said:
Be something bigger,
Be something bigger,
Be something!

Nobody ever told me I had the power to leave a hole when I withdraw
my hand from water or move a crowd with mere words or play notes on a piano like bullets to your eardrums.
And in all of this, I wonder if the big things know how important they
are, because I’m a mustard seed and nobody expects me to move a mountain,
Or even cover its slopes in yellow.
But I still feel vastly important, so what then?
So this is my push, my push that you may never get from another person, ever. So, listen carefully:

I EXPECT A LOT OUT OF YOU.

Don’t be discouraged when you can’t cross one line, ‘cause you’ll pass a
hundred others learning you can’t go over one.
This is a dare: go to your fridge and get out all your eggs and put them in
one basket and tell me if you’re still incapable.
And if you are, go back to your fridge and get all your egg based
products, ‘cause you missed them, you missed them and you need them and the neighbors not lending any ingredients.
And when you get there, wherever it is that I pushed you to, don’t worry
about telling me—
Cause I
Will notice
And most of all remember that if you’ve been pushed, if you’ve really
been pushed, you’ll be dearly missed when you’re gone.

                                                         -Marty Schoenleber III

The basketball says thump thump thump to the concrete
Two black kids play a hoopless game. The rules? Intuitive.
The top stair railing of the apartment is a three pointer
Both of the walls along the side are an approved backboard
The grass is out of bounds, the door opening is a time out
The constant rattle of the railing assures without doubt
That they’re draining those shots like Ray Allen
It is the first day over 60 degrees all year and the boys
Smile like the sun granted permission for happiness
They are young and carefree and pulsing with life
But they will grow out of that fickle, temperamental joy
And they’ll rent a room or two in a brick apartment
With a red railing on the third floor, so they can listen
At times annoyed, at other times enchanted, I know this,
Because I am in a brick apartment, and I know the rules



(c) Marty Schoenleber III 2013

We are always running
These streets holding us
As we hold hands
Your hand in mine,

We are running
We are running,
Not following anyone
Not following anything
We are unique
We are pioneers heading west
Not chased but willingly chasing the sunset
Where the horizon and the sky meet with a seamless kiss
We are hoping that they aren‘t the only things that love
          each other so much they can be together without
          leaving a mark

Not tearing or wounding or cutting or finding any cracks
          and fault lines, perfectly matched
One falling into the sea
One rising into the clouds
And on and on and on forever
Dripping off the edge of the known world

Who can know our world
Who could have chased us this far

We are alone in the wild
This rushing and running
Running from the streetlights falling away far behind us
Our hands tight like a taut rope from our shipwrecks
We are pulling one another from the depths
Neither an anchor
But both anchored together

Sinking
Sailing
Storming seas of sidewalk puddles and pavement bleeding
          together
No edges
No seams
No feet
No legs
No bodies
All running heart first shoulders back, eyes closed
Winds whirling around us

Running not following
Holding not falling
Chasing and ending somewhere in that kiss of sky and sea

Finally finding rest
Wrapped in a peaceful footstep folded-up asphalt blanket of
          each other‘s peace and preface
The only unstitched and perfect seam is the horizon that
          God wakes up and puts to bed where we find our
          heads were tucked in
But our hearts weren‘t allowed to end



(c) Marty Schoenleber III 2012

I once knew a little man
Who kept at a job he did not understand
And day after day
He’d go off to work and he’d say:
Today I’ll learn who I am

But Monday came
And then it went
And Tuesday came
And it too was spent
Like Wednesday and Thursday
And then at last Friday
While he sat in a confused lament

And week after week
His office chair squeaked
Until finally he made up his mind
He’d quit, he decided, and just in time
For that very night he died in his sleep

(C) Marty Schoenleber III 2013