Sometimes
         I feel a well
                   dug deep
         into my heart
  I try to stop it
but it quickly
becomes ocean
  and overflows  
     into great tsunami
          rises over all the levees
             rushes past dams                  
               breaks down tall
                   city structures,
              edifices crumbling
           in its path
     all the squid and octopi
    skitting forth
in wild pulses,
tentacles entangled
     in doorways and rooves
        slipping through narrow
                window-openings
                   as they pour ink
                       in clouds,
                         shifting shapes
                          in cephalopod excitement
                            while blue whales
                            and humpbacks
                               breach over bridges,
                             phosphorescent jellies
                          light up
                       the dark streets of
                      my arteries
                     electric eels illuminate
                    the alleyways of
                   desolation's thick syrup
                     and I cannot stop it even
                            if I wanted to,
                   these darkened,
                     swirling waves
I am both floating and flying
like a jumping manta ray
curling around the ferries
bobbing in seahorse iridescence
weaving between buses
as if they were corals

And when the storm subsides,
colorful rockpools form,
rich in diversity
It is there,
in between the
multicolored ***** and
succulent shellfish,
in a mermaid's
       voluptuous smile
and turquoise eye
that I see you,
so crystal clear
                I could reach out              
                      and bring you to me,          
                         holding you tight
                         until the
                gentle break
     of
          morning

~for my father~*

I.

My neighbor Dave
had a hose in his hand,
standard garden, green,
almost like a movie.

His driveway was bright black
the white rocks of our backyard
meant something, standing so close.

Always moving so fast toward another
direction. The memory of the flowers
at sunset, when I learned what the word
“bloom” meant. It wasn’t real.

We used the hose to freeze water
over the rocks in the winter.
This was our sliding,
our skitting into older.

That Christmas
all I wanted was a bicycle.
The house gave up no secrets.
Closer and closer to Christmas,
I found so many presents.
I never found the bicycle.

This was how to measure love

I went to bed so angry that year,
lost in thoughts of running
to a world of backyard ice and bicycles.

In the morning when I saw it,
they confessed Dave’s involvement
He had hidden the bicycle.
Dave’s smile became
something else after that.

I learned to ride slowly,
tumbled down a hill
in blood and tears.
My father carried me home
and our bikes. I’ve never known
how he did it.


II.

Years later and later still.
I don’t know what happened
to that bicycle. It was black
fading easily.

Even though I likely lost it
in the first eviction,
or maybe the second,
the third. I don’t think I left it
after the fire. Maybe I still dream of it.

Later still. I stopped speaking
to my father. It was both our faults.
We both blamed someone
else for three years.

When I saw him again
he was fatherly. Unusual.
He wanted to make sure I was okay.
He wanted to make sure I had everything
I needed. I told him I needed
food and a bicycle. We went out
to get these together. He smiled.

In the dreams,
People come with whips
in pickup trucks. They carry
My childhood away
like a so-frightened horse.
In the dreams,

this time, the bicycle was red.
I don’t think of him when I ride it.
I hardly think of him.

This is how you measure love.

Those were the dreams where we ride off
childhood friends and I.
We ride off to where it is red, blooming red.

Static radio click and a skitting bird,
stench of cigarettes and stale beer
salt and vinegar or dry roasted?

The dormant dampness
of barely-used picnic tables.

Flat coke hanging to melted ice,
warmth trapped under cloud.
Phone under thumb -
get together.

Bike chains and combination locks,
empty wallets, Rizzlers, filters,
a key to the house.

Sticky coaster and slimy taps
beads of sweat on the frozen glass.

Tired of these ******* holidays,
leave me feelin life in a daze.
Tired of this ******* war,
Christmas or Xmas,
Mary was a ******* *****.
Beloved of the lord.
Lets push someone down,
to get into that door.
People pushin and Shovin'
'Tis the season to be Lovin'
Pass the bottle I need a drink,
I need a minute to think,
everybody skitting around
slipping and sliding like an ice rink.

Running on a campaign  of family values,
But the **** you're sayin,
Just ain't true!
Ready to be done with this,
With all of you.
I don't care about your bedroom.
What you gonna do for me,
For all these people like me.
Quit talkin and do it,

Tired of the *******,
you keep putting me through it
Tired of the single-mindedness
And its wide spread acceptedness
It's your fault we're in this mess,
And broke-*** ******* like me
Stuck payin for it,
The reason for this season
died years ago
I'm just gonna say it
Tired of layin low
I'm not the only one
saying what son?
I just want to be done
I'm Not sorry if you're angry with me
It's been building up
and building up
try to tear it down
But I'm fed up
Try to bring it round full circle
Sick of these people
who won't hear the truth
Till this **** hits the roof
gazin around heads aloof

Tired of the *******
you keep putting me through it
Tired of the single-mindedness
and it's widespread acceptedness
It's your fault we in this mess

Tick hour, I'm not afraid of you.
The courtyard's grey and full of silence,
Maybe someone will cross in your time,
But I already made my way to my towerlet,
Perched inside the treasure holder, letter shelves,
Deep within the library.
Others have come, inmobile in you
Typing, eyes skitting, nestled feathers on sofas,
Just like me, but ignoring you.
Tick then! Who am I to care,
The morning's mine to flirt with
And you don't even know about the afternoon.
There are no clocks here except the ones
We choose to see, and no one makes that choice
Here, except accidental numbers on a computer screen.
So tick, fearless warrior,
I'm a vestige of speed in distance
- I'm scurrying away with thoughts
And you have no power here.

He
Its like she give my heart an incision wit no precision n trip. I swear this girl be trippin wit no permission slip

She
He has me falling all over myself just one look and i can barely control myself ,, why is he speaking about permission when all this was written long ago

HE
It might have been written long ago in the history books. But now she sittin in a page of my mystery books. i guess kanye was right and it all falls down. Cuz she fell off the Smoove throne but i aint take away the crown


She
Now its war...why is he lying, it was he who had me crying and now i'm so over caring, you can have your fake crown and feel like a man...i just want my heart back before the hole in it gets any bigger,, this heart used to beat, it used to sing such a beautiful song but now it screams ****** and boy did you do the crime

HE
Fake crown or not you were my queen. I bowed down to your love cuz it was stronger than me. I would have given up kingdomes and gold for just one kiss. Leavin you would be suicide like skitting my wrist. But now you left me and i hate you but its u i always miss. But now the beat of my heart is elongated. But what ever happened no we gon make it. You got me cut so deep no knife no sword. Took my heart like kanye took taylors award. You said You'd **** for me thats how bad you wanna ride. But you end up killin me without a homicide


She
I guess my love was too much for your fragile heart to handle because you give up so quick kanye didn't even have a chance, i wish we had a fight or if someone else in the picture cause then i could understand why you stabbed me in the back when i was to busy only looking at you, its alright i'm okay finally sick of all your many changing faces, your true colors are out for me, now i never want to see you again, these lips you can never taste again, i'm done with this hating myself for something that's in the past, its funny now that i'm gone you keep saying i'm the who took your heart away when i never really had to begin with maybe beyonce has it now i don't care cause all this is so yesterday

He
You say its so yesterday. But why do i see myself hurtin till tomorrow. The pain and the sorrow. I gave you ma heart and you threw it back like it was it was somethin to borrow. Funny i didn't i looked a library. I wasn't obsessed wit you aint maria carey. you say i gave my heart to beyonce but your irreplaceable. You can only love once i thought you were misplaceable. But now your lost like the tv show and untraceable. Everything wit you made sense but now im so illogical, our love was higher than any level we was astronomical. I was deep inside you spiritual biological. Deeper than your follicle. There will never be another no sequel no chronical. At least your hearts beatin. Mine wont stop bleedin. Without you i'm like asthma. No breathin. How am i supposed to survive. Plz come back to me i wanna stay alive. For your lovin i thrive. Your sweet and beautiful like a bee hive. so please come back i deserve a second chance. And i promise the level our love will enhance

She
But you don't see that this over for me i can't keep throwing myself at your feet begging you to catch me, i'm like a fish out of water i can't survive in your world, when i think back on how good we use to be i literally shake, the way i used to melt whenever i hear your name, the way my knees used to go weak, how i used to see the sun,stars and the moon in your eyes,you were a monster on my back, a drug i couldn't turn down, an addiction that rotted my soul but..now all that keeps playing in my head like motion picture,everything we've been through and everything about you seemed to a big lie, a lie you made yourself see true, where the hell was i when you loved me like you say you do, i only remember all those broken promises, all those times you chose your career over me, when all you cared about was the money, the cars, the clothes and the ***'s, i suppose you want me to believe you once again, wait for your calls again like a silly lost pigeon but i won't cause i can't..not anymore