an ocean feather snuffs it in an alcove, to my leftjust another pair of lungs to expand and swill the seaand i wave curtly to the ***** on the next corner(nothing to see nothing to see) kindlingher shoulders against the lamp-post shelooks more like an angler than a good timeand paint by number peeling swips, lightning strikesupon her hips and the smoke machine pumps nicotinethrough out my veins, on the verge of somethingepicglitter lines the gutter with a sunless pulse all its ownand concrete currents sweep the ground beneath my feetas i exit the aphotic zone:ale stained blouses and hardened nipplesmake my artist type jealous beneath the soft neonsof the brickyard pizza sign    the whirlpool opens with asureness of free beer to soften my mindand i've done this enough for the anxiety to subsideso i kick off these shoes and iDIVEinto a plethora of flannel jacketsand guys named 'steve'

I glanced at the first rose of winter,
Blighted & withered by the cold,
Her blood red & stained onto the pages
Of my very first winter poem.

Across the white grounds stood a man,
Old & shivering like erosive sand,
His rake taking back the souls of nature,
Leaving still the branches bare.

But bare not much like the book on my lap,
Its skin & tissues as bare as a single hair,
The wind gushes & hushes & swips
Turning the pages alive and well.

I desire to press the ink onto the page,
And yet empty it is without a word,
For after the rose choked & blighted,
My first poem was stolen & gone.

By the wind, and into the sky,
Into the soul I've longed to recall,
Words were not enough for a poem,
For poem was not words but a person of a soul I desire.