Awakening His Glory

Billy came into my office
sat down and crossed his legs.
I couldn't place his expression.
We cast aside formal business
for a few moments
I asked about his family.

"There is none.
I was an orphan."

I became tense.

He swooped in with emotions,
tragedies, poured out to me
details, his hand to his forehead
like it was the first time
it had all come out.

Billy's eyes told a different story.
They were calm and collected,
his voice was matter-of-fact.

"The man who owned the farm
liked little boys.
For three years
he used me like a woman."

He had practiced this.

My hands were folded in my lap
the whole time,
grasping the other hand's fingers
so that I felt something
other than the emptiness
the recounting of his life
put inside me.

We finished our transaction,
Billy left.
I turned back to my papers
and could only laugh hysterically.

Letter to Leilani

Every year we grow stronger -
wiser.
Every breath we take
we sip in greatness.
I have never known
a bridge so solid,
a heart that beats so passionately;
a butterfly so graceful
as you.

Our path sometimes follows
over gently rolling terrain,
sometimes we ride against the wind;
know that I will always sing,
"Oh how I love thee
in times of tribulation,
in ages of adulation,
forever and always we shall be."

The Thing About Flowers

She's been stammering
lately, I tell her jokes
and she stares
as she does at the television
these days it looks like the light is gone.
Twice misspoken
in one sentence,
her words used to stretch
across the horizon
and now they fall at her feet,
and she stumbles.

On warm Sundays
she is on her knees
in the dirt.
I watched her once out the window
caressing the leaves
her distressed Japanese maple
wilting like me,
she pruned the branches
of her azalea bush
like she was trying
to shape my disasters,
trim them so that it would grow
strong and bloom
into a full life.
Sometimes I see my face
in the poms of her fragrant lilacs.

I wonder if her memories rise to the surface
behind her bright green eyes,
or if they flounder on the rocks.

She used to be so powerful.
She waged all out war
on life
and won, but once she broke her toe
and I saw her sniffle.
I saw her weep
coming back from her father's hospital room;
it had spread all over.
All I could do
was fumble an I'm sorry,
just stare like she does now.

That's the thing about flowers:
you don't speak to nurture,
their strength is not fortified by words.
She can mumble and stutter
to their petals,
she can cut away their sorrow.

The thought of your body
covering mine
makes my stomach perform acrobatics.
My cheeks flush.
I can feel
your breath against my neck
and know what it sounds like
when you moan,
even if it's only pretend
for right now.
I've thought about your face
when you come:
how your eyes close so tight.

Maybe it's just a spectre
my mind is making love to.
I turn my head
and you're watching me;
I'm undressing you
and you don't even know it.

Open Letter

If you can make the world a better place,
then do it.

If you can't,
at least believe that someone else can.

The end of excuses is happening.
Adapt or be left behind.

Create:
or you will be destroyed.
Save:
or perish yourself.

A Mirror

All life is a mirror
held up to another mirror
creating an infinite reflection.

I often find myself
covered in shards of shattered glass;
it must be,
I pound my fists on the mirror
while I sleep.

Can you create for me
an end point?
Somewhere in between?

I would like to occupy that space
where the reflections meet.

When Your Gun Is Laid To Rest

You'll be placed under the oak tree right next to Uncle Newell
beneath the stand where you set your sights on more than a few
deer walking by, sixteen points, one buck in a million doe.
I will dig the hole myself - all the beads of sweat
every tear dropped
will form a tributary to carry off my sorrow
into the waters surrounding our family's parcel.
Is this what your father wanted?
Is this where your heart rests?
It was never in your chest, judging by the size it could fit four
or five
but you always kept it for the trees fallen across the creek
or over the bridge that you built yourself.
I could never bring myself to stay there with you
it wasn't my world and it wasn't my home - there in the thicket
where the A-frame was hidden unless you knew your footing,
seventy seven paces from the bank
that's where you knew everything would be okay;
even if you didn't make the kill you still took a shot.
I've got my own gun now.
My birds fly differently than yours and my fawn will eat clover
forever with you watching from the tree tops.

Days Are Driftwood

I woke up
this morning it's Friday.
Yesterday was Tuesday,
on Sunday
I was a child.

My days are driftwood
lost somewhere
in the stream
around the bend
down the road from my house.

I swam in it once
as an awkward preteen,
mostly knee high;
at the end
I remember a waterfall.
I stood in the downpour -
thought about the water
pulling down my skin
to make me longer,
stretching me out
until I became the length of the stream.
That was two days ago.

Time just trickles
along with the current,
your life tide
ebbs and flows until
you open your eyes
and it's your last day
on earth: it turns out
to be a flash flood.

Next Wednesday I'll be in the ground,
but Thursday I'll be back.

I turn over in bed
and it's Monday again.
Where did the weekend go?

Last Night

Last night I chased
a fox running rampant
through the woods
behind my home.

I will tell you this:
there is more carnal hunger
that flows through my veins
than human blood.

I caught up with the fox and tore out his throat.
I watched him bleed out and left him for dead.

In my mouth
grew stalactite fangs,
stretched my lips open
enough to encompass the earth --

and from the depths of my cavern
came a howl
that shook the heavens
and shattered the stars.

No Night's Darkness in the Morning Light

I am most gentle in the morning
when I wake,
if I rise with the sun, you
at my side
then surely
I was a blur in the night.

Something secretive, vicious;
drawing you out and feeding
from your goodness.

I was a fury and now,
drunk with echoing slumber
I, like the tranquilized tigress,
could be your pet.

You may do well to remember
that docile sleeping face,
and in memory
my darkness is not so weighted
as my stolen, fleeting aurora grace.

Three Steps

First time:
we touched bellies
our hair tangled into the other's
red swollen lips
warm with wanting
soft
with hopes and expectations.

Second time:
jumping off jagged cliffs
into the welcoming ocean below
trusting hands clasped
held tight
our feet brushed the other's
in bed sheets
there were blue lights
cool with calm
smooth
with desire.

Third time:
we let go
revelling in the knowledge
the other will come back
silent with comfort
warm with wanting.

Your Life Is Not Your Own

Your life is not
your own, it belongs
to whatever is holding you down.

Some tell you:
swim!
Others, drown.

Above all else,
do not trust
the court, they will take the crown.

I was forced to leave the plains.

I was forced to leave the plains.
Sulked my way back,
what you think you know -
abandon all that -
return to the swamps.
Soak with me once again.

In the middle of the bog,
at the center of all
things dirty and violently drenched
sits a patch of green.
It contemplates life;
it is my beacon of creation,
and death, I have forgotten
what grass feels like
under bare feet. I cannot
swim to it, no not yet.

There was once a constant offering:
unlimited pleasure, unending possibility,
but now - now that offering
instead is sacrifice; it got cold
so very fast.
The plains were slashed and burned.
Now I lay at the bottom of a swamp.

Opposite and Between

Can things like darkness
and light,
strife and love be born
out of the same place?

Can opposing forces be not really
two separate actions
or ideas
but rather be two sides
of the same coin?

If the outcome of all things
is death,
then does opposition even factor?
If all matter has the same fate,
then we are everything; opposite
and between.

Letter to Emily

My friend!
My soul-sister!
My bandita freedom-fighter!

O those glorious roads we travel!
O those sights we see
and bridges we cross,
cliffs we scale!

How will my heart become full again?

It is the fresh face,
it is the crooked beaming smile -
one tooth and one nail at a time -

when it is us again
and the steps and strides
never fell out of sync!

It is You and I,
my dear dear friend.

That is how.

How I will miss you.
How my spirits will fly
again someday.