I had a dream about us.
Some scenario I screwed up, classic
anxiety fodder – lost the tickets, some
missing clothes, late for the train, but
every curveball just had us laughing.
I felt right as rain; rain drops tapping
out Morse code messages on the sill,
I don’t understand but I’m always
listening – I never remember dreams,
but today I woke up laughing
Category: Poetry
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How I Know It Was All Real
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Hosanna
Electric-warm, white hot like a filament
brilliant and unbearable to witness, fire
rolling through my body like dry brush –
consume me; burn me, I’m fuel for touch,
for the ecstaticism of cells crying out in
millions of voices; choirs of angels, songs
proclaiming your name your name your
hands, your heart, now mine – gloria, like
a veil is lifted and I see the world in truth –
overwhelming goodness and light poured
into my life, writ cross skin, and how holy
it can feel; my cup overfloweth, and yet
you pour, and you pour, and you pour
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Deus Ex
The pastor asked us to imagine god
bigger than the stories we were told –
take god out of the box, decide our own
motives, limitations, creations, flaws –
make god as big or as small as we’d like.I imagine god was that neighbor who
lifted the bike off of my body, after he
watched me thrown down and beaten
by bullies from the park – straightened
my handlebars and pointed me home –I think god was there when my son was born.
Happiness miles, years, and forever away, so
somebody had to hold all of that joy, the love
flooding that hospital room when I could not –
somebody had to welcome that baby home.God was there in the dorm room, in the car,
god was with us in the bedroom, on the stairs –
behind me in the kitchen; held my heaving back
while I cried, and I cried, and I cried – god made
sure when we were together, we were home, andthe truth is simple and lonely. God is inside us
and only comes out when we forget ourselves;
god is the surrender, the last serving of dinner
placed on another’s plate, the sobbing shoulders,
the waking up, the trying again to make it home.
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On Letting Go
Give me gentle hands, and no more desperate clutching
and grasping – born into this starving lonely body, sorry,
I say, letting go of your shoulder – just steadying myself –
pretty half-lie; dizzy, yes, bones begging hold me togetherSeven years asleep, now, or is that even the right scale?
Mountains aren’t measured by the distance they move –
maybe my majesty is carved in stone – I am silence and
stillness, my arms stretch wide; I will carry it all. I must
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Slack Tide
What was it like to watch a man dissolve
like clay too loose to mold, a bad batch, all
undefined edges – did you try to cup me in
your hands? Did I pour out of your fingers?It’s the season of my zodiac, water sign, ocean
deep, buried down where the light cannot reach
or just transient foam rolling to shore, back out
to sea, forming and dissipating and reforming –let me be the beach. Slow erosion, not riptides –
let me be a polished worrystone on the river bed,
let me be braids of kelp reaching from the abyss
like fingers pleading, oh, to feel another’s hand –not the forest fire, the new growth,
emerald blazing up out of the black –
turn this decay into something intransient,
just let me give all I can before I pour away
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Redacting Hate & Finding Hope
so filled with
your entire lives
Are you so
content,
in absolute bliss?let it go,
perfection
sacrifices that you know nothing about
shame
a million years of
shame.you became
you
YOU you
And THAT’S LOVE
The bottom line is choose
some higher standard.remember to share love
it’s not hard.
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Charcoal
Call it a privilege, the knife of stabbing pain down your back –
it started while moving the coffee table to make room for his bed,
you felt the muscle snap leaning over to kiss your son’s head – oh,
throw my limbs on the fire. I’ll burn to keep him warm. After all –
when he runs up to wraps his arms around my torso, bury his head
into my cheek, doesn’t everything fall right back into place? I’ll give
him everything, all that I am – his fire is still burning bright while I
am all charcoal and ash, but he keeps me warm – he keeps me warm –
keeps me in his heart his arms his dreams his mornings; he keeps me
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Fireflies
Think of the fireflies
when you’re ready to
leave this all behind –
maybe all joy has left,
your bones feel buried
already – family, joy in
your wake, mornings
of grief, tears, waiting
for moments to bleed
past into the next, but
think of those fireflies;
you had forgotten them,
galaxies burning, dying
over and over again out
lonely in the tall grass –
you were eight, once,
what did you long for?
Don’t you have it, now?
Did you forget?
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Cardboard
Romanticize cardboard. Moving yourself in
between domiciles, bruises down your arms –
how many angles you can study a traffic light –Romanticize emptiness. The real deal; it feels
like clinical shock, catatonic on the carpet and
you’re supposed to care about curtains? But yes,romanticize screaming fits. Exploring the limits of
where losing it can take you – urgent care lobbies,
ECG rhythm strips prove broken hearts can still beat
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Call it Homesick
A “golden shovel” poem, using Christopher Tapp’s poem:
i am homesick
for a home that
I have yet to createAbundance is just a stuck accelerator and I
am all tire squeal, burnouts, heart race, I am
legend; that hole in my chest, I call it homesickcall them nightmares, waking or not, if not for
the pinch you could be asleep, but you know a
real terror when it arrives – know when you’re home
(you can see it in the eyes) but, you know all of thatyou know the tiptoe, you’ve tested those edges, I
can see it in your eyes. It took all that I have
not to mention it, give a knowing nod, and yet
it’s written across our faces, the sun reaching to
the corner of the bed, a peace I’ll never recreate
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Seashells
I should have been made of paper, instead
I’m just the paleness and fragility, cut corners
and folds – couldn’t I be unscrolled tapestry?
Or uncovered, a new Rosetta Stone, wrap wise
words around my body like ivy – then, maybe
someday I could be found, too, desired for
being the long-sought answer, storyteller –
this constellation of freckles and scars
could be holy, powerful, a new Zodiac –
I’ll tell you everything you want to hear, just
hold me close to you – read me to find those
apocrypha, give me all the terrors you hold –
I could have been ready. I should have known,
I could have moved the stars, the very fate
written into my skin. Could’ve written better
stories, some happier endings – did you know
there are safe footfalls across grief? I clung
chest-heaving on each one while I swam blind
across the chasm, I could have shown the way
so nobody else has to fall in – I’ve mapped these
dead-still waters, like when I was younger –
I collected shells, dug up treasures to dry out
in the sun, desperate to prove how hidden things
can be beautiful, too ashamed to drag out any
treasures inside me, hiding an opalescent underbelly
of oil slick rainbow scales underneath secrets and
shame – I should have been a hermit crab, instead.
I should have been an oracle – shackle me and
let me breathe in the smoke, I’ll face madness,
my jaw is clenched, anyway, I’ll bear the grin –
I should be given one shot to defy the fates
and stare down the gods; I could burn –
ignite the tapestry, fuel for the final push,
one last hearty bellow into the furnace and
I am brilliance, I am the first day, I am the last,
I am alchemy, transmuting blistering light
into memory – I’d be gone
but I’d win.
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Eulogy for the Living
Always, your smile was always springtime warm.
Taught yourself French with dozens of cassettes
borrowed from the library – you dreamed of Paris,
painted wide landscapes of deserts, adobo domes,
oceans, beaches; read Louis L’Amour and escaped
any chance you could – taught me shapes of words
too, you took me with you, for a while – all of those
memories glow sepia tone, they’re almost a home.I hope I don’t haunt you. Always I’ve wanted you
happy – how long I’ve sobbed for all of the love I
sent; hoping for ripples to echo their way back,
even as I child I could see you were riddled with
holes, gaps I thought I could fill – I’m sorry, mom.
I tried, and how long I’ve cried, self hatred flared
because I could not burn bright enough for you,
because I’m sure you sob, too – your sun has left
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Counting Footsteps
To be loved is to be seen, and
I’ll never let them look closely –
that’s when the shot is fired, I’m
a deer in crosshairs, rabbit running,
all tall ears counting footsteps until
I’m safe, I’m safe, I’m safe, I’m safe,
the pulse of my heart pleading, please
this time please let it be true – I wonder
what soft prayers do prey whisper while
waiting for the danger to pass overhead –
the tall grass listens, the wind carries to
mother god, cosmos, whatever cares to
listen, and if I must be your eyes then
witness this suffering, you gave me this
paper skin, crooked, bird-hollow limbs –
you made my heart pound and plead as
I cower in the dark hollows of my chest –
if that final, fatal stroke isn’t coming now,
then when?
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The Seventh Day
The priests were convinced – told us it was god
who built this world bespoke, bare hands and all –
six days to decide that yes, our hearts should beat
loudly enough at night for lovers to hear, breaths a
perfect fragile rhythm – it was god who made it so?
And as I whisper my prayers into that silent dark
I know the real miracle is that I can stitch myself
to this moment; surely you feel my fingertips as I
sew myself into your warmth, my hands weaving
back and forth, our breaths in and out, that soft
ocean crash of our embrace; every tear a blessing
as I weep for the impossible gift of each next beat –
if you listened to my shaking prayers, I’m thankful –
thanking god, thanking the quiet corners of a hotel,
thankful this happened at all, this happened at all
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Promises
In my mind I carry a worn Polaroid,
a scene, blue skies, my inner child and I
sharing a shady park bench, quiet and
watching the world go by, together.I’d be the one to break the silence,
but damn, kid, what can I say?
We persist, endure, yes, it hurts –
each waking, each brief dream –yes, Cameron. I am sorry. That
our name slides hot on our tongues
electric sour like licking a 9-volt,
and I am trying to turn it sweeter.We don’t become less afraid. I’m sorry,
the breadth of grief will only grow
deeper, wide and fathomless choking seas
of it, and we’ll tread water, kiddo –we’re good at it. Now comes the part where
I wish this wasn’t a worn photo, sad poem,
that we were past strained metaphor so
I could lean in close to you on the bench –whisper promises into your shoulder that
yes, we still sob for the violent wonder
of it all – just to be here, to lick the battery –
we persist. They never beat that out of us.I could tell you that yes! Yes, we cried
when the children danced in the aisles
while the fiddle played at church – trees
blossomed outside, as if listening, too –I would lean into you, Cameron –
our name sweet on my lips as I swear
that we are in this together – show you
how our softness was never a mistake.
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Loud
The self-help book said that shame and silence
are quiet companions – the corollary point being
you can fight shame by fighting the silence; but
I’m bad at reading rooms, and when I’m loudest –
well, people get scared.I’m the price for the joy, the longing and lonely
which comes after, the ringing in your ears and
not warm like fresh sheets, not a gentle breeze
I’m all hard ground, thin clothes, freezing wind,
the reckoning in the recollecting; it’s loud, butnot loud like singing, not loud
like contagious, sleepy laughter,
not loud like sunlight breaking through
morning blinds piercing the black,
I’m loud like heartbreak,
loud like a burn ward,
I’m loud like a bruise
but that just means
you’re stuck with me
a while, I linger, but
at least I am loud,
can’t ignore me, now
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Witch Burning
I know you’re still here.
This is the only way I’ve
ever kept captive audiences –everyone gawks at car crashes.
I’m written out naked, a diary left open,
so take all you need, here are my confessions:the pride of accepting you’re a piece
that will never fit – it takes you, whole, a
maniacal ecstatic joy burning at the stake,poems should be public square executions
so here are mine – I build my own guillotines,
and I adore demonstrating each deadly cornerbecause I’ve lost my taste for this life; slaked, gone
when I first found the words for it, unholy text
eclipsing dawn, a ten year old learningyou could leave it?
you could leave it –
you haven’t left it, yetthe fire is taking you
whole, you’re laughing, loud,
and you haven’t left it, yet
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Breath
Heart beats like a rabbit, but not a good one –
doc says I’m skipping beats, so I’m the rabbit
that gets caught. Sometimes I feel those fangs,
the sharp pangs digging in, just under my lungs –
I’m sitting still but my body is running a race, and
life is the predator stalking, circling in, circling in –
howling, and hungry. You can see it in the breath.
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Wisteria
For once, let me be the springtime blooms
and not desperate vines; let me flower –
all softness, a curtain of petals and
not those long grasping fingers
of gnarled woody branches
choking all the trees
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Overstayed Welcomes
The solitary answer that comes
listening to the silent streets
outside your window at night,
quiet broken by the gentle whir
of car tires, each set a promise –
anywhere but here
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And I Was Left
What was taken, when the house was razed:
The better parts of my childhood, daydreaming
fantasizing feral, figuring out how to be human
and jumping fences, strolling backyard beaches,
watching storms looming across the bay, those
thunderheads nightmares are born from, awful
and bountiful as the sun that would come after –
hiding places under beds, broom closets, even
behind that hedge where I’d smoke cigarettes –
no more grass, no more tire swing that gave me
my first concussion, no more fence out front
that chipped my eyebrow, no kitchen cupboard
that scarred my nose – I knew which of those stairs
creaked, how to pry the back door’s deadbolt free,
and every single shadow and quiet place knew me –
we would sit together in the silent dark, like praying.
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Salt
It was deliberate.
I burned the ships –
cut off my retreat back to your dementia,
before I chose contorting into that chasm
inside your heart where the love belonged –
was it always me? Is that why you miss me?
If ever I turned on the light, in there,
would any of you still faintly glow?
Still I turned back! I turned back,
I stranded you on the shore – the
chasm in my heart ached for you
so I turned, because fuck salvation –
I am the proud pillar of salt you see
blowing away; did the wind carry
my voice? You are loved, forever –
were you running from this ache?
Did you see me turn?
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String Theory
I’ve read string theory – there’s enough that makes sense,
like how my waveform also collapses when I am observed –
don’t perceive me; then I’ll be everything, just possibilities,
because heartbreak’s all hard edges that cut – you can’t harm
ideas, and you can’t touch me when I never was, don’t worry –
maybe I’m invisible but I’m everywhere, you’re a part of me,
I am in everything, do you feel me in the air when you dream?
I am your breath, I am a thought, I am a wave, I am long gone –
I never was, I am a part of you, I’m with you always always always
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Treading
Whenever hands reach out
they’ve only pulled me down –
it’s like how my mom and dad
would drive to visit with boxes
full of garbage, broken tools and
old mementos – oh, they’ve always
written such devastating poems;
all the ways they couldn’t love me,
the gestures they could have just
written down, ideally, but instead
here’s your junk mail, that broken
trophy from high school – do you
remember? Do you remember us?
floodwater already up to my nostrils,
I’m gasping, spluttering back to shore,
catcher in the rye shouting stay out,
save yourselves; I will be fine –
all I know is treading water
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Stained Glass
It’s not as complicated as we’re making it.
I think it always was supposed to be
all accidents, that we’re just spilled milk
and the sum of the tears that came after.These arms can hold so much, you know –
each failure fuck-up fracture frailty falter,
fingers gently, carefully carrying each piece,
I’ll hold every single one patiently in place.Tell me every way that you’ve broken; show me
your scars, bruises – I’ll reveal all of mine, the
cigarette burns, the scar raked across my nose
I got when I was three; all the ways I’ve bled –it’s sacred, you know. We’re mosaics, queens
and kings of kintsugi, cracks shining golden
bright; each time we shattered is a sunburst.
You were never broken. We’re all stained glass.
CALL ME BELOVED 