The Stars Have Your Eyes

The stars have your eyes
I don't know if they were shoplifted
or gifted
but regardless of who has them now
or how that possession came to be
they'll always be yours
and they'll always be
my favorite thing to see

The Stars have your eyes
they know me best
in the latest hour
when wishes come free
and time
is a crawling baby

the day is mostly
just a necessary routine
of earning to survive
but through the darkness
I see your eyes
and I feel alive

In the morning
 I'll turn blue and miss you
as I prepare
to hustle the clock
from 9 to 5

But while night
is fighting shadows
for wearing the same dress
I'll search for your eyes
high above the rush hour stress
and know
without a doubt
I was born
because they were meant to be seen

You're Gone Again

The early sun finds me forgetful
of yesterday's sad song
but it won't be long
before a cloud rolls through
with an image
of us without you
and the hard fall begins

You're gone again
you only left once
but you're gone again
how can that be?

the only answer
is the memory
seizing my breath
and stabbing my chest
while you are at rest

Your infectious laughter
it's gone again
your winning ball game smile
gone again
I rise for the times
it will come back around
like a stadium's wave
but when I visit your grave
You're gone again

You're flying somewhere
only a dream can find
So I sleep each night
 to ask you back
but when the dream awakes
you're gone again

So hard
that fierce sun strikes me

Evening Verse

I often stay awake
to listen as the night sleeps
to hear it deeply breathing
and know that life
does not only rise
for the morning
sometimes it's about the quiet night
wrapping its reflection
a gift
for tomorrow's sleepy eyes to open

So Far Away

I’ve been wandering about
Pretending to do

Everything

Everything except 

missing you

I walk,

 I run,

I close my eyes

And speak to the sun

It searches my skin

Detects no rain

I smile

It won’t find

my hidden pain

I’ve been selling time

At a discount rate

It just doesn't seem

Worth its weight

Without the gold

Silver linings

Hanging off the clouds

Like broken thread

I can’t sew

So I’m pulling on them, instead

I've been hanging around

Pretending to stay

When really

I'm so very, very far away

So far away

 from everything

Everything

Except needing you

Leave Some Room

When it comes to creativity
Experience is fruitful
extravagance is detrimental
live life
live it like you have no other options
live it like it will kill you if you don't
but keep your possessions simple

When you have more than
you could possibly want
there is no room
 for desire or dreams
and you become sleepless,
weighed down
with a cluttered home
filled with things you don't pay attention to
and love gets lost
somewhere at the bottom of it all

So save some  room
for what may never be
because that's when and where
the mind sparks out of defiance
and does some amazing things
to make up for what reality lacks
and what others say it can't have

Falling Stickers

All the things that I pray
 God will show me,
all the questions I've asked
glow like stars, stickered
on my bedroom ceiling

The place of horizontal whispers
too weak to straighten out
all that the day
 has bent out of shape
Slowly
 the stars peel and fall
while gravity rolls its eyes

The place of kneeling wishes
never standing up
 to open the lids
 that block its dreams

The place I'm leaving
to find somewhere
open and true
to wake up to

Why?

Why would Heaven ever look down?
(We ask the sky
through an open window.)
Why? When its breeze glides
 its soft feet on a dance
to a magician's song

Why would Heaven look up?
(God asks, silently to himself)
Why? When I splashed its life
with a little bit of each color
a little bit spread out everywhere
to make a whole lot of everything

Why would Heaven ever look down?
(We ask the sky)
Why? When it can catch
an unwanted, ugly nightmare
embrace it tightly
and kiss it sweetly
 into a beautiful butterfly

Why would Heaven look up?
(God asks with a shaking head)
Why?
When I brushed its hair softly
away from its ears
and whispered it awake
to rise and live its dreams

Why would Heaven ever look down?
 (We ask the sky)
Why? With all the magnificent it is,
why would it care to see
these overused brooms,
 and floors that only meet the broken

Why is Heaven playing catch? (God asks)
Tossing its tears up to the clouds
and catching them
again and again
with its glove
each time they fall back down.
Why? When friendship
 is offering a tissue and a smile

Why would Heaven
ever want to look down?
(again, we ask the sky.)
There is no chance
it will ever look down
to see and answer me.

Why won't Heaven look around??
(God asks, confusedly to his thoughts)
Why doesn't it know who it is?

Phantom Pain

I found myself walking a straight line

across a sober rope

every worry

punching my chest

hard enough
to threaten a fall

every strike

rattling broken desires

to take the route

to leave it all

hitting bottom

doesn't hurt

neither does 

the climb back up

it's the memory of the heart

a phantom pain

strong enough

to force a paralyzed soul

to feel the rain
and crawl away

from the haunting agony

Your World

Show me who you are
row me through your dreams
my feet have been
walking in my own
 dusty dirt so long
and my eyes are squinting
to see some colorful things

Tell me as much as you know
I promise to listen
 longer than,
the longest standing tree
and I will do my best
to be worthy
 of your kind company

Let me be a part of your world
mine has grown so old
I'm ready to move
these hurting toes
far away
from tripping stones
to airy blue and shining  gold

Hold Me Calm

fingers dancing

using my freckles

as their guide

on this ballroom skin

a passionate kiss

letting me know

I can't win

Hold me calm

with your eyes

while the eloquent sky

reads our epic destiny

I Worry For You

I worry for you
with the part of me that
 though may not share
the DNA of your pain
still resembles the sting
like a distant cousin
who lives next door

I know enough of the night's demons
to know not to rest
when it's my turn to keep watch
and I've learned enough
of eternity's tales
to pray that this heart
does not guard in vain

I fear the prophecy's truth
of the inevitable moment
when you're too ghostly
 for my human arms
when it's out of my hands
and up to God.

So I do the best thing I can do
and look at you and smile
and hope you find
the part of yourself
 that you think you've lost

I've kept pictures
to revive your memory
of all the places
where you've planted beauty
and all the faces
you've warmly touched

Just see yourself
when you look into my eyes
see the soul that brightened them.

Lazy

Sometimes
I'm not ready for the ride
these words want to take me on
But I have no fight for their pull
so I throw my pajamas in the hamper
and leave my pillows' lull
 for the bustling streets


I don't want to scream shotgun
into the air
and run from the ricochet
I just want to be in bed
 with the dimming day
but time keeps tossing and turning
so I write anyway

But I try not to let the words know
that even though
 I crave silence
and dread their shout
I'm grateful for them
forcing me out.

Wheels

I want to take a break
 from the track
catch my breath
stop racing against my thoughts
and just be still
be still
for a moment
and nothing less or more

I'd like to turn the knob
and turn my life around
open the door
to the freedom
 I think we were all meant for
forget the safety
of falling
on the same old side of the bed
for 5 to 7 hours
only to wake to a familiar dread

and if I
stumble upon tomorrow
like some stranger's land
and lose the way back home
perhaps the future will let me stand
on its balcony
and share its view
maybe the panic of change
will be tamed
 by the new
grabbing my attention
like a puppy picked up
by the scruff of the neck


All I know
is that I'm ready to
brake the wheels of repetition
and walk away without turning back
or turning those wheels again.

My People

My people
don't look to faces
for their favorite color
They look to the earth's roof
or to its bed

My people
 never search for certain eyes
to find their favorite shape
they search the clouds
and they move the same
taking their time
getting to know it all
the air, the fire, the dirt, the water
and the life that sits itself
at the center of the elements
listening to chanting hearts
enchant the vibrant arts

My people
don't wave flags
to conquer territories
or mask their debt
 claiming to own
what God has loaned
they wave quilts
stitched from patches of kindness
slipped anonymously
over the years
through the mail slot of their door
and they return to sender
by tucking in
winter's dark and cold

My people
don't have one symbol
marked like graffiti on paper
smearing on hands
 exchanging it
for a larger pool
to fill their party
with diving greed.
They have a soul
shapeless and inkless
no keyhole to refuse what isn't its kind
no brand to iron you into a herd
just love rolling like a globe
on sincere words

My people
shake up the alphabet
like kindergarten partners
So U and I can hold hands
on a field trip together


My people
never drive a bulldozer
through an envious dream
they'll pat you at the ballpark
they will ask to join your team
and be a part of
what brought you safely home

My people
don't have a coast
or a time
 that suffocates in one zone
and to them
native is a foreign word
that plants itself in the way
of  harmony's breadth
We knock down the barricades

We don't line up to stand
in order of height or dollar
we move forever
side by side
our siamese friendships
 move forever
like a choir of deep oceans and high winds
moving the clouds to tears

Beyond The Reaching Arms of Rescue

Did you feel me aching for you
while you were under covers
hiding from a comet's stare
shushing the clock's nervous ticks
begging a pillow
 to catch each tear
so that the drops won't give up
your whereabouts

Did you hear me hurting for you
when you swallowed the key
to your chambers
and choked
beyond the reaching arms of rescue
so that you could let the night sleep in peace
instead of climbing over it
 to turn on the light

Did you feel me missing you
before you were even gone
when I stretched out my leg
and tried to trip you
at the very first step
of multiple attempts
to leave

Did you see me crying for you
Did you recognize my fists
 flailing through the void
that now takes up residence
inside your silhouette


It was never my intention
to lay my aching
over your pain.

I shouldn't have hurt for you
I should have hoped for you
so you could feel my hope
and hold on
long enough to find my love.

Come Outside

Love
patient and quiet,
it waits
on the last step of your porch
and forgives
each hour you spend
wading through your murky soul

Each second,
it times
the laps you run
 around your crowded mind
of cloned faces applauding
when you smile
and booing
when you cry

It waits without knocking
sitting on the chance
you will come outside
like an egg
that will one day crack itself
to meet the world

You can imagine what it's like
and fly on every fantasy
that will always
crash land you home

or you can
slide down the banister
that leads to your front door
Go out and meet its smile
and learn everything there is to know
about togetherness
each day
for the rest of your life