Opening The Book

I hold within my palms
ashamed tears
proud smiles
desperate prayers
deep steady breaths
 rushing through
 a tunneled fist of night
determined to heal
 the frost's harsh bite

Hopeful fingers cross
Constant cowering
Unavoidable loss
Discovery
Insanity
bouncing assiduously off the walls
like a hell-bent racket
fighting stubborn tennis balls

nervously nibbling nails
leaping spits of bravery
emotions
no longer victims of slavery

forgotten gratitude
swallowed hunger
soul screaming
like echoes of fired shots
when life roughly
combs through the knots

I show them
like corridors filled
with judgments old and new
 hung by shaky hands
for crooked eyes to view

I leave them open and free
like pastures of expressions
explorers have claimed
and named
while piercing their flags
straight through my heart

all that has grown within me
I now lay it all down
for a thousand sights to soil
for love to nurture
for hatred to boil
for thieves to take
for neglect to rot

I toss my book on the table
the pages are always flipping
even when my mind is not

Not Guilty

My lover is not a thief

he never stole my heart;

it is still where it has always been

of that I'm certain,

or I would not feel its beating.

He warmed my life with his breath

when he whispered

spring butterflies into my ears

and my heart chased them

 all the way to June.

My lover is not guilty

he never took my love;

he lit it with his summer hands

when they touched
 the willow's shadow

on my skin,

and banished the sad shape

 before it had the chance

 to reach down

and tattoo me with its tears.

My lover is not a marauder

he never invaded my soul

he walked up toward the fence

that protected the garden

of my blossoming dreams,
 carrying fresh water 
and some extra seeds

and asked, most earnestly if he could help

My lover never committed a crime

He committed his love to mine

This

This is like nothing else

And so this I can’t explain.

This isn’t like thunder

Because thunder loudly comes and goes

And this silently stays

This is nothing like the rain

Because the rain fills the rivers

and helps the living grow

This drains my strength

This stunts my heart’s growth

This is nothing like grief

Because grief is the lowest of many steps

This doesn't lead my shoes
 to any higher levels
This curls alone in a dark corner

This is nothing like madness

Because madness stems from passion

And has wide, intense open eyes

This has no loving roots

This is a weed suffocated beneath cement

This is nothing like pain

Because no drug can numb this

This can’t be put to sleep with pills

This lies beside insomnia

With no hope for a peaceful coma

This is nothing like fear

Because fear is conceived by the unfamiliar

And I know this too well

This can’t be conquered face to face

This has no face

This isn’t rage

Because rage can be hushed

Like a strong breath to a candle’s flame

This burns

 like a thousand year old unknown part of space

This has no metaphor

This has no image

This has no voice

And I hope you never know this

One Day

I walked and walked

But no new distance ever grew;

Same thin space remained,

tightly tucked in my back pocket.

So then I flew and flew,

and was just a flame short

of the dawn viewing me as a rocket.

I spoke and spoke,

Though my voice

 never awoke

 the snoring wind

I smiled when asked

But beneath the mask,

I never grinned.

Each time I planted hope,

Winter overstayed its welcome

And the earth just couldn’t cope.

Still I move

Still I fly

Still I speak

Yes, still I try

All without

A thousand reasons why.

except for the most obvious one...

If I persist,

One day, my spring will come

Blind World

There were times

I wished my heart would stop

There were moments

I wished the clock would stop

There were hours

I wished the world would stop

Not a thing was still

All I was, was nothing

Unseen... the part of the picture

That escapes the eye’s curiosity

Unable to leap out of the negative

The part that played no part

There and not

 Not a soul knew my soul

And then

Time beat my chest

Until the rhythm of its seconds

Resuscitated my will

until the earth, the air, sound…

everything was new

 The depth of life was stronger than my own sobriety

I closed my eyes, 

drifted in darkness

And complained of a blind world

until I finally opened them enough to see

the sky's bright eyes

that were always watching over me

MAYBE

Maybe if my life crawled

Slow enough to trace the Earth

And come back to the beginning

Still beating, still burning

More than June’s screaming sun

Maybe if my heart was as proverbial

As one mentioned on many a beloved poet’s page

And attentive eyes studied its rhythm

Sometimes slow, sometimes none at all

Forever living far beyond its allotted time

Maybe if my hands

 touched the bark of the oldest tree,

that has offered more breath

than my lungs will ever struggle for

stronger than the storming centuries it stood up against

Maybe if my eyes came alive

Like a city weekend night

And I were somewhere breaking the speed limit

On the fastest way to not here

Enjoying every unfamiliar turn

Maybe if time would stop stealing

my side of the bed

And leave me with a little room and proper rest

If each hour were as soft and kind as my favorite pillow

I wouldn’t mind its company and I’d be better for it

Maybe…

If I were all these things

I wouldn’t be me.

Final Storm

You left your footprints

I found them there after yesterday’s rain

 alone

 in the mud

I was happy to see them

Even though it meant

I’d never again

 get to struggle with the blinding sun

To see the hope in your eyes

As your lashes flutter

Unaware of the envy

In the bird's chirp and morning's mutter

The footprints stay

Long after your final storm

Beside them, I stand long in thought

Close to where you once briefly stood

Perhaps taken by the same current

Of confusion

Struck by the same jolt

Of anger

submerged in a river

polluted with our own qualms

so much that
an invisible today

and the urgency

of every imagined tomorrow

formed a bleak yesterday

that I could not find the strength

to wipe away

I imagined a world

That understood the breadth of you

a Brilliance

stretching the visions

Of those who gazed upon it

With elated eyes

My mind drifted to all the moments

You could have made true

In the places that could have been

If the future safely held you

The sidewalks with your scribbled name

I will walk up to,

stop and smile

because it’s a name I knew

and I’ll wish those that walk by it

would have known it too

You left your footprints

and even though it was too late

I left mine beside yours