Missing You

Lately,

I have been visiting days

specifically those

 that knew you quite well

asking them to share a memory or two

I have been touching walls

that you've spoken to

when I was too busy to listen

hoping to feel 

leftover vibrations of your voice

I have been walking in reverse

tracing the steps back to

the moment when you lost your life

wishfully thinking I could find it 

and give it back to you

I have been painting the words

"I love you always"

mixing my bleeding heart
with the bluest days

because purple was your favorite color

I have been cursing

 time's impatience

it knew you were always getting lost

 and arriving fashionably late

yet it selfishly refused to wait...

I guess that must be 

why these hours are so lonely

they really missed out on something

 so incredibly beautiful
and indescribably great

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