Back Home

Here we are back in the Northwest, where

Everyone’s too upbeat about the future and

So assured that it’s all gonna change.

Here in the Northwest, our consciousness like

The Pacific, crashing and swelling and cold

And never too far from the rocky shoreline.

Here we are back in the Northwest, with

The only predictable weather and the

Forecaster has it quite easy from winter to June.

Here in the Northwest, our hearts tied by

Computer wires, our minds by ideas and

Tall metal bridges grid-lined in the sky.

Here we are back in the Northwest, where

Sometimes I miss the deep South, a world

Where life is clear-cut and restrictive and safe.

Back in the deep South, the mentality’s old and

Well-tested, the art’s so alive and lives uncontested

And the store has 43 types of thin-sliced white bread.

Here we are back in the Northwest, where

Everything’s so young and recently destroyed,

And nothing lasts longer than a music movement.

Here in the Northwest, the clouds hanging like

Coffee smells in the morning, the days lagging

Like an empty Nirvana song.

XX---

People Change.

I can’t state what you say cuz I don’t know.

The only reason that you’ve given is that shrug and small denial,

That enigmatic smile,

That apologetic way in which you slowly lose your voice.

I can’t argue if you never argue back.

I can’t reason with your mindset since you only state the facts,

If your single contribution is the lack of our locution,

And that loyalty of yours that I can only barely track.

And I worry that… you’ll never be the same.

You know that this decision’s not the game you play with colored guns

It’s a reality that’s harsher than your glaring desert sun

And it will change the man you thought you’d be

And this life that you’ve begun

And she’s right, you know, that this will make you straight –

And take if from me, straight’s not something you want to be

And I prefer you bent, we… both do.

You want respect, you’ll get incomprehension

You’ll get fear and quiet guilt and

Be ignore and acknowledged like you’re shifting dimensions,

And I, I am afraid that you won’t be the same.

People grow. People change.

But I want – at the very least –

I want your smile to remain.

XX---

The Downside to Consorting with the Gods

Woulda done, shoulda done

Lizabeth had a son

Hair being chalky white,

Eyes being black.

Asked ‘bout the color she

Said with a blubber the

Father was Charon who

Pigment did lack.


X----

He Asks No More

He said I don’t feel my heartbeat anymore.

He said I used to have a rhythm, like a knocking at my door,

I used to feel like somebody who’d never lived before,

I used to feel my body track the beating at my core

He said I don’t feel my heartbeat anymore.

He said I’m not pulled to wander anymore.

He said I used to speed on highways just to hear the engine roar,

I used to let the windows down and wish that I could soar,

I used to drive through rainstorms just to watch the water pour

He said I’m not pulled to wander anymore.

He said I don’t dream of flying anymore.

He said I used to stretch my wings and glide over the sea and shore,

I used to swim among the coral on the ocean floor,

I used to dream a world with a thousand open doors,

He said I don’t dream of flying anymore.

He said I used to feel like living. But no more.


XXX--

I Don't Miss You

Poem will not be published due to ridiculously impossible-to-publish nature of poem.
And that's all I'm going to say about THAT.

the 110th floor

I stopped understanding war when it wasn’t about the bad guys and the good guys anymore.

I stopped understanding war years ago, when parents society-sophisticated tried to explain the smoke

And the one thousand back-flipping papers in the sky

And the dust storm running down New York streets:

Firefighters caught up, women in business skirts running and

The planes came from two different directions but

Somehow there were four of them?

I didn’t understand. I didn’t try very hard.

I stopped understanding war when I realized it wasn’t just this once.

When I realized that a war didn’t have a time period, only amplifications

That the towers in New York were really the towers in Khobar and

People screamed the same in Vietnam tunnels as Iwo Jima foxholes and

Your hands shook the same on the video camera in

Tiananmen square and the streets of Syria,

Which were really the streets of Nuremberg, the glass

Sparkling on the pavement like lost stars and

I didn’t understand. I tried to sort these wars into “just” and “un” but I failed.

I stopped understanding war long before I realized the internet understood it all.

Long before I knew that Wikipedia’s blued links could lead me from page to page and

I could spend all night reading about one “operation” after another, searching for

Something headed “The Answer” or “History’s Judgment” or “A Real Reason We Decided To Invade”

Long before I apple-tabbed al Jazeera every hour to check on six separate states of Spring and

Watched hours and hours of footage too raw to be distant in which the

Same floors buckled under the strain of fire to collapse one after another after another and

I had to turn off the sound.

I didn’t understand. I didn’t have the processing power of my little-screened laptop.

I stopped understanding war even after the explosion of its supposed solutions.

The man hiding in his supporter’s dirt floor, his picture on the front page, he didn’t look

Evil, he looked pitiable – he looked helpless – he looked afraid and

The white UN drones, their target compounds didn’t just hold dictators they held a family and

When desert-camouflaged troops crossed over that line for the (gods I hope) last time

It wasn’t a victory it was a breath finally let go and

It was the excuse we needed to forget four and a half thousand left behind and

One set of blood-stained pictures dropped into the ocean after them and still

I don’t understand. I’ve discovered the end of a code-name isn’t the end of a war, only an era.

I’ve stopped understanding war and, honestly, I hardly try anymore. But goddammit I remember.

I can’t tell you if tanks in Kuwait were reasonable, or Cold War funding for Afghan rebels,

And I can’t tell you what it feels like to be hit with a water canon or lead bullets or the loss of a father

But I remember that someone does. I don’t forget that someone stood in a Palestinian camp and lived and

Someone stood on the 110^th floor and didn’t, and I don’t forget that

Someone is responsible. That sometimes that person is the UN’s most wanted

And sometimes he is the decorated war general and the foreign affairs official but I don’t forget that

Sometimes that person is me and even though I –

I don’t always understand, I remember that the violence doesn’t leave when it passes over my head

It isn’t gone when it leaves the television screen and the laptop screen and the public scene, even if it

Is sometimes impossible to understand, it is War and

It remains.


XXXXX

quindesce

One of my favorite things to write during NaPoWriMo, today's (third) poem is actually a pwoermd - a one-word poem.
This one is created with the words "quintessence" and "evanesce" as its roots, but with a meaning slightly different from either.
Some other pwoermds I created tonight (they're lots of fun) that weren't chosen in the final cut are included below.


ineffvanesable

windter

sexpectant

evangeliscence


XXX--

Letter-Stall

I met her –

Slate-hair, slim-breath, lost-halo her –

As a last-seat rambler.

She heart-stole me.

She is a rebel, her –

Rose-heart, storm-blest, star-tooth her –

Tall tales stole me.

She rises; she –

Loose-limb, lazy-hair, heart-rest she –

Is more lost,

Here is mere me, sole, me.

I’ll miss her –

Mast-raise, sail-raise, heart-raise her –

‘Till she sails home to this shore,

To me, lost at this shoal; me.

She is small, her –

Maze-lost, mail-heart, sheer-tore her –

Bless is a loss, a hole, to me.

To me, home is her –

Tame-bear, time-raze, to-amaze, lite-beam, sole-heart her –

Am I lost? At a loss? Is this role me?

Oh I, I blame her.

I swear I haven't totally lost my mind with this poem - it's called a "Beautiful Inlaw", and it's a form where the only letters you're allowed to use are those of a name. I used the full name of a good friend of mine; this poem is about her.

X----

Reasons

It was

Eighty degrees and

Sunny today,

I

Stayed inside

Due to a

Compilation of

Factors, including

The humidity

And ticks

And wi-fi connections –

I

Opened the window

To find

The wind was

Blowing pleasantly;

I

Stayed inside

Due to some

Complex considerations,

Including

My grandfather

The dog

And

Neighbors –

My

Lined paper

Remained

Blank in

The second half of

Everything,

From

Lunch on it sat

Waiting

And empty

With the pencil sitting

Right by,

It

Didn’t do anything

Because I

Didn’t go out,

Due to

A lot of stuff

I

Had

Going on, including

History homework

MacBook keys

And a couch –

The air was

Heavy with

Thunderstorm

Weather, and

The clouds were

Building

Up

In that

Thick

Sky I

Love

But I didn’t

Go outside

Because of

Some multi-faceted

Reasons

You might not understand,

Including

Apathy

The suspension of time

And ticks.

XX---

COUNT

Fibonacci

Numbers

Always seemed

So damn perfect.

They are so starkly irregular,

So dependably irrational in their quest for infinity.

If phi is my favorite number, if a spiral is my favorite shape,

Is it possible that my thoughts are spelled out in long and complex, curving sequences of one, one, two, three, five?

Is it possible that my path in life will be a line twisting at one hundred and thirty-seven point five degrees, brushing the golden edges of ever widening rectangles as they expand into space?

Or is my obsession with patterns only the symptom of a mind too number based to accept the unpredictability of reality?

Should I stop counting clouds because I know they’ll never form cohesive sequences?

Maybe life’s meant to be qualified, not quantified.

Still, my head wonders: Is

The world logarithmic,

Or is

It

Binary?

XXX--

Telegraphs from a 9 Worded Heart

Lydia –

Somehow, it’s

Gonna be the same.

Lydia –

Your prediction

That it would change?

Lydia –

This time

Your foresight was wrong.

Lydia –

Can you

Believe it continued on?

Lydia –

I don’t

Know how it survived.

Lydia –

Were we

Wrong to have implied?

Lydia –

I’m sorry

We caused you pain.

Lydia –

We didn’t

Want to break again.

Lydia –

I noticed

You’re happier with this.

Lydia –

You realize

There’s no more miss?

Lydia –

I can’t

Say that we’re strong.

Lydia –

And gods,

I can be wrong.

Lydia –

I decided

We’d take this chance.

Lydia –

Please cherish

This one last dance.

Lydia –

We’re hoping

That nothing more tears.

But Lydia –

There’s nothing

But pain within cares.

Lydia –

Be careful

But goddammit, go love.

And Lydia –

Remember, you

Don’t have it rough.


X----

Progression

Nine days ago I would have declared that

You were an entertaining person who I love to

Pretend not to respect, but that you were

Not extraordinary in my life.

Eight days ago I would have said that

We had a history long enough to make me

Smile when I saw you, and call out

One of your nicknames, but nothing more.

Seven days ago I would have shrugged that

You were a good teacher but needed

Experience, and you were a boy and

We all know I don’t like boys much for anything.

Six days ago I would have admitted that

The best thing you’d ever done for me was say

That I’d performed well on stage last night

And sound like you meant it without freaking out.

Five days ago I would have grumbled that

Your five-fingers are ridiculous and

Your suit is ridiculous and

So are you, but I still like you.

Four days ago you said something that

I pretended not to be surprised at but

In reality I was reeling and thrilled all at once,

And my opinion of you snapped and reformed.

Three days ago when I saw you I

Smiled more than for other teachers because

I knew that the day meant something more to you,

And I wanted you to wear that rainbow so badly.

Two days ago I wondered just who the fuck else I

Really knew who was gay and close to me,

And asked how my policy of emulation could work

Without someone like you around.

One day ago I suddenly felt like
I was living among aliens, non-threatening but strange,

And I was quietly glad to know just one more person

I could count on as a comrade-in-arms.

Today I marveled that my view of you could change

So quickly and sharply, and realized

Just how much I need to have someone in that

Role you tentatively fill.

Tomorrow I’ll again thank my stars that

I’m allowed to know you, and even if

Nothing comes of this at all,

I’m relieved just to have you exist.

XXXX-

Fly-over Quilting

I feel like finding America.

I feel like flying low over the countryside from end to end and back again,

Like tracking every patchwork field through the airplane window

And tracing every interstate exit to a strip mall

Marked by cars moving in slow, silent symphony

So far below.

I feel like finding America, suddenly.

I want to touch each of the corners of this irregular that every school child can draw,

I want to see more than just industrial complexes from the airport window –

I want to see the land. The burger joints and forests and every arching bridge.

I feel like finding America. I want to know it.

I want Midwesterners to be more than a TV show, I want them to be a face.

I want travel to be more than the distance between a slats deploy and landing gear –

I want it to be a memory. A person. The twang in a voice.

I feel like finding America, now.

What other country could be more separate? More divisive?
Where else could I know nothing of two thirds of my nation,

Yet feel so protective of their individual lives

And so possessive of our unity?

I feel like finding America.

I feel like filling in the patchwork of fly-over states

With a patchwork of people and places and reality,

And marking out my path in a quiet, trailing line

Of red embroidery thread.

XX---

Every Night I Say

It's just

One more day riding the currents again, it's just

One more day mired in history and school work and,

Yeah I should be thinking moving I know I should be but

It's just one more day, just another meaningless set of hours

It's just

One more day ignoring, ignoring, ignoring them all, all of the

Things building up inside my life my head and it's just

One more day just 24 more opportunities to write something

And 96 more chances to have a conversation

And it's just nothing. It's just nothing, it's nothing, this's nothing,

There's nothing left even for this. It's just one more poem.

It's just one more dishonesty implication. Don't worry. Just one more.

And it's just, it's just, it's just one more night,

One more night I'd rather be living than letting go

Back to the dark and the tireless sleep.

X----

Better than Drinking Alone

Dear letter waiting on my bedroom floor:
I am aware that you are ready to be written.

And yes, I even know that all your content has already been drafted and decided,

And all that’s left is to place my sentences as neatly as possible on your lines.

Truly, I’m sorry, letter;

I know I said I’d write you this weekend

And right now you’re probably sharing a drink that’s called loneliness with my laundry,

Which I also said I was going to do this weekend,

But currently my sleep time is running right into my homework time

And I’m already beginning to feel that sour regret creeping in.

But I promise you, letter, I will return for you –

As surely as Odysseus returned to his wife, although hopefully with less murder –

And I shall write you out into all the meters and meters of literary glory

That has been your birthright since I first wrote the “Dear”.

So please, letter, please wait for me.

Take another sip of that mango cocktail with my forgotten laundry,

And know that by the time I cross back over Kentucky state lines to land by the lakes,

You will already be in the hands of your lover.

XX---

Spent in Time

It was just another day

Spent in "Breathe in, breathe out"

It was just  one more series of hours stacking up

That resulted in "done" and "have to" and "not there".

It was just another set of experiences,

Lending themselves to shaping the person I will become, become, become.

It was just another day spent in a brainstorm for my next letter,

Just another winter spent preparing for summer,

Just another test run. Another practice through life.

It was just another evening spent on decoding homework that

In the end was offensively easy;

It was just another evening full of don'ts and try to's and denials.

It was just another minute I spent doing something than what I want to be,

Just another sound wave that could have been Defiance, Ohio

It was just another series of clicks through inexistent

And conversations which could have been held better

And the repeated realization that I can't change everything.

It was just another day spent being the youngest I'll ever be,

Just another step closer to a mortality too fragile to accept.

Today was just another day, spent into emptiness,

And this is just another poem to despise it.

X---

Don't Tell

He envies my “courage”, thinks there’s naught I don’t tell,

Different from his silence and his shy “Don’t tell.”

“Don’t ask,” urged the sergeant, in my dark dreams of war,

Young soldiers naïve to the thought of my Don’t Tell.

Ev’ry touch to my body, every glance she sends low,

Every spark through my skin, it implies “don’t tell”.

“How are you?” she’s asking, but I don’t give the truth,

Her gaze tries to seek it, but my eyes don’t tell.

“I won’t ask,” he says simply, and he turns away,

But I promise to his back: I’ll defy Don’t Tell.

He stays silent on the ride up, I know he’s not fine,

But I don’t try to force him – I know tough guys don’t tell.

Coming out wasn’t courage, I cringe when they cheer,

But they know it: my comrades, my allies don’t tell.

It scares me to speak, don’t want to talk to her,

But I’ll have to – my frown and my sighs don’t tell.

My truth is escapist – my candor, remission –

There’s deceit in my ease and my wry, “Don’t tell.”

Out there in the battle, where a soldier may fall,

My only words left for comfort are “Don’t die. Don’t tell.”

It was in every word, the cruel implication –

Every time what I heard was “Good bye. Don’t tell.”

To him, I say nothing. I don’t let him know.

I shrug and agree and I don’t – I don’t tell.

XX---

To Self

Dear Lydia,

Things here are, as usual, all contrasts.

There’s lots of action – always events and people rushing – but time stands still. Nothing changes.

Damn, I don’t even know who’s winning the primaries. Somehow, it doesn’t seem so important here.

Everyone here is still in that season-long limbo, smiling every time we mention the summer,

But you know how much we like the short weeks and the softball tournaments, too.

It was sunny enough for my sleeves to get rolled up this weekend, and I thought about you.

Is it warm in the city? Is it as beautiful as that one day on Clark?

You turned 17 recently – I remembered. Congratulations!
Sometimes I feel older than you, even though I was born later.

Oh, and sometimes I feel younger. I guess time really does pass weirdly here.

Every time we go stargazing, I think of you. Do you remember that night on the dock?

We all miss you here, especially me.

I know exactly what day I’ll be seeing you, but sometimes I still wonder if you won’t just appear

Maybe from around a bend in the trail down from TS, or behind the craft shop, or something.

I’m not sure anyone else quite gets it. Having you gone is like lacking a piece of myself.

In order of send this letter, I’m going to have to borrow an envelope from somebody,

And root a stamp out from under my bunk. I know they’re down there, somewhere.

Then I’ll have to go up to the office – do you see what kind of strife I go through for you?

I really missed you, Lydia. The rest of them, they’ve been here since March;

But I stayed every month from when you left, almost a year ago.

I was always waiting here for you,

Even over Christmas.

XX---

Literary

That splintering vandal

Ruining the word, the dignity of language,

With his spray paint and disinterest;

His exaltation held in each heel

As they strike the ground and propel him away;

His accomplishment held in hindsight, in memory,

Each line so effortlessly verbatim;

An accomplishment of the public school system,

An addendum to the misdemeanor statistics;

His aerosol paint went skittering across the concrete surface,

Catching the toe of his stained sneakers;

His laughter erupted when they spotted him in the alley,

Rising up through the rooftops like helium.

The original lines, in Belgian: Het splijten van de ruimte wordt geheel in helderheid verpakt staat schitteringen toe te huilen.

My visual interpretation: That splintering vandal, ruin the word, heel in held hind, verbatim stat, skittering in toe, the helium.

X----

A Note - Ratings

Today I went through the poems I've already written and rated them, at the bottom of each. I did this because, from reading other NaPoWriMo blogs, I know that poem quality can vary a lot within a blog; and visitors (if any are out there) can read one poem and assume the rest are just as crappy (something I do far too frequently).
So, I've rated each of my poems specifically to how much I think other people might like and be able to relate to them (versus the ones I understand but no one else does). The more X's out of five, the mo' betta it is. Dash marks are placeholders.
To anyone reading this, whether you're a friend or stranger, please read one of those three, four or five star good poems. The worse ones just really aren't worth your time.

Coward

I twist-turned into the car like

It was mine, somehow, and started it up

I turned the radio volume higher feeling full of something like friendship, only simpler

Wet and cold and exhausted and feeling touched, by something. Feeling grateful.

I pulled into the driveway like

It was my last action before the martyrdom,

Full of serious, slow significance and a tidal wave of dread that knows it isn’t wanted.

Contemplating that open garage door as if it was the cave that held my monsters. If only.

I walked into the house like

It was the same action I took every day,

As if everything was normal, as if I wasn’t bothered, as if I wasn’t lying with every smile

And turned impulsively away from the voice in the living room, to keep one second more.

I engaged in conversation like

I didn’t think it was cynically meaningless,

Or far more terrifying than jumping off all the high places I’ve ever been, without a rope,

And nodded and asked the questions I was supposed to and pretended I wanted to be there.

I left to strip for a shower like

I wasn’t trying to wash off my feelings, too,

And I stood there in the hot water just trying to stay as blank as the white-flecked wall.

I let the water run down my legs and pool around my toes, already wrinkled from wet socks.

I brushed through my hair like

I wasn’t stalling in that one empty room,

I stood there in front of the mirror and didn’t have to try to keep my face straight,

Just fumbled uninterestedly with my bra, the catches sliding past, past, past.

I left through the front door like

I wasn’t sneaking away like a thief,

A criminal who steals the support of a family without offering their own solidity to be used.

I pulled the handle until it clicked, and didn’t look back as if I would have liked to lock it.


XXXX-

A Third Dimension

To get off the ground has always been difficult.

Since mankind first learned to run and move and understand,

We have envied the creatures that have claimed the freedom of a third dimension.

We have longed to map our potential in spheres instead of circles,

And to breach that upwards that eludes us.

I love airports and the hours they hold all bottled up within them.

I love the tacky news stores with racks of candy and the long, wide corridors.

On a plane a feeling of suspension – not of gravity, but of time – pervades my senses

And suddenly it seems my minutes are so meaningless I can waste them how I choose.

I love the way the plane noses up into an angle surely steeper than Everest,

And watching the miniaturized landscape spread out below you, unobtainable, distant.

There is a weightlessness that comes with swinging, when the arms are long enough.

The air-cutting movement form one end to the next is exhilarating,

But the true freedom comes right at the edge of the arc as the seat goes out instead of up,

When you feel like you could just keep going forward, just slide off the cusp of your seat,

And never land again.

I was never good at climbing trees, I was always too afraid of the uncertainty.

I was always too aware that I could fall at any moment, my foot could slip so simply,

And the earth would rise up to meet me in a rush of air.

But there was something about struggling higher, always reaching one branch up,

Feeling the subtly changing sway of the trunk beside me,

Feeling the branch made for grabbing – its width, its bark made for holding on to;

And I wanted to reach higher, I wanted to make it to the crest of the evergreen

But I never could.

So often man describes lightness, freedom, tranquilty as “like flying” –

As if that action should require no work and give only reward, the vast skies;

As if once man can lift himself off of the ground, all the worries of every day

Will fade behind him, indistinguishable from the land.

Sometimes I stand on the pedals of my bike and pump my feet like I am sprinting,

And I rush across the pavement faster than my eyes can track my progress.

Sometimes everything on the ground – this unknowable web of connections –

Is simply too tangled; sometimes I want to leave it below me until it becomes obsolete.

Sometimes when my eyes well up and I don’t want to feel my own tears fall,

I just push through those pedals like my feet are meant to go all the way to the ground.

And sometimes that isn’t enough, I just can’t go fast enough. I have to go up.

Sometimes when the air starts to eddy off me and stir through my hair, I pretend

That each push of my foot to the ground is also a tiny push upwards,

Every time my pedal comes around is another propeller turn to take me up,

I pretend that the click of my gears is the slats deploying and my wings are extending out,

And maybe if I keep pushing, keep going forever, someday I’ll lift away from the earth.

To get off the ground has always been difficult.

But I’m willing to try,

If only one more time.


XXX--

If It's Inexistant

Time always struck me as an

Odd configuration of numbers on the façade of a primitive perpetual motion machine,

I never quite calculated

How throwaway seconds could turn into unfathomable millennia.

Time always seemed to me a

Heavy blanket of reality in the air around us, a fundamental force,

Springing into being in the

Shatteringly theoretical explosion that red-shifts us all.

Time always struck me as

Inherently inexistent, envisioned but innately intangible

It is incomprehensible

In all that it is everywhere and omnipotent, it can barely be imagined.

Time always seemed to me a

Stuttering human invention to explain the root of that ineffable change,

A term created from paralyzing fear:

That of action and reaction and inaction and what we have done and must do.

Time always struck me as a

Falsehood in and of itself, a lie created by the most self-deluded species only to comfort

And since time doesn’t really

Exist, I didn’t really turn another year today;

I didn’t really climb sixty thousand seconds closer to a great unknown today;

And I am only moved to stand on the cusp of adulthood

In our human-warped view of the world.

XX---

Letters

Words spill over quietly to him like

The childhood stream I can’t dam fast enough,

Confessions tumbling over my wall which

When I started, I never meant to let go.

My head skips from one thought to the next, and I know that

If this were a conversation I’d be talking way too fast,

And as it is my pencil lines are blurring and

My fingers are tripping over themselves.

In lucid moments I know I’ve got to tell someone

The truth, because it’s escaping towards his vacuum presence

Just for somewhere to go, and I throw up walls because

It’s not the direction I want.

Who is this man? He’s just some

College-age vagabond, just a person I chanced to know,

And if he has a brilliant mind and duplicate philosophy and

Smiles at me when we meet, it’s just coincidence.

Who is this man? My troubles aren’t his

Worry, his problem, his place to listen to; not for

Three more months at least; and if he

Laughed because of my letters, that means nothing.

Sometimes when my walls slide down a little and

Reason is in view, I know I’ve got to talk to

Someone, other than him, so I can breathe again

And let the thoughts in slowly, one at a time.

As it is I just set the pencil down again and

Close my eyes like I’m sitting in front of the

Sunset I don’t want to see, and take a breath and

Start to write to him again, my head a little lighter.

And if he’s just a vagabond, well

That’s alright with me; hobos all ace poetry,

And if he’s so much more as I suspect then I

Will send this letter on with love

And live in preparation for the next.


XXX--

Watching Them

Watching their

Feet skirt feet skim the top of the linoleum floor tiles, like

It could be hardwood in a ballroom

Watching them

Drift like thunderclouds,

Not graceful but steady, not wistful but intentioned.

Watching their

Hands placed lightly together,

On a shoulder, a waist, a thigh

A gentle reminder of presence, of countrol

Watching their

Faces turned up in the confidence that comes with age, or

Turned down in the uncertainty it brings,

Watching their

Eyes which don’t wander in the circles they’re tracing

Eyes that stay tight on each other, on looking up and forward

Watching them

Watching each other,

Their gazes directed into one another,

Into a past that they share and they hold.

Watching them

Dozens of us, our eyes quiet and thinking,

Wondering or wishing,

Watching them

Dance across that linoleum floor just like

No one is there at all.


X----

Now Changed

You used to be the responsible one.

You were a human calendar,

You were always ordered and never forgot and never forgave

And you urged us to live up to your standards of commitment

And aesthetics and perfect attendance.

You used to be the eager one.

You were always pushing us and marching on

You were moving forward and striving farther,

The first to volunteer and the first to complete

And to climb another step up the pyramid.

You used to be the radical one.

You used to get into debates where the answer was always “you’re wrong”,

And your position was always the left.
No matter the argument, the reasoning, the person,

Liberal was the only right way.

You used to be the flirtatious one.

You were always around when there were clothes to be taken off

And cuddles to be had on the hallway floors,

You always stole kisses where you could get them

And emphasized the female side of bi-curious.

Now you’ve flipped on those of us who thought we knew you.

Now you’re a wary moderate, you defend capitalism –

When you think no one’s watching –

And you haven’t held my hand in months.

Now you’re unreliable, irresponsible,

Indefensibly flaky,

And you couldn’t care less about a schedule.

Now you aren’t the person we knew anymore.

You aren’t the constant we came to expect.

But if you had to make that choice again –

To remain who you used to be, or to change –

I would tell you to make it over and over and over.

Because now,

When you see the catalyst of change for your reliability, affection, and morals,

Now when you meet him in the parking lot,

Your smile reaches up to the sky.

X----

All In Spring

My spring was all in February.

My crisp sunny days, my new-leaf-green and baseball, it was all over months ago

In the two-week flash of warmth within the rain.

My spring was all in February. My official hibernation’s end,

Me emergence from the shell into the world again

It was contained in those days of the barely-born year, singular.

My spring was all in February. It was the mind-set,

It was the way we stopped wishing for snow and started wishing for sun,

Stopped recalling the summer and started planning for it.

My spring was all in February, this year. My Opening Day was two months ago.

My spring has come and gone and now I sit and wait through this interim,

This summer that doesn’t know it’s summer yet, that still battles with the rain,

Patiently remaining through a storm not spring-fresh but summer-heavy. Summer-dull.

My spring was all in February. My spring was three days in an open field,

My spring was all alive in a spark of cloudless skies

And six separate laughs.

My spring was all in February, this year. My summer started then.

By the time the sun stretches out wide enough to embrace us, again,

It will already be fall.

XXX--

The Edge of the Night

Every day fades out with a pink horizon and another cycle of homework,

As the night fades in on the periphery of vision,

Slowly, shadowy assassins creeping nearer

Across the edges of the yard and down the street.

Pushing the night.

Just keep on pushing the edge of the night.

Every evening draws darker with the hour,

The night combing shadows out longer and thicker like carded wool.

The dark seeps in under doorways and through windows,

Filing up the places light had held so shortly before.

Pushing the night.

Just keep on pushing the edge of the night.

Every night slowly closes in on itself,

Each soft light a point of resistance against this creeping sea of darkness.

Slowly the shadows close in from all sides as the light bulbs go out,

One by one by one,

Until only my reading light remains, a bouy in the ocean.

Pushing the night.

Just keep on pushing the edge of the night.

Every mind succumbs to dreams sometime,

Every eye must eventually close.

But don’t surrender to the clock and the quiet without testing your strength.

Don’t let your last corner of light be surrounded with night and destroyed.

Strike out farther into the dark, last longer than your alarm says you will;

Let your rebellion be in your existence, persistence, your sleepless remaining.

Pushing the night.

Just keep on pushing the edge of the night.

Every night finally recedes into morning.

Every stretching shadow shrinks back towards the pink horizon,

And the inexorable tides turn away.

If you can resist its pull, the darkness will retreat

And the world returns to its wakefulness.

So when the thrill strikes you to remain,

To stand sentry against the dark in his kingdom,

Remember what you are doing, with each second that ticks by to eyes open –

Pushing the night.

Just keep on pushing the edge of the night.


XXX--

Sun-Born

I was born on a day without sun.

And I’ve never regretted that fact.

I was born in mid-April, and there was no sun, there was no snow, there were no… thunderstorms.

There was plenty of rain.

I as born on a day without sun, so

I didn’t get any inside of me we I took my first, trembling breath

And opened up my eyes to that first view of fluorescent hospital lights

And rain.

I was born on a day without sun,

So I don’t have my own little nova in my chest,

Flooding my insides with light and seeping outside into soft warmth on my skin.

I just had to make some of my own.

I was born on a day without sun,

So I just created a little light for myself –

Just enough that when it dapples through my bronchia it’s still bright enough to fill up my chest,

It doesn’t have the pure gold hue of real sunlight and it doesn’t slip outside –

I don’t glow like those born into the sun –

But my sunbeams are just as bright,

And just as warm.

I was born on a day without sun,

But I never worried about it.

Everyone has to make their own sunlight sometimes.

I was born on a day without sun,

So I make it for myself instead.

And usually it’s simple – all you need is a little personal fusion –

And my head’s full of easily combinable materials,

Unworded thoughts and wishes and stars, memories like orbitals around my future,

And plenty of potential energy.

But sometimes my head gets dark, and smooth as night,

Sometimes I need a little light to start with,

A narrow bean to lance in through my eyes and reflect and collect in the back of my brain.

Sometimes I really need a genuine sunray.

I was born on a day without sun,

But sometimes I need it more desperately than I care to admit.

Sometimes I seek it out while clinging to the last sun beam in my chest,

Wane and wavering,

Alone.

Sometimes all I need is one of those sun-born. One of those nova-fueled people who shine out.

One of those people that glow, that radiate; one of the sun-born.

You were born in the sun.

You have that light-source within you; you radiate.

This isn’t a question of work, or of struggle;

I know you need to make your own sun, everyone needs to make their own sun sometimes;

This isn’t about strife; I know that my sun is so much easier to make than some,

I know you have struggled to make it before, but you –

You were sun-born. You have that golden glow.

You have that warmth that lets you wear sandals year round, and that inherent shine.

You were born in the sun because the light that you make can come out.

Because you shine, you radiate, and that sunlight can come out

It can lance in through my eyes and reflect,

And collect in my heart,

Because you were born with a ray of light in your chest.

You were sun-born.

I was born on a day without sun.

But I’ve never regretted that fact.

You see, rain becomes a blessing when it is your birthright.
I think the first element I ever felt was water,

Was tiny drops falling onto my new-born skin

Before anyone told me which weather was “bad”.

It hurts my eyes to look at the sun,

But rain has always treated me gently. The rain has always fallen softly on my skin.

You were born in the sun.

When I’m around you, I feel like a shadow. You eclipse my self-made light,

You with your summer-gold hair and that way that you radiate.

I was born on a day without sun,

But you fill me up with it. Your beams lance in through my eyes

To reflect and collect in my lungs.

And even though the rain is my birthright, and my sunlight is real,

 Being around you seems like summer.

It’s the way you radiate.

It’s the way your beams lance in through my eyes,

To reflect and collect

And collect forever.


XXXXX

At Night

You used to always be there at night.

It wasn’t just the childhood-hazy plasticine stars, it wasn’t just bedtime whisperings

Or the way you made sure the closet doors were closed:

You used to always be there at night.

It wasn’t just the TV on low when you were too cool to spend daylight with me,

When the door separating us from our consciences was slowly slid shut;

It wasn’t just the infomercials and the late-night chatline ads –

It wasn’t just while we were awake.

You see, you used to always be there at night.

I could tell when I finally stood up as silently as I’d learned from you

And slid back the door as silently as I’d learned from you,

And passed by your bedroom on tip-toed toes seeking solid floorboard, I could tell –

I could tell that you had been the last one asleep that night.

That you had been waiting with me.

You used to always be there at night.

Sometimes I went to bed and your light was still shining on,

Sometimes I woke up when the front door opened and you slipped through,

Sometimes I sat at my open window and just stared unseeing past the sky

As you smoked weed in the basement while our parents were out,

And sometimes you were six thousand miles away

But while you were on that airplane I was in your bed, I was remembering,

And I was waiting for you to come home.

Because you used to always be there at night.

Somehow time slipped past us and you moved out and you moved on

But that didn’t change how I felt about you, that only made me proud

And suddenly when things came crashing down and you came back I realized

That now you’re no longer here at night.

It wasn’t being gone. It wasn’t that you were missing too long.

It’s that I can’t remember that girl whose eyes met mine in our wall-wide mirror.

It’s that I can’t hold onto the light under your door when you’re the one thing I’m trying to get away from,

The one thing that fills up my head when they’re fighting again,

The one thing that I try to flood out ever day with the noise and conversation and anything

And now you’re no longer here at night.

The one time you were constant, the one time you didn’t flicker like the lit end at the window

Well, now you’re no longer here at night.

Now when I get up silent like you taught me I don’t think about you,

Only the time and my laptop and the sleep I’ll be getting.

Now when I pass your bedroom it’s an empty shell and I don’t notice, I don’t care,

Now when I finally fall into bed and close my eyes I’m asleep before try to remember.

Now you’re no longer here at night.

It’s my one respite

From the way you haunt me in the day.

XXXX-