Bumpy Ride

I am trying not to be overwhelmed
by the sheer intensity of your
smile they say, and even you will begin to believe you are
happy to make your acquaintance my dear, do I know you? You're face looks so
familiar touch is what's most comforting in times of
need I remind you I am not a fragile thing? I won't
break my heart why don't you? Don't I also deserve
good things come to those who
wait--don't leave me here
alone doesn't have to feel lonely when you love
yourself is the only one who you can rely on in times of
trouble you for some spare
change is inevitable, but transformation is
rare and elusive is the kind of soul-shattering love you hear in
fairytales are like magic tricks - a comforting illusion, created to appease the
naive must be my middle name. I fall for the same trick every
time is ticking, tick...tock...and yet I'm living in slow
motion sickness is common on journeys such as these. It's going to be a bumpy
ride it all the way to the top to see the view. Oh, what lovely
views change as people are exposed to more diversity of
thought I would have learned by now...thought I really would have
learned my
lesson
eight,
please
open
to
chapter
twenty
three
in
the
book.

Greeting

Free
So incredibly free
is a feeling so foreign,
so fearsome in its enormity
What do I do
What do I do

I never knew
the weight that rested on me
until I wrested it off
Where do I go
Where do I go

Now I know
My selves aligned
in joyous union
Yes
Yes
Hello me.
Hello.

Don't Worry

Drip drop
water edges above the rim
pushing upwards, resisting
before spilling over into what was empty
filling the shape of space
however it can
creating one void, to fill another.

Drip drop
valves leaking
creating one void to fill another.
my heart stops -
don't worry, it will revive again
its too alive to die right now
too living.
pushing upwards, spilling.

Drip drop
overflowing
just a little, these feelings
pushing upwards, resisting
trembling a little
on the edge
don't worry, I won't break
I'm too alive right now
too living.
the void as small as a glass
of water
even smaller now
receding.

Don't worry.

Poetic Bones

"i don't get poetry"
you say

as your fingers slowly trace
in rhythmic patterns
around my cheekbone
across my lips
along the jut of my hipbone
my pulse, gently beating
a thousand words per minute
the curvature of my lines
read back to you in
kinesthetic verse
geographic planes
translating metaphor into meaning

you smile and i skip a beat
the next line all forgotten
but you.

you.

drifting into the hazy dream of sleep

you, who think poetry a bit obscure
deciphers the rhyme and rhythm and reason in me
and i think you get it now

that aesthetic inquiry
expands the awareness

one
microcosm
at
a
time

unearths
the poetry
in all.

Words while walking together

"One thing is for certain,"
she said
"That you are Alive.
Everything is moving,
shifting, transforming.
It's raw.
It's painful.
It's disorientingly terrifying.
Change causes you to question everything,
To take everything apart
and put it back together again.

There are so many moving parts.

You cannot--are not--taking a passive role in your life
as you are confronted with your own shuddering, trembling
Reality.

You are very much Real.

You are very much Alive."

Nostalgia

where. did. all. the. time.
Go?
passing Quick and Hot as the midday sun shining over a four-lane interstate Slow as the evening sun creeping below the horizon lazily inching until only a fingernail of fire remains
and vanishes so You
you have crept past me Out of our life Splendid Dazzling Blinding crept into your own life now living and yet
I am left here to remain
your friend in another world where Time
is no enemy and Friends
are forever.

a dream that woke me up at night

Goldilocks

She came to me for comfort
and I wrapped my arms around her heart.
"Too tight," she said.

She came to me for wisdom
and I shared with her my truth and light.
"Too bright," she said.

She came to me for solace
and I spoke love and peace into her mind.
"Too loud," she said.

She came to me one last time
and took my head into her hands.
She whispered back to me
and hauntingly
she sliced me open chin to chest
with the tip of her fingernail.
And left my insides wide wide open
a vulnerable red window into my pain.
Left me to hide away from her in the
secret places
of our family home.

To run and run and run and hide
until the gifts I could offer her
were just right.