Sleepless

There is no sleep left-
chest heaving, empty;
tears
and cold feet.

I am alone here,

my family is gone.

I have been called "a cancer"
twice.

I have driven dark roads,
the only direction I knew,
screaming.

I have reached out
and been told to move on, but also
to learn,
to grow,
to pursue
to pray
to hope, and
to wait.

My chest is empty,
there are still tears,
and cold feet.

Now there are new arms around her, and

I am alone

and Sleepless

again.


Years ago there was a boy that lost a girl
now there is a man that lost a woman.

I'm not sure what to tell him
to console him when he is at his worst

he made the decision
he did what he thought was best

it was wonderful while it was there
dog
house
support
feet rubbing feet when sleep was seconds away

he thought of other women,
torn apart on the inside
fantasies, never materializing
all the good
no reality
none of the bad

she said she thought he would propose
he thought he would propose
her friends thought he would too

but doubt was there

then
one drunken evening
she said she would never start a family
she laughed at the idea
and he's the only witness

then, a few months later,

she said that his ex was right:
that he was a cancer.

...he is not a cancer
he is not a fool
he was kind of a fool

but

he was fighting for clarity
he was fighting for what he thought was right
he was fighting for what his heart ached for

and now all he is fighting for
is the ability to breathe
the ability to keep the hole in his chest from sucking in the rest of his being

he is in pain
and theres nothing to do about it but walk forward
and into the clear.

Elephant Graveyard

When I was young, I learned that 

there is a place 

where elephants go to die.

As a boy 

I thought that this was sad;

but now, as welcome grey 

wanders around my ears,

I have realized-

I don't think that they went there

knowing 

that they would expire-

but more like that man 

who climbed a very high mountain-

he,

and they, 

went

to live.

Sometimes I forget why. 

Why I'm walking

stumbling,

clawing, and

dying for an idea that even I sometimes question.

I'm doing it to live

and that's enough for now.

--------------

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 444 Castro Street, Suite 900, Mountain View, California, 94041, USA.

A Chilly Morning

Complacency flowers into compassion.

The treadmill doesn't want you and

the microwave doesn't whine so much anymore.

These things aren't pure evils.

Don't forget how to come back home.

Don't forget how to be uncomfortable.

Don't forget how to scathe,

how to ignore flirtation

and how to scorn.

Yesterdays nerves are

todays cold showers-

are tomorrows grins.

Remember the good work,

do more of it.

Remember the good coffee

drink more of it-

enjoy the bitter

shirk the sugar.

Remember the poor work.

The endless lines about the color and 

clarity

of scotch.

Remember that whiskey will always be king.

but water will always be a steady queen.

Remember that the desires of the flesh are never wrong

but aren't always right.

Remember the first time.

Remember the best of friends resemble the most pernicious viruses

cropping up

in the darkest of places 

in the most inopportune times.

Never inoculate yourself to them.

Remember that bow ties are worth the effort.

Remember to breathe

Remember to love what you do

Remember to enjoy the fall, and be always wary of

the climb.

Journal: Entry 1.

It hurts more to see the past in lively motion, 
not just a photo 
or from passive memory- 
but from a flickering film;
life looks forward
through the frame 

and not regret,
but shame
clouds into my blood.

Feelings I've long since felt,
feelings I've done my best to compact and bury,


resurface

and, for a moment,

I feel terribly, blindingly
whole.

Afterthought

There is something irresistable

about loving an idea and only and idea.

We are captivated by the past 

and the paths that we never walked.

Sometimes, without knowing, head wins over heart

and we watch passively, as 

love fades 

and reality grows.

We will love as we are expected to 

we will think about the hard fought dreams

of our youth's persistence 

as if they were only the fanciful, 

flickering, frames 

of someone else's home movie.

We all sit in the dark sometimes,

contemplating the features within the shadow of a face 

not yet illuminated in our foyers mirror.

There,

below,

in a porcelain tray

are the keys to cars and 

houses, alongside

the invitations to relatives' weddings 

and birthday parties for neighbors' children-

a whole reality never once dreamt as a child,

an unwelcome truth,

a bitter pill tasting eerily similar to the taste in the back of our mouths

when the first step down the wrong avenue was taken

Staring back in every reflection is the dark outline 

of someone,

perhaps,

we should have been.

When did we lose ourselves 

to the other side of the mirror?

Seed

A far off storm

ripples through the moist

night.

Laying there,

eyes moving beneath taught lids,

my muscles tense as

a stiffness spreads like moist cobwebs

just beneath my skin.

Then, just as

an anesthetic failure on the operating table-

my eyes peel wide with silent panic,

a warm tear falls down my temple;

my tongue is cotton, and

I cannot cry out.

It's not a masked

killer, or an oily, 

tentacled monster that chases me-

but the rotten seed of a plant

sewn from love and left to the frost,

many years before.

We are all each other's

nagging feelings.

They say our ears turn red 

when thoughtful people remember; but

cold fright is more accurate

tale as

a shadow slithers 

across my grave.

Long hours I've spent with ghosts;

judging, questioning,

continuing ill-fated affairs and

imagining unwritten romance.

All the grudges held 

out of unfounded, misplaced pride

and embittered in the fires of 

childish haste;

fall back, turning around

and sour only myself.

All of these things are chasing me

and every moment I lay calm,

resigned to deep dreams-

she finds me,

she hugs me,

and I wake 

screaming.

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 444 Castro Street, Suite 900, Mountain View, California, 94041, USA.

Concerning the Blank

One would think
a crisp, white plain
broken only with lines
of blue
and red
and sometimes a blinking 
cursor
would be met
with the spoils of prior
contemplation,
great things brewed 
in grey matter tea.
One should be reminded of
great masters
poised fingers over
worn keys;
thundering concertos to come.
Yet the perceived
masterpiece simply sits
behind otherworldly tension.

Dust tends to gather in these moments
tumbleweeds crisscrossing
reminding us of our own stillness
glasses fog, smudged fingerprints appear
temple screws mysteriously
unscrew themselves
and housework becomes an
exotic
sensual
distraction.

Paper cuts become a
dangerous
reality.

For all the notes that came before;
in showers,
cars,
unromantic dates,
and long,
lonely walks;
only the lost bits 
of grocery lists remain
the twice forgotten red onion
remains in the miserable
forefront
of your 
rotting,
prehistoric
brain.

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 444 Castro Street, Suite 900, Mountain View, California, 94041, USA.