it will be
litmus,
an invocation,
a homework check;
what did we
promise?
what have we
delivered?
it will be
hot meals
interrupted by
glass clinks
and kind words-
some warm,
some cool.
it will be
one of us,
across the room
from the other,
confident and
wondering-
‘how do they know
that person?’
it will be
a negotiation-
who will
drive there and
who will
drive back?
then compromise
because one of us
took a last
toast for the
team.
it will be
poems of us,
with a shared pen,
a blank page-
wondering
are we the
creators or
will it write
us?
it will be
a memory play
taking me back
to our
first lines
and how everything
was prosaic
before i
met you.
what if we never were alone?
Just past the post,
keep walking.
Let your neck flex,
eyes raise, and
lock on a few future
intents.
Have patience.
Be gracious,
unfazed.
Then, step away
from devices.
Let loose
from disguises and
expect some fatigue;
face to face
is hard
with all of
this noticing
without
notifications.
lifting words from paper
In high school my teacher believed that a life was best understood through poetry. My teacher loved poetry. I did not like poetry. I did not know how to love words or otherwise. And I could not imagine words enough to make my world any better. But, I did like her. I compared her to sunsets and music. Her favourite piece- If by Rudyard Kipling fed anger and angst into starved souls for many students, mostly because our particular cohort was filled with scientists and carpenters, mathematicians and athletes- so English class as a rule existed outside their practical minds. If could not exist without then. Poetry was an abstract maze. Impenetrable. And inescapable. Kipling and high school expected us to delay our gratification, to live up to expectations, and to slow down enough to notice. Rudyard wanted us to wait, and to be lied to, and not to look too good, and be skeptics of truth and our friends, and not to cry or hold friends close, and to start over, again and again and again and never breathe a pained word of it. And then, in the end, accept that others will blame you for their same misfortune. English class became too much with all of the if this and if that. Even if I could break with habit, I understood inference quite well and the message was that even if I suffered nothing would be learned from it. And likely, when I am most broken someone will likely say if you'd only done things differently then ...
sometimes at 7:00 AM
the roads are full
of movement and sound
a marketplace teeming
with loud line ups at coffee
shops and cars waiting
to make left turns off
of main streets so fast
that it seems like every
one is catching advance
green towards something
or returning home from some
beginnings or endings
dawn chasing daytime sending
sunrise and street lights
into confusion.
riptide
They ask. Are you okay?
I say. Yes.
They follow. You sure? Okay? Today?
I say. I guess.
Really? They add.
Really. I confess.
Are you mad?
No.
You seem upset.
How so?
I dunno. Just now.
What? That? That sounded angry somehow?
Sorry, sorry. Wow. Now I know I’ve probably bothered you.
Nope. That’s not true.
…was just saying… so anyways.
I ask. Are you okay?
tropism
and even though
there is more space
out there
than in here-
a bit more room
where you stand.
it would be easy
to assume
that there’s no motion.
and if it seems
like my swells
don’t happen on demand
or appear clear,
you should take a
minute away from
this conversation.
then you might
understand that
no matter
what my waves
sound like
to your ear,
my tides aren’t
the same.
and I ain’t the same
ocean.
words keep wolves at bay 