a thought

"between the anger
and the thousand hollow words
we'll never share
i wonder
if i am
your greatest failure
or you
mine"

something i stumbled upon

sun rise

i'm awake. the vicodin itch is wearing off, or
perhaps
i have become numb.

the sky is getting
lighter and
i guess
the sun is rising
to my east
somewhere
because my horizon is this
lovely warm color of
a freshly plucked peach and
ever so slowly this
is becoming the sky
that i can see
and it is a happy shade of
nectarine
fading into
lavender
fading into the
blue
sky of what today
might become.

this is a calm and lucid
presence of being that
i can't remember having felt for
quite some time now.

i feel
serene and
calm and
everything i perceive to be
ethereal and
glowing
with the promise of
better days.

good things.
beautiful things.

being present in the moment at present
nothing is more important or beautiful than
this
is
right now.

good morning,
blue-bird.
good morning
to this
crisp bright air that is filling my lungs
with
oxygen and
hope
and promises of better days.
good morning.

roof-tops

let's climb up to the roof-top
we'll take a blanket
and a bottle of wine

we can write all night
and sing with the Moon

let's climb up to the roof-top

we can look at the stars
and talk about
time travel
and
growing up
and being
different or
better
or getting lost

let's climb up to the roof-top
we'll take a blanket and
a bottle of wine

and i will be yours
if you will be mine

starshine pt deux

i feel
this night air on
dampened skin
and
firestorm breeze
through wet hair
and cement still warm from
mid-day sun
beneath my feet

i hear
crickets chirp their evening song
and city sounds that permeate the night
and the rustle of branches as they are
caressed by gentle breeze

i see
brick and stone and a fence of wrought iron
and grass
a little patch of green oasis
in this industrial desert

and i see the Moon and
there is beauty and warmth
in her smile
but i can not see my
star-shine sisters & brothers and my
star-shine lovers
there is too much
dust and smoke and exhaust and
i just want to see the
stars shine
and twinkle and
laugh as they waltz across the midnight sky,
winking at me
teasing me
coaxing me
out to play

so i feel alone and small under this
vast night sky
in which
my sister and brother star-shines are
hiding somewhere
maybe it is my turn
to glitter and laugh
and waltz about this patch of grass,
winking and smiling
to tease
to coax
my star-shine lovers
out to play.

green eyed monster

before i can even formulate
this thought
these words
completely,
i am choking on them
but i think them
nonetheless
and, please, do not misinterpret
this
but
i hate you
sometimes
how you can just
look at a person
and make them fall in love
and you just know
the right things to say
to a person
to make them fall in love
i hate
how you don't even have to
try.
because you are just so
beguiling
and
enchanting
and i don't want to feel this way
or have these thoughts
because
i shouldn't care so much
but i do.
and i know that i am just being
petty
and jealous (you know how i hate to be jealous)
and altogether
girlish and childlike
then again i suppose that i honestly am
all these things
which is why
sometimes
i hate you
(because)
you make me
hate
myself.

eye of the beholder

i'm just not beautiful
like you
are so beautiful.
my smile is just too
big to be
pouty like your
smile is pouty.
and my eyes are just too
open to be
seductive like your
eyes seduce those who into them gaze
and i'm just too
not dainty and waif-like as
you are the daintiest
and the waif-liest
i'm just
not beautiful
like you are
so beautiful

me with my
too big smile
because i am silly and laugh real hard
and my
too open eyes
because i am unassuming and not afraid (of you)
and because i'm just
not dainty or
waif-like
because so what if i like to eat? and because
i have big bones and
that's not my fault, nor do i care

i stand tall
and yes, i am solid
i can see everything with my open, honest eyes
and they are clear and
blue like sky or
green like oceans or
grey like weather
and i use my too big mouth to smile genuinely and
laugh heartily and to
tell you things
like
i'm just not
beautiful like
you
are beautiful

and oh, i just wish (sometimes) that i was
beautiful like
you
are
beautiful.

movement

things are happening.
slowly
but they are.
everything is changing.
slowly
but it is.

excerpt

"there was such an overflow of divine love that the angels came bursting forth of their own accord. circle upon circle of spirit lights radiantly dashing the heavens, whirling about the sun in clouds of crystal fragments. they were blasted out of eternal sleep by the blinding light of a direct vision of Glory. so devastating was this light that only their flaming wings could offer protection from this fire that also gave them their birth."

miss scoons
"angel city"
sam shepard

reasons why not

because i probably can't
because i feel inadequate
because i lack the confidence
because i don't want to
because it hurts too much
because i am afraid
because it might fail
because i don't know
because i'm too tired
too drunk
too lazy
too anxious
because i could do something else
because i need to be challenged
because i can't do it alone
because you never called
because i keep forgetting
you
just a little bit more
because i am alone
and
in pain
and
feeling listless
because you hurt me
because you broke me
because you left me
or i left you
either way.
because my heart was broken

that's why.
why i can't let you back in to my life
why i can't open up to you
why i can't let you come over
just to talk
why i can't do it anymore
why i don't want to start over
because i can't.
i can't start over
there's no such thing.
because i don't want to hurt
any more
because i don't want to be vulnerable
because i don't want you anymore
because i can't.
because i won't.
because i don't
love you anymore.

that's why.

starshine

and it's 4:51 and i'm awake again
still
awake i think i'm always
awake or maybe i'm
always sleeping
i can't tell the difference
between waking and
sleeping and dark
and light and when
is it the
daytime
when the moon
he smiles at me and
beckons me closer
and closer still
and holds me
in his gaze
or was it the
night-time
when the clouds
they made shapes
and held hands
and giggled and
called out for me
to join them and make
shapes and be free
i think maybe it's
all the same and the same
is different which makes it new
but nothing varies
so it becomes
older yet this moment is not ever
like the last one, but maybe the one before it
or it could be brand new
then you'd never know because
we can never remember because
what? we're only human
and can only percieve
just so much
with the 10% that we are capable of.
who is to say really what is
new or day or moon or sun or night or old
surely we will never know

and it's 5:00 and i'm awake still
again
and the man in the
moon he
was beckoning me but
i looked away for just a moment and
now he's leaving me he's
hiding behind the
weeping willow but maybe i can still see him
through the low swinging branches
and short gusts of windy breath
i looked away for just a moment and now
he's leaving me
i thought maybe
he might have loved me
even just for a moment
he did call out for me to join him
in his orbit
or my orbit
or something that orbits
but i see now that he didn't really love me
and he's dipping lower behind the willow tree, hiding
still i thought for maybe a moment or two
or 34 moments something timeless or
transcending of time
he may have loved me.

and it's 5:06 and i'm awake again
still
and i guess that the quilt above me
scattered with patchwork and things like
star-shine and aeroplanes and planetary movement
well i guess the quilt, she's always
illuminated
but now maybe she's a little bit lighter than she was
before but then again maybe not, because really
who can tell and who is to say really
what is what and such and such and so and so
because yr mother told you so.
as my starshine aeroplane quilt slowly drifts
away from me i can see
pre-morning-time clouds awakening and beginning to
stir and swirl and wave good-morning good-evening to all the little
star-shines who blink and yawn and stretch their little star-shine arms
above their heads and ready themselves for slumber
and the blue-birds and robins and sparrows i can hear them
as they wake and call
good-morning to the swirling twirling clouds and
good-evening to the star-shines and to the aeroplanes
so maybe it is morning after all
but who is to say, really?

and it's 5:13 and i'm awake still
again
and it seems that things appear more clear than they may or may not have been
before and maybe i am more
lucid or perhaps less
but i can see now the trellis on the back fence
and the climbing ivy and the weeping willow
i can see her branches more distinctly
and she is beautiful and serene and melancholy as ever
before i could see the ends of my finger-tips, maybe
and the ashtray overflowing next to me
and the willow across the yard
with the moon peeking through, keeping his distance
and now i can see the oak tree
where it has grown through the eaves of my bedroom because
maybe you planted it a little too close to the foundation
or maybe because it just wanted to be closer
and a part of the love in this house
who is to say really. what the oak tree wanted

and it's 5:21 and i'm awake again
still
and the crisp new air
she is biting at my too pale cheeks
and now that i am thinking about it
my finger-tips are cold like the washroom tile is
coldest when you step out of the bath
but i know that my finger-tips are still moving and
working and fighting and creating because
i can hear them or rather i can hear the
clickety-clacking of my shiny red lacquered finger nails on this old
keyboard where it sits with me on
old and grey-ing wooden steps in this
post-midnight pre-dawn moment that is eternal and finite

and it's 5:26 and i'm awake still
again
and i can see just one lonely little starshine
still twinkling and winking at me from the
almost blue
quilt that covers us (me and the beagle and the weeping willow and
everything and also you, because you are here too)
this rebellious little starshine she does not want to
go to sleep
or maybe she does. who is to say, really.
perhaps she can't. or maybe she's just forgotten what the difference is
between waking and sleeping and dark and light and when it is the
daytime
and when it is the night-time.

i see you, starshine, and i know you and it's okay.
he almost fooled me too.
you thought he loved you so
you came when he beckoned you into the
sky and then when he began to slip away
and hide behind willow trees and ivy'd trellises
you were unable to unentangle yourself from his
cursed quilt.
and now starshine, she's forgotten what the difference is
between waking and sleeping and dark and light and when it is
the day-time
and when it is the night-time.

and it's 5:34 and i'm awake again
still
but this is okay.
i see you, starshine, and i know you and it's okay.
he almost fooled me too.

i am not in love

maybe i made a mistake
and
i keep thinking that
maybe i was wrong and
i know i'm not in love
with you but
i love you
still and
i can't stop thinking
that maybe i made the
wrong choice and
maybe love
is it enough just to
love
and
maybe not to be in
love and
i'm confused and
i am thinking that i
love you and
i think i was just
maybe a little too
this or not enough
that and
i just keep thinking
about
maybe i was wrong and
i love you
still but i guess i know that
and i can't, please can i
take it back?
maybe i didn't mean
what i said to be so
mean and i just.
love you still.
and.
i made a mistake and.
i'm sorry and.
forgive me
and
just hold me
one more time
so i know
that
i was wrong.

i'm making faces at you right this moment.

i don't have a poem for you.
not today.
not this week.
i'm just too busy
being awful
at
everything
and
i tried to write a poem
for you,
but it was just
awful.

as it turns out,
i'm very good
at
being awful.

i do what i can

and i'm sucking on those
root beer barrels
if only because
they remind me
and i'm wearing all those
old flannel shirts
if only because
they remind me
and i'm making all these
corny jokes
if only because
they remind me

and i'll still collect
nutcrackers every winter
and make a big to-do
over the 4th of July
and i'll still read the comics
in the Sunday Times
and watch old Westerns like
they're going out of style

and i will keep
wearing your watch
and resurrecting you
in conversation
if only because
i'm afraid to forget

make believe

i was right when i wrote
everything would be different.
i just didn't realize
how
or
to what extent
or the reason
why.
because
why
hadn't happened yet.
no one could have foreseen
what took place on that
fateful night.
i wouldn't know where to
begin.
if i even want to begin.
if i write it down
it might come back to life.
we've worked so hard to bury the memory
to forget
what we did.
forget.
like you can ever really forget
something of that magnitude.
inebriation
that can't be counted as
an excuse.
to write it down
makes it real.
as it is
i am convinced we dreamed it up.
a waking
lucid
nightmare
of a dream
but
a dream.
like the monsters under your bed
and the skeletons in your closet.
pull the covers over your head and you are
safe.
fill the closet with winter coats
and
umbrellas
and
skis and golf clubs and board games
and the skeletons will stay
buried, deep within.
this nightmare event
you can bury it.
and we did.
or at least we tried.
or at least
i tried.
maybe i was the only one
who wanted to forget.
who
needed
to forget.
to keep things
normal.
to move on
or around
but not through.
to sidestep the
repercussions
of our
insipid
actions.
was i the only one
who did not want to
talk it through?
who remained
tight-lipped
about what it was.
if you don't ever talk about it you can pretend
that it was meaningless
that it was trivial
that it never happened.
i can still pretend
yes, i can still pretend.

this is happening

every so often
i can hardly remember
the sound of your voice
or
the awkward rhythm
in your walk
i'm losing you
all over again

glimpse

broken nails and smudged lipstick
there's a run in your tights
your dress is torn
you are falling apart
but baby
it's beautiful

she sells shellfish

i don't mean to be selfish
but i need you right now
i'm not trying to be selfish
but i need you to be here
i don't want to be selfish
but i need you to love me
i shouldn't be so selfish
but i need you to care
i know i'm being selfish

but so are you.

somewhere there is a story

all of a sudden i'm home again.
only it's not home anymore.

just a house.
just a bed.
just a prison.
and the warden.

a man short in stature.
a man who wasn't here before.
this man who thinks he runs the place.
does he not know?
he isn't welcome here.
only by the old school marm.
not by those imprisoned in these ancient walls.
if these walls could talk.
they'd tell him to leave.

all of a sudden i'm home again.
only it's not home anymore.
just a house.
just a bed.

and the memories
they fade.
if these walls could talk
maybe
just maybe
they'd tell me the story
of when this house was a home.

but the memories
they fade.

just a house.
just a bed.
just a faded memory
to which i lay no claim.

the face of existence

but words are things, and a small drop of ink, falling like dew, upon a thought, produces that which makes thousands, perhaps millions, think.

lord byron

in summation

"in the long run, we are all dead"

john maynard keynes