257. Serenade

Each evening I dip my hand

into the bottom of my mailbox

praying that it won’t come up

with your set of keys.

256. Haiku: Black winds and the crosses we made over our chests.

Here, why you left me:
I was the kind of monster
that made you happy.

255. It took years but it rebuilt us.

We ran through corn fields reaching towards velvet sky,

with ghost fingers at our heels while we learned

how to make the shadows move for us. I am your gravity,

the pill that helps you sleep at night. You tell me that I am brightness,

bettering. We are the pillars, the chariots, the temperance.

Once I tried, and failed, to explain what it is like

when you step into a room. How miraculous it is, the light

that fills up the cracks.

I think this took more work than you expected.

I ask to dream about you, and in the morning am disappointed

that it was only darkness. I am told,

“It will be a quiet passage through this sorrow.”

I am told to not tell you what I want, that it is not for you anymore.

I think that I am too much fire and water to live with, and never at the same time.

254. Please let your boat come back home.

In a dream, you walk into a grey sea and I don’t 

follow you. Clothes and all. 

Later, you are reborn 

and we are kissing in a grey room. Gunfire, 

meant for me, and then it is my turn to run 

without being followed. 

I am over the fence. 

I am in the fox hole. 

I am in the dusted shadows. 

I am in a forest of brilliant jeweled blue-greens, 

but the shots still scream out behind me. 

I am never out of sight 

but at least in here, 

the color permeates everything.

253. Marblehead

When I came home from work today there was glass on the floor.
The window, next to the front door. The cat had bloody paws.

When waiting, time slows like sticky sap from a tree
and nobody wants to get their hands dirty. I think I'm out.
I'm not comfortable with this level of vulnerability.
There isn't even any skin left.

You are the lightning of my life. Am I the leaping crocodile?
I could hit my head on the curb and dream about you for days,
and when I wake up my hands will still go right through you.

I am tired of taking myself so seriously.
There is always a hidden dragon in the fields, but I just want it all
to look like gold, swaying and singing.

252.

When she loves you and she puts her hands inside of you

When it’s what you’ve wanted your whole life

And you can sleep through the night now, dreamless

Something that looks like peace, a spark in the fog

You are allowed to say it then, allow it to be yours:

Joy, joy, joy.

1. I know, it’s been quiet here. I haven’t been finishing anything. I start and I start, but something always happens. An ending is missing. A middle. I get bored. I get frustrated. I have so many pieces of poems, but nothing is fitting together somehow. 

2. How about a secret? Will that make up for it, for now? I am in love with someone and we keep ending up in the wrong places. I have never been in love with someone that was so scared of other human beings. We all are, sure, but I think the trick is to stick around and fight through it. Most of the time, he doesn’t stick around and fight through it, and I’m not sure what kind of person that makes me, for staying.

3. Above: I have three poems in this. I am very grateful. I am also not sure where you will be able to purchase it quite yet, but I will tell you as soon as I know.

4. Most of you are strangers, but I hope you are well all the same.