Poétique

Enough

Semi legendary
You find a way around
A distance can be found
From caring too much
For loving with everything
You have to give
For being imperfectly present
In every day that you live
For each part that can be
Touched and each moment
That can be nourished
There is a space where
Judgements will release us
In the open arms of the earth
Standing in the chaos of
Feeling like you’re not enough
There is a mystery that
Is solved in the air that
Holds us up
In the potential construct
That we have made up
There is something
That we all do not know
How it ends or how it begins
Semi immortal
You find a way around
A distance that is found
True to the beloved self
Sharing existence with all
Forgiven for not
Feeling as if you are enough
Finally in one eternal breath

Innermost

Wait it’s not that deep
Breath on my ear
Whispering words
Fallaciously or even
Just to tease
Wait it’s not that deep
Surface connection
Take it brick by brick
Tongue on my ear
Flames are to lick
Illusory notes
At the back of my neck
Questions answered
When the heat settles down
Emotions are high
In the heart and the mind
Claims to be something
Romantic reminds me of
Sitting at the edge of a fountain
Feet dangling in the water
Reaching over with definite
Prattle tickling my ears
Handling fears
Wait it’s not that deep
Let the spark stoke the fire
Strike the match on the grit
Of my heart unpredictable
Moments in charge
Let the surface enrage
What the depth could engrave

Premier

A suzerain to myself
I’m goaling to be ground zero
Start with hello and
Beginning to look now
Past the curls into the eyes
Try not to remember
Any hurt from the lives
Before I have led
It’s like I’m living multiple
Past lives in one lifetime
My suitcase lost its handle
No longer hindered
By the weight of all the things
I have been carrying
I dropped it all, left it
At the station and then
Went shopping to start over
With new things new people
A different wink and stop to
Think for awhile about the
Coffee with a stranger
At the table in the corner
Middle day and the next
Morning could be seen
Amidst the eyes of another person
Looking through the same entrance
With new affections

Red Birds

Monotonous tone
Tumbling drone on repeat
Is the hummingbird to my
Psychedelic central network
Emotions at my fingertips
Nerve endings systematically
Outstretched to the sky
When the grey crawls in
The blue breaks brighter
In both of my eyes
After the melancholic
Piano player slowly
Stood up from his bench
I heard the red birds fly overhead
Even though the windows
Were closed my heart
Was again opened to
Hear the sound of another
Person walking in
I recognized the waiter coming
Towards me in the arc
From far away I was uncertain
If it was her hair or her smile
Is this a church in Italy
Maybe a restaurant I’ve seen
In a magazine next to the water
Uncertain but reassured it was a dream
When I felt the edge of my blanket
Against my lips
Thirsting for destiny

September

Cool breeze refreshing
Pink sun bathing me
Tomorrow is today again
Later the sound of loss
Reminds me of hope
The smell of alder wood
In the air welcomes fall
It’s only September
Still we can sense
What is coming in
Vibrant colors on the ground
I recall that the train ride
Wasn’t nearly as long
As I imagined it would be
The scenery sped by
Heat and flies
Legs swinging over the edge
Of an endless valley
Immeasurable vociferous depth
Like the weight of a stone
In your gut
Flowers come and go
Parading the moon
Emotions waiver too

Estranged

She wasn’t peaceful
Everyone new to be careful
Around her depending on…
She’ll take all the
Fresh pressed juice
That you’re willing to give her
We all want attention
Most need affection
It’s quiet when you walk
Into the room in her absence
Remember the boom
Recall all the arguing
A maze of emotions
Tied back to California
Introduced her to friends
We gathered there and
I was ungraciously
Pinched out in the resolve
Came to be with an X
Cross you out gone
Scream and shout
Certain to flivver
Moving on without you
Rudely awakened
Solving the equation
Minus and pluses
She wasn’t peaceful
And the girl who was stolen
Went with her

Two Peas

Attenuated heart
Wounded from the exhaust
Bruised and bled sore
Healed by the garden
Two peas in a pod
Tending to the flowers
Mending the core
Pulsating new with desire
To feel better post red letter
Teaming vessels of light
Coursed through the veins
Off the pages in flight
From the soles of my feet
Climbs each vertebrae
Night rings up to skull
Lips round the bottle of life
Vilified and godlike
Innocent grasshoppers chime
Every pure drop drips
Indistinguishably right

Hooked

A whinge of second guessing the self
Relief comes in the return a reception
What of the moment just as it is
Reassurance in the palm of your hand
No terms for judgement if the truth
Is what it is it stands on its own
Quietly observant but as loud as a word
Will allow another one to share
If a heart is on a string there is no
Need to pull the line we are not fish
To be caught but emotionally we
Are hooked by our own thoughts inside

Pulling

Keep keeping up
Or we’re gone
Authenticity is what
Keeps people going
Easier to give up
Than to put up with
Easier to give in
Than to stand up for
Who wants to be hard
Fixed in forever if
We can compromise in
Halftime but not now
But if ever we can get there
Hands are not tied
And the black and white
Is blurred then good
Keep going pushing
Through the murk
Feels redoubtable
On the other side
A breakthrough

23

We only look like that
When we’re twenty-three
Hair blowing in the wind
Walking casually
A world of eyes
Taking us in
No real concern for anything
Or what lies around the bend
And once we look like that
We seem to be
Attending to realities
Soon realizing that we are
Twenty-three years older
Holding on to twenty-three
The newborn youth we used to be
We see ourselves becoming
A version of what we had no clue
Would be our truth to be
So many dreams were dreamt
Beneath the stars inside our youth
Beholden to the same remains
A youthful heart within the frame
That is also the container to
The one who once was twenty-two
Becoming twenty-three