Hope and Loss

There was Hope there

Sitting with arms crossed

In the company of Loss.

Hope and Loss had sat together

On the stoop of Heaven

Many times before and watched

the leaves fall

the snow come and go

and the flowers press their faces out of the mud.

They both had seen countless tears evaporate

into the summer sun.

Hope and Loss had become rather good friends

through thick and thin.

Hope was the one that knocked on

the door of Heaven

But it was Loss that wandered in.

My Childhood Dream

When I was a child

and adults asked me

what I

wanted to be

when I

grew up

I never said that

I wanted to be the president

or that I wanted to be on television

or like my mother

or my father.

I did not wish to be wealthy like the

family down the street.

When I was little

I imagined that,

when I grew up,

I would have wings

or fishscales and a mermaid tail.

I imagined my skin would change color

or be every color

all at once.

Teenage me wished

to be invisible at times,

breathe fire at others.

Twenty-something me wanted

to be able to speak

to animals and trees and flowers

and also have the ability

to change the weather

as easily as I changed my mind.

Funny how now

this late thirties me thinks

I am well on my way to being

exactly what that little child me

wanted to be.

I feel so blessed

that I became an artist.

Broken Things

Broken hearts

Broken dreams

Today was full of broken things;

Broken sticks

Broken stones

City street full of broken payphones

Broken condom

Broken tooth

Broken neck

In a noose

Stranger on street says -

"Broken things have no use!"

The latch doesn’t catch

The zipper, it sticks

The clock’s hands are frozen

No more tocks or ticks

The faucet drip

Poor granny's hip.

Only saving grace for today's broken ways

Is that at least

I like broken things.

And broken things -

Like me.

do YOU hear me when i ask

every morning

i hold my heart like a ball in my fist

i pet hope like a cat in my lap

i close my eyes

i wonder

do YOU hear me

when i ask

for small things today

lofty wishes yesterday:

please let these words sprout wings

and fly away

do YOU hear me when i ask

for safety all around those that i love

for ease on this journey

for peace

for trust

do you hear the small whispers

the dreams that i dream

the imaginary bouquets of flowers

i wrap with wishes and deliver

to those in need

do YOU hear me as i sigh

wondering why i need

these words

do YOU see me

with my hands palm to palm

across my heart

asking for a way

forward

do YOU hear me

though i seem to ask

the same things

each and every day?

i believe

yes,

YOU do.

The Here and Now

There are treasures buried

Amid the ruins.

Beneath the debris of catastrophic events;

earthquakes, tornadoes, fires, floods.

I wear a mask as I pick through memories

hoping not to get sick from them.

Memories;

Charred, buried, blown like trash

from a place that once was familiar, comfortable

into a wild directionless wind.

How exciting to stand here -

like a relic unmoving as the wind erases,

erodes, eradicates

where I was.

That which I will now follow

is this pebble in my chest.

This smooth, hard pebble I gently grasp

then cast

across the lake of my mind.

Where it skips, skids, tiptoes over the surface of reflections

from Memory to Future,

from Fear to Hope.

***

That pebble grows heavy as it travels the distance

Until it becomes a stone

that drops

and disappears into the Here and Now.

***

Waves ripple out from that point

circular and vast

in all directions.

A Poet's Lament to Love

Your musk remnant on my pillow

Rouses me in the night

Roll over blind

Blanket mass

Eyesight fights

Radiator rattles competes with

Silence.

Makes my dreams incomplete.

***

In complete darkness

My heart thumping

My mattress a drum

Skipping beats.

***

In this state I find myself too often;

Restless body

I've become

Enshrouded in your essence

So I inhale

Savor the flavor

Grow dizzy on your fume

***

My bed

My small hell

***

Radiator laughs

Echoes through the empty room

Mocking me -

the lamenting poet

with his over-dramatized doom.

As I pen this poem

About how something so lovely

As Love

Can conquer and consume.

Roses

He gave me roses

like blood.

Gave me

memories

that never confused me

until now.

The roses look like velvet

nestled there

amid green leaves

unfolding here

in the messy bedroom

full of cigarette butts and scattered thoughts.

After all that has come

after all that has passed

our hands still cling to one another

through the silence of night.

Our dreams maybe still meet

as we lie side by side

on a bed that sometimes seems

too small too offer

any comfort

anymore

with all of this

too familiar company.

Those roses

they remain here this grey morning

after he has left and flown back

far away to some place where the sun

always shines

and history does not change.

He brought me a dozen roses

wrapped in brown paper and hope.

They smell of romance and velvet

far-off youthful advances.

They smell of a perfume

that calls some far-off time

back to mind.

My lover was here -

now there.

Every moment a gesture that evokes memory

every word could bring a thorn

or safety.

We are blooms

tied together with a string

that both constricts

and holds us to make us

into this incredible

breathe-taking

display.

He gave me a dozen velvet roses

wrapped in words like

"i love you"

and "hope" and "stay".

The roses hold their heads up

even now as their very roots have been

chopped neatly away.

Replaced by clean water

in a transparent vase.

Beautiful Roses.