Hunger growls, and I listen.
I will be the one that lasts.
Out of sight, no sound given.
You will be the one I catch.

Wind howls; I am missing.
Sky is watching my advance.
Muscles tighten, knees stiffen.
Nightly creatures all in trance.

Screams muffled, blurry vision.
Searing pain — you collapse,
Giving in to intuition.
Knife digging deep and fast.

Two are one in coalition.
Hunger finally satisfied.

Whatever I think, I say it and mean it.
I wear my heart on the seams of my sleeve.
The coming wind holds my poems and their meanings,
Like smoke, I let it pass over me.

I follow every laughter, every melancholy feeling.
I tread every road that I ever see.
To be alive is to bear the searing
Fiery breath of what caused us to be.

I, that hold the cold of summer leaving,
Can only sense that I hold my poetry—
That which I hope has sailed with the weary,
That which I dread always follows me.

Who in this world could claim the right
To define what is a memory?

To be able to see what others can’t see,
To be able to smell flowers in dreams—
We are all a walking treasury.

What magic we make that grows with age
And creeps through our melodies,

That trickles from books, from lasting looks, from yawning gentle poetry.

What words can change in an hour or an age
Of long past tales and history?

Can we remember or try to dismember
The meaning of a eulogy?

Do we surrender to cold December
And live again in memories,
Or wish that someday we break asunder
And become immortal memories?

Gather around me, point and laugh,
Watch me dance with a broken half.
How easy pain can be disguised—
Just hide your face, then mask the mask.

Come and try to comprehend
How a broken leg pretends
To find footing amidst torment,
Beneath the stares of a thousand eyes

Everyone has a broken half—
Half hearts, half brains, half short-stretched hands.
Try as you may to refuse and defend
Your half pride and half lies and their
Sickening stench.

Never thought a man could confess,
Or even have the courage to explain himself,
How bad and awful can be dismay,
Or even realize his closing end.

Instead, we stumble around and shout—
To forget it all, we shout loud and proud.
And if we still hear whispers of reason,
Our throats are ready to smother it out.

What good is light for the stars,
when the stars are blind, my love?
If stars were to trade their fire and bright
to see for just one day and one night,

would there still be light, my love?

Still, how can stars ever see,
if others don’t sacrifice their sight?

Then—
can you count how many would be
willing to do it for others,
and be the ones we truly love?