I walked through a pond of croaking frogs, loud and strong and forever a gallant song until I approached --
Whence they ceased their tune.
I wrapped the silence around me like the silver lining of Joseph's dream coat.
And rode the waves of fog around me, strong, confident and unimpeachable.
Shadows loomed, daring me in the face of darkness to stay strong.
I picked up the pace, and I ran my race home yelling --

yippeeeeeeeee!

Such was the nature of your love –

you didn't even care

to say goodbye.

the freedom i was chasing
was never so far
i blamed you i blamed life
i blamed myself
i blamed my heart

but really it was just divinity
or maybe just the way things go
i searched for love for peace
for mercy for belonging
for a place that felt like home

now the understanding presents itself
just like this
you can try and fight change
but the simple fact that always was and will be
is that it just is

At lunch I bought a pear,
its shape: a quiet joke.
I cut it clean and slowly,
the blade, the slice, the poke.

It tasted like a breather,
not sweet, just real and right.
Like silence in the stairwell
or breezes late at night.

The afternoon unknotted,
each task a gentler climb.
I fed the cat. I folded shirts.
You’re not here. I’m fine.

He crawled through seven weeks,
her voicemail still unplayed
burned letters on the stovetop,
and brushed the ash away.

The mattress holds her perfume,
her hair still haunts the sheet.
It lingers just to gut him,
then breaks beneath the heat.

"I gave you what I carried,
a key, a ring, a name.
You marked it as a chapter,
the ending never came."

Streetlights blink and stutter,
pulse yellow, white, then blue.
They gnaw beneath the ribcage
and press on every bruise.

He heard her laughter echo
through gutter sweat and smoke;
coins scatter on the concrete,
a rimshot to the joke.

He cut this trail in whiskey
left dents along the floor,
no battle flag, no anthem,
just shrapnel from the war.

Her glance, a flint and trigger,
still burns behind the eyes.
Not love, not even fury,
just silence split with lies.

The bottle knew its ending;
its glitter salts the ground.
No sirens in the alley,
all bodies have been found.

He slips the lock in shadow
and drifts beneath the gray.
The gospel wilts by morning.
He never meant to stay.