His touch haunted her,
Guarded as her heart was, she couldn’t afford
To connect,
To attract,
To enter into any state of delicate but zealous longing
Instinctively she knew
Any feeling would be misleading;
Splendid sensual snow melting into liquid lies,
Her heart disarmed, sinking into that gusty sea
Of spoiled desire
A barbarous distance between craven obedience
And the grandiosely brilliant beam she used to embody
An emotional war as tangible as a robust ruin
Worn down by stormy weather, unable to shelter
Her blue-eyed innocence
Recondite or unexpected it never was,
The effect of his shaggy possessive smile
And giddying twisted promises
Drawing out her hurt and suffering,
Disguised as a youthful fluttering
Of nonchalant excitement
A deceitfully draining destruction lurking
In his fondling fingertips,
His smiling dimples,
His laughing wrinkles
Yet thoughtfully she took the plunge
Into a wilderness she couldn’t afford
To miss out on

It's two minutes past the deadline
The coffee he spilled has seeped into the wooden table
As if leaving a masterpiece of stains would somehow make it right
The boom caused by the implosion of his future still echoes in his head
As he lifts himself from the shallow puddle of confidence
That has almost dried up whole
The dirt under his fingernails is a reminder
Of the time he spent trying
To get this tree of missed chances and what-ifs
To grow again
His car keys and his passport he uncovers
From under a pile of broken promises
Maybe he can push back time
Following the sun

PART I: ADRIFT

Madness passed Misery
and bumped into me.
We travel together now,
Islands lost at sea.

Ahead, Tomorrow rides,
pinned to the sunrise.
Yesterday dogs us,
marking our tides.

Empty atolls pass
on windborne paths.
Now homes to only bones;
more dead outcasts.

The Ocean never laments
or attempts to make sense.
We just wander across it
until living relents.

PART II: VAGRANT

Lagoon to lagoon,
harboring my tether.
Giving me shelter
from daily storms.

Lost in the masts,
a paper boat.
Taking on water...
as expected.

A lucky hook
snares the soggy craft.
Dried and opened:
a cry for          .

When no reply came,
a folded flotilla
Whitened the water,
a cry now screaming.

This harbor now empties.
My travels resume.

PART III: DREAM

The sea fades to gulls, and then,
a delta rushed with mountainfulls.
I've become a salmon fighting upstream,
an island lost in a riverbed dream.

Hold your breath, forget
Which bridge to cross is about
What to leave behind

Pitch black storylines
Ink painted former forest
Fire wrote a book here