my street on four wheels
where they don't move
their feet. And screaming like
a banshee, howl. I sit on

my deck and scowl at
the silence they stole. Ugly
trolls at it again just when
I'm billowing in my reverie. They

massacre a memory. I can
not hear the robin sing over their yelling
and bantering. So, I make my way
inside. But I'm still attacked on

all four sides by little people
amplified. I'm a bird in a cage. It just
gets worse with age and spring. I can
not escape the hollering. This was a quiet

street. Now it's a riot of little feet shouting
inanities, calling it play. It's a black cloud
on a sunny day. There's not enough
chardonnay to make the noise go away.

grass beneath my feet
sun burning my skin
but I don’t care about hurting my chin
I’m just running while I’m still five feet

It’s still fun to play hide and seek
I’m not hiding yet just for the sake of it
and I’m not worried I will lose my grin
my mouth was never close to a fist

and I’ll never get to shout so loud
or get that safe and sound
like in the backward of my aunts house.

My bones have already cracked now
I don’t frolic, I don’t sprout,
don’t visit
The backward of my aunts house.

Kneeling at your headstone
Where nature stopped mourning
The grass has grown tall here and
Your silence strong.
I know you’re free from the body
And the sins of our fathers
Chiseled on dry bones
But my flesh begs for your return
I dreamed you are sleeping
A polarized bad dream
Where I have to let go
But  I’ll just wake you now
I’ll give you my breath
To breath in
To open your eyes
I’ll give you my all
For the chance to stand near you
And shed tears of forgiveness
But I don’t want you to fall.
You will always be safe here
Safe in this song
May you live In this poem
As the shadows grow long.

I can't close my eyes
tears gather.
I can't breathe
the air is stuck.
I can't gulp
my throat is tight.

I try to plant my dream,
but land is
barren

Still, I try.
Even my conscience
mocks me.

I was not trained for this—
no welcome packet, no handbook for gravity.
Just a name that clings like static
and a voice that trembles when spoken too clearly.

They asked me if I had room.
I said I had weather.
They asked me if I would disappear.
I said watch me smolder, and stay.

I have loved like a lighthouse
with no shoreline in sight,
signaling to anyone
who mistook reflection for return.

I’ve held their names
like breath under water,
carved pathways through others
just to find my own again.

But I do not sculpt.
I do not steal 'the good stuff'.
I inherit fire
and ask it if it remembers me.

If you see yourself in me,
look again—
I am not a mirror,
I am the window you opened
and forgot to close when the wind picked up.

Still, I arrive,
boots echoing in the hallway
of someone else’s myth,
offering only this:

I will not rewrite you.
I will not finish your sentences.
But I will stand here—
untranslated,
unsaved,
untouched by the need to be anything
other than true.

Watch me disappear
Before your eyes
Been hanging ‘round here
Begging for replies
Too many times
Unanswered
Pushed aside
Stayed too long
****!
I’m gone

he held the knife
blade bright as the sun
with an edge
as dark as night
it's anger swallowing light

cold as a dead man's finger

meeting flesh to the bone
again and again
until rivers ran
where none should flow
his victim cold
as a dead man's finger

the scene set
for the guys from forensics
to take their pictures
make measurements
of blood spatter
then pack up the mess

cold as a dead man's finger

to the victor the spoils
mobile phone and some cash
living to make future chaos
he lies on his bed
staring at a blank ceiling
no feeling

cold as a dead man's finger

I was thinking about the blast
of neon colors in a film
and the New Wave Music
and Marie Antoinete pastels

But in my childhood
it was as if we had other hues,
a small box of crayons at hand,
or that the world was seen through
Kodachrome film.

There were lollipop reds and purple
and dungaree blues, lake and skies,
lemon ice yellows, setting suns
and lush summer green.

In scratched lenses, children seemed to play
as if inspired by the living colors,
imagining that their lives would last forever.
And even as they grow, it immortalizes them.

But, like life, the colors decay
and we gaze at scenes of sepia and moss,
with ochre grass and reds turned brown.
We must attune memory to remember more.

And using suspension of disbelief,
Elders, middle-aged and children gather
Like the neolithic ceremonies meant for gods,
But celebrate, not the stars or stones,
Rather the lives we have lived or have yet to taste.

Is it a person or a place,
A thing whose soul I can never know?
A warrior howls with the wind
in the trackless wild.
Or a peerie lad running through sand
on St. Ninian's ayre?
A maid swimming
in an unreachable isle
or the luffing of sails
in the harbour at night.
An expanse of heath
with a bird above.
A person or place
That I'll always love

I did my best and it was
Good enough for some
But not good enough for the entire circle.

I apologize to those passengers of Life
Who did not or could not see
The percipience of my nature
For they were involved in furthering
And sustaining their own
Patches of life and rightly so.

They blamed me for
Mismanagement of my own life
Which may have in some way
Ruffled the feathers of their opinions
What they saw as mistakes
I saw as vehicles to freedom
What they regarded as foolishness
I considered as creativity's spur.

The width of Raison d'etre is wide as sky
The length of choice is unfathomable
The height of desire reaches the stars
The Sun, its Planets and their Moons
Devices for every nature's florescence
Difference is not a defense
For claiming quality
It is the hallmark of creation's artistry.

The crisp of January and August's heat
The abundance of Autumn
And Spring's colorful spirit
Testament to the unstoppable diversity.