Need May 2009
I am a volcano,
frozen embers rising
like vapor to the surface
of my skin.
I am bottled within.
I can feel my cells
as they are mesmerized
by you. Just looking
makes my muscles
crave movement.
I ache to hold.
I feel like I am running
inside. Circulation at a leopard’s
pace, as I race to be within inches
of your gaze.
This hunger never seems to end.
Holding fire
always seems to burn,
and yet it tries to lick,
gently, at my skin.
I am a volcano
thawing, growing numb
with need. And yet, you are nowhere
to be seen. I haven’t met you yet.
I do not know your face,
but I do know what sets you apart—
my heart and the warmth
you bring to me.
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Highly Decorated July 2008
I.
Involuntarily enlisted in a war
against ourselves; the selves
that were given to us by others.
Not given like a present you can return,
but rather passed on.
Individuals’ actions and their residual effects
rubbing off on us.
Whether by environment or by accident,
we are bombarded insidiously with the consequences
of others’ carelessness, thoughtlessness.
The aggressors rarely paying the price we pay
for surviving and trying to live despite the obstacles.
We all deserve medals—
as a beleaguered battalion,
we wrestle with odds and ends of despair, rage,
sadness and sometimes a built-in indifference
constructed to protect us from our collapsing sense
of safety.
II.
the hostile voices that try to tell us
this war is not real, are not our own voices,
full of doubt, billowing like loose petals caught in the breeze--
hostile voices and rhetoric that when picked apart
can be traced back to the sick root of a tree.
III.
If someone used investigator’s dust—
he would uncover the imprints others have made
on us. Unseen to the naked and untrained eye,
these lines are deeper than any wrinkle on sun-aged skin.
Reaching further than their visibility implies,
through a jagged landscape
where memories hide deep.
Memories we need not know in detail.
Their presence is felt in spurts, volcanic
ash rising. Quaking nerves firing
at an invisible foe. Sensitive to disturbance,
security is tight.
We all deserve medals—
as a beleaguered battalion,
we wrestle with odds and ends of despair, rage,
sadness and sometimes a built-in indifference
constructed to protect us from our collapsing sense
of safety.
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BX January 2009
one by one
we go home,
taking a piece
of shared memory.
As battle ties loosen,
unfolding,
we each still share
a collective mission:
To never abandon hope
for too long.
To never forget each other—
the myth of aloneness
relentlessly
trying to weed its way
back in.
If recollected,
the puzzling nature of our lives
would fit.
Veterans of BX,
it’s hard to be together
as anything else.
If only we could be
in each other’s lives,
completely, forgetting
the scars that history wrote.
Remembering instead the
warmth, guidance,
the camaraderie, of
a beleaguered battalion
strong together,
indefinitely.
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—One Year— March 2008
Revelations
echo in the chambers
of my mind,
revealing how deep moments
are engraved within.
I run away
into the darkness,
exploding in grief,
seeking a shield
from others’ eyes.
Even Love shines a light,
unwelcome in its breadth
and honesty.
I bow my head, earnestly,
searching for a way to explain
why I run further away,
strands of my hair gathering around.
I bow my head in profound confusion,
hoping to disappear into the shadows
long enough so you forget my presence.
But I know I sob,
shaking the caverns of my mind,
as moments crumble around me.
I cannot protect myself forever
from the wrath of my grief,
except by going deeper,
hoping my being
will disappear without me
or anyone else
knowing it.
