not enough

I’ve run circles around shadows
Raised two people from a grain
Crossed oceans and added,
collected and borrowed,
Begged and bent to be let in
yet fled at every chance
I’ve climbed mountains in my mind
and tumbled down numbed
by blatant lies meant to exalt
and suppress all uprising

Nothing has touched me
like colours and smiles
hiding in the corner
of a mouth or an eye
or the blush of a cheek
or the belly of a cloud

I woke with a poem
swirling in my head
The words to be said aloud
were plain and measured
without rhyme
but with cause
and reason enough

The clause underscored
the glaring metaphor
But by lips’ touch to cup
thoughts leaked to the ground
And I ached for the stars
in the vacuum above

recovery

Stay sharp, stay strong
stand
keep walking, keep walking

tall face out

keep walking, keep looking, straight ahead
keep typing, keep flinching,
inching towards a better place
towards comfort talking

In here, all is silence
No one talks, they look
out windows, they look
past floors, they look
to their next step
All is invested
in that next step

considerations

I tire of strategies and ways
to cope with oncoming days
relentlessly repenting my weakfisted displays
of resistence
Should I walk you through
the maze of forays I’ve made
to breach your frame of reference and make you see me
Or should I don those gifted feathers and the walk
that make me talk in ways
that appease and rename me

South, North, West, East,
Worst, Best, Most, Least

these things matter
to you it seems

And just like that
I’m calculating freedom
Considering extractions
and subtractions
against the cost of inaction
And alone glows like a full moon
This ill-fitting life
spreads a feast before me
While I, measuring my worth inversely to your silence,
starve for the stars above

opus

How easy to fall for
the nibbling of a cuticle
under a brow furrowed in consternation relaxing
into a whisper
“it’s okay, you’re alright”
breaking into a smile
mocking all propriety

On the other side
I sit with you–watching other lives–waiting
for confirmation
I should rise up–flee dancing–to my doom

all (a)part

A few steps on
and details will blur
The errors and slurs
looking back will concur
It was just life
making itself heard
above the din of clinking
glasses raised to chins
under eyes glancing
to catch sight of daggers
advancing to nail them
to a whim for the night
Some are flung,
some take flight
from the orbits of ones
skillful at hunting
for fillers and props
to their cheap thrills
While others watch
the slaughter of hearts,
uttering remarks behind
napkins drawn to lips,
hungering to be part
of the scene

half past

Let us live our best lie
sipping sour wine
under stars straining behind
our bluffing smiles
Denying how or why
We’re just beasts in heat
thin slices of meat
parting to greet
the next hint of kindness
with gritted teeth

They say I’m wound tight
taught and unwilling,
but I’m just stuck between pendulums swinging
looking up at the clock
waiting for the tic
and the toc to knock me
to the top with a view
of the other side of you

Disappointment sits
in the ruts on my face
along with last night’s liner
Though there was a moment
finer than the hairs on our necks
raised by our breaths
counting the waves

I wish my life could be
this seemly fantasy
dancing on the edge
of the sea, of a dream
riding on the steam of oloong tea
rising from the froth
of the tide like a goddess
to hear you confess
your utter distress
at your failure to impress me

Instead I fall into the past
and land crashing at
the feet of my failures
raised at half mast
to ward off such
futile endeavours

tuning out

I’m a master of last words
gone unheard
Running faster
towards disaster
than fall leaves under foot
Still, I stop to capture
stillborn laughter bursting
forth from yet another
struck dumb with wonder
at their footing crumbling
and the bridge giving way

I stopper the song
from seeping into my veins
It cannot stirr my senses
to see through the haze
I tune into debates
on the uselessness of faith
And think of time wasted
waiting for change
to come from beyond
and release me from blame

fall

Though it came
without rain or relief
By the end of October
I knew it was all over

Silence hung
like a threat
hunched in a stand off
between the earth
and the clouds

Leaves turned brown
leaning far down
begging the wind
to release them

Birds gathered and scattered
Rain ceased to matter
Waiting for distraction
was the only action
of defiance left
for those bereft
of hope and rope enough
to pull or swing from

Come November
and even leaves
cannot remember
what it felt to be green
reaching for blue sky
as I cannot recall
how or why
I reached for you
Just the hurt and
the taste of dirt
that came with falling

lining things up

I stall in the rain
drained of another day
Of setting up pieces
for the play that
never takes place
I remain as I woke
With promises revoked
And expectations of exceptions
like leaves dulled
yellow with deception
I lie about with
nothing but time

Time to sort and rearrange
the blight of change
and the lines it traces
confining us to this page
To chart the findings
that time denied until
there was not time
to take off our binding duties
and soothe our aches
in the rising tide
And if requests to see
through your angry eyes
and the hurt they belied
are vengefully denied
I’ll swim back up the page
to find the source
of my mistakes
Marking the time until
I’m arraigned and
condemned to make time
for atonement

shifting

Did you think I would flip
on a dime-store line
after 25 years worth of time
And that in you I’d find
something unexplored
through your imploring eyes?
I’ve seen the tides come in
and sweep my castles aside
and took it in stride astride
the latest crushed hope
the door to freedom would open
my clam shell heart
Like the heat of friction
could fix my mixed-tongue diction
and shape a fiction
in my mind so as to find
solace in you
Let us savour
this year’s flavours
as I fall out of favour
with the changing sky above us
and sand giving way
beneath our feet
hushing our decrees
while we shuffle dreams discreetly
I grow tired of beseeching
for the chance to appease
So I will give in
to my tether and
talk only of the weather
and the unavailing
view from here