late luminescence

 

photo: under bridge utrecht

 

photo: dunmore caves, ireland

but, just, please: 
the space,

between




does not belong
to anyone. 

 

photo: nelly's house

 

photo:

 

photo: Leadenhall Market

you could hear a foot fall
shoulders grow small
watch the purple elephant crawl across the room

you could hear a pin drop
feel her heart stop
watch the hot breath pop a full balloon

you could hear God's whisper
the subtext while you kiss her
watch the splitting of the zipper as the world goes into bloom

 

photo: Kiefer, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam

 

photo: flixbus from utrecht to antwerp

I have it stuck in my head that I am always the one who is expected to stay stagnant

to be the girl waiting back behind the picket fence who is familiar in all the ways that feel like home

but in all honesty, I am too disparate to be her

half the kitchen would be clean and the pantry would be full of all the ingredients of abandoned dreams

i'd be eating the leftovers of last week's culinary disaster

my room would be a museum of all the times i have ever loved, even if i'm only sentimental in the short term

and my desk would be covered in receipts and empty boxes of cookies,

all the postcards we bought and never made time to write

i paint my life with the best of intentions, i thought about you but not in the way that wounds

i'd either be in all day or never at all

contradiction, cyclical rebellion, oscillation, dejavu

its always the smallest things that really break you

 

photo: Van Gogh's waterlilies in Musee de l'Orangerie, Paris, France

I don't really understand what exactly I have for my appeal ---

I know its not good to talk down yourself but like I just feel ---

I'm dead weight, I'm always late, I might not flake but like

I'm certainly far cry from being the best 

I'm dead weight, when will my luck dissipate

I'm always late, and they still wait

I might not flake, but I feel sure one day they'll deem me a fake

I'm certainly far cry from being the best 

is it only a matter of time? 

most days I don't even make the sloshing rhyme,

but if I was on the stand, with a gavel in my hand,

I'm certainly far cry from being the best, so when will I fail the test?

I would deem me so unworthy.

 

photo: Houston, TX

11/8/21: "I know you don't want to hear from me, but I am selfish"

Perhaps a little lonely, too.

There is nothing quite like ping pong,
a kid made of mischief and wayward grins clicking the flashlight:

on. and off. and on and off and on.

And then staring into an abyss,
falling into the habit of trusting there will always be
another lighthouse flashing back.

Kismet. There is a witty romance in the word,
a feather light kiss and a "well met" that's stuck in your cheek.
I wish, I wish, I wish I could have my pick
of grapes on the trellis, or fruit from the orchard.

And yet, a part of me knows not to waste my Angel numbers
and lucky dimes on things that could bring me to my knees.

See, that's for selfish prayers at night. Wondering what love is,
what God is, what I am. No matter how far I go, home is the heart
in this breast, the breath in this chest.

My mom says I best well not forget it,
even as I will feel sorry for it, most days.

I will wonder if people love the moon more than the sun,
even if I know I do not.

Because the suns in the sky, the stars, even they must
want to be heard, to travel so far.

I am not bold enough to say they are envious,
but wouldn't it be something if everyone realized
even the stars get lonely too.

The fires all go cold, and all feel It creeping in
sometimes. Still they burn.

As I sit on this stump and read
from these pages of your cousin's pulped flesh,
I burst with the excitement of next year seeing you draped in color,

You. master of graceful loss.

You, vessels of wasted breaths,
remind me of aching regret
and how we live despite it all.

The adults wonder while I write,
"would you rather learn to love
from a tree, or a goldfish?",

and I ask the question all week long.

Perhaps too many people say tree,
not for what you are, but for what you give.

Is it love if it is also exploitation,
the story of the taker and the fool?

My father says a child's love can never rival
that of a mother's on days when she yells
and I slam my bedroom door shut.

He is probably right.

Some others choose you for your age,
and I wonder what my grandma would say
if I loved her for simply her wrinkled soft skin, sunspotted and all.

I know she would not say much.

But she might give me dog food for dinner, which would be a shame.
Or she might cry, which would be much, much worse.

And yet the irony is that you will likely die a premature death,
your promises to the coming years cut short by a swift axe to the side.

But perhaps the most ubiquitous answer is that they love you
for what you represent-- the Earth, the shady days, your poetry,
roots clinging to the Earth as your limbs that are constantly

 

photo: sunrise (late to zero period CS) in Arcadia, CA

I wonder how the houseplants feel about dust
Caked in skin like a teenage girl’s first face of make-up.

I wonder how much dust we collect when we sleep,
And if our eyelids crave it every night.

My sister is lying next to me and I don’t kick her out,
And in the morning they will look at me with confused faces at the miracle.

She’s still small, yet so much bigger than she was before.
Growing is an odd thing, so easily mourned.

photo: sunset and phone lines silhouette in Arcadia, CA