J.D.

And there I am...

With this bottle in my hand, and I keep thinking,

"It's only a small sip. Why fight?"

So the bottle tips slowly,

And the liquid fire that has for so long been tantamount to my death

Roars down my throat.

With that burn comes the self-hatred and pity from 15 years ago

Leaving me to wonder what I do with....

all the loving in my heart as Heaven's door is shut in my face.

451°

A stuffed animal.

A photo.

A letter of some forgotten love one summer when her hair smelled of fresh strawberries

And you were still young and vibrant.

Why do we turn our memories into solid forms

Thereby plucking them from our hearts or our minds 

And removing them from the matter where they lay?

Turn to look at the memory 

Of the pain turned from feeling into solid form.

His perfect smile.

Her eyes that sparkle like stars at the edge of Jupiter's moons.

That moment when the wind was at your command and the universe clicked

How often have you returned to look? To feel? 

A small voice deep in the walled recesses of your heart tells you, "No more."

So that smile and those eyes are placed down and warmed by the orange glow

Until the 451st degree takes over and the man, 

Or the woman, 

Or the moment

Slowly ceases to exist thanks to Prometheus's gift. 

One by one,

Little by little, 

The pieces break.

The man falls away.

The woman returns to the stars.

The wind breaks the shackles you placed and returns to its glory,

But not before doing you one last favor and taking the small pieces of your 

Faded moments and scattering them for you. 

And the degrees that freed you await you to feed it more in a misguided attempt to survive.           

Split

What does the body do when the heart is taken?

Does it collapse and cease to feel the sunshine

Hanging well above it?

Does it fold and drop into the cracks of remorse

That litter the house where it sits?

Or does it keep moving without purpose?

A husk that masquerades as a human being

Moving at the beat of its former heart.

The hole where the hand reached in is still fresh

Like the memories of the hand who held it.

Yet she too is now an empty vessel as she holds my heart,

And I now stare at my hand and find a heart not my own.

I have hers; she has mine,

But neither one of us can reach each other.

What does the body do when the heart is taken?

It yearns for its loss to be returned.

Gleaned

The sun dips down on the violent water

And creates a serene darkness that plunges

Its fingers into my soul

Yet a single blue light on the edge of the horizon

Glints and warms my heart against

The understanding of my mind.

That blue glint takes the warmth of my hand

And walks with me in deep wooded conversations.

It is warmth that slides up my arm and settles itself

As though a moon has found its planet.

While gravity can be turbulent, the rotation continues

to allow the seas to sway the boats and create that blue glint.

No moon, no stars, and no lighthouse can remove that glint

From its affixed position on the edge of the horizon.

Decimation

The hammer clicks slowly as the words roll from your mind into the chamber.

No doubt the bullet has my name on it as your tongue sets into firing position.

You've picked your target. You've made sure it will bury deep in my heart.

So you suck in the necessary fuel deep into your nostrils, and, with nothing left to lose

You fire....

As the gun goes off, the sound is not deafening or painful, but soft and almost melodious.

The target, hypnotized, cannot move as the bullet travels quickly toward it.

It is unsuspecting, like a child unaware of what a pin does to a balloon.

Each word lands and the target crumbles into a lifeless heap.

With your job done, you slowly pack away your weapon of choice

And begin surveying the damage.

A cold smile licks on your face as you realize you have finished

So it is time to move on to the next one.

Hanging

The boy stands still in the swirling wind

Looking for the voices he has become accustomed to hearing

Only to find himself strangely alone.

Countless times he has plunged his hands into the fire, the water, the wind

And pulled out each person before the pink moon rose in the east.

Only now the rose-hued Selene rises for him and no one is to be found.

A look in his eyes finds not tears of rage, but solemn understanding

Because the movement of light around him occurs

From his placement of the stars.

Every moment from here to the approaching entropy of his breath

Happens due to his ignorance, his choices, and his heart.

The wind begins to push him harder and harder

Toward a definitive but he resists the scythe and asks for one last word.

One last missive to those he misses and needs.

With his strength ebbing from him and light overcoming the wind,

He conjures their faces and merely says, "Sorry," then fades out

To become part of petals floating on a pond.

8,765.8

It slowly rolls by like a still river.

(It flashes by in a second.)

It brings with it souls not before seen or felt.

(It takes with it people who stood the line and are no more.)

It creates memories that will stand the test of time.

(It destroys moments that felt like stone but were built of sand.)

It is constantly welcome.

(It is always dreaded.)

We lift our heads high to feel the warmth and joy it brings.

(We hang our heads under the weight it drops on us.)

We constantly count it to build toward the inevitable joy we expect.

(We always watch it build toward the end we may not want.)

It saves the day and crushes the soul... or is it saves the soul and crushes the day?

And that timer starts again at zero and climbs once more

Until we can no longer remember why we truly cared in the first place.

Worry

Push it down and bury it.

Somewhere deep in your heart where no one,

Not even those who read you

With the clarity of Spring morning,

Can find it.

Let it sink into your veins

And become part of your blood

So that it is masked by the very movements of your mind.

Never show that it hides deep in your being

For the monster that dwells there will surely destroy them all.

Growth

"You have to open your fist," he whispered to me quietly,

And I did,

And when I did, her hand slipped out.

Like the animals discovering the returning landscape in Spring

She stepped forward into the world without my hand to guide her.

My only vision now is of her back as she took the sun with her

And left me here to figure out what happens next

With nothing more than a matchstick of reasoning.

The cold bite of the wind sinks into my now empty hand

As I push hope around me like a blanket and wait

For the darkness to part around the saving grace of a hand to pull me

Back from the ironic fall from grace I have created.

Te desidero, and go forth into the welcoming world.

Let Orpheus be your guide to a point and make no mistakes.

No man calls me Eurydice.

The hand that returns the warmth should not be yours.

Neighbor

He never puts on a shirt
As he stands in the fading sun
Quietly rocking back and forth
With the beer in his hand.

It's distracting to man and beast
As the jogger can't help but stare
And her Beagle pulls on the leash
Toward his lawn.

Fifteen years he's sat on that porch
Looking over the changing landscape
Of young couples gaining their first child
And losing their minds.

Like a Sphinx. Like a watchman of time
He holds the answers to random moments
Of his neighborhood. Who owns this lot?
Where is the fence line? Why should we care?

So he stands on his holy ground
In his too tight shorts and too narrow mind
Explaining to no one in particular what should be
And what will be.

A moving statue of a bygone era that no one wants back.
And when asked to put on a shirt
He merely remarks:
"Do I tell you how to live?"

And we live under the names of neighbors...
Even though we have no idea who we are.