all the same

i see my reflection
in the black mirror
tired, heavy eyes
aged by indecision
isn’t it really
inaction a warm 
blanket of this middle passage
from some book
or poem
to make it all just right
just keep writing;

a thousand monkeys

on a thousand typewriters

and eventually this comes out

my sides are split open

and pouring 

from every pore

breathing something within

into 

this world we 

find ourselves alone

most mornings before

the haze burns 

often a cool cloudy 

these are the warmest

nearest peace i know 

here is a complicated

only as much as you make it; 

fuck

i dance

and fidget

and anguishing minutes become hours

become months

and years later

how can the hurt be exactly

the experiences pouring in

the hurt pouring out

i need to purge

an immense clarifying

screaming

stop the clock

what has happened

a suspended animation 

product of constant rising and falling

an oscillation 

increasing frequency until 

pull back far enough and 

the parabola flattens

i am a hurt child

unequipped to share

unable to understand

the difference between

normal and not

knowing the difference between

war and peace

within

we never get to the point

there’s never, if you’re paying attention, 

inarticulate adolescent

the angst is better dressed

a parlor trick to distract

the forever truth knowing

our wounds 

won’t heal at the

hands of another 

no matter how warm

basking in the glow of the deepest

real love refuses 

ruled by the quantum ticktocking

of a knowing so deep

space and time 

irrelevant

when a thing is

it just is

bound by no clock

can also mean

bound by no expectations

can also mean

lasting a moment

or written about in a 

thousands of years from now

stardust will know

just as the child

what is

what is not

neither needing nor caring of

why

only seeks to sooth

understanding doesn’t change

is

or is not

doesn’t change 

the rising and falling

is happy

smile

is sad

cry

is both

life

stop trying to fix

how the past hurt

that child lives forever 

is gone and grown

into now 

soon to be gone forever

moving toward some 

carrying our shadows

weigh nothing more than stardust

and memories

and imagined pasts and futures

all the same