between here and there

peak summer swelter
and finally it returns
the rising before the sun and 
doing nothing else, can do nothing else
I write 
about you as always
except you always changes through
the years have left me 
advancing on some fronts and retreating on others
wondering where the border between
you & i; Us
and then, there's them
on the outside (or at least, the other side)
imagining only what they think
it must be true
a coward, heartless, cold
shoulders and backs turning
toward the end
but it didn't have to be this way

Overwhelming loss feeling your

Absent minded day to day and 

Never realizing the damage

We’re too old for this shit

Why can’t we find

That shared path is out there

In the gloom and shrouded from

Unseeing, unwanting eyes and hearts

You know the way as much as I 

Do you want it

Because my life is yours if

Just see my pain and 

We’re all a part of it in 

The other reels at our clumsy

Loving you is still easy

Naturally fitting together 

Funny how the frames almost

Nesting dolls of the persons

Who were we when we were

Together only a past tense 

I hope not,

But why

What impossible truth do I see in

Your heart so strong

But tender too are those nights

From memory and a peace 

Only possible in the warmth of 

Loving our nest 

No matter the storm outside 

Eventually we had to leave it

And lost ourselves and became ourselves

A part of the storm

Tossed and shaken

Reaching out for the other 

Furious or heartbroken 

The hand outstretched through the tumult

Offering safety and love and security

While the other tallies the wrongs

Balancing the ledger so that each time 

Holding only cost more

the ambiguity of breath

cast aside for fear
of moving into a future
i still have to write it
right this ship
it sways and rolls until

we're floating upside down

& the water rises to the floor

where is the bottom of 

this decade has been 

nothing but adrift

my self an amalgamated

island of dying kelp avoiding

being washed ashore and food for the 

scavengers

am I bottom feeding

what sustains these efforts 

knowing the truth is 

exactly as she screams

He died today

last year

how possibly has this been

am I really here?

I don't know how to 

honor him, honor them

how much more should

how much more can 

I do anything 

right or wrong

you just have to keep going

it'll be messy

it'll be beautiful

it'll be sadder than even imagined

but only if you keep trying

keep moving

and when finally you find 

whatever soft spot 

in the heart of things

and you finally

let the walls crumble

and deep breathing

sigh

finally in that space

you are infinite

and even in the deepest 

peaceful rest and safety

the spirit moves

always

walking home

waking before the alarm
still in the dark
but clarity
'remember this'
i dreamt of walking home

it was never a home 
i knew though where i was 
coming from some far off place before the 
lights turn on and reality

sit in this moment
and feel whatever it feels
don't
denial doesn't actually change 
you are whatever you 

such a tender feeling now
and I see you
smaller in the distant 
mirror reflecting the shimmering heat

the city recedes behind scrubby hills
rise and descending into that great
sandy plain 
an expanse of rock and dust
the occasional green hue holding 

faster and faster across this 
open the windows and feel the 
hot air amounting to 
best intentions are fucking nothing

what do all these dreams mean

you know exactly

it's not even avoiding 

the truth permeates the 

everything of living the last

one more time and 

finally the

we are at the mercy and 

the gratitude for 

a universe circling around countless others

and we 

the same a 

speck of

this sounds familiar and

there are no answers.

two days

the sadness of another
isolated grey morning dawning
realization that today is no
further down the road than 
yesterday i was one day younger
versions of myself never imagined
being where i am today; 

I really do love you

are probably better cutting ties

with the creature behind the keyboard

helps keep a distance between whatever

self-ish or self-less

it doesn't matter 

both see the world from a 

I can only imagine the tenuous

feeling shaky and when's the 

penny dropped for me

flashing on the screen

"I love you"

there was no fury

there was resolve

i am not going to let this end

all things do

as they, and we

and the trees and the sky 

and the birds in it

impermanent

it's just a matter of perspective

I have just that

it's not just imagining

I know exactly how it feels to hold a thing

together we 

holding on, battling on

hope against the hopeless

can you surrender to 

i dreamt the most horrible 

i'm so sorry

not for loving you 

will remain with me forever

arrives whether we want it to or not

i fear death as much as 

anyone still wanting

to lead a particular 

this life has not been bad

i've been lucky

I've known beauty.

and whatever is the absence

i've felt

it arises in me without warning and 

like a spooked animal

the instinct is to run

away from the dark feelings

won't go away

but, they don't need to

welcome them, accept them

remove their power stares directly

the sun in my  

eyes closed and seeing the

opaque reminder that within

still beating, this heart

through feast and fallow

storm and calm

an anxious ceasefire in the small hours

slip through, pass by and 

gone forever

I don't want to be another ghost

nor to know another

life will always be with me

as i hope you will be

in perfect balance we teeter on this 

crest of the western mountain 

views into an ocean of clouds

hard to tell the haze from the shimmer

sea holds me mute

a pebble within

and as distant as any other

sharing an origin

the pebble, I, and the ocean

a recognition of the truth

of any life 

even where there is no life

in those trees though

they fucking breathe and fill

my deepest emptiness with

something never quite put to words

miss the point

I'm trying to say 

in the deepest forest of my 

memories are lies, unintentional

avoid the details

remember how to feel

feel to know which point on the map 

drawn from memory and ignoring the side roads 

backtracking from the rim of this 

canyons are earth in relief

the memory of this planet's past

lives are the same

i have changed

the course you choose

to ignore or reckon with

the reality is that

this is what I believe

in yourself accept the 

worse in every way, I'm

not quite free falling

not too late to self-arrest before

the great yawning ocean of air

i'm sliding toward oblivion

out of control 

the more i wait

the less likely

dig in and do something

ring the bell and 

make the earth sing

a resonance that carries on

long after the friction is applied

this life echoes

put it up to your ear and 

you can hear your past

selves screaming your name

move man, time is running 

out the door and into tomorrow

you never know until 

you try.

little creature

how do you burn down

the forest explodes

a billion twinkly shadows

shades of green overlapping

and in the middle

the perfect most tiny

elegant little 

flowers bloom in the 

strangest places make you

feel more like yourself

has been searching the same

we just can't quite

find what

never existed except

if you can dream it

stops being real the moment

walking away

down that same path 

is never the same as 

time before 

you moved differently

the wind tasted of a

different seasons

reminding 

renewal is 

even the most fragile

little flower

has deep roots.

soon shall i

there's always more to come
sometimes the next minutes
turn into years and 
i'm 43 now
20 years ago and then some
windblown, rattle trap of
a condemned home 
is still a home
one that you want to 
leaving does't mean
sometimes that's just what comes 
next steps, there's no way round
the building built beneath 
these feet only work walking
forward is the only 
directionless a sea of kelp
floating cities of 
inidivual pieces fall away and 
washed on a shore
misunderstood and discarded
does the sea weap
salty tears covering so many
times our face next to
yours and mine pantomiming
some larger thing happening here
we're wrapped in a 
this is all so distracting
and time is running
are the words harder to form
to find a truth
who ever said there was one
what answer will satisfy
there is none.

i'm a big dumb

monsters under the bed 

haunting me since 

my memories 

of some things they

never faded

worn elbow patched

the wound is still there

now you go into the world

wearing a sort of armor

pierced hearts finding just

the smallest space between these 

ribs like the blinds fluttering

rattled by the atmosphere and 

shaken from some mid morning

the skies are still grey 

but with air so cool and sweet

you know there's light behind

we're all left by

someone will be there after

the fall is around the corner

turned toward which

ever love lasts

i really do still believe that

they can change the world

the words a window

representing some deeper 

understanding

longing, dying to live

and be loved

for exactly

yes, accept this 

for what I am, i am

healthy or sick the 

truth of 

is there anything left to

just say it

comes into this world and disappears into 

an ether of experience

unbothered, mute

to the immensity we

feel this thing

but the trees don't 

fucking child to be so

still caught in 

this loop of 

self-denial

hoping that 

you were born anything

other

I'm just sitting here

and watching 

the leaves sway and 

dancing in the wind

soon

shall i

be.

maybe if i keep writing

eventually the answers will
fall out from this one may
irradiate my heart 
once and for all I sink
into the art
to living a life
some of the folks down
here things have turned 
however they do, they did
going back isn't an option
on the future is always a gamble
with hearts, the house holds
the secret we all know
time runs out and you'll never
waiting is suffering;

every single day undistracted or unplanned

there is no plan

for which ending

or is it a beginning

you must understand that they

two pieces of the same 

get close enough and every circle

a straight line between then

now I lost my way

and a new light rising on a new 

line of sight vanishing 

in a pinpoint of clarity

clarifying only that there is nothing

solid in the core of anybody

but the earth made us

returning to it sooner than ever

hoping for a reprieve that never

mind the darkest bits and 

what shines in the distance never

dullest thud of wind

knocked from my sails and drifting

a languid surface hanging lifeless air

and under the sea you know

a world beyond imagining

is all we got to get 

past a point where letting go

seems possible if only

strength comes from the 

moments that you remember after 

everything still makes me 

it's a kind of happiness

like for someone else

that was you, is that possible

more than you ever dreamed

a domain of fear

the darkened eyelids hinting at 

an inner life twisted and 

i've never been good at tying knots

are they scars on those trees

mending in acquiescence to forces

you only see them in relief

a shadow of past 

the wind howled this way

so i bent down and let the shore

drifting down a river whose

terminus 

this isn't the end of of the line

maybe nothing more than a junction

one of so many little dots on this

could you chart your life

what story do you tell of 

is the articulation accurate and enough

to sustain you toward the next

the map point yet filled 

you've gone over the edge of the paper

it doesn't matter

the walls filled with memories

writing on any available surface

to catch the water as it pours out of the base

a sieve leaking and making a mess

better than bursting

you can't stick the balloon back together

it's best to ride the current higher and higher

hope is at best

we drift gently toward

some warm field, green and sweetly

humid rustling on a quiet save

the bees buzzing about

this business of 

biology won't be bettered

there's nothing to overcome

with me and we'll 

walking together for while

the sun sets eventually

to rise again

and whose hand then

are you holding?

it always matters

what am i supposed to do
nothing will happen unless

what if

maybe

could be

i’m not sure

signs are all around

not even signs, but glaring

directly, openly 

and yet, and yet

your tears well up, you balk

why is that

what truth are you seeking

what don’t you already know

maybe the unknowing is any future

course charted easy to see on this

heading in a different direction 

you’re choosing to fly into the cloud

which way is up, how close are the mountains

i had the worst dream last night

terror and pleading to please don’t

be responsible and accept 

that whatever happens next

on the page, you’re the one with the pen

ink to paper and suddenly

as if we’re all a little magic

idea becomes reality

it has been a hazy dreaming maybe 

half and half living

half measures eventually give way

through the valley the water must rush

gravity’s invisible hand, relentless and 

inescapable the ending of 

all stories like ours 

is the same as any before or yet

&yet &yet

there’s a light of hoping against

the deluge may be diverted

it doesn’t have to turn out 

the same essential life

forcing through the years

forging a path uncut

purposely going left when all else is right

in these lives

we are representative of 

the species has a knack for stacking the deck

against myself the odds aren’t

hope is greater than despair

nothing is ever that 

the world won’t end

until we end

and by then

it won’t matter.

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

the immensity

what is this weight
what is this sour taste
why does the sun not warm me
why can't i shake this shadow
why is every experience muted
what am i doing
why i am here
how long can i delay
what hope is driving this?

tilting at the same old

leaves starved for water

hanging inert in the stolid heart of

the summer sun

forcing retreat 

or am i advancing 

toward some

truths about ourselves

defy explanations

the expectations of others

what did we do then

what does anyone when 

navigating the within and without

& hours hurtling through space

sharing the landscape 

crawling across the horizon 

we feel like flying

tiny creatures humbled 

the immensity

 

what we surround ourselves

with hope and love and honest

opens arms welcoming

the future arrived so quickly

the weight

of love we burrowed into

and digging in the enemy is 

behind our lines lies

a truth in each chest

of drawers we rummage for pieces

this puzzle we’re trying 

to make it always means 

something gnawing a distance

between within and without

knowing that rock and i

am of the same stuff