Tribute to MCS

You spent 4 years
at a 2 year college
and have nothing to show for it.
I whine about how
'the future freaks me out'.
And keep telling myself that
that everything's fine,
surely not convincing you.
I live vicariously,
rockin' to the beat
in my heart, it says:
Jay, I'm so proud.
And Betty, there's no one I'd
rather waste my time with.

Silent Insecurities

He woke me up at dawn,
his black tie like a snake coiled around his neck.

I looked up at him with dazed eyes,
a fog of sleep clouding my senses.

Black blazer draped over his briefcase.

He brushed a hand through his hair,
like a rake over autumn leaves.

Starkly contrasted with the innocent cream walls,
a jutting, imposing building in the distant skyline.

Leaning over he cupped my cheek,
goodbye he said, tasting bitterly of black coffee.

I’ll be waiting I responded,
with the obedience of a puppy,

a small smile tugged at his lips.

Turning, shrinking through the doorway,
though to believe this you’d have to accept

that he woke me up at all.

Once Again

The end of the world could come in flame
and all hell would freeze over.
Humans would look up to the heavens
the sky cleaving open
wide, in an insanely inviting gesture.
They'd pray fervidly,
the godless embracing god
and the religious abandoning him.
We can only hope
that when it ends
a new world will be created
once again.

Fire

When Prometheus brought fire
the sun hid behind the clouds.
And a mountaintop rang with
anguished screams.
Prometheus payed in flesh
for his fore thought.

Break

I've never heard a better fiddler
than the man on main street
who's cross-eyed.
Because of him,
I once tried to pick up the guitar
but it was too heavy and
my weak limbs screamed in protest.
I have better luck demagnetizing room keys,
anyway.
And getting locked out of
said hotel rooms.
That's how we met.
By then all you'd gotten from your
poli sci degree was a paper cut.
And that reminded you
startlingly of your mother.
And her constant instructions
to 'sit up straight!' and
unconsciously you corrected your
years of perfected bad posture.
You would hate when I'd slump
in my chair as if I was
trying to disappear
or at least hide.
Muttering 'I'm sorry'
for my barbaric
table manners and for
the heavy conversation that you
couldn't seem to carry.
But I know,
after all these years,
you still look up
at the moon
and think of me.
Just as I glance at
clocks and remember you.
But, we straighten up
and move on.

in the beginning

your smile fell.
microorganisms springing
from your teeth, your lips providing
the cushion of the earth, and that
tongue is the boundless ocean.
the world birthed from such
chaos.

The Fountain

I’m quite parched
and off mark.
I could be cured
with just one
sip from the
Fountain of Youth.
And de Leon would have
my head and I
would wish I wasn’t
young anymore.
Some say,
that youth is wasted
on the young.
And I've heard its possible
to grow up,
I've just never met
anyone
whose actually done it.
But
life seen through
these eyes
have more to say
than my lopsided mouth
could ever utter.
Between you and me
and our hands,
wrinkled with the years.

Runners.

Hot air rises from the concrete
in swift, promising ringlets.
The noon sun bearing down on
unsuspecting townsmen.
Runners take their ritual jog,
stealing through each trail in all their
paled, sweated, short-shorted glory.
Soft claps of conversation left in their wake,
only spoken between soles and dry Carolina clay.
Moistened breaths quickened and whispered,
living to quiet the air.
Slight ups-and-downs of chests
oxidizes blood cells and
gives the Earth reason to revolve once again.
Maybe if there was one skipped step
the world would cease to move.
And we would be sent tumbling
into the blazing sun,
bones incinerated into the body's
last action of that day.
Maybe.
But the jaunt is not slowed,
the step not skipped,
and these runners never still.

A Pair of Darwin's Finches

It’s almost ironic now to ponder evolution,
and even more to teach it.
A bored room of twenty-something
ninth graders with their hands
plastered to the sides of their faces,
sleeping.

You’ll come to mind.
Not because you believed it,
in fact you're in fervid opposition.
As I gesticulate its components,
I’ll smile.

You never knew
how I would think about us.
How everyone insisted we were the same,
but we knew that we were different,
and I, being the logical one,
thought of evolution.
Your caustic behavior reminds me
of punctuated equilibrium.
Your decisiveness and the way you spoke
like you write
and write how you feel.
No finesse - that you could do without.
And the way your emotions ran
quickly and slowly at the same time.
And there were even moments
when they’d flatten out and I’d
wonder where you’d gone.
‘Cause you certainly weren’t
the same person.

And I like gradualism.
Growing at a steady pace,
monotonous in my ways
and thoughts.

We’d butt heads and kick
up the dirt in anger.
But when the dust settled
we were always unscathed.

After my students have gone,
rushing out at the dismissals ring.
I’ll realize it’s been too long
since you’ve called
or I’ve called.

No matter how hard we resisted change,
speciation took its course
and we were isolated.
Separately.
I can't tell you when or how
just that we are.
Maybe it was inexorable;
maybe we brought it upon ourselves.

[the art of punctuation]

you are my question mark
the parentheses around my mouth
trap coordinated conjunctions
my lips stitched with
dashes of trepidation
it was in those moments
when you were gone
that i wished
i would never have to
wonder again
dots of pregnant pause
quaking readily between us
we probably make no sense
anyway
sometimes it’s hard to
tell what my brittle hands
have been feeling
they haven’t felt much
in the past three years
burned by the cold
arms that i once fell into
i know
it’s completely absurd to
think that they could speak
but it’s true
i’ve heard them whisper
they miss you
of course i never really
had you
still
they miss and type the
wrong things and touch
the wrong people
but it’s all because they miss
and you should have given
them a chance
they say
constant quotations
fray from my nails
as they scratch the air
but that’s beside the point
for once i was happy
with myself
i realized why
i could never convey
why you looked past me
you were my exclamation point
and i was just a comma