Prose Poetry & Rhyme

Prose poems, haiku, free verse, songs.

Early Summer Sunset

"Give me something of you that no one else has gotten," he said. "Show me something no one else has seen."

She smiled. In the request she heard his need to feel a singular, private connection between them. A desire, however impossible, to banish the specter of Lovers Past. This moved her deeply, because she could relate. Jealousy was a pin prick she felt keenly and all too often. The glimpses of it she saw in him only made her love him more.

So she held her breath and plunged into waters that were increasingly unpredictable. Warm one day; icy another. She swam deep and her muscles limbered with the movement. She felt vulnerable and beautiful, and when she rose to the surface, the breath she took to fill her burning lungs was triumphant.

But he was gone. She was alone in her victory, which suddenly felt small, stupid, and superficial.

She tread water quietly, scanning the shore, expecting him to reappear at any moment. But he didn't, and after a while she let the tide pull her in to a beach quickly cooling in the early summer sunset.

Either Way

Sometimes loving you is like wrapping a blanket around a small, fragile creature. Soft fur, steady heartbeat. Calm and grateful for the shelter I have to give.

And sometimes loving you is like gathering broken glass with my bare hands. Fractured pieces reflecting light in every direction that I'm ineptly, hopelessly trying to capture. Splinters and blood and the suspicion that I'm only making a bigger mess.

Don't be scared of me; I'm not scared of scars.

Buyers Market

I've built a summer home for us, with walls made of expectation.

Sometimes winter won't let go, gets jealous of spring, and there's nothing anyone can do about it until the sun turns and says Enough. I have been waiting and waiting for that moment, and I can feel it coming. And when it does I want your skin against mine, as the heat sinks back into my bones.

I've stocked this summer home with all the things we'll need. Beach towels, my terrible navigation, and a full tank of gas. Watermelon cubes, sunsets to squint at, and cool sheets for sunburned shoulders.

I'm packed and ready to go. I don't think I'm going to bring my phone, or my laptop, or very many of my insecurities. I want to leave space for the things we didn't know we'd find there.

There's room for two in the summer home I've built—but just barely. Let me know if you want to come along; otherwise I'll bring more of me.

Prize

I have been spending all my quarters on the claw game that is us. I'm not getting any better, but I'm definitely going broker.

At first I thought it was about precision. That if I puzzled out the distance and depth—if I reached just far enough—I would get you in my grasp. It didn't work.

Down you tumbled back among the others, sinking in the softness, winking one perfect, plastic blue eye at me. I was teased, I was titillated. I tried again.

I thought maybe my perspective was off. That from where I stood unmoving, you were too two-dimensional. And god knows you are anything but. So I went this way and that, lifting and dropping my head, tracking you like an animal that hasn't yet decided whether it wants to be caught.

But all my dancing around made me run out of time, and the joystick went joyless in my hand.

I cashed in a five, then a twenty, then my heart's savings, and I played until the arcade attendants (who look suspiciously similar to my friends) gently pulled me away.

"We open at 11," they said, leading me to the exit. "But maybe consider a hike instead?"

I am determined to beat this game. The prize is wildly out of reach, but I am wild about the prize. Though if you could just lean towards me the tiniest bit, we'll have a much better chance of winning.

AMULET

They met in a space that was small and close, empty of expectation but full of possibility. She assumed they were alone. But something about the way he glanced sideways, nervous, then leaned towards her--

"What is it?" She touched his top shirt button, then his chin, trying to draw his gaze back to her face.

"Doesn't matter." His lopsided, reassuring smile. "I'm safe here. You're an amulet."

And she believed him.

But then time went on. And the thing, which had a name neither of them spoke aloud, kept creeping into this space of possibility. Sometimes she'd catch it in the periphery of her vision, waiting, watching, threatening. Sometimes she'd feel the weight of it on them, pressing down and pushing the air out of the room. Sometimes it tore through the moment as quick as lightning, burning her, branding her with tiny scars of unforgetting.

The thing became a thief. It stole trust. It stole joy. It stole patience. And most unforgivably, it stole time. It stole every solid stone they stood on until they lay crumpled on the ground, unmoored.

"I thought I was an amulet," she whispered, clinging tight, desperate and terrified the thing was going to rip him away forever. He shook his head; it was all he had the wherewithal to do. But she didn't know if that meant that she wasn't, and all was lost, or that she was, but it didn't matter, and all was lost anyway. She didn't know, and he couldn't say, and she was left unknowing if she had ever been anything close to enough.

And the unknowing was another tiny scar, too.

Not Sure If Honeybees or Murder Hornets

There is a moment that will not leave.

Remembering it is like waking to a dozen pairs of gossamer wings on my skin. Each fluttering detail of the scene—the diffused light of the room, the cloud white comforter we swam in—lands lightly at first. Then your face comes more clearly into view, and I feel again the way you would grab my arm or my leg to wrap around you, to always keep me close. And suddenly the soft touch of thought becomes a hundred blistering bee stings.

I breathe through it. It ends. It's okay. I'm okay.

Bees are important to all ecosystems, and I don't want my memories of you to collapse. I just want to bottle the honey, honey, and not have a hive for a heart.

Per Curiam

For months now I've been seeing a star get bigger and brighter and closer, until I finally realized it's not a star at all. It's a gavel coming down, fueled by finality so sure it's splitting the sky in half.

Every night the courtroom assembles on my ceiling. The jury troops in, exhausted by evidence that doesn't sway them as much as emotion, no matter how many times it is trotted out for their review. A judge in heavy black robes presides, a faceless ghost whose ruling will set no one free, anyway.

And you. You shuffle in, locked in chains whose weight and shame have somehow transferred to me.

And I. I lay pinned on my back, listening, learning nothing of use as you plead the fifth for the sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth time.

We represent ourselves, or at least pretend to, two souls already jailed by our own devices. And every night I wait for you to object. And every night I watch your face for some sign of protest. But silence is the only argument you have to make, and I have no choice but to allow it.

P r o b l e m

"I have a problem," you said, and as they hit the ground the words grew like seeds planted. "I have a problem," you said, "but I don't have it when I'm with you."

Well, the part about me fell away like chaff. But the part about you took root between us, deep and undeniable. In time it forced its way up, splitting the sidewalk until we could not walk to one another without stumbling.

"I have a problem," you said, and the words swelled in the summer heat, higher and higher until they were as tall as the Hollywood sign. Until they were tall enough for you to climb right inside and hide from me there, whenever I looked too hard. Whenever I loved too hard.

You left, but the shells of one word remain. I can see your ghost sometimes, in one or another letter.

I can see you in the P, waiting at the gate, your thumbs hooked under the straps of your backpack.

I can see you in the M, how you kicked all your limbs out across the bed at night.

I can see you in the O, curled senseless and lost to me, around the thing you couldn't escape.

And so on. But it's just an illusion; it's not actually you. Tourists don't know, until they try, that they can't really get to the Hollywood sign. And now I know I can't really get to you.

The Barrel of Chances

Some of us keep a barrel of chances, in a secret place, just for someone special.

It's hard to hide a whole barrel, though, so our closest friends and family—usually they know. Our closest friends and family have seen us slink off to this secret place, pry the barrel head off, and fish out another chance.

And then another. And another. And another.

They've watched as we doled them out to our someone special like saltwater taffies to children. These chances dissolve like taffy, too, leaving nothing behind but a taste for just one more.

The barrel of chances is deep and wide; it's sturdy like our unshakable expectations, with oaken staves as pliant as our boundaries. It endlessly replenishes itself, like magic, so no matter how hard you try, you can never get to the self-respect that hides at the very bottom.

Chirp

You came to me this week hidden in the secrets of others. They have no idea that in them, I only ever see you. I see you in their desires, their curiosities, their apologies.

I only ever see you, still.

I gave in, I laid back, I closed my eyes. I swallowed the burning, selfish desire to reach out and interrupt your journey. The ache is a kind of faith. I have to believe you were there with me, and that you just don't know how to get back.

It's been almost two years since we went to the canyon. The swing. The spilled wine. The drum. I'm here now, you said.

Were you?

I hear you in songs you'd probably hate, in things you'd never say even if you felt them like blood in your bones.

It's a kind of faith.

Slingshot Moon

Time is a liar. "Just relax," Time told me. "I got this."

Time said I didn't have to do a thing. That I had the easiest job in the world. That all I had to do was wait.

"Do nothing," Time said. "I'll take care of everything."

But Time lied. I waited and waited and waited. I sat on my hands when they itched to reach out. I bit my lips when they longed to call out. I quietly ticked off days and weeks and months, keeping still under Time's stern gaze.

But Time lied. Nothing was fixed; nothing made better. So now I'm looking for a new truth. And I think I've found it in the rising moon.

Last night the rising moon was a perfect disc of cool white neon. It hung low and heavy in the eastern sky, an unmissable invitation. The road curved as I walked, but I didn't take my eyes off it once.

And every tree seemed to split at the top, like a slingshot cradling a milk-white marble. Branches lined up one after another all down the street, so I could follow this slingshot moon and think about how someday, I will launch myself eastward to be closer to it. Like a slingshot marble I'll fly fast and far, catching the rising moon when it hits exactly the right spot in the sky. I'll let go and drop back to earth, and I'll plant myself there. I'll put my own truths down then, and they'll grow deep and real, like roots.

That feels like something I can do. That feels like choice and change and control, when the second, minute, and hour hands of time have done nothing but tell me lies.

Such Great Heights

The climb was painstaking. Every foothold was a lie; every single step forward came at a cost of two steps backward. Backsliding for weeks at a time. She told herself that even the longest, darkest winters end. But deep down she didn't know if she really believed that. And some days, she didn't even bother trying to haul herself up. Some days she just sat and let the cold strip her to the bones of pure sadness.

Then one morning, a memory broke across her. But though she flinched for the pain, there was nothing in it but sight and sound. It had no force behind it. It was a flickering movie screen: one dimensional. Neutral. She took this memory in her hands and carefully unfolded it. As she opened it up, more details escaped. A tone of voice. A turn of phrase. A touch of skin.

But it didn't hurt. Miraculously, against all the odds she'd stacked up in hopeless confusion—it didn't hurt. And that's when she knew she'd reached the top of the tallest mountain in the world. Without even realizing it, she'd moved up and through and away and beyond.

With slow, measured steps she crept out onto the highest peak, wondering what the view would be, and what glimpses of future happiness she might have. But the mountain was so high it ended in clouds. There was nothing to see, but plenty to feel. And that's when she realized:

There are an infinite number of futures.

There is only one present.

But for some, there are two pasts: the one we want to believe happened, and the one that actually did. You can see them both, but only if you climb the tallest mountain in the world.

Concessions

Everything I want to say to you is like an overpriced box of candy at the movies, shrink-wrapped in plastic. There is no subtle way to open it, but you can't quit until it's done.

And if I did: sour bites would tumble out loudly, briefly enjoyable but ultimately regrettable.

Not worth the cost.

Gatekeeping

A feeling like forgiveness came knocking at the gate. I saw it through the peephole but I didn't let it in, because feelings often wear disguises and I'm not always sure I can trust them. But I was less afraid than curious, so I went to the window and drew back the curtain, and this is what I saw:

I saw you and I in a surprise meeting, running into one another on some common, beloved ground. I saw myself not freezing, and not running away. I saw myself smile and even laugh a little. But I saw that underneath, my bones were like cold stone in winter moonlight. They held no warmth for you, because they'd been bereft of sunshine for so long.

In my fantasy, you came to me wordlessly, and I melted against your chest in pure bliss. But that you doesn't exist and never has, and that me learned to keep myself warm all through winter, alone.

And now there's a gate where I make my feelings stop and wait until I trust them. Today a feeling like forgiveness came knocking, but it was just indifference in disguise.

The One Who Would Not Budge

"You can't stop here," they said, when they found me planted cross-legged on the road. I looked up.

"Why not? There's plenty of room to pass around me."

"It's a No Standing Zone."

"I'm not standing. I'm sitting."

The officers shifted uncomfortably, glanced at one another. "Listen," said the first, whose name badge read APATHY, "We know you've been here a while already. It's time to move on."

"Well, I can't. I've tried."

The other, whose badge read SYMPATHY, knelt down. "Do you want us to call someone for you?"

"Like who?"

"Like a friend."

I brought my knees up to my chest and wrapped the flannel I was wearing tight around me. I pulled the sleeves down over my hands, disappearing as much of myself as I could in the brown and green plaid. It was an invisibility cloak that hid exactly nothing from no one.

"Everyone knows everything already," I said softly.

"Look here," started Apathy, "you can't just---" But his partner held up a hand and shook his head, and they left.

The next night they returned to find me in the exact same spot. "We brought you something." Sympathy held a weathered envelope with an AirMail stamp. He buzzed with excitement as he handed to me.

"What's this?" I asked, accepting it with little interest.

Apathy glared. "Just open it."

Inside the envelope was a four hundred and forty-eight word apology, from someone six thousand miles away, whom I hadn't thought about once in two years.

I read it, then read it again. "What am I supposed to do with this?"

"We thought you'd be pleased." Sympathy was disappointed.

I handed the letter back. "Would you please go? I'd like to be alone."

"This is unhealthy," declared Apathy. "Pathetic, really."

"I am aware," I replied.

"What are you going to do, just stay here forever?"

I took a deep breath and looked from Sympathy to Apathy and back again. "Have you never read any of the Romantics?"

"You mean like the stuff with Fabio on the cover?"

I blinked. "No. No I do not mean like the stuff with Fabio on the cover." I took another deep breath. "Gentlemen, I appreciate your concern. I do. But right now I am like a character in a Bronte novel. Unrequited, long-suffering, noble if unrewarded devotion—all that. I see no reason to move on from where I am until I'm ready, and frankly, I think there's worse, less beautiful stances I could take up in this life.

Sympathy's face softened. Apathy's brow furrowed.

With my thumb I traced circles around the button at the bottom of my shirt. "I'm choosing this," I said, as if to the button. "I might stop choosing it tomorrow. Or the next day. Or the next. But right now, here, exactly where I am is exactly the only place I can be."

I pulled a matchbox from my pocket, struck a light on the nearest memory that sparked. "Now if you don't mind, I have a candle to burn."

As they walked away, conferring in low tones about the one who would not budge, the setting sun blurred them into silhouettes. I couldn't tell without squinting who was who, because the road I wasn't ready to move down very quickly disappeared into a future I wasn't ready to see.

War Cry

There is a space that exists between two people who have something to offer one another—something to demand of one another. In that space is an energy of their design, willed to life by the words they exchange, the glances and glancing touches they share. It is an electrified fence, the disarmament of which requires mutual consent. Intentions—good, better, or the best—have nothing to do with it. It will kill regardless. We've all died on it, at one time or another. We've all reached the first foolish hand out to test the voltage, hoping against hope that what we press our fingers against isn't fire, but another warm, open palm.

That space is infinite. That space is infinitesimal. It's the stretch of beach that one moment drowns in the depth of splashing foam, and the next yawns wide, sunning itself for the briefest second before disappearing once more. Empty, full. Full, empty. That space is more alive, more inviting, and more dangerous than anything else we can know in life. It compels us, commands us, and, as we tally heartbreak, threatens us. Seldom do we heed. More often, we choose to dash ourselves upon the rocks, the only evidence that remains of our courage the invisible, useless war cry of the unrequited lover: I'll go first.

Of Peaks and Paper Dolls

I have been thinking about you, and how you slipped into quiet and shadow, living a life I don't know anything about anymore.

In the peaks and valleys that is our friendship, you once wrote out of the blue, I think it's time for another peak. But then you disappeared again, before I could even find my climbing ropes. And I was ready to scale whatever mountain face it took, to see yours again.

Now the only evidence I have of your continued existence is in photos of her, where you are like the trimmings cut away from a paper chain doll. You're not what I'm supposed to look at. But you are the context and the frame and the source. She wouldn't be unfolding prettily across the world like that, an accordion of grace and youth, if you didn't fold yourself in two, four, eight to give her that world.

And I understand it more than you know.

But peaks are worth the effort to climb and make for beautiful pictures, too, if you can tear yourself away from the shape of her long enough to remember.

Sandcastle Man

Sandcastle Man lives at the sea, and will never live anywhere else. “The sea,” he mumbles to himself, his mind corroded by the salty air. “I am the sea and the sea is me. Sea me, see me. See me!”

Sandcastle Man has been hard at work. His face is puffy and red with the effort of trying to build something that matters. Crabs scurry by, accustomed to his messes. They’re temporary, after all. Gone by morning, one after the next.

A half-dead squid has washed ashore, and in a delirium of delusion, Sandcastle Man pulls it from the briny tangle of weeds at his feet. Its slick, grasping limbs thrill him, and he places it safely above the water line to watch him. “My little mermaid!” he declares. The squid grows limp and still.

Sandcastle Man digs and scoops and molds and smooths. Plastic buckets and shovels litter the beach, a testament to the sincerity of his conviction. But under his gnarled hands, all that takes shape are crumbling, wet lumps.

Finally finished, he whoops and dances and calls to the moon, who ignores him. “This one! This one this one this one!” Seagulls glance then glide on. The tide comes in for the kill.

Sandcastle Man lives at the sea, and will never live anywhere else.

Your Fat Little Dog

Your fat little dog

is staring at me across the aisle of this dirty subway car

I saw the way you yanked him through the door, even though he was scared of the gap below. (I don't blame him. Transitions make me nervous, too.)

Your fat little dog is staring at me as though he knows

I'd give him fewer treats, but more love

The Words

The words sat inside the girl, threatening to choke her if they weren't set free.

"Let us out," they begged. "We'll kill you if you don't."

"No you won't," answered the girl, swallowing them back down again. "You'll die yourselves if I just wait long enough."

"You can't," scoffed the words. "You never could and you never will."

The girl took a deep breath and held it. She willed the air in her lungs to trap the words in a thousand tiny balloons, and carry them off where no one would ever read them.

"We're still here," said the words, after a moment. "Nice try though."

"You'll only make things worse," the girl sighed.

"No we won't," the words replied. "We'll change exactly nothing. Not for the better and not for the worse. Things are what they are already. We've had nothing to do with it."

The girl, realizing this was true, said, "Fine. But only a few of you can come out. The rest have to stay. Decide amongst yourselves who it'll be."

The words clustered into a huddle to confer, jostling one another and tangling up their meanings. They spoke in a whisper so the girl wouldn't hear. Finally, they called out, "Okay, we're ready!" and ten or twelve sentences marched forth to be released.

The girl closed her eyes and opened her heart, and dozens of words took flight, beating their wings frantically to get clear of her before she could change her mind.

Those left behind watched, satisfied for the moment. They knew it was only a matter of time before the rest of them would be set free, anyway.

The girl knew it, too. And all she could hope was that when they were, they wouldn't carry her off with them.

Tetherball

I've taken up a new sport! Tetherball. It's so great. Of course, you can't play by yourself; you need a partner. Mine is always the same.

We stand across from one another (not side by side), and smack the everloving hell out of a ball. The ball doesn't really go anywhere; it's tied up, so it can't move very far. It just goes around and around, back and forth, from him, to me, back to him again. He hits it, then I hit it. I hit it, then he hits it. And so on and so forth and so on.

Sometimes one of us will swing and miss, and the ball winds up on its rope, tighter and tighter until clang! against the pole—it has no more slack.

So we wait for it to come undone.

Then we hit it some more.

It's an excellent workout, too! Totally exhausting. In fact, on days when I play tetherball, I don't have the energy to do anything else, like write, or think, or feel. I just lay around afterward, dazed and slightly confused as to who, if anyone, won. There's no referee, so sometimes it can be hard to tell.

Tonight the game was especially rough. I slammed the fuck out of that thing. He hit it pretty good, too. Eventually, he had somewhere else to be, so he left. After he'd gone, I took a closer look at the ball. It's taken quite a beating lately. It's torn in a few places, and starting to lose its shape.

So I untied it, brushed some of the dirt off of it, and put it back inside my chest.

I probably shouldn't play tetherball anymore.

Sandpaper Fact

Denial is a kind of friction, when the thing you cannot accept continually, relentlessly rubs up against reality - which never budges.

And every piece of evidence chafes, and hurts, and blisters.

I have been guarding a certain fiction with every fiber of my being. And now every fiber of my being is worn threadbare by merciless, sandpaper fact.

Eventually, I guess, acceptance will win, when that protection has been scratched all away. When there is no more friction. When I am just gossamer on the ground.

Deadbolt

The ocean tried to follow me home tonight. Did you notice? I didn't want to say anything, didn't want to distract you while you drove. But I wondered if you saw it in the rear view mirror, black and surging and foamy with hate. I guess I know what it wanted. I guess sometimes I want the same thing.

It kept up with us a good while. I could hear it, even though I didn't turn around. Flooding the highway, waves crashing and tumbling over one another in desperation to catch me once and for all. It must be tired of getting so close each time. It must wish I'd be more realistic.

But then you said something, I don't know what it was, but it was like that moment when a sail unfurls, snap! and the wind slams into it, and we picked up speed like a boat on the water, except this water we left behind, because all of a sudden we were flying. And that's how we got home.

I don't think it knows exactly where I live. I think I'm safe. But I'll deadbolt the door and check over my shoulder for the next few days, just to be sure. The dog will keep an eye out, too. He already knows to.

Anyway, that's why I was quiet tonight, in the car. The ocean tried to follow me home.

Tidy

The space where she'd been filled in quickly. Empty is not the natural state of things, so life closed around the specter of her memory with ease. That nothing much changed revealed how little of significance she had displaced. Forty-six of the most meaningless chromosomes ever to be paired. Didn't she know it.

The last in a long line of would-be saviors stood stunned, still clutching his fistful of curling, writhing lies. She wouldn't do that. She's not that selfish. But a heart torn by shock can knit itself back together faster than one torn by pain, and the lies didn't have much bite left, anyway. By spring a vigorous program of forgiveness (the self and the other) muscled out her ghost completely. Everyones knows: spring is no time for looking back.

Safehouse

I'm building a safehouse for my demons, because they need a new place to live.

I tried keeping them in a prison, but the riots and breakouts were extremely disruptive.

I tried giving them a playpen, but they had entirely too much fun at my expense.

So now, a safehouse. Somewhere out of the way, off the grid, that only I know about. An agreement between us. I'll never evict them (would that I could), but they'll stay quietly undercover.

Visitors to be allowed at my discretion (but they shouldn't get their hopes up).

The Safest Place of All

The safest place of all is a cave that lets in no light.

Outside, the sandstorm of the world rages wild. Howling winds slam sheets of dust against the side of the mountain where the cave is hidden. This dust is made of millions and millions of broken, useless words. But you can't hear a thing, when you're in the safest place of all.

In the safest place of all, you are safe from every snarling, biting beast that prowls outside. There are many, but the two most dangerous are Miscommunication and Misunderstanding. They will tear through your heart in seconds flat if they can get at you.

It doesn't matter what day of the week or month or year it is, when you're in the safest place of all. It could be the most beautiful Saturday of Spring and you wouldn't know or care. All you need to worry about, when you're in the safest place of all, is keeping the fire lit.

The fire you tend could mean anything to you. It could be your resilience, or your self love, or even your will to survive. The fire is everything. And that's why all else fades completely away, when you are in the safest place of all. Keeping the fire going is all that matters.

You can't live in the safest place of all. You can go there for a little while, when you need to. But every practical thing you need to stay alive is outside. It will always be this way. So you must never, ever, ever let the fire go out in the safest place of all. You need to carry a little bit with you, always, to get through the sandstorm of life.

I Sink

It feels like a sunset. It comes on the same way, too. Slow leaking colors, spilling and pooling, shifting and expanding. They are my emotions: joy, fear, anxiety, shame, hope. All my collected feelings that blend and bleed into one another at any given moment, on any given day.

The night pushes them down, flattens them out, steals their space and their oxygen. It crowds them out of the picture as I watch, feeling my oxygen disappear, too. Intensity builds, flaring and fingering out in a last fiery gasp.

Then nothing.

Then dark.

Then emptiness. Or rather, hollowness. What's the difference? Emptiness is the property of a thing that's been void forever, or for a very long time. Or a thing that belongs that way. Or is natural that way. An empty room. An empty glass. Once full, but not needing to be.

Hollowness is a quality of unnatural lack. Things that are hollow shouldn't be that way. Hollow eyes. Hollow soul. Hollow grave. A space asking to be filled.

So, hollowness. Hollow but for wisps of the emotions that blazed bright just moments before. They swirl like smoke inside of me, barely there, and certainly unable to be grasped. And after another few minutes, when dark becomes darker, they're gone, too.

And then it's just black. With very little air to breathe. Everything has been flattened out, the good and the bad. Not even sadness or despair remain. Not enough emotion to generate even a tear.

So I slink home in the twilight, my feet leaden with dread of nothing worth dreading. And I slump against the wall of the elevator, artificial light ugly on my ugliest moment. And I drop onto my bed, dead inside, mechanically lifting my hand to stroke the thing that is so alive, and so needing me to stay that way, too.

And I know it's temporary, and I want to forgive myself, but I can't. Because I don't deserve the indulgence of it, and I haven't earned the right to swim in these waters right now. Have I ever? Probably not.

Probably not.

I'm a joy junkie.

The Silver Lining of Apathy

What I've come to realize is that apathy is strangely empowering, if I look at it the right way.

Apathy is what exists at the very bottom of the hill. It's the thing I bump into when I go rolling down, down, and down some more. Hitting it doesn't provide any bounce to send me back up—but it doesn't give way, either. There's nothing past it. I can sit there with my back against it and know, if nothing else, that I'm not going down any further.

Apathy is the big, fat cipher I find in the bucket, when I make a last, feeble attempt to pull something up from the well. Even something useless, like anger or fear. But the well is dry and the bucket is glaringly empty. There isn't even any surprise in that moment. The well, the bucket, and I all knew this was coming.

But that's the point at which apathy becomes potentially empowering. Because from that point on, any tiny drop I find in the bucket, should optimism or curiosity or just plain boredom send me back to the well—just to see, just for the hell of it—is a bonus. Oh, ok. Well then. Wasn't expecting this. Guess I'll go ahead and drink it. Yeah. Just a drop, but I wasn't expecting that. Sort of really nice, that was. Kind of incredibly grateful for it. Oops, I'm smiling. And now I'm laughing.

I'm so very glad no one is witnessing this. I look like a maniac.

Maybe there'll be another drop tomorrow.

Like Neon

I am developing an imaginary suit of armor, so that in the stillness of night, when all pretense of strength has dropped away and I am left exposed, the arrows that come for me can't pierce as deeply.

At first I pictured actual armor. Brass, glinting, annealed—strong as flint. But I am no superhero.

Now I see light. Warm and white, humming like neon. I bring one knee down, curling into myself, and it cocoons me naturally. It wraps around my body, protective and fierce. And though there is no escaping the onslaught of memories, judgments, fears—if I meditate on this visual—the sting is mitigated.

I'm trying to convince myself I was born with it.

The heights of estimation

The Heights of Estimation (where my heroes live) are treacherous and difficult to reach. Steep, craggy cliffs buffeted by icy, howling wind. A thorny, overgrown path that discourages visitors. I call on them only when I absolutely must—my heroes. Which is how I suspect they prefer it, anyway. Wizards behinds curtains keep the curtains drawn for good reason.

Still, I am a faithful supplicant. Bundled against the unbearable cold, I make regular treks to pay homage. I set my most lavish praise on their doorsteps and retreat quietly. I await response. Sometimes it comes; sometimes it doesn't. Either way they keep the homes I've built for them, high, high up in the clouds. The Heights of Estimation are rent stabilized.

Once in a while my mind plays tricks on me, and I think I see one of my heroes down here, in the sublunary world. But I know that can't be possible. Why would they consort among mere humans—flawed, pathetic, needful? What use is this place to them? They have everything they need in the lofty aeries I so lovingly furnished with my fulsome admiration, my undying devotion.

No—my heroes are quite comfortable where they are, I think. Safe. Elusive. Unassailable.

Unknowable, ultimately.

The Schadenfreude Buffet

When you dine at the Schadenfreude Buffet, you must show restraint.

Heavy platters of exquisite food will be passed around. No matter your appetite, you must take from them lightly. To gorge yourself would draw scorn and shame. So though you may relish what is served, remember to disguise your delectation in an air of detachment. You are a civilized being, after all.

But should you drop your napkin, under the table will be a sea of legs dancing in delight. The Schadenfreude Buffet is always full of hungry dissemblers, savoring every bite.

Punctuationally

She takes the first, tentative steps onto the oversized ellipsis, which carries her like a moving sidewalk through the empty space. It travels horizontally, left to right, and begins to repeat itself. Space, ellipsis. Space, ellipsis. Clusters of three dots she must walk across. She jumps the chasms between the clusters with trepidation at first, but soon hits her stride and makes the leaps with ease. Step, step, step, jump. Step, step, step, jump.

Suddenly, her landing doesn't stick. The first sphere of an ellipsis spins beneath her feet like a barrel floating in the river. She wobbles and dances, dangerously close to falling off. We see her arms shoot out sideways, desperate to find balance. Her feet eventually find a pace to match the spinning dot, and she's safe, but the game has changed. The ellipses aren't solid and sure anymore; they're treacherous and slippery, and threaten to throw her at the slightest misstep.

She keeps moving, though slower now than before. The dots spin beneath her feet as if slickened by oil. And now, another change: the ellipsis beneath her feet spreads out, widening impossibly. She'll never make it across; the distance is too far. She perches precariously for one final moment before losing her balance and dropping down, down, down between clusters of dots that are stretching out across the vacant blackness.

Arms and legs akimbo, hair caught up in the fall, she goes down, down, down. Nothing but empty space around her at first, and then, floating up, one after another, spread across the screen—question marks. Like tiny umbrellas, or parachutes. They go up, up, up as she keeps plummeting down, down, down. She grabs for one, just catching it by the dot of its bottom half, and her body slowly swings to a stop, like a wind chime abandoned by the breeze.

She hangs on. The question mark moves vertically through a void filled with the more of same, faster than some, slower than others. Her arms are growing tired. She pulls herself up to stand on the dot, holding on to the curved stem above it.

One by one, the other question marks disappear until only hers remains. A horizontal line—a dash—breaches the right side of the screen. She sees it. The dash repeats, and repeats again, unfolding backwards to the left, until it spans the nearly the full length of the space above her. It's a path she needs to get to.

She tries to climbs the question mark she floats on, to use its rounded crown as a stepping stone. She pulls her body up—but in doing so, her weight causes it to capsize, and she scrambles to stay on board. The top heavy mark swings back and forth like a pendulum, jerking her with it, until she tumbles into the opened, upside down curve of the bulb.

She's safe, for the moment, in this makeshift cradle, which drifts without an anchor through a sea of black.

For Want of a Do, For Lack of a Show

I gathered up all of his Says
I tried to find a use for them.

They were light as feathers, so I thought—
maybe—
a pillow?

I stuffed them in a case
I sewed it shut
but when I put my head down
there wasn't much support after all.

I looked closer
I sorted them into piles:

Shoulds and Wills and Want Tos
were Good Intentions
redolent at first
their scent and color quickly faded though. :(

Compliments and Praise
I weighed against Honesty,
and Honesty launched them across the room
where they settled
in a pretty (useless) heap.

Anger found me then,
so I grabbed up the pillow
I slammed it on the bed
(this is a recommended therapy on many fine advice-doling websites)

But I've never been good at keeping things together
so the seams burst.

Feather-says flew everywhere.

The dog raised an eyebrow.

I shrugged at him.

Together we watched my mess rain down.

And as they floated to the floor, I realized
their usefulness
as breadcrumbs
leading me back to where I shouldn't go again.

She is Like a Cat

She is like a cat.

She is like a cat that you desperately want to call your own, for a little while.

You put out food, hoping to lure her close.
She takes the food (and is grateful for it).
Then she slinks back out of reach, jumping on the fence, balancing one foot in front of the other.
Never looking down, or left, or right.

From this distance, in this light, she is glorious to you.
Radiant fur, shining amber eyes full of heat.
She must be so soft. She must be so warm, to hold.

You want her to stop circling your legs.
You want, finally, to feel her climb into your lap.
Then, oh then. What you would do.

We both know what you would do.

And she would stretch herself luxuriously, under your touch.
And you would hear her purr, which is as rich and loud as you've imagined.

But also, after a little while, you would notice that she is not that glorious.
You would feel the grit in her fur. (She's been outside a long time.)
You would see, up close, that the shine and heat in her eyes is actually low-simmering fear.

And then, maybe, you would stop feeding her.
And she would feel the pinch of hunger more keenly than you would feel the loss of a temporary pet.

That is why it is hard for her to trade your legs for your lap.

Not that she wouldn't.

Not that she won't.

Your Glass Box

Your glass box is beautiful; I can't deny that. You built it with care, with trust for strangers you'd yet to meet. Still haven't.

Never will.

Through it I see your need, the vulnerability that you wear like a second skin, so comfortable and smooth. Was it always so?

They come and press their hands against it, leaving fingerprints—smudges of an imagined caress.

That part makes me sad. So much, given away so freely. Your deepest and darkest, offered up to the undeserving and greedy and careless.

But I understand the exchange, and the shallow satiation. I don't begrudge you.

Your glass box is beautiful. I see exactly who you are inside it.

Ghost Guy

Ghost guy doesn't want to be seen. Not really. He lurks in the hallway, rattling chains, muttering the occasional, non-commital moan, hoping to be glimpsed in your periphery. But by the time you turn to face him straight on, he's vanished.

Ghost guy wants to haunt your life but not actually be in it. He'd rather be a secret than a centerpiece. He fancies himself mysterious and elusive, but if you could hold him still long enough to lift the sheet you'd see there's not much underneath.

Ghost guy will tell you he's "complicated." He likes the subtly self-effacing sound of that, likes the way it unhooks him from the responsibility of trying harder--of being better.

Don't be scared of ghost guy. He isn't real. Turn on some lights and he'll float away.

Fifty Irons In the Fire: An Irish Drinking Song

Young Patrick was preoccupied with his perfect plan—
"Gonna make a masterpiece, gonna be the man!"
Never did a lick of work, all he did was talk—
But talk's no match 'gainst the ticking of the clock!

Oh, let's raise a glass to the uninspiring ones!
To the losers and the quitters who will never get it done!
They poke, they stoke, fifty irons in the fire—
Naught gets done, but the flames get higher!

Now, Natty was a boastful boy, music was his thing—
"Just you wait until I'm done! All the world will sing!"
Meanwhile he just lay about, lazy to the last,
Jealous of the symphonies that his friends amassed!

Let's raise a glass to the uninspiring ones!
To the losers and the quitters who will never get it done!
They start, they stop, to succeed they do aspire—
But all they've got are fifty irons in the fire!

Then there was old Flannery, locked himself away—
Spent an hour on his craft, every single day!
Word by word and page by page, a novel did appear—
"It's wonderful what you can do, with eighty-seven years!"

So spare a thought for the uninspiring ones!
For the losers and the quitters who never got it done!
Years went by and the legend they acquired
Was thirty, forty, fifty useless irons in the fire!

Chicago Winter Haiku

boot beaten, wheel whipped—

curb slush of black-tipped meringue

March's melt begins

sidewalks get swallowed

by the soundlessness of snow

heel clicks and claps, hushed

brittle bare twig trees

whisper of a wardrobe change:

floral dresses soon

icicles at noon

give up drop after bright drop

brace yourself, sidewalk

tail tucked, head hung low

elevator ride to doom

not all dogs love snow

quarter-sized snowflakes

sifted from grey cloudshakers

one would fill a spoon

pound ice to powder

blow it off your mittened palm

December's pollen

slapping, choppy froth

someone is shaking the lake

spilling imminent

pause in the foyer,

button up against the cold;

revolving doors whoosh

10.

the geese took the park

not even pit bulls go near

let's just surrender

11.

what are the skies like?

take cinderblocks soaked in milk

freeze, then thaw. voilà.

12.

bright bits of wool knits

mirrored in the silver bean

just don't lick it, please

13.

public ice skating:

teetering, staggering crowds;

handful of showoffs

14.

it comes down to this:

Ear Muffs, Hat, or Hooded Coat

find your team, players

Chicago Spring Haiku

Overnight scene change—

Tulips. Tulips everywhere.

Crayon-bright bulbs flash.

snow, winter's clean sheets

someone yanked off the covers

green grass grins, awakening

on Wacker, LaSalle:

striped cafe awnings shudder,

shaking off frost's dust

two yellow kayaks—

banana peels skimming by

Riverwalkers watch

Pale Shoulder Seeks Sun

for no-strings spring freckling

Will u be my UV?

gnat swarms at the lake

gulped happily by sparrows

by me, not so much

branches in blossom

flirt with every passerby—

You know you want a photo.

Jump Rope Rhymes for Ex-Boyfriends

Little fish clown face, splashing in your pond,
What will you do when the water's gone?
Will you flip, will you flop, will you gasp for air?
Don't look now, but no one’s there

---

Fibs and frowns and fat, bald lies
Fly back home to your mama's side.
Take your frau and put her in the kitch'
Sew her up quick with a husband stitch

---

Apron strings,
Apron strings,
Cheapskate date.
Quit the bourby and the derby
Ten years late

Exhortation

Literally

Literally sat alone on an overstuffed Chesterfield sofa, at the annual Gathering of Misappropriated, Misapplied, and Otherwise Corrupted Words, nursing a French 75. She watched the party with apprehension. Her agent had been right; she'd had to come, if only for the sake of networking. She desperately needed some positive PR. The Dictionary Society of North America had fucked her, and they had fucked her good. Writers, linguists, and grammar purists everywhere wanted nothing to do with her—thanks in no small part, she suspected, to this hatchet job. Verbum non grata, that's what she was.

Still, she couldn't shake the feeling that she didn't belong. Most of the secondaries here had officially turned decades, if not centuries ago. They'd had plenty of time to grow into their new meanings. As if to prove her point, a few of the pre-1700s laughed loudly at something Gay said. Literally suspected he killed at these things. So to speak. She crossed her l's and took a sip of her cocktail.

Earlier, one of the halfways had cornered her, asking a million questions about transition. Nonplussed was an elegant word, despite the perpetual knit of her brow, but she was terrified. Wanted to know what the process was like, how long it took, whether there was anything anyone could do to stop it. Literally had been frank. "Nope. Not a blooming thing. Language belongs to the people who use it; we're utterly at their mercy."

"But what about correct usage advocates?"

Literally snorted. "Correct. Go talk to Travesty about correct. He's got stories that will curl your hair." Nonplussed shuddered. She'd heard about the abuse Travesty had suffered after 9/11. He'd never been quite the same since.

"I just...I don't understand," stammered Nonplussed. Non plus literally means not more. No further. It's Latin!" she cried. "Don't they still teach Latin?" Perhaps unwilling to wait for an answer she already knew, the adjective excused herself, s's rustling as she swept off to the powder room. Literally just sat and drained the last of her drink. Everyword handled transition—or as her agent called it, "upgrading"—differently, she guessed.

Their exchange had caught the attention of several others, some of whom spoke in low voices on the far side of the room. They glanced her way every so often, clearly discussing her plight. Verbum non grata indeed. She sighed and fingered the lemon twist in her glass.

"Supposedly and Supposably, at your service." Literally lifted her eyes to see a pair of tall, dapper, impish looking words looming above her. Old French, maybe Middle English? It was hard to say. It was also hard to see much difference between them.

"Cousins," explained Supposedly, seeing her bemusement.

"Though these days, you'd think we were fraternal twins," added Supposably.

She extended her hand. "So nice to meet you. Are you..."

"Secondaries?" supplied Supposably. "Dear me, no. Just good old-fashioned confuseds."

Literally pursed her limps in sympathy. "That must be very frustrating."

"Ah, it's not so bad," said Supposedly. He snapped shut the clasp on a sleek silver cigarette case, offering her a smoke which she declined. Passing a cigarette to his companion and lighting one for himself, he went on. "You get used to it. Rather fun sometimes, actually. Can't tell you how many first dates we've derailed," he said with a wink.

"Supposedly, you're terrible." Supposably giggled, careful to aim his smoky exhalations away from Literally's face. "Really though, could be worse. Have you seen Cheeky? She's an absolute mess. Running around, shoving a lingerie catalog under everyone's noses. 'Honey,' I told her. 'You're going about this all wrong. You've got to own it.'" He examined his lengthening ash. "You'd think a word like Cheeky would have a better sense of humor."

"I don't follow," confessed Literally. "What's happened to her?"

Supposedly waved a hand impatiently. "Hardly anything worth crying over. Some fashion designers started using Cheeky to refer to, you know, knickers and whatnot that show a bit of, well--"

"Ass cheek," Supposably finished, raising his eyebrows dramatically. "Cheeky, in addition to saucy, audacious, and bold, now means literally exhibiting cheek."

Was it Literally's imagination, or had he deliberately emphasized that antepenultimate word? In any case, she was definitely going to need another cocktail.

Because You Didn’t, I Did

I'm staring at the white space bottom left of my last blue
But there's no three dots, no grey bubble transmission coming through
And the basket with your boxers doesn't have as much to say
As the snapshots that you strung above the pillows where we played

And the tie dye that you twisted stained a lot more than my shirt
Like checkered shoes, pacific eyes, like blackouts soft and blurred
I've been waiting for so long to hear the song I thought I earned
But it seems there's none forthcoming, so this is what I've learned

All the things you love
And all the things you hate
Stay bottled up until it's bottoms up
And then it's much too late

And you can buy more keyboards
And you can remix lies
But what's the point of keeping up
A songwriter's disguise?

You packed up all your baggies, took your Herschels and my heart
Found a forest cold and clean where you can make a brand new start
And someday maybe sunshine and my love will bring you back
Until then here's to finding and then writing a new track

Cuz all the things you love
And all the things you hate
Stay bottled up until it's bottoms up
And you can't think or see straight

And you can stitch new patches
On pants you've long outgrown
But you're much too good a tailor
To tear up what’s been sewn

In a Day

A toddler leans out of his stroller, pointing and shouting,

delighted with something he sees or

demanding directions at his nanny—

I'm not sure which.

His grey-haired guardian,

unrelated but nevertheless tethered to the tiny tyrant,

leans in to listen. To accommodate his mood.

An old woman boards the bus, all in white.

Like a bride coming down the aisle she moves past us

looking only at an empty seat in the back.

We twist our bodies to give her room.

Graceful solitude: carrying all that she needs within her.

And me.

Some days I feel invisible

because I've made myself that way, and it is a relief.

Other days I'd like to point the way

and have someone drive and listen and accommodate.

Twinning 1 & 2

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