it is difficult to think in poetry and prose at the same time.

the space echoes in me.

the midwest.

i stare out the window counting field after field of mustard weed.
we drove and saw the earth turn over and over on itself.
after fourteen hours we stopped; still looking for a home, we stopped to rest.

what is it about the midwest that leaves me feeling so empty?
the space is too -- looking out, i feel lost.
for the first time in a year, i long.

this is nothing like a crowded city.

what do i use to orient myself?
words, people, time, place.
i am still looking for a home.

graduation

after it was all over, she went back to the dishes. still in her antique dress, she scrubbed them to prepare for next time. that was always her impulse - draw attention to the forgotten and shrug off the ceremonious. she didn't know if it was admirable. she didn't know what it all meant. there was so much fuss for the end. rather, she wanted to know something really very simple.

had she done well? is she loved?

can she love?

and it seemed to her, as she scrubbed the last bit of counter top, that a 'Yes' would deserve accolades upon accolades.

I woke up this morning with the words of a lonely man running through my head.

and in this way,

new york makes the world smaller.

there are so many people gathered

in such small places.

the world comes crashing in-

i go in search of a bigger world.

seasonless

seasons in new york change in a day.

there is no snow gathered in mounds

following my front walkway ,

leading me from the street to my home,

ushering me from the door to the fire.

there is no snow to indicate the passing of time

from christmas to easter,

from january to march,

from winter to spring.

there is no snow to remind us that we live in

days and seasons;

we live in time.

with the absence of the elements stretching from

one day to the next,

indicating continuity,

our days are isolated.

rhythm becomes the beat of the trains

and the horns of the cars,

but we do not understand that life passes

in seasons and in time.

that one day i will grow old like my mother is growing old

like my grandmother grew old.

that one day i will bury my lover in the field where we first lay

in springtime when our love was new.

I will lay him down again in spring, to mark the fullness of life

in the fullness of a year,

in the fullness of a season.

and one day, i will be buried underneath the field where i first conceived

a thought that i could love.

i do not know it yet.

there is no field here for me to go fresh and sweet to be undone.

there is no mark of death in this place.

only the steady pulse of the same age

for ages.

there is no labor to tell me that i must work for the food i eat.

only the steady pulse of tired hands and hearts.

and spring came in a day.

and will leave in a day.

and there is no more thought of winter,

there is no more snow to remind us what was,

and what will be.

Left untended, a broken heart leads to a dull heart. Scar tissue loses feeling. It is harder to worship without healing. It is harder to love without blood.

I want to worship & I want to love.

Is is possible to ask for love in every movement and whim of my hand, and still run from it? even at the mention of its name, my eyes dart toward the door.

i stand with my foot in the door, keeping in ajar, saying over and over again, L-RD i will not forget you. Do not forget me either.

wonder.

truth.

love.

security.

sitting at home, i crave a home like never before.
tranistion leaves me walking exposed and unsettled and hidden until i find some covering.

cover my head and give me a home.

there she waits.

There are many doors. Each door is different. The first is painted red, the colour of a barn. The next is yellow, the colour of a mustard. The third door is unfinished oak. There is a spot worn away by many years of banging. The handle is loose from so much prying. Beyond that door, the thickest and least inviting, there is a warm breeze. It is almost as if the guest enters the beach. The following door is a Dutch door; the top half is always open. Beyond that, there a screen, and then just a stone gate that leads to a garden. In the garden there is a swing and an oak tree standing tall. Rose vines trace the gate. In the garden there sits a woman on a rocking chair. Her hair is gold and her eyes hold secret sorrows. She appears worn out and ready, both at the same time.

Each door requires a different skeleton key. This makes it difficult. She likes to watch them try to search inside her words. Her words always give a clue to the next entrance. She never inteded to have so many riddles, it only just happened this way. if happened after gate was first built. Riddles make games among friends. They increase in difficulty as the door increase in width. The red door is almost immovable. Sometimes, from loneliness, she calls out the answer to the first riddle. Too many thick doors cancel the sound.

There she waits.

she

she especially liked closing her eyes when she rode her bicycle, and opening them while she curled into fetal position under water tumbling in circles. she pictured her pores opening into an infinite number of holes, ready to absorb the world. she liked being the only one in a field of flowers. she liked imagining, and she liked listening to the same song on repeat, hoping to strike the initial chord of sorrow that told her as a human being she was meant to find something.

but, she found it difficult to look them in the eyes. there were thousands at this point. she thought it lonely to look at so many people and still be just one person. she found it difficult to always be searching.

she felt the loneliness in her bones, and so, naturally, she wanted to follow it. maybe its source would be its end. the loneliness was so familiar it was almost a comfort. it made her want the desert. it made her want the ocean.

i want to learn to write truth.

"do not tell me words are useless when written language has been the most poignant and timelessly powerful form of communication know to man." (unknown)

"You see I am trying in all my stories to get the feeling of the actual life across - not to just depict life—or criticize it—but to actually make it alive. So that when you have read something by me you actually experience the thing. You can't do this without putting in the bad and the ugly as well as what is beautiful. Because if it is all beautiful you can't believe in it." (hemingway)

"I really believe the addict-the sex or the drug addict-is closer to the deepest truth than the mere moralist. I think the addict is looking for the very best thing in some of the very worst places. He's looking for heaven; he's looking for a transcendence of self-consciousness and moral responsibility; he's looking for the state of mind that the saints in heaven have and the mystics have for brief moments on earth." (kreeft)

“All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.” (hemingway)