Perhaps life left me submerged
in places I was never meant to be 

Gestalt draped in childhood innocence
left me behind —  
in the car
a small parking lot of shrubs
a walkie talkie
and a detective pad 

I’ll find you mom
I’ll find you dad

I’ve tripped and trampled 
success and defeat 
now sit alone  

Swallowing the smog of city air
and as freedom it went down 
charcoal marbles down my throat
lump after lump
static chimes
building a cairn for me to climb 

But on it I dance
like Joan danced on fire

My skin became paper
fluttering away 
with the echo of each thump 

Each step 
on chipped cobblestone 

It only took a day for 
white tennis shoes
to be laced in red clay 

The pointless flames 
of still blue desires 
quiet with distance 

And comes a resolve when 
we are no longer severed
between now
and a very uncomfortable 
place in time 

The realization 
forces a smile
like a fishhook 
dragged through skin 

Es gibt keine Zufälle
tomorrow it will begin

I saw a rainbow once
not here
here we have tracks
tire skids in the air

The same black rubber
from travelers
who never arrive in person  

I wonder how many
continue 

As electrons in eternal hum 
searching for a path 
through a line 

I open my eyes
the satellite in the garden 
reflects the piercing white moonlight 

The magnolias are blooming
I wonder how many travelers
are watching them with me

Glass used to be sand
something broken 
heated white hot until
it became
perfection so lifeless, it’s frozen  

Yet,
I still want to touch the
panes in front of me
to feel the cold pain 
of something I cannot have 

I wish I could freeze the moment like 
the sand suspended 
eternally in a glimmering water 

So many pieces
a mosaic of endless fractals
Is it a perfection that can be sheared? 

I’m lucky that I’ve fallen
in earth
in grass
in clay
in the small dome of atmosphere
where glass is just pieces

Does a page know when it’s blank?
No more I suppose
than when it’s filled with emptiness 

I can throw my shadow behind me 
as far as it will go
and cast a spell so far forward 
that it will become rippled by time

It’s a beautiful story
and I can’t tell if 
I more like rain 
or being caught up
in the fog 

I see a figure looking
for hope
in the crinkle
of discarded newspaper 

Poor soul,
if only you could amount to ink 

I can’t see my reflection
in the mirror anymore
because I’m not there

Maybe we agree to 
the pain because in it
we find a beauty we cannot
replicate by will

For instance, going 
home
the sonar pulse 
calling in a twisted geography 

It’s easy to get lost in
what is perpetual 
when one hand melds to earth
and the other to the sky 

I’m caught in the cross breeze 
and quite honestly
hope the lack 
of destination will 
allow me to fly

Here, 

it rests
precisely out of reach
and so elusively near 

When all that’s left is 
the last sentence
letters trickling down
from a twilight sky

Illuminated by the 
afterglow of 
twinkling initials 

A hidden treasure
just a heap of memories 
exposed  

Inside they’ll see 
a reservoir so bright 

They’ll say it was fed by
Chernobyl springs 

But forevermore I’ll 
set them free
and if I’m poisonous,
let me forever be