A Few Short Words

I made a cage inside my head,

I plumped the floor to make a bed

but after years of lying there

I realized it was too bare.

So in my cage I placed objects,

the simple things a life collects.

Then one day I woke to find

the cage I’d built was not my mind.

Even with my props unfurled

I’d somehow made a hollow world.

All arranged, so neatly stacked,

they couldn’t hide that something lacked.

I’m in love with the horizon

though I know it’s just a ruse,

when every time I wander there

the fucker up and moves.

One time I tried a sneak attack

by walking in reverse,

but when I turned around to look

the distance was perverse.

I wasn’t any closer,

I just couldn’t understand,

when wherever I am standing

I can grasp it in my hand.

I try so often now

that it seems like self abuse

but I can’t seem to figure out

why my passion’s so obtuse.

Sometimes I think I see you

in the street,

before I realize it’s a lie.

There’s nobody like you,

simply wishful thinking

and the spectres of my mind

that populate the streets

and bring a smile to my lips.

I fall asleep listening to my thoughts

as they pad through my head

with hard soled intent.

When I sleep, I dream of you,

and I wonder,

what are you doing there,

so out of place?

When I wake, I wake into

a maddening silence,

the emptiness of my bed,

a longing in my arms,

and I wonder,

where have you gone?

Comfort finds its purchase

in a three a.m. embrace.

Two bodies intermingled,

two hands that interlace,

outside and all around them

the coldness has it’s way

but holding one another

keeps the chill at bay.

I threw a stone across a pond

and noticed it not sink,

which made me skeptical.

So I made another choice

and threw, this time

drowning my intentions.

A wake, rippling waves

at a minutia of knots

across the skein of time.

An open book,

written with words I’ve never known,

I teach myself to read

in stops

and starts

and stutters.

But reading is it’s own reward

and learning loves no other,

so I turn another page

and slowly lose my stutter.

In learning words

I learn to love

their careful application,

their oh so perfect placement

and delicate dictation.

After I’ve turned every page

I’ll read again, most every day

to know that all the words within

grow finer as they age.

When I think of you, amongst the throng,

you’re a shining light, a heartfelt song.

You’re the clay that binds my bricks together.

You’re the education that makes me clever.

You’re every smile I have inside.

You’re a slender bridge across a great divide.

You’re every other different thing.

You’re every song I’ll ever sing.

You’re everything that’s good and free.

You’re everything, just that, to me.

The sun’s glare tears through the orchard’s canopy,

dapples grass and leaves.

A first budding presumption of nature

hangs fragile from a lowly bough.

Quiet expectation,

nervous anticipation,

unknowable excitement,

percolate and permeate its juvenile core.

As sun and moon play catch and kiss,

celestial chase of aeons,

presumption steadies,

and nature’s bud grows, more sure

of its place in the world.

The chase continues

but the pace slows.

Our bud, ripe and red,

no longer juvenile,

but strong and lush,

rocks and readies

for the fall of age,

and leaps.

The distant world rushes forward,

eager to greet, anxious to meet

nature’s daring presumption,

who unprepared, is battered and bruised

by the world’s callus enthusiasm,

thuds and rolls,

stops and lolls.

A last vestige of nature’s presumption

sits fragile on the leafy ground.

Peaceful degradation,

slow degeneration,

last disintegration,

permeate and percolate its senile core.

The world rots away

as sun and moon

catch and kiss and play.

The night moves so fast

but they stay the same.

Always the same.

That’s the thing

about people,

they only change

the skin they’re in,

not the frame.

I lost my favourite jacket,

the one you gave me

in the cold.

‘It looks better on you.’

You said it smiling,

that was warmth enough.

All I have left of you

was stitched in its seams

and worn across my shoulders.

Now all I have left of you

can’t keep me warm.

‘Drama queen,’ she says

and smirks in that way

that means more

than the words she uses.

Sometimes I catch her

looking at me,

as she does,

with just a hint

of mischievous mystery,

and I wonder,

as I often find myself doing,

what goes on behind

those gorgeous green eyes.

When I was younger man

I made castles built of sand

and cried when they got wet.

I watched and wept

as my dreams turned to mud,

my crenelations crumpled

and my ramparts ran to ruin.

I wallowed, worn and wary,

wondering what if?

But now I stand on surer soil

and I’ve built a better building

from more meaningful materials

with dreams that don’t destruct

at the sucking of the sand.

How is it that you keep me

so completely in your thrall?

With so few many sentences,

with so few words at all.

When even from such distances

the silence seems to speak.

I hear your voice inside my head

and feel my knees grow weak.

You’ve become my favourite moments

even when you aren’t around.

I don’t think you understand,

that your impact’s been profound.

I know I’ve never felt this way,

or felt anything at all,

when even from such distance

I’m completely in your thrall.

There’s a mystery in her eyes

I want to solve, to see dissolve.

I want her eyes to look at me

the way I see her smile

snap like lightning

across her face

and illuminate all around her.