Its been three hundred
and eighty days since I
first said those beautiful
words to you, frightened
as ever as I held you in my
arms; the sun was setting,
casting golden shadows
across our bed, and I kept
asking you to tell me a
story, just one more tale
to prolong the afternoon,
for I knew once you took my
heart, I’d never get it back.
And just look at us now
darling – it’s still yours,
just tell me a story.
For months I was carrying a
gram of hope around my heart,
telling myself that I was
patient enough to wait for you
to realize where your home
truly lay, between comfort and
complexity, growing rustic at
the edges with time and wild
fires blazing up in passion –
but those are not realizations
forming on your lips as we
finally take that dive and
converse back like we used to.
I am kept at a distance, with
two smiles and a half shrug,
for your words are telling me
never again, or ever truly was.
Believe me sweets, this isn’t
the truth that I was hoping
would become our end, but I
have listened to your sonnets
growing out beyond the waters;
I shall drop all hope the
next time that it rains.
(For Ann Morse)
Back to the days of
Crayola and pop music;
when life was optimistic.
Before the Beats’ words
sprouted my ideas to the
heavens, rooting them in
foundations of debauchery
and debris – I felt home.
When prose was just another
word, and abstract meant
nothing in rhyme; when
words were lost without
blue ink to take notice,
back before odd numbers
became haunting, and
broken heart pieces ran
frantically through verse –
there was one to inspire;
a rose in the rubble.
A library of foundation
in my childhood recanted,
with books and metaphors
still springing up in
free formed rhyme today –
she was a model for the
curious, the knowledgeable.
With a love for dark
chocolate, set to illuminate
all seasons of fall, it is
her voice that I carry in
the outskirts of my mind,
creating pillars of hope
and discovery in my stages
of free verse and rhyme.
I cannot recall when my
words in ink first flowed
through me as my foundation
of love, yet I know she was
there with words and books
in hand, calling out
“Sandburg” as though my
tears couldn’t be more
proud to have a grandmother
like her, on my side.
On the bare walls
of our old apartment,
memories are playing
like reels on repeat,
showcasing dances of
first every things
overlapping with what
would become our lasts;
cries are no longer
the sound of the room,
instead replaced with
our song, that I can’t
bring myself to listen
to, playing on mute –
pleading with me to
simply ask of you,
if you even struggle
half as much as I do?
Storylines in Verse 