you, who is missing

i lay in the bath
and peel off my nail polish
while the water goes cold
dark flakes float
and sink
and stick to my skin

and i wonder as my fingertips have pruned
shrinking away from the air
if you'd notice the ragged edges of  my cuticles
years of fighting habit to tear them apart
i wonder what the edges of your fingers feel like
or the base of your neck
how you breathe while you sleep

and i can't remember what you smell like
but i remember exactly, your laugh
and what you felt like to be near
when we sat in the sun and sweat in silence
or breathing over jasmine pearls on the brisk mornings
and i'm supposed to find comfort in the moments
graced and burned into my memory
but really, mostly, i just notice how gone you are

it begins always one thing and becomes another

angers//company

if you have to go to the bathroom
i will go with you
and i will wait and give an-ny mo-ther-fucker
with a side-eyed second-sighed glance in your
general direction the stink eyed stare down
of a lifetime.
if you have to go to the bathroom
i will go with you and i will hold your hand
i will stand watch in or outside of
any signed room or stall
if it makes you feel any less alone.
i will pull the fire alarm and empty
libraries and grocery stores and rest stop
info centers
you can ask me
to pass you some toilet paper
even if you haven't run out
but just
need to touch my fingertips for a moment
if you have to go to the bathroom
i will go with you
and i will check my privilege in the mirror
and i
will be silent

saccharin

too young to retire from something,
too far along, too far gone,
to have made a career out of anything,
but missing you

and and and//drafting

i'm somewhat enamored with all these covered bridges
hiding all our dead in the ditches
heavy water cold and dark
and all the years go by and we haven't found our way back
and you're still somewhere sounding in the dark
like a beacon back to my bed
and i cant sleep...
where do we go from here
and i carry myself every morning
feet are heavy
creases in my cheeks

and we're shooting arrows into the dark
sink our bottles stuffed with notes
set our bridges afire

...and thrown up hands
white flags wrung filthy and tattered
words came stale, wet lips, blearied eyes

westward//drafting/moves

to uproot where temporary stability landed and where we fled from green waters and heavy floridian air
old ghosts in party dresses and sad balloons and refusal to let us grow
where we left with empty hands and with each passing hundred miles our skin grew tighter, the air thinned,
and yet our palms grew sweaty and we felt a home coming we'd never known before
to warm golden nights in place of growing glowing dawns where we lay the sun to rest
instead of scaring off our ghosts in the morning

i'd kill someone for a 7-up right now

i used to wake at one am, my brother still up watching Star Trek: TNG at Gramma's. we'd maybe agree on something to watch, sharing a room on these visits, him an angsty teen and me not quite there yet. he knew i'd fall asleep and he wouldn't have to wait long for the tv battle to become irrelevant. he was always pretty good at waiting it out. i'd fall asleep with a can of, or sometimes a cup of, 7-up between our beds, maybe a Nilla wafer stacked on top.  the twin beds were just far enough apart for a glass of water and i could never figure out how my grandma managed to make them military tight all by herself, every single time. i always fell asleep facing the wall, listening. floral wall paper. wood paneling. floral sheets. wool blankets. thin orange top blankets with ridges. mattress with a small person sized sink in it.

a thousand miles to go and nowhere near the start.

when this coin rubs clean
when the flowers fade and the words have rubbed away
from years of salt and sweat and never falling completely from round my neck
i'll pitch this copper coin into the sea.
it came with a hole
saw me to quebec
when it ceases to stain my chest and neck a green circular stamp
and the wreath has broken to pieces
maybe i'll bring it back to montreal, sink it into some canadian waters

drafting//2015

maybe it begins after midnight
maybe it begins after we say a new years prayer
maybe it begins after you go to sleep and wake again

i had it in my hands
i'm broken
and i give too much

and all that we can't see
and all i haven't said
and all that we can't keep during the day
and (maybe) i'm all that i'll ever be in your hands
and maybe it begins after an admission
...too much too much too much
and all the things we haven't said
and i give too much

bus stop roughs

/

bare bones&drafting// watchers

the crows are gathering
over your house 

they lingered over our bed in utah 

in the trees that lined the narrow part of the virgin
they watched us cross texas without stopping
i felt one above my head at night in the bayou,
invisible against the dark

there's a light about spring rain
heavy in the fall, everything just hanging on
my heart
the leaves on the trees
colors burn as they fade and crackle

the door opens and closes

Here I came to the very edge
where nothing at all needs saying.
Everything is absorbed
through weather and the sea.
And the moon swam back,
it’s rays all silvered,
and time and again
the darkness would be broken
by the crash of a wave.
And every day
on the balcony of the sea,
wings open, fire is born,
and everything is blue again like morning.

- Pablo Neruda
On the Blue Shores of Silence

"Start now. Start where you are. Start with fear. Start with pain. Start with doubt. Start with hands shaking. Start with voice trembling but start. Start and don’t stop. Start where you are, with what you have. Just … start.”




Ijeoma Umebinyuo

“I want to be with you,
it is as simple,
and as complicated as that.”

—	Charles Bukowski

photo: julian bialowas

welp

molina is killing me this morning.

baby take a look
look at your man 
do I look like a man who doesn't understand 
you are the one true thing 
in a world full of untrue things 
if you're down on your luck
I will hold you till better times
so baby take that look
look at your man 
do I look like a man who doesn't understand 
you are the one

Of course I'll hurt you.
Of course you'll hurt me.
Of course we will hurt each other.
But this is the very condition of existence.
To become spring, means accepting the risk of winter.
To become presence, means accepting the risk of absence.

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry in The Little Prince

///bits of into the forest

/There will be no rescue.
/The tragedy of choice.
/I never knew how much we consumed. It seems as if we are all appetite, as if a human being is simply a bundle of needs to drain the world. It’s no wonder there are wars, no wonder the earth and air and water are polluted. It’s no wonder the economy collapsed, if Eva and I use so much merely to stay alive.
/Every now and then he glances at me, and when he looks away and keeps on playing, it feels as though his music is a secret he’s telling me about in a language I don’t really understand.
/…cradle the crescent moon in your hand

it’s late October and the sun warms the deck for the first half of our daylight hours. at least for now.
we sat around the fire last night, bathed in the hunter’s moon’s blinding watch. nothing seemed especially out of place, and still, nothing seemed right because you weren't there. i built the fire, sipped whiskey, and talked with friends, boys, and made jokes.
i’ve only been inside to cook today. returning to the warmest spot in the yard to eat, finish my coffee, read my book (the cracks in my fingers have loosened and spread).
the birds meander to the northeast corner of the garden now, scratching at the topsoil, digging ditches to bathe in warm dust before it disappears for the day. I’m settled on the deck above them, my jar of water leaves prisms next to my legs. my shins grow pink, my arms and chest are warm and my eyes burn a little from ceaselessly letting in the light, and holding back water.
this morning, the air was cooler, despite the sun warmed deck. the yard totally silent, only the falling leaves made any sound.