Poetry

Before I was a blogger, I was a poet. You can buy my self-published book here, but you can also read some of my work below.

Get Out of Here

“I couldn’t wait

to get out of this town”

my mother said

in the town she was born in,

next to the mother

she grew up next to

and the daughter

who grew inside her,

memories speeding past

behind her eyes like

mile markers.

But in two generations

no dust clouded

the trunk of their vehicles.

No boxes were packed;

my mother and her mother

stayed put.

Now

when I hold paper bills in my hand

they seem as thin as butterfly wings

and more apt to fly away

with every crumpled moment

I invest here.

My body knows my plan

as if a constellation’s path

has been etched

into my skin but the more

I sip the water

brimming over with fluoride

the more I wash down

my troubles with kool-aid

the more I begin to douse unsavory dinner conversations

and sweep dirty laundry

under the proverbial persian rug,

I can feel my panoramic vision

reduced to my peripherals.

And just like that rug,

it fits the area that my life

covers.

Its compact and limited.

In this town, the sky makes me feel

claustrophobic as it only

inhales day and exhales night.

Even my vision is circumcised

through lenses with rims that like

a carriage horse

I am not spooked by the progress that races by me.

This town is too small, for mosquitoes

happily breed in tears, and vines creep out to hold me close.

I need to sharpen

believe in something

get out of here.

And straighten out my

mother and her mother

left in my hair

and hope I don’t disappoint

myself in the wrong direction.

 

Love Poem

If a man tries to explain what love is

a fool he is indeed

for he will also try to explain it in chemicals

and I have seen sunsets that have produced

nothing short of a religious moment

from only light being fractured by one million drops

of visible clouds.

Haikus: Four Seasons/Four Operations

A summer wedding,

swans on the lake; I was meant

to be your plus one.

Corpses of leaves, I

crunch, pull my coat closer, you

subtracted my love.

Winter winds outside

log multiplies the flames and

my longing for you.

Spring in my step and

my heart: dividing it so

still left me with half.

Instant Gratification

A girl with fire gold hair, tangled and snarled so succinctly,

sat complacently;

eyes intent on the stage.

I blushed as her underwear raised

out of her jeans like a blue moon.

I wished for her to turn around,

to see if the rarity of her hair

would match her face.

I willed feverishly to catch a glimpse,

to know her countenance

like my own.

When she rose once more, quite erect

our eyes met

hers utterly unflinching, open and true

so blatant and candid

she stared with

complete abandon.

I was not disappointed.

The Maiden Lasting

I stare out through the glass,

at a white landscape

blanketed with security

saturated with purity.

An endless virginity

marred only by the ram-rod trees

and the deer’s soft tread over

the frozen ground.

A vastness incomparable…I think

when my eyes

alight upon a single tree

who, although the solstice has passed,

retains her leaves…

though they are decrepit and lifeless.

I wonder if she has cursed her

decision; renounced it until it

reverberated to her swollen limbs.

Pregnant with so much failure,

it seems her time has waned

now that the snow is melting…

but, what has she learned?